Ana NielsenPetersen

1925 Iowa State Census, Pottawattamie County, Council Bluffs Ward 5, page 403, 919 6th Avenue
Wilson, Soren Head M W 59 Owns Free $6000 value 43 yrs in US, 43 yrs in Iowa naturalized 8th grade edu b Denmark; Father Wilson Peter b Denmark [no age, deceased], mother Myrtue Mette K b Denmark [no age, deceased] married Denmark
Wilson, Christiana Wife F W 55 35 yrs in US, 35 yrs in Iowa naturalized 8th grade b Denmark; Father Christanson [sic] Soren b Denmark [no age, deceased], mother Petersen Anna b Denmark [no age, deceased], married Denmark

Note that this census reports that Kristina (Christiana)'s parents are deceased, while a Christensen family genealogy reports (with no documentation provided) that they died later, her father Soren in 1926 and her mother Ana in 1945. The enumerator put no age, which was the way it was noted that a person was deceased. Perhaps this was an enumerator error, because the age was not reported?

Also the census reports that Kristina's mother's surname is Petersen while the family genealogy reports it as Nielson. The "surname" patten in Scandinavia was to take the father's name and add son/sen (or in some tribes/nations is could also be daughter). The census report should mean, then, that her father's name was Peter, while the genealogy would indicate that her father's name was Niel. However, a married woman sometimes would go by her husband's name, and it could mean that Ana had been previously married to a man named Peter or Petersen.