Norwegian Americans

Norsemen from Greenland and Iceland were the first Europeans to reach North America. Leif Erikson reached North America via Norse settlements in Greenland around the year 1000. Norse settlers from Greenland founded the settlement of L'Anse aux Meadows and Point Rosee in Vinland, in what is now Newfoundland, Canada.[2] These settlers failed to establish a permanent settlement because of conflicts with indigenous people and within the Norse community.

A 1925 U.S. postage stamp featuring the ship Viking honoring the 100th anniversary of Norwegian immigration.

There was a Norwegian presence in New Amsterdam (New York after 1664) in the early part of the 17th century. Hans Hansen Bergen, a native of Bergen, Norway, was one of the earliest settlers of the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, having immigrated in 1633.

Another of the first Norwegian settlers was Albert Andriessen Bradt who arrived in New Amsterdam in 1637. Pieter Van Brugh, Mayor of Albany, New York was the grandson of Norwegian immigrants. His mother's parents were Roelof Janse (1602–1637), born in Marstrandsön, a small island situated in Båhuslen province in Norway (ceded to Sweden in 1658) and Anneke Jans (1605–1663), born on Flekkerøy, an island situated outside the town of Kristiansand, Vest-Agder county, Norway.[3]

Approximately 60 people had settled in the Manhattan area before the English take-over in 1664. How many Norwegians that settled in New Netherland (the area up the Hudson River to Fort Oranje—now Albany) is not known. The Netherlands (and especially Amsterdam and Hoorn) had strong commercial ties with the coastal lumber trade of Norway during the 17th century and many Norwegians immigrated to Amsterdam. Some of them settled in Dutch colonies, although never in large numbers. (For further reading, see for example J.H. Innes, New Amsterdam and its people.) There were also Norwegian settlers in Pennsylvania in the first half of the 18th century, upstate New York in the latter half of the same century, and in New England during both halves.

The earliest immigrants from Norway to America emigrated mostly for religious motives, as Religious Society of Friends and Haugeans. Organized Norwegian immigration to North America began in 1825, when several dozen Norwegians left Stavanger bound for North America on the sloop Restauration (often called the "Norse Mayflower")[4] under the leadership of Cleng Peerson. To a great extent, this early emigration from Norway was born out of religious persecution, especially for Quakers and a local religious group, the Haugianerne.[5]

Cleng Peerson

The ship landed in New York City, where it was at first impounded for exceeding its passenger limit. After intervention from President John Quincy Adams, the passengers moved on to settle in Kendall, New York with the help of Andreas Stangeland, witnessing the opening of the Erie Canal en route. Many of these immigrants moved on from the Kendall Settlement, settling in Illinois and Wisconsin. Cleng Peerson became a traveling emissary for Norwegian immigrants and died in a Norwegian Settlement near Cranfills Gap, Texas in 1865.[6]

...in 1825, during a period of particularly fierce religious strife in Norway. In July of that year, a group of six dissenting families, seeking a haven from the official Norwegian state church, set sail from Stavanger in an undersized sloop, the Restaurationen. When it arrived in New York harbor after an arduous 14-week journey, the Restaurationen caused a sensation, and the local press marveled at the bravery of these Norwegian pilgrims. Local Quakers helped the destitute emigrants, who eventually established a community in upstate New York. Today, their descendants are still known as 'sloopers'."[7]

While about 65 Norwegians emigrated via Sweden and elsewhere in the intervening years, no emigrant ships left Norway for the New World until the 1836 departures of the Den Norske Klippe and Norden. In 1837, a group of immigrants from Tinn emigrated via Gothenburg to the Fox River Settlement, near present-day Sheridan, Illinois. It was the writings of Ole Rynning (1809–1838), who traveled to the U.S. on the Ægir in 1837 that energized Norwegian immigration, however.[8][9]

Throughout much of the latter part of the 19th century and into the 20th century, a vast majority of Norwegian emigration to both the United States and Canada followed a route commonly shared by most Swedish, Danish and Finnish emigrants of the period, being via England by means of the monopoly established by the leading shipping lines of Great Britain, primarily the White Star Line and the Cunard Line, both of which operated chiefly out of Liverpool, England.[10][11] These lines negotiated with smaller 'feeder lines', primarily the Wilson Line, which was based out of the port city of Hull on England's east coast, to provide emigrants with passage from port cities such as Christiania (present-day Oslo), Bergen and Trondheim to England via Hull.[12] Steamship companies such as Cunard and White Star included fares for passage on these feeder ship in their overall ticket prices, along with railway fares for passage between Hull and Liverpool and temporary accommodations in numerous hotels owned by the shipping lines in port cities such as Liverpool.[13] Most Norwegian emigrants bound for the United States entered the country through New York City, with smaller numbers coming through other eastern ports such as Boston and Philadelphia. Other shipping lines such as the Canadian Pacific Line,[14] which also operated chiefly out of Liverpool, and the Glasgow-based Anchor Line[15] operated routes to ports in eastern Canada, primarily Quebec City, Montreal and Halifax. Because Canadian-bound routes were slightly shorter, lines which disembarked at Canadian ports often provided quicker passages and cheaper fares.

The Canadian route offered many advantages to the emigrant over traveling to the USA directly. "They moved on from Quebec both by rail and by steamer for another thousand or more miles (1,600 km) for a steerage fare of slightly less than $9.00. Steamers from Quebec, Canada brought them to Toronto, Canada then the immigrants often traveled by rail for 93 miles to Collingwood, Ontario, Canada on Lake Huron, from where steamers transported them across Lake Michigan to Chicago, Milwaukee and Green Bay. Not until the start of the 20th century did Norwegians accept Canada as a land of the second chance. This was also true of the many American-Norwegians who moved to Canada seeking homesteads and new economic opportunities. By 1921, one-third of all Norwegians in Canada had been born in the U.S.

Norwegian settlers in front of their sod house in North Dakota in 1898.

Norwegian immigration through the years was predominantly motivated by economic concerns. Compounded by crop failures, Norwegian agricultural resources were unable to keep up with population growth, and the Homestead Act promised fertile, flat land. As a result, settlement trended westward with each passing year.

Early Norwegian settlements were in Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and Illinois, but moved westward into Wisconsin, Minnesota, and the Dakotas. Later waves of Norwegian immigration went to the Western states such as Washington and Oregon, and Utah through missionary efforts of gaining Norwegian and Swedish converts by the Mormons. Additionally, craftsmen also immigrated to a larger, more diverse market. Until recently, there was a Norwegian area in Sunset Park, Brooklyn originally populated by Norwegian craftsmen.

Data from the U. S. Office of Immigration statistics showing trends in Norwegian immigration to the U.S. from 1870 to 2016

Between 1825 and 1925, more than 800,000 Norwegians immigrated to North America—about one-third of Norway's population with the majority immigrating to the US, and lesser numbers immigrating to the Dominion of Canada. With the exception of Ireland, no single country contributed a larger percentage of its population to the United States than Norway.[16] Data from the U.S. Office of Immigration statistics of the number of Norwegians obtaining lawful permanent resident status in the US from 1870 to 2016 highlights two peaks in the migration flow, the first one in the 1880s, and the second one in the first decade of the 20th Century. It also shows an abrupt decrease after 1929,[17] during the economic crisis of the 1930s.

During the colonial period, Norwegian immigrants often joined the Dutch seeking opportunities for trade and a new life in America. The Dutch often took Norwegians with them to the New World for their sailing expertise.[18] Many immigrants during the early 1800s sought religious freedom.

From the mid-1800s however, the main reasons for Norwegian immigration to America were agricultural disasters leading to poverty, from the European Potato Failure of the 1840s to Famine of 1866–68. The agricultural revolution also put farmers out of work and pushed them to seek employment in a more industrialized America.[19]

A re-enactment of Norwegian farmers making head cheese in Wisconsin.

The majority of the pioneer immigrants, the so-called "Sloopers," assisted by American Quakers, went to Orleans County in western New York state and settled in what became Kendall Township. In the mid-1830s the Kendall settlers gave impetus to the westward movement of Norwegians by founding a settlement in the Fox River area of Illinois. A small urban colony of Norwegians had its genesis in Chicago at about the same time.

Immigrant settlements now stood ready to welcome Norwegian newcomers, who, beginning in 1836, arrived annually. From Illinois, Norwegian pioneers followed the general spread of population northwestward into Wisconsin. Wisconsin remained the center of Norwegian American activity up until the American Civil War, a war in which a number of Norwegian Americans fought for the Union, such as in the 15th Wisconsin Volunteer Regiment. In the 1850s Norwegian land seekers began moving into both Iowa and Minnesota, and serious migration to the Dakotas was underway by the 1870s.

The majority of Norwegian agrarian settlements developed in the northern region of the so-called Homestead Act Triangle between the Mississippi and the Missouri rivers. The upper Midwest became the home for most immigrants. In 1910 almost 80 percent of the one million or more Norwegian Americans—the immigrants and their children—lived in that part of the United States. In 1990, 51.7 percent of the Norwegian American population lived in the Midwest; Minnesota had the largest number. Minneapolis functioned as a Norwegian American "capital" for secular and religious activities.

In the Pacific Northwest, the Puget Sound region, and especially the city of Seattle, became another center of immigrant life. Enclaves of Norwegian immigrants emerged as well in greater Brooklyn, New York, in Alaska, and Texas. After Minnesota, Wisconsin had the most Norwegians in 1990, followed by California, Washington, and North Dakota.

In a letter from Chicago dated November 9, 1855, Elling Haaland from Stavanger, Norway, assured his relatives back home that "of all nations Norwegians are those who are most favored by Americans."

A newcomer from Norway who arrives here will be surprised indeed to find in the heart of the country, more than a thousand miles from his landing place, a town where language and way of life so unmistakably remind him of his native land. Svein Nilsson, a Norwegian American journalist (in Billed-Magazin, May 14, 1870).

This sentiment was expressed frequently as the immigrants attempted to seek acceptance and negotiate entrance into the new society. In their segregated farming communities, Norwegians were spared direct prejudice and might indeed have been viewed as a welcome ingredient in a region's development. Still, a sense of inferiority was inherent in their position. The immigrants were occasionally referred to as "guests" in the United States and they were not immune to condescending and disparaging attitudes by old-stock Americans. Economic adaptation required a certain amount of interaction with a larger commercial environment, from working for an American farmer to doing business with the seed dealer, the banker, and the elevator operator. Products had to be grown and sold—all of which pulled Norwegian farmers into social contact with their American neighbors.

In places like Brooklyn, Chicago, Minneapolis, and Seattle, Norwegian-Americans interacted with the multi-cultural environment of the city while constructing a complex ethnic community that met the needs of its members. It might be said that a Scandinavian melting pot existed in the urban setting among Norwegians, Swedes, and Danes, evidenced in residential and occupational patterns, in political mobilization, and in public commemoration. Inter-marriage promoted inter-ethnic assimilation. There are no longer any Norwegian immigrant enclaves or neighborhoods in America's great cities. Beginning in the 1920s, Norwegian-Americans increasingly became suburban, and one might claim, more American.[20]

Kransekake cake decorated with small flags of Norway at the Olmsted County Fair in Rochester, Minnesota.

Norwegian Americans cultivated bonds with Norway, sending gifts home often and offering aid during natural disasters and other hardships in Norway. Relief in the form of collected funds was forthcoming without delay. Only during conflicts within the Union between Sweden and Norway, however, did Norwegian Americans become involved directly in the political life of Norway. In the 1880s they formed societies to assist Norwegian liberals, collecting money to assist rifle clubs in Norway should the political conflict between liberals and conservatives call for arms.

The ongoing tensions between Sweden and Norway and Norway's humiliating retreat in 1895 fueled nationalism and created anguish. Norwegian Americans raised money to strengthen Norway's military defenses. The unilateral declaration by Norway on June 7, 1905, to dissolve its union with Sweden yielded a new holiday of patriotic celebration.

In American popular culture, Norwegian Americans were the central characters in the popular CBS network television series, Mama (1949–1956). Set in San Francisco around 1900, the weekly program focused on working-class family life.[21] They also form the background to Garrison Keillor's "Lake Wobegon" series of novels.

According to a 2018 paper, Norwegian immigrants who lived in large ethnic enclaves in the United States in the 1910 and 1920 "had lower occupational earnings, were more likely to be in farming occupations, and were less likely to be in white-collar occupations."[22]

The Distribution of Norwegian Americans according to the 2000 census.

• There are more than 4.5 million people of Norwegian ancestry in the United States today. Of these, approximately three million claim "Norwegian" as their sole or primary ancestry. The population of Norway itself in 2013 was 5.1 million.
• A little more than 2% of whites in the United States are of Norwegian descent. In the Upper Midwest, especially Minnesota, western Wisconsin, northern Iowa, northern Illinois, and the Dakotas, more than 15% of whites are of Norwegian descent. Nearly one-third of all North Dakotans claim Norwegian as their ancestry.
• 55% of Norwegian Americans live in the Midwest; 21% live in California, Oregon and Washington.
• Norwegian Americans actively celebrate and maintain their heritage in many ways. Much of it centers on the Lutheran-Evangelical churches they were born into. Culinary customs (e.g., lutefisk and lefse), national dress (bunad), and Norwegian holidays (Syttende Mai, May 17) are also popular. A number of towns in the United States, particularly in the Upper Midwest, display very strong Norwegian influences.

Norwegian Americans are primarily descendants of 19th or early 20th century farmer or working-class people who emigrated to North America to farm rural areas, and thus represent a somewhat narrow segment of the Norwegian population and culture at the time, with a more limited connection to Norwegian urban culture as well as middle or upper class segments of the population. By the late 20th century, Norwegian Americans had been out of touch with cultural developments in Norway for a prolonged period and their cultural conception of and ideas about Norway are often seen as outdated by Norwegians. While Norwegians are largely secular, typically only attending church for weddings and funerals, Norwegian Americans are often religious[23] and their ideas about Norway are often based on 19th century national romanticism, which went out of fashion in Norway about a century ago.

U.S. communities with high percentages of people who use Norwegian language are:[31]

1. Blair, Wisconsin 8.54%
2. Westby, Wisconsin 7.67%
3. Northwood, North Dakota 4.41%
4. Fertile, Minnesota 4.26%
5. Spring Grove, Minnesota 4.14%
6. Mayville, North Dakota 3.56%
7. Strum, Wisconsin 2.86%
8. Crosby, North Dakota 2.81%
9. Twin Valley, Minnesota 2.54%
10. Velva, North Dakota 2.52%

The ten U.S. counties with the highest percentage of Norwegian language speakers are:[31]

1. Divide County, North Dakota 2.3%
2. Griggs County, North Dakota 2.0%
3. Nelson County, North Dakota 2.0%
4. Norman County, Minnesota 2.0%
5. Traill County, North Dakota 2.0%
6. Vernon County, Wisconsin 1.8%
7. Steele County, North Dakota 1.6%
8. Trempealeau County, Wisconsin 1.6%
9. Lac qui Parle County, Minnesota 1.5%
10. Pennington County, Minnesota 1.0%

• Augsburg University Minneapolis, Minnesota
• Augustana College Sioux Falls, South Dakota
• Bethany Lutheran College Mankato, Minnesota
• Concordia College Moorhead, Minnesota
• Luther College Decorah, Iowa
• Pacific Lutheran University Parkland, Washington
• St. Olaf College Northfield, Minnesota
• Waldorf College Forest City, Iowa

• Blegen, Theodore C. ed. Norwegian Emigrant Songs and Ballads(Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 1936)
• Evjen, John O. Scandinavian Immigrants in New York 1630-1674 (K. C. Holter Publishing Company, Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1916)
• Gulliksen, Øyvind T. Letters to Immigrants in the Midwest from the Telemark Region of Norway (Norwegian American Historic Association, Volume 32: Page 157)
• Nilsson, Svein. A Chronicler of Immigrant Life (Billed-Magazin, Madison, Wisconsin, trans. and ed. C. A. Clausen. Norwegian-American Historical Association, 1982).
• Øverland, Orm, ed. From America to Norway: Norwegian-American Immigrant Letters, 1838–1914, Volume One: 1838-1870 (University of Minnesota Press; 2013) 472 pages;
• Ræder, Ole Munch. America in the Forties: The Letters of Ole Munch Ræder (ed. and trans. Gunnar J. Malmin. Minneapolis: Norwegian-American Historical Association, 1929)
• Varg, Paul A. ed "Report of Count Carl Lewenhaupt on Swedish-Norwegian Immigration in 1870" Swedish Pioneer Historical Quarterly. 1979, 30#1 pp 5–24. Swedish diplomat provides a wealth of factual detail on immigrants. online free copy

• Bergland, Betty A., and Lori Ann Lahlum, eds. Norwegian American Women: Migration, Communities, and Identities (Minnesota Historical Society Press; 2011) 320 pages; scholarly essays on the experiences in rural and urban settings.
• Bjork, Kenneth. West of the Great Divide: Norwegian Migration to the Pacific Coast, 1847–1893 (Norwegian-American Historical Association, Northfield, Minn., 1958)
• Blegen, Theodore C. Norwegian Migration to the United States (2 vols., Norwegian-American Historical Association, Northfield, Minn., 1931–40)
• Blegen, Theodore C. Cleng Peerson and Norwegian Immigration, (Mississippi Valley Historical Review, March 7, 1921: 303–21)
• Brøndal, Jørn. Ethnic Leadership and Midwestern Politics: Scandinavian Americans and the Progressive Movement in Wisconsin, 1890-1914 (University of Illinois Press, 2004).
• Brøndal, Jørn. "'The Fairest among the So-Called White Races': Portrayals of Scandinavian Americans in the Filiopietistic and Nativist Literature of the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries." Journal of American Ethnic History 33.3 (2014): 5-36. in JSTOR
• Eriksson, Katherine. 2019. "Ethnic enclaves and immigrant outcomes: Norwegian immigrants during the Age of Mass Migration." European Review of Economic History
• Evjen, John O. Scandinavian Immigrants in New York 1630-1674 (Genealogical Pub. Co., Baltimore, 1972)
• Flom, George T. A History of Norwegian Immigration to the United States: From the Earliest Beginning Down to the Year 1848 (Private Printing. Iowa City, IA. 1909)
• Gjerde, Jon. The Minds of the West: Ethnocultural Evolution in the Rural Middle West, 1830–1917 (University of North Carolina Press, 1997)
• Gjerde, Jon From Peasants to Farmers: The Migration from Balestrand, Norway, to the Upper Middle West (Cambridge, New York : Cambridge University Press, 1985)
• Jacobs, Henry Eyster. A History of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the United States (1893)
• Lovoll, Odd S. "Norwegian Americans." Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, edited by Thomas Riggs, (3rd ed., vol. 3, Gale, 2014), pp. 343–357. Online
• Lovoll, Odd S. Norwegian Newspapers in America: Connecting Norway and the New Land (Minnesota Historical Society Press; 2010) 432 pages; discusses more than 280 Norwegian-language papers, both short-lived and successful, founded after 1847.
• Mathiesen, Henrik Olav. "Belonging in the Midwest: Norwegian Americans and the Process of Attachment, ca. 1830-1860," American Nineteenth Century History 15 (no. 2, 2014) pp: 119–46.
• Munch, Peter A. Authority and Freedom: Controversy in Norwegian-American Congregations, (Norwegian-American Studies 28. 1979)
• Nelson, E. Clifford, and Eugene L. Fevold, The Lutheran Church among Norwegian Americans: A History of the Evangelical Lutheran Church (Minneapolis, Augsburg Pub. House, 2 vols. 1960)
• Nelson, O. N. History of the Scandinavians and successful Scandinavians in the United States (O. N. Nelson and Company. Minneapolis, MN: 1893)
• Norlie, Olaf M. History of the Norwegian People in America (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Publishing House, 1925)
• Olson, Gary D. "Norwegian Immigrants in Early Sioux Falls: A Demographic Profile," Norwegian-American Studies, 36 (2011), pp 45–84.
• Qualey, Carlton C. Norwegian Settlement in the United States (Northfield, Minn.: Norwegian-American Historical Association, 1938)
• Rygg, Andreas Nilsen Norwegians in New York, 1825— 1925 (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Norwegian News Co. 1941)
• Woods, Fred E., and Nicholas J. Evans, 'Latter-day Saint Scandinavian Migration through Hull, England, 1852-1894', BYU Studies, Volume 41, Number 4 (2002), pp. 75–102; scholarly essay on the experience of Scandinavian emigration