Sisters Linnea and Violet's parents were pioneer Baptists in Sweden and their uncle was exiled from Sweden for his Baptist faith. He came to America and helped establish the first Swedish Baptist churches. Their father was a minister and home missionary. Violet graduated from the University of California in 1926 and graduated with nursing training from Mounds Park and Midway Hopspital in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1936. She was apointed a missionary in May 1937, but taught at the nursing school for about 25 years before heading to Nicaragua in the 1960s.

Linnea Nelson also graducated from the University of California, in 1926, then from Berkeley Baptist Divinity School in 1933. She was appointed in 1935 by WABFMA and worked in East China. She first taught at the Cheng Mei Girls School in Kinhwa and then in 1937 became associate professor of English at the University of Shanghai. She was appointed as the Helen Barrett Montgomery memorial missionary.

Linnea returned to the U.S. in 1943 and became Dean of Women and Professor of Religious Education at Berkeley Baptist Divinity School while she earned her doctorate. She joined the faculty of Central Philippine University in 1950 as Dean of Graduate Studies, professor of Bible, English and Education. She also served as acting president of the University twice. After her 1969 retirement, she contintued to teach at the nursing school in Managua, Nicaragua, Bangalore India and Bacone College in Oklahoma.