Born in Porjus in the far north of Sweden, Phebe Maria Lindgren was the daughter of the confectioner Per Helmer Lindgren and his wife Valborg Tyra Augusta née Sandberg. After graduating from high school in Luleå in 1943, she studied art history, archaeology and Nordic folklore at Uppsala University, graduating in 1948. That year she married Karl-Erik Johan Fjellström, a fellow student. The couple had three children.
