Authentic Scandinavian Midsummer Fest Offered At Good Templar Park's 114th Swedish Day

GENEVA, IL — Come celebrate the real Swedish Day in Geneva, Sunday, June 15, at Good Templar Park, 528 East Side Drive. This gem of a midsummer fest runs from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and features authentic Swedish cuisine, maypole dancing, cottage tours, music, games, Icelandic ponies, Nordic crafts and Vikings.

Admission to Good Templar Svenskarnas Dag is $7 for ages 13 and up, free for children 12 and under, active military (with ID) and those who show in traditional Scandinavian costume.

Illinois’s oldest and longest running ethnic festival. Good Templar Park’s Svenskarnas Dag (Swedish Day) offers a traditional Scandinavian midsummer celebration. Besides serving favorite Swedish foods – Ligonberry pancakes, Swedish meatballs, fried herring, cardamon coffee cake, almond tarts, and other American fare – children’s games, wonderful kids craft projects, Blue the Icelandic horse, a Viking encampment, cottage walking tours and group dancing around the maypole fill out the day’s events. The park offers plenty of room for your family to sprawl out and have a picnic for your dad on Father’s Day, or simply to enjoy a day in nature.

Friends of the Viking Ship will also be offering tours of the replica-Viking ship that sailed into the 1893 Columbia Exposition from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Viking ship tours happen every 15–20 minutes. Adults 18 and over, $7; children age 23-27, $5; children 12 and under free. Last docent-led tour is at 3:30 p.m. This is the actual, 130-year-old, full sized, 78 foot long Viking ship which was built in Norway in 1893. It sailed nonstop across the entire, stormy North Atlantic Ocean to become a star attraction visited by millions at the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago.

Good Templar Park's Swedish Day is the oldest and longest running ethnic festival in Illinois, traditionally held on the third Sunday in June, which also happens to be Father's Day. The first Swedish Day picnic and celebration of the summer solstice was held in 1911 in Evanston. The annual picnic attracted thousands from Chicago's Swedish immigrant community. Looking for a place where they could hold an alcohol-free Midsummer festival, the mostly Swedish members of IOGT, a temperance-focused fraternal organization formed in the 19th century to combat the high rate of alcoholism in industrialized Europe, purchased 60 acres along the Fox River in 1925.

Swedish Day is still going strong in Good Templar Park after 114 years. In 2020, the continuity was kept going when Swedish Day went drive-thru, and people were able to pick up Swedish meatball dinners and other Scandinavian cuisine.

The historic park is populated by charming summer cottages (stugas) built in the 1930s and is home to the replica Viking Ship that sailed the Atlantic Ocean to the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago. This annual celebration family festival is open to the public and attended by people of all nationalities.

Schedule of Activities, June 25

9 a.m. – Gate, restaurants & Kaffe Stuga open
10 a.m. – Worship Service, music by the Holmstad Choir, children’s activities, Blue the Icelandic horse and Viking Ship open.
10:30 a.m. – Cottage Walks begin
11 a.m. – Lutefisk Toss - A Scandinavian Tradition
Noon – Maypole Raising and Swedish folk dancing
1 p.m. – Opening ceremony, Procession of Flags, posting of colors by the BSA, Sweden and National Anthems: Tina Lawrenz
Welcome: Steve Kass, President, Swedish Day 2025
Remarks: Honored Guests
Introduction of Performers by Master of Ceremonies: Dr. Paul R. Muhr
1:15 p.m. – Chicago Spelmanslag
2 p.m. - Nordic Folk Dancers of Chicago
2:45 p.m. – Die Musikmeisters Band
3:30 p.m. – Northland Vikings Reenactors