When Lars Magnus Ericsson left the company in 1903, he was still only 57 years old and in the full prime of life. It appears that he had no desire to sink into an existence of passive leisure but wished to apply his energies to farming, an avocation in which he had been interested since the purchase of his estate at Ahlby, near Stockholm, in 1896.
He plunged actively into his new venture, making substantial investments in his property with the objective of making it more productive. He also found time to indulge one of his earliest and permanent loves, designing.
Ericsson continued to run Ahlby until 1916. Hemming Johansson recalls that "he was by no means a hermit. There, as host, he displayed the greatest hospitality and amiability and his pleasure in welcoming friends of various classes was great and unfeigned. On such occasions he could give free rein to gay spirits and let his sense of humor come into play without the restraint which he might have thought should be maintained during work hours."
When he turned Ahlby over to his youngest son, Ericsson moved to a neighbouring farm at Hagelby, applying much of the knowledge and experience acquired on his first estate.
As the years advanced, however, his sight began to fail, first depriving him of the pleasure he had always found at his drawing board and later forcing him to give up reading. In his last years his continuing thirst for news and knowledge could be satisfied only by having someone read to him.
On December 17, 1926, in his 81st year, Lars Magnus Ericsson passed away. Five days later his remains were laid to rest in the ancient cemetary of Botkyrka, not far from Stockholm. In accordance with his wishes, there were no eulogies and no commemorative stone marks his burial spot in the small churchyard.
In 1946, however, on the centenary of Ericsson's birth, a simple but impresive marker was erected in the churchyard of his native parish, Varmskog. The brief but eloquent inscription reads: "The Swedish Telephone Industry Bears Witness to His Achievements."
