Lindahl & Runars

[Karen Norwillo]

I have a copy of a work permit issued to the first husband of my maternal grandmother. It is signed by a Mr. Lindahl of Lindahl & Runars. It appears to attest to his charachter and work abilities. Was this the practice to issue these papers when someone moved-on? Does anyone know what type of business Lindahl and Runars was?

[Margareta Högman]

Hi Karen,
 
Lindahl & Runer Mekaniska Verkstad was an engineering workshop in Gävle (X) at the end of the 19th century.
 
I found this link about the part owner David Runer (II): http://web.telia.com:80/~u38401132/Maria/pf4b0ce49.html
 
Regards,
Margareta

[Ingela Martenius]

Karen,
 
I doubt it's a work permit.
Only a foreigner would need a work permit, and not even that would have been necessary at the end of the 19th century (from around the 1860's until WW I very, very few countries demanded things like passports and work permits). And a work permit would of course be issued by the authorities, not a private company.
 
It sounds more like a testimonial. It is still the practice here that a testimonial is written when you quit a job. This applies particularly to simpler jobs - you'd expect someone who's worked at a supermarket check-out to present a testimonial when applying for a similar job somewhere else, but not a surgeon, a CEO or an IT professional (they'd be headhunted or, if actually applying for a new job, they'd give references - names of people recommending them).
The only permission possibly given in such a testimonial would be that your previous employer might state that you have indeed quit your job, have no further obligations towards the company and are free to look for work somewhere else (a sort of release clause).
 
Ingela

[Karen Norwillo]

This may have been written for him as a recommendation before he travelled to America. He came to the US, married, and was sent back to Sweden with his wife and small child to recruit men and their families to emigrate to work in the iron ore mines in MI. He died in a mining accident shortly after returning to MI. His widow married my grandfather. They are my mother's parents. The reason I called it a permit was the bold heading at the top of the document says Arbetsbetyg, which my Phyllis J Pladsen dictionary translates as work permit.

[Anna-Carin Betzén]

I'm not familiar with the Phyllis J Pladsen dictionary, but clearly its author has made a mistake in this case.
 
Arbete = work, betyg = a statement of a person's level of accomplishment (like how well a student has done in a school subject).  
 
My dictionary suggests these translations:
betyg: certificate, testimonial
arbetsbetyg: character
 
Testimonials may have existed in the U.S. too. One of my ancestors worked in the U.S. for a while in the 1920s and 1930s, and I have copies of a testimonial he received then. It's typed on company letterhead, and begins with the phrase To whom it may concern (there is no heading saying specifically that it's a testimonial). In short, it goes on to say that Mr. ... has been employed by the company as a ... and has proven himself to be a hard worker... I can, therefore, recommend him conscientiously to anyone that may need his services. It's signed by the company's president. As the president had emigrated from Sweden some 30 years earlier, I don't know if this testimonial reflects American practice or if he wrote it because that's the way it was done back home.