Lars Jacob
| Jacob Truedson Demitz | |
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Demitz at his Mae West Centenary dinner given at Berns in Stockholm, Sweden, August 17, 1993
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Lars-Erik Jacob Ridderstedt |
| Also known as | Lars Jacob |
| Born | August 13, 1948 |
| Origin | Sweden, United States |
| Genres | Entertainment director, writer |
| Years active | 1961–present |
| Associated acts | AlexCab, Wild Side Story, Westites & Maeniacs, CabarEng |
Jacob Truedson Demitz (born Lars-Erik Jacob Ridderstedt on August 13, 1948) is a Swedish-American writer and entertainment director who wrote a 1996 book about Scandinavian kings and, as Lars Jacob, has directed underground cabaret shows in the United States and Europe since 1972. He was born in Sweden, grew up in Illinois, and has since lived in Sweden, Florida and California.
Demitz was born in Örebro, Sweden, the son of singer Birgit Ridderstedt and C. Erik Ridderstedt, and first arrived in the United States as an infant. He lived in and near Chicago until the age of 13; his father headed a crafts and gifts import business and his mother produced entertainment ventures.
Not wanting to be mistaken for a cleric uncle also called Lars Ridderstedt, who had gained notoriety in Sweden, he decided in 1969 to use Jacob as his first name. In 1980, after noticing for many years that Americans had difficulty pronouncing his parents' last name, he adopted the surname of Demitz, which had been the original name since 1693 of the extinct House of Ridderstedt before they were ennobled. He was the first in 300 years to revert to that name.
His patronymic Truedson, which he added in 1990, stems from a Scanian great-great-grandfather, Trued Abrehamsson, whose lineage has been traced back to the 1640s when the area and the family were Danish, and whose descendants live in many parts of the US.
In 1996, after more than 30 years of research, Demitz published Throne of a Thousand Years, an account of the rulers of Sweden that has been appreciated particularly for its English-language name forms for Swedish royalty and lack of nationalism. The book has been acquired as a reference work by many libraries, including the national libraries of 73 countries. It has been out of print since 2001.
Demitz's 500-volume historical library has been accepted in advance for posthumous donation to the Folke Bernadotte Memorial Library at Gustavus Adolphus College, making him a member, as of 2005, of the college's Gustavus Heritage Partnership, named for King Gustav II Adolf of Sweden.
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