Norwegians in Wisconsin

Author / Creator

Fapso, Richard J

Available as

Online

Physical

Summary

Norwegian immigration to Wisconsin began in 1838, when Ole Nattestad staked an eighty-acre claim on the Jefferson Prairie in Rock County and became the first Norwegian settler in Wisconsin. By the ...

Norwegian immigration to Wisconsin began in 1838, when Ole Nattestad staked an eighty-acre claim on the Jefferson Prairie in Rock County and became the first Norwegian settler in Wisconsin. By the late nineteenth century, when Norwegian immigration largely came to a close, more than 30,000 natives of Norway had settled on Wisconsin soil." "Norwegians in Wisconsin relates the causes that impelled migrants to come to the New World, their dangerous Atlantic voyage, and the establishment of Norwegian communities in the state. The challenges of unfamiliar farm machinery, agricultural techniques, language, clothing, and foods also shaped the Norwegian experience in Wisconsin. New to this edition are the selected letters of two observers of Norwegian settlers' early lives here: Ole Munch Raeder, a Norwegian scholar who toured Wisconsin in the 1840s and whose chronicle of Norwegian life in the state appeared in newspapers in Norway; and Anders Jensen Stortroen, an immigrant farmer who corresponded with family in Norway in the late 1850s.

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