Erik August Larsson
Cross-country skier
Died when: 69 years 332 days (838 months)Star Sign: Aries
Erik August Larsson (12 April 1912 – 10 March 1982) was a Swedish cross-country skier who competed in the 1930s.He won two medals at the 1936 Winter Olympics in Garmisch-Partenkirchen with a gold in the 18 km and a bronze in the 4 × 10 km relay.
The same year he was awarded the Svenska Dagbladet Gold Medal.Larsson also won a bronze in the 4 × 10 km relay at the 1935 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships.
Larsson was born as the second youngest of six siblings in a religious Finnish-speaking family.In 1935, he started working as a cleaner at the Kiruna iron ore mine in the summer and as a lumberjack in the winter.
In 1939, after attending a prayer meeting in Kurravaara he gave up his sport career and became a Laestadian Christian.He was later a preacher in the Firstborn Laestadian congregation in Kiruna.
His son Lars became a preacher in Luleå, while his granddaughter Åsa Larsson was a tax lawyer and a writer of crime novels.