Stockholm, Sweden in the 1940s

Work

Trams and city labour

Public transport was itself mass work and mass habit: on one March Saturday in 1940, more than 238,000 Stockholmers travelled by tram³. By 1941 the street system also included a trolleybus line from Stadshagsplan to Karlaplan⁴.

Home & table

Small flats, big households

Public housing had reached Roslagstull, Traneberg, and Hammarbyhöjden, where most Stockholmshem flats were two rooms and a kitchen, about 46 square metres⁷. A family needed at least eight people⁷ to qualify for four rooms.

Money

Ration cards mattered

Everyday money was not enough by itself: households also needed ration cards and coupons¹. Fuel saving reached the kitchen, where a Kok-Lotta cooking box¹ was promoted for long cooking with less gas or heat.

What people feared

Neutral, not untouched

Stockholm was in a neutral country, but not outside the war; neutrality brought mobilisation, controls, and contested concessions¹⁰. On 22 February 1944, four bombs fell in Eriksdalslunden near Skanstull⁸.

Law & power

City, state, and planning

The city engineer's office made Stockholm legible in six detailed 1:4000 map sheets². National officials also tracked the capital's growth, warning in 1943 that new housing had shifted families toward outer districts⁶ faster than higher schools had followed.

In the air

The welfare future

The language of Folkhemmet promised better homes, health, holiday leave, and leisure, while reformers argued against overcrowding and inadequate domestic standards⁵. In 1944 the labour movement put forward a postwar programme of social reform and greater public control¹⁴.

Who lived here

Capital and refuge

Stockholm was a large city of about 670,000 people by the end of 1945¹¹. Its Jewish community was nationally central: before the war, Sweden had about 7,000 Jews, most of them living in Stockholm¹³.

Roads & news

Papers, radio, rumours

A Stockholmer could follow the war through Dagens Nyheter and Svenska Dagbladet¹², state radio, public notices, and talk from stations, ministries, and legations. After 1942, even evening visibility was regulated by electricity rationing¹.

Year by year

1. 1939Germany invaded Poland and the Second World War began, making Swedish neutrality a daily political fact. the world¹⁰
2. 1940Ration cards and coupons entered Stockholm households as wartime controls reached ordinary shopping. here¹
3. 1940Denmark and Norway were occupied by Germany, putting the war at Sweden's western and southern doorstep. nearby¹⁰
4. 1941The first Stockholm trolleybus line opened from Stadshagsplan to Karlaplan. here⁴
5. 1942Electricity rationing began on 1 October, changing the way Stockholm streets looked in the evening. here¹
6. 1944Bombs fell in Eriksdalslunden near Skanstull on 22 February. here⁸
7. 1944The Swedish labour movement drafted a postwar programme of social reform and greater public control. the country¹⁴
8. 1945Germany surrendered in Europe, and Stockholmers heard that the war around them was ending. the world

Pictures from the time

What the sources say

• Stockholm's central districts were mapped in 1938–1940 on six sheets by Stockholms stadsingenjörskontor, at a scale of 1:4000. from the sources²
• The 1938–1940 city map recorded building materials, property designations, land use, lock thresholds, elevation marks, administrative boundaries, and individual building shapes. from the sources²
• During the war years in Stockholm, rationing applied to everyday consumption, and Stockholmskällan illustrates ration cards and coupons from 1940. inferred¹
• Electricity rationing began on 1 October 1942, and Stockholmskällan says that in the evenings only car headlights and street lighting lit Stockholm's streets. inferred¹
• On one Saturday in March 1940, more than 238,000 Stockholmers travelled by tram, over one third of the city's population according to SL. from the sources³
• Stockholm's first trolleybus line, route 41 from Stadshagsplan to Karlaplan, opened on 20 January 1941. from the sources⁴
• Stockholm's city-council decision to build a large-scale metro came in 1941, and formal construction began in 1944. from the sources⁹
• Stockholmshem's first public housing blocks before 1940 included barnrikehus at Roslagstull, Traneberg, and Hammarbyhöjden, with most flats having two rooms and a kitchen and measuring about 46 square metres. inferred⁷
• In those Stockholmshem blocks, a household had to contain at least eight and at most thirteen people to qualify for a four-room flat. inferred⁷
• A mid-1940s modern Swedish flat could have a living room, kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, balcony, built-in storage, hot water, and a rubbish chute, according to Nordiska museet's 1940s-flat reconstruction. from the sources⁵
• A 1943 government proposition said Stockholm's higher schools were badly distributed because new housing had shifted the population toward outer districts, causing severe school-place shortages especially in Bromma and also disadvantaging the southern suburbs around Enskede. from the sources⁶
• The same 1943 proposition reported that Bromma's existing secondary school had 41 classes and 1,275 pupils. from the sources⁶
• Sweden was officially neutral in the Second World War, but Stockholmers lived with wartime mobilisation, censorship pressures, rationing, and highly contested concessions to Germany and later the Allies. from the sources¹⁰
• Shortly before 9 p.m. on 22 February 1944, aircraft flew over Stockholm and dropped four bombs in Eriksdalslunden near Skanstull. inferred⁸
• Stockholmskällan describes gas-saving cooking equipment such as the Kok-Lotta cooking box, because wartime households were expected to save fuel as well as food. inferred¹
• Stockholm's population at the end of 1945 was approximately 670,000 people, according to the ArkivDigital description of the Stockholm population register. from the sources¹¹
• Dagens Nyheter and Svenska Dagbladet were major Stockholm newspapers in the 1940s, and Svenska Dagbladet published annual yearbooks covering events of the period. from the sources¹²
• Before the Second World War there were about 7,000 Jews in Sweden, most of them living in Stockholm, according to a Yad Vashem country summary. from the sources¹³
• In 1944 the Swedish labour movement drafted a postwar programme calling for social reforms and greater political control over business, including nationalisations. from the sources¹⁴
• No single online source opened here gives a street-by-street list of ordinary food prices in Stockholm during the 1940s. not known
• No local source opened here describes the interior of a poor 1940s Stockholm tenement room in enough detail to reconstruct it confidently. not known

Sources

1. Ransonering under andra världskriget. Stockholmskällan, 2025
2. 1940 års karta över Stockholm. Stockholmskällan, 2025
3. Tunneln under Götgatan – från häst till storstad. SL
4. Stockholm trolleybus. Svenska Spårvägssällskapet
5. 1940s Flat. Nordiska museet
6. Prop. 1943:150 angående anslag för budgetåret 1943/44 till avlöningar vid de allmänna läroverken m.m.. Kungl. Maj:t / lagen.nu, 1943
7. Stockholmshem 1930–1940. Stockholmshem
8. Bombningen av Eriksdal 1944. Stockholmskällan, 2025
9. Stockholm Metro. Wikipedia
10. Sweden during World War II. Wikipedia
11. Searching by Name in Swedish Records Using ArkivDigital. ArkivDigital / FamilySearch, 2020
12. Svenska Dagbladets Årsbok: Adertonde årgången, händelserna 1940. Projekt Runeberg, 1941
13. Sweden. Yad Vashem
14. När freden kom till Sverige. Stockholms universitet, 2025