Signe Hammarsten-Jansson Signe Hammarsten-Jansson Signe "Ham" Hammarsten-Jansson (née Hammarsten, 1 June 1882 Hannäs, Sweden - 6 June 1970 Porvoo) was a Swedish graphic artist who designed, among other things, around 220 Finnish postage stamps during the course of three decades. She was the mother of Tove Jansson, creator of the highly successful "Moomin" characters. Signe Hammarsten came from a respectable Swedish clerical family and was the child of a pastor's daughter and a court chaplain. Hammarsten's parents were opposed to her becoming an artist, and as a girl she had considered a career as a surgeon. Hammarsten went through 8 years of
Jansson Jansson Jansson is a Swedish patronymic surname, meaning "son of Jan", derived from Johannes, a cognate of John. There are alternate Belgian, German, Dutch, Danish, Latvian and Norwegian spellings. Jansson is rare as a given name. As of 2014, 86.2% of all known bearers of the surname "Jansson" were residents of Sweden, 5.1% of Finland, 2.9% of the United States and 1.7% of Norway. In Sweden, the frequency of the surname was higher than national average (1:199) in the following counties: In Finland, the frequency of the surname was higher than national average (1:1,893) in the following regions: Jansson, a