Obit

The Reverend Palmer Ervin Swenson, a longtime leader in Omaha’s religious community, died Friday at the age of  87.  Rev. Swenson was born in 1919, the seventh of ten children to Jens and Marie (Pedersen) Swenson, a first generation Minnesota farming family.  In 1938 he traveled to Chicago for studies at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary, and met Helen Bates, a home missionary he courted for four years and then married in June 1942.  Pastor Swenson was ordained in 1944, and served churches in Winnebago and Albert Lea Minnesota, and Huron South Dakota before being called to Omaha’s Sunset Hills Baptist Church in January 1962, where he served until 1972 when he moved to pastor in Worland Wyoming.  Rev. Swenson returned to Omaha in 1983, serving as interim pastor over the years for 10 Nebraska churches until his failing health kept him close to home.  Recently, his attentions have turned to fund raising projects for Camp Moses Merrill in Nebraska and the University of Sioux Falls in South Dakota.  Helen, his wife of 57 years, preceded him in death in 1999.  He is survived by two sons: Lyle of Phoenix and Kent of Omaha, daughter Jewel Cooper of Cedar Rapids Iowa, three grandchildren, two great-grandchildren, and his best and closest friend, Floretta Ward of Omaha.