Göran Elgemyr

Göran Elgemyr
Göran Elgemyr, in Stockholm, 2025
Born	Carl Göran Elgemyr (1939-02-07) 7 February 1939 Falun, Sweden
Nationality	Swedish
Education	Bachelor of Arts
Alma mater	Stockholm University
Occupation(s)	Journalist, producer, historian
Employer	Sveriges Radio
Awards	Guldspaden

Carl Göran Elgemyr (born 1939) is a Swedish radio producer, radio historian and author. He received his Bachelor of Arts in 1970, and an honorary doctorate from Stockholm University in 2015. In 1971 he was employed as a researcher at the press archive at Sveriges Radio (SR). From 1975 to 2000 he was a radio producer and reporter at Swedish Radio, where he has made programs on contemporary Swedish and Nordic history, especially World War II.

Together with former ambassador Sven Fredrik Hedin, Elgemyr was honored with the Guldspaden, a Swedish journalistic award for investigative journalism, in 1998. The two received the prestigious award for their programs about Swedish collaboration with Germany during World War II in the resale of German gold from central banks in occupied countries, so-called Nazi gold. Neutral Switzerland made similarly questionable purchases.

In 2015, Elgemyr published the book Kai Holsts mystiska död (The Mysterious Death of Kai Holst) by Jure Publishing. It dealt with the Norwegian resistance fighter Kai Holst, who was found dead in Stockholm in June 1945. The book was based on Elgemyr's two radio programs from 1992, but was greatly expanded with archival material and various investigations into the background to the death.

Göran Elgemyr grew up in Falun, Hedemora, Sveg, Gävle and now live in Stockholm. In Gävle he took his secondary school diploma in 1955. In the years 1956–1966 he was an assistant in a bookstore, primarily in Fritzes Kungl. Hovbokhandel in Stockholm. After high school studies at Heliskola (a private evening school) in Stockholm, he studied at Stockholm University in the subjects of political science, history of literature and modern history. His exam papers on the author Ivan Oljelund, as well as on the so-called treason trial in 1916, were published in a shortened version in the series Litteratur och samhälle (department of literary sociology, Uppsala University). They were also published in a shortened version in the journal Arkiv för studier i arbetarrörelsens historia. He received his Bachelor of Arts in 1970, and an honorary doctorate from Stockholm University in 2015.^[1]

In 1971 he was employed as a researcher at the press archive at Sveriges Radios channel P1. From 1975 to 2000 he was a producer and reporter for radio programs on Sveriges Radio's P1. Göran Elgemyr has made radio programs for a number of editorial departments at SR: Radioteatern's documentary editorial department, the General editorial department, God morgon Världen!, Klarspråk, Dagens Eko and Samhällsredaktionen. From 1993 to 2000 he was a reporter on Studio Ett and P1 Morgon.^[2]

In Elgemyr's program production, contemporary history has been central: the Nordic countries during World War II, Swedish neutrality and security policy, the Swedish Security Service (Säpo), spy cases, the Swedish intelligence service and radio history. In most cases, he has brought to light previously unknown material, often of a controversial nature. For example, Operation Stella Polaris, where in 1944 several hundred Finnish experts in signals intelligence were transferred to Sweden, when Finland was on the verge of surrender and a Finnish government in exile was being prepared in Sweden. Together with his fellow producers Jörgen Cederberg and Jan Bergquist, Göran Elgemyr succeeded in 1977 in unearthing information about large parts of the operation, which had been kept secret until then. Among other things, they found a private law agreement on the deposit of the intelligence material, which was stored in two Swedish castles and then microfilmed. In 1983, Cederberg and Elgemyr published the thesis "Operation Stella Polaris – Nordic Intelligence Cooperation in the Closing Stages of the Second World War" in Clios goes spying. Eight essays on the history of intelligence.^[3]

The highlight of Göran Elgemyr's career as an investigative journalist was his reporting with former ambassador Sven Fredrik Hedin in the late 1990s. In a unique collaboration between the newspaper Dagens Nyheter and Studio Ett, Sweden's purchase of gold from Germany during World War II, known as Nazi gold, or looted gold, was exposed by the two. The articles also dealt with the flight of German business capital to Sweden, the Nazi looting of art treasures, the German smuggling of stolen diamonds to Sweden, and more. Mass media around the world were interested in the case.^[4]

The articles in Dagens Nyheter are based on archival studies in Bern and Zurich in Switzerland, and Washington D.C. in the US.^[5][6] In 1997, the Swedish government launched a state inquiry into the matter. Following the attention that Elgemyr's and Hedin's articles aroused, Dagens Nyheter's editor-in-chief Arne Ruth chose to publish his own contribution to the newspaper. There were a collection of critical articles about Sweden during World War II, including some by Elgemyr and Hedin: "Who made money in World War II?" "Naziguld. The Swedish Riksbank and Swedish companies acted as receivers in the largest robbery in history."^[4]

In 1998, Elgemyr and Hedin received the Guldspaden award for their articles and programs on the topic of Swedish-German economic cooperation during World War II. The Guldspaden is a prestigious Swedish award for investigative journalism.^[7]

Göran Elgemyr has also long been interested in the fate of Norwegian resistance fighter Kai Holst, who was found dead in Stockholm in June 1945. Elgemyr made two radio programs about him for SR in 1992 that attracted great attention in both Sweden and Norway. In 2015, he published a book about the case, Kai Holsts mystiska död. In June 2025, Elgemyr was interviewed in a major article about the case in the magazine Aftenposten Historie, about the death that has interested and engaged him for over 35 years. The article stated that Elgemyr, together with Professor Tore Pryser, Holst's niece Kari Heyerdahl-Larsen Høgset and Ulf Larsen, are working to have a public investigation of the case carried out.^[8]

From 1980 to 1984, Elgemyr was a research assistant at the Department of History, Stockholm University.^[9] He was a board member of the Press History Society (formerly the Friends of the Press Archive) from 1983 to 2007, and was on the editorial board of the yearbook from 1983 to 1993. He has also written a number of articles for the yearbook.^[10]

Elgemyr has been researching the history of Sveriges Radio since 1974. At the time, this was largely a virgin field of research. His research has been disseminated in articles, books and in a number of program series. Above all, he has focused on freedom of expression on the radio, especially the program sector "politics and society". He has also examined Sveriges Radio's relationship with the authorities, the Swedish Telegraph Board, the press and Tidningarnas Telegrambyrå. Likewise, program policy during the war years and relations with the Nordic neighboring countries Finland, Denmark and Norway.^[2]

He was a board member of the interdisciplinary research foundation Etermedierna in Sweden and a member of its working committee and editorial committees in the years 1993–2014.^[11]

He was a board member of the Democracy Institute in Sundsvall from 2001 and chairman from 2005 to 2008, as well as on the board of the affiliated research company Demicom. In the years 2016–2021 he was a board member of the Stockholm Journalists' Seniors, and chairman from 2019 to 2021.^[12] Elgemyr has also been a contributor to Nationalencyklopedin (the National Encyclopedia) and Svenskt biografiskt lexikon (the Swedish Biographical Lexicon) as an author of biographies of people active in broadcast media.^[9]

• «Radiohistorisk forskning», in Antennen nr 1 (personaltidning för Sveriges Radio), 1975
• «De nordiska grannländerna i svensk radio 1939—1945», in Pressens årbog (Danmark), 1978
• «Radiotjänst och Vinterkriget», in del 1+2 in Nya Argus 3–4 and 5–6, 1980
• Operation Stella Polaris – Nordic Intelligence Cooperation in the Closing Stages of the Second World War, with Jörgen Cederberg, 1984
• Tala till och tala med. Perspektiv på den svenska radion och televisionen, with Jörgen Cederberg, Legenda, Stockholm 1984 ISBN 9158206132
• «För nordiska lyssnare. Radionyheter på danska, norska och finska i andra världskrigets slutskede», Presshistorisk årsbok, 1986
• «Maktkampen kring Dagens Eko – uppkomst och utveckling.», in Brunnberg og Elgemyr (red.) Dagens Eko. Nyheter i radio under 50 år., Stockholm: Sveriges Radios förlag, 1987
• «När Dagens Eko bröt vetorätten», in Brunnberg og Elgemyr (red.) Nyheter i radio under 50 år, 1987
• «Politruktjänsten som skakade radion», in Forskning om journalistik, Nordicom-Nytt/Sverige 4. 1988
• «Kontraspionen Otto Kumenius – en Münchhausen?», in Historielärarnas förenings årsskrift 1989/1990.
• Frihet under kontroll: Den svenska rundradiofrågan 1922–1924, Stiftelsen Etermedierna i Sverige, 1993
• «Radion i strama tyglar. Om Radiotjänsts tillblivelse, teknik och ekonomi 1922–1957», Stockholm: Stiftelsen Eftermedierna, 1996
• «Sweden and the Shoah: The Untold Chapters», Sven Fredrik Hedin and Göran Elgemyr. Policy Study no. 11. 1997. Institute of the World Jewish Congress, Jerusalem.
• «Sverige bytte järn mot stulet guld», with S.F. Hedin, Dagens Nyheter 21. januar 1997. Subsequent articles 22.1, 12.2, 21.10, 30.10, 29.8 1998, 13.11 and 11.12.
• «Schweden kaufte bis 1944 Gold von den Nazis», Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 21 January 1997
• «Sverige og Schweiz i samme båt. Guldhandeln med nazisterne var lukrativ», the newspaper Politiken 25 January 1997
• «Stolen gods in the Central Bank: Sweden swapped iron for looted gold» (21 January 1997) and 22 January 1997: «Sweden and Switzerland lined their pockets». (in www.clintonlibrary.gov./…./6997222.gold-related.).
• «When Stockholm glittered with stolen diamonds. Swedish companies traded illegally with the Nazis», (in www.clintonlibrary.gov. /…./6997222.).
• Får jag be om en kommentar? : Yttrandefriheten i svensk radio 1925 1960, Norstedts, Stockholm, 2005 (nätversion från ur.se) ISBN 9789151843254
• «Radiotjänst dilemma under den tyska ockupationen av Norge och Danmark», in Nordisk presse under andre verdskrigen, Pressehistorisk tidsskrift nr 13/2010
• «Inventiveness and a Desire to Experiment. The development of production technology in Swedish Radio 1925–1955». (in Djerf-Pierre&Ekström (eds) A History of Swedish Broadcasting. Communicative ethos, genres and institutional change, hange 2013
• «The Swedish Foundation of Broadcast Media History: An Overview», see previous book.
• Kai Holsts mystiska död : – Historien om en norsk motståndsman i Oslo och i Stockholm, Jure, Stockholm, 2015 ISBN 9789172236158
• Vilhelm Moberg och radion. Dramatikern och den obekväme sanningssägaren, Carlsson Bokförlag 2017 ISBN 9789173318532
• Sven Jerring i Amerika. Reportageresan i svenskbygderna 1937, Carlsson, Stockholm, 2025, ISBN 9189826540

• «”Skall rundradion få parasitera på pressen eller ej?”: relationerna mellan pressen, TT och ljudradion 1922–1970», 1984
• «”För nordiska lyssnare”: radionyheter på danska, norska och finska i andra världskrigets slutskede», 1986
• «En svensk journalistbragd under andra världskriget (Om Uddevalla-journalisten Per Perslows nyhetsförmedling om förhållandena i Norge)», with Jarl Torbacke and Elisabeth Sandlund, 1987
• «Radion och krigsutbrottet 1939», 1989
• «Tre krigskorrespondenter om Vinterkriget (Om Sven Aurén, Astrid Ljungström och Bernhard Valéry)», 1990
• «Tyska påtryckningar på Radiotjänst 1940», 1993
• «Presshistorisk årsbok: Ett 25-årsjubileum», 2008

• «9 April 1940. När Danmark och Norge togs på sängen. Om dagarna före och efter den tyska invasionen av Danmark och Norge berättar Göran Elgemyr.», 1-2- 1980.
• «Frihetens stämma i Norden». Göran Elgemyr berättar om hur lyssnarna i de krigshärjade grannländerna fick ett eget nyhetsprogram i svensk radio.» 1984
• «Ett missnöjt broderfolk. Om norska misstämningar mot Sverige under och efter andra världskriget berättar Göran Elgemyr.» 1–2. 1985.
• «Svarta fåglar över Norden. Temakväll om 50-årsminnet av Nazi-Tysklands ockupation av Danmark och Norge. Temakväll.» 1990.
• «På hemligt uppdrag i Stockholm. Peter Tennant, brittisk pressattaché i Stockholm under andra världskriget berättar för Göran Elgemyr om de händelserika åren». 1–2. SR P1 9.6. and 16.6. 1990.
• «Norska radioagenter i tjänst hos Secret Service.» 1–2. 1991.
• «Motstånd i det fördolda. Om norska XU-agenternas spionage i det tyskockuperade Norge.» 1-2- 1991.
• «Lillehammer-Stockholm. I kölvattnet av den tyska kapitulationen.» SR P1 17.4. and 20.4. 1992.:
  • 1. «Den mystiska kofferten.»
  • 2. «Liket på Gärdet.»
• «Röhsska museet i Göteborg: täckmantel för samarbete med norska motståndsmän 1940–1945». 1–2. SR P1 20.5. and 31 May 1993.

• «Jag vill vara neutral, säger radion. Om synen på politiken i radio berättar Jörgen Cederberg och Göran Elgemyr.» 1–3. 9.9, 13.9 and 16.9 1976.
• «Högt spel i Norden. Maktspel kring den sekretessbelagda Stella Polarisaffären.» 1–2. (with Jörgen Cederberg and Jan Bergquist). 27.3 and 3.4 1977.
• «Spioner i etern. Om finländsk och svensk radiospaning under andra världskriget.» 1–2. (with Jörgen Cederberg). 23.8 and 25.8 1977.
• «Ljuva 60-tal. Tittarstormar vridningar och skjutjärn. Jörgen Cederberg och Göran Elgemyr granskar det politiska stoffet och samhällsbevakningen i radio och TV under 1960-talet.» 1–4. 24.2, 3.3, 13.3 and 17.3 1978.
• «Uppdrag utan gränser. Intervju med kontraspionen Otto Kumenius, verksam inom den finländska, svenska, tyska och japanska spionaget under andra världskriget.» 1–3. (with Jörgen Cederberg). 8.4, 15.4 and 16.4 1979.
• «Fred till varje pris. Om arbetarfredskongressen och den efterföljande förräderiprocessen 1916 mot Zeth Höglund, Erik Hedén och Ivan Oljelund.» 1–2. 28.9 and 5.10 1979.
• «Cell 232 Långholmen. Ivan Oljelunds fängelsetid 1916–1917.» 12.10 1979.
• «Vårt blödande broderfolk. Vinterkriget mellan Finland och Sovjet 1939–1940.» 1–4. 25.11, 2.12, 8.12 1979 and 7.1 1980.
• «Rapsodi-reportage-dokumentär. Verklighetsskildringen i svensk radio i ett historiskt perspektiv. Jörgen Cederberg och Göran Elgemyr lyssnar på stilarter och röster från radions första tre decennier.» 1–2. 7.7 and 14.7 1985.
• «Med vapen, sprängmedel och flyktingar i lasten. Arne Elström med täcknamn "Nybo" berättar för Göran Elgemyr om krigsårens illegala trafik mellan Jylland och Göteborg.» 22.6 1986.
• «Waldheims förlorade heder.» 27.9 1987.
• «Författarinnan Amelie Posse – orädd och obekväm sanningssägare.» 1–2. 24.12 1992 and 1.1 1993.
• «Sveriges Radio 75 år. Hur radion bildat, fostrat, roat och oroat genom decennierna berättar Göran Elgemyr.» 23.9 2000.

• Mediehistorisk Årsbok, from Svensk Mediehistorisk Förening
• Slutrapport Sverige och judarnas tillgångar, SOU 1999:20, Statens offentliga utredningar från Utrikesdepartementet

• «Kai Holsts mystiska död», from Tyresöradion, 10 November 2024
• «Radions historia med Göran Elgemyr», from SR, 22 August 2015
• «Göran Elgemyr, radioproducent och historiker.», Intervju med radioproducenten och historikern Göran Elgemyr, gjord den 11 januari 2018 på Gärdet i Stockholm, på Youtube