Carl Gustav Otto Hansen was born on March 16, 1871, in Trondheim, Norway, and emigrated to the United States with his mother and siblings in 1881, first settling in Walnut Grove, Minnesota, and later Minneapolis. Largely self-educated, he briefly studied at Augsburg Seminary and worked in printing before beginning a long career in journalism. From 1897 to 1935 he wrote and edited for Minneapolis Daglig Tidende, later working for Skandinaven in Chicago and then serving as editor and educational director for the Sons of Norway magazine. Hansen was also an active musician and choir leader, a founder of several Norwegian-American organizations, and the author of My Minneapolis (1956). He married Amalie Marie Edsten, and they had four children.
Helge Høverstad was born on March 15, 1870, in Vang, Valdres, Norway, to Torger Anderson Høverstad and Gjertrude Helgesdatter Leine. One of five children, he immigrated to North America in 1892, arriving in Quebec before settling in Holden, Goodhue County, Minnesota, where relatives already lived. He studied at Hamar Seminary in Norway and later at the United Church Seminary in Minneapolis (now Augsburg University) and Chicago Lutheran Theological Seminary. Høverstad served Lutheran congregations in Illinois, Wisconsin, and Iowa and also contributed to church work through the Foreign Missions board and writing for St. Petri tidende.
Eivind Klaveness was a Norwegian-born physician, writer and lecturer; he practiced in Brookings, Sioux Falls, South Dakota, as well as in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota. He held many offices: president of Vestfoldlag, of the Minnesota Leif Eriksen Monument Association, of the Scandinavian Republican State League of South Dakota, and was medical director of Sons of Norway and of the Surety Fund Life Company. He founded the Klaveness Corporation (investment bankers representing Klaveness Bank in Oslo); wrote two books, The Enchanted Islands (1939) and Norske læger i Amerika 1840-1942 (1943). He was a frequent radio and after dinner speaker; and was an equally frequent contributor of articles on medicine and politics to newspapers and journals. His correspondence with Richard Olsen Richards of the Richards Trust Company of Huron, South Dakota (3 volumes), reflects the story of that state's politics during the first three decades of the 20th century.
View the finding aid to the Eivind Klaveness papers here.
Biography/History: Nicolay A. Grevstad was a practicing attorney and editor of Dagbladet (Oslo) before emigrating in 1883. In America he was editor of Nordvesten (St. Paul); leading editorial writer for Minneapolis Daily Tribune; editor of Skandinaven (Chicago) (1892-1911); United States minister to Uruguay and Paraguay (1911-1915); publicity director of Minnesota Safety Commission; chief of the foreign language press publicity service for the Republican National Committee (1919-1925); agent of a Chicago bank syndicate for Uruguay; and editor of Skandinaven (1930-1940). Articles by Grevstad on courts of conciliation in Norway and in America appeared in the Atlantic Monthly (September, 1891 and November, 1893).
View the finding aid tothe Nicolay A. Grevstad papers here.
Rev. Parelius H. Rognlie was born near Trondhjem, Norway, on December 21, 1858, and immigrated to the United States with his parents in 1870, settling in southeastern and later southwestern Minnesota. He studied at St. Olaf College and Luther College, supporting himself through teaching and farm work, and briefly returned to Norway in 1885 for eye surgery. After further study, he graduated from Luther Theological Seminary in Minneapolis in 1891 and was ordained that same year as pastor for several congregations in Renville and Sibley counties, Minnesota. He married Ronnaug Marie M. Gullerud, and together they had six children.
Articles, reports, songs, stories, and pamphlets concerning the temperance movement among Norwegian Americans. There are reports from organizations in Alberta, Canada, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin, and articles by Waldemar Ager, Adolf Bredesen, Carl E. Carlson, Theodor H. Dahl, Knut Gjerset, Paul M. Glasoe, and Gjermund Hoyme.
The American Birkebeiner was started in 1973 by Tony Wise, a founding member of the Worldloppet federation of cross-country ski marathons. The race is held in February in Hayward, WI. Wise drew on his Norwegian heritage in starting a race named after a famous event in Norway. The American Birkebeiner, also called Birke, is named after Norwegian Birkebeinerrennet. This race commemorates an important historical event when in 1206 a group of Birkebeiner party soldiers, who fought for Sverre Sigurdsson and his descendants in the Norwegian civil war, smuggled the illegitimate son of Norway's King Håkon Sverresson from Lillehammer to safety in Trondheim.
Ole Olsen was born on March 12, 1871, in Oslo, Norway, to Marie Gulbrandsdatter and Edvart Olsen and grew up with five siblings. In 1890, he emigrated to the United States with his sister Bertha, arriving in New York before traveling through several cities across the country. Olsen worked as a machinist in places such as Laredo, Wilmington, and Philadelphia, served in the U.S. Revenue Cutter Service during the Spanish-American War, and later worked as an engineer on coastal steamships. In 1905 he married Emma Noble in Philadelphia, and they had a daughter, Ena (Ina) Frances Olsen, born in 1906. He was also a member of the Socialist Party of America.
Correspondence and assorted papers of a pharmacist and administrator of the St. Paul Luther Hospital. Includes a small booklet for the Woman's Club (1910-1911) Dell Rapids, S.D.; class notes from the University of Minnesota, Department of Medicine, 1895; clipping on Karen Haugen.
The catalog record to the John E. Haugan collection can be found online here.
Papers of a Norwegian-born Lutheran clergyman: correspondence, school notebooks, and a manuscript (44 p.) of his translation (portions of Joh. Ludwig Hartmann's (1640-84), "Evangelisk Troesgrund," from German to Norwegian.
The catalog record for the Mikel C. Holseth papers can be found online here.
Translated copy of letters received by a Kalispell, Montana, farmer from his parents (of Stokke, Vestfold) at his departure to America. For Horntvedt family history, see "Aette historie og familie register av slegterne Mokkenes, Horntvedt, Myrre og Gjein."
Letter (April 18, 1863) from a Thunhovd, (Buskerud) Norway, resident to his "farbroder" Knudt Synstegaard, Orfordville, Wisconsin, concerning weather, health, farming, and an inquiry about the Civil War.
Mainly correspondence of a Norwegian-born farmer in Wiota, La Fayette County, Wisconsin. The letters, written by relatives and friends from California, Iowa, Nevada, Illinois, Minnesota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin, present a picture of the migration movement in its various aspects in both country and town. There are also letters by a student at Mount Horeb Academy (1895-1896).
From the Knut Gjerset papers on women and Norwegian American Encyclopedia.
Letters and other writings regarding Wilhelm and Elise Waerenskjold. A pastor's daughter, Elise lead a party emigrating to Texas between October 1846 and March 1847. The Waerenskjolds married in 1848, settling at Four Mile Prairie. Her letters and other writings serve as a primary source of information about the Norwegians who settled in Texas.
John Anders Johnson was born in Telemark, Norway, on April 15, 1832, and emigrated with his family to the United States in 1844, later settling near Koshkonong, Wisconsin. After the deaths of his first wife, Karen Thompson, and their daughter in 1860, he remarried Kaia Nicoline Kildahl in 1861 and had six children. Johnson became a prominent Norwegian-American businessman, founding companies such as Fuller & Johnson Manufacturing Company, Gisholt Machine Company, and Hekla Fire Insurance Company, and serving as president of the National Association of Implement and Vehicle Manufacturers in 1896. He was also active in politics and public life, serving in the Wisconsin legislature and as county clerk, writing on major social and political issues, helping found the Chicago newspaper Amerika, and supporting institutions like the University of Wisconsin.
Reverend Fredrich August Schmidt was born on January 3, 1837 in Thüringen, Germany. He graduated in 1853 from Concordia College. Four years later he finished seminary work at Concordia and became minister to a German congregation in Eden, NJ. In 1861, Schmidt became associated with the Norwegian church when he started teaching at Halfway Creek, near La Crosse. The next year, the school renamed itself Luther College and moved to Decorah, Iowa. Schmidt was an instructor at Luther College until 1872. After his stint at Luther College, he took a professorship in Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, which was then supported by the Norwegian synod. Rev. Schmidt headed the faction that left the synod in 1886 and organized "The anti-Missourian Brotherhood." In that year he also became a theological instructor at St. Olaf's College, Northfield, Minnesota, for this faction.
Campbell Norsgaard, a Norwegian-born photographer and cinematographer who later lived in Connecticut, served as the official photographer for the Royal Norwegian Air Force during World War II, documenting servicemen, aircraft, the Royal Family, training facilities, and international operations, before later producing nature films for the National Geographic Society. His collection includes color slides, transparencies, and black-and-white negatives from Canada, India, Norway, England, and beyond, featuring aerial views, portraits, wartime activities, the return of King Haakon VII, and Sigrid Undset’s travels, as well as signed pilot portraits; it also contains nineteen 16mm films (1942–1946) depicting Camp Little Norway, the Royal Family, the RNAF, and postwar events in Norway and Russia.
