The Scandinavian Element in the United States
172
Mattson, Story of an Emigrant, 59-93.
173
Anderson, Norwegian Immigration, 112-127.
174
Enander, Borgerkrigen i de Forenede Stater, 106; Dietrichson, Det Femtende Wisconsin Regiments Historie, ch. i.
175
Dietrichson, “The Fifteenth Wisconsin, or Scandinavian, Regiment,” Scandinavia, I, 297 ff.
176
Nelson, History of Scandinavians, I, 166.
177
Quiner, The Military History of Wisconsin (ch. xxiii, “Regimental Histories – 15th Infantry”), 631.
178
Johnson and Peterson, Svenskarne i Illinois, 143-149.
179
Ibid., 155-161.
180
Mattson, The Story of an Emigrant, 59-93.
181
Ibid., 62.
182
Annual Report of the Adjutant General of Minnesota, 1866, II; Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 303-304. Similar figures for Iowa are in Nelson, II, 67.
183
Church, Life of John Ericsson.
184
Fædrelandet og Emigranten, July 21, 1870; interview in 1890 with the Rev. U. V. Koren, the first Norwegian Lutheran minister permanently located west of the Mississippi. Miss Bremer in October, 1850, described the road over which the early settlers in Wisconsin went 30 and 40 miles to market: “the newborn roads of Wisconsin, which are no roads at all, but a succession of hills and holes and water pools in which first one wheel sank and then the other, while the opposite one stood high up in the air… To me, that mode of travelling seemed really incredible… They comforted me by telling me that the diligence was not in the habit of being upset very often!” Homes of the New World, II, 235-236.
185
It was on faith in the future of the northern zone of the Northwest, based upon observation, that the Great Northern Railroad was built without any land-grant or subsidy such as the Northern Pacific and other roads demanded and got.
186
A copy of this interesting little pamphlet, without signature, was found in the National Library in Stockholm.
187
Young, Labor in Europe and America, 696. Laing, Journal of a Residence in Norway (1834), 151, describes the conditions in a parish, Levanger, near Throndhjem. There fifty estates were entered to pay land tax. Out of a population of 2465, 124 were proprietors cultivating their own land; 47 were tenants leasing lands, and 144 were “housemen” or tenants owing labor for their land.
188
Bremer, Homes of the New World, II, 314-315.
189
The charm of this name was illustrated in a curious way during the journey of the writer and another American through the mountains of central Norway in the summer of 1890. One early evening they came to the cabin of a sæter, or summer pasture, high up on the side of Gaustafjeld, and asked to be lodged for the night. It appeared that the only room available for strangers was already occupied by two young men from Christiania; but when the conversation developed the fact that both the late-comers were from America, and one from Minnesota, the woman of the house hastened off into the next room, ordered out the two Norwegians, and announced on returning that the room was at the service of the foreigners!
190
Report of the Board of Trade of Great Britain on Alien Immigration to The United States, 211, 212.
191
Goddard, Where to Emigrate and Why, 247.
192
Report of the Industrial Commission, XV, 22.
193
Mattson, The Story of an Emigrant, 29 ff.
194
Mattson, The Story of an Emigrant, 17.
195
Ibid., 29. For work on the Chicago & Rock Island Railroad, Mattson received $.75 per day, and paid for board $1.50 a week, but the determination of the real wages, per month, requires a liberal deduction from these day-wages, for the process of acclimatization was severe in such malarial districts as that in which Mattson worked, and few men at first worked more than fifteen or twenty days in the month.
196
The following tabulation is drawn from the statistics of Dr. Young, Labor in Europe and America, to illustrate the differences of wages. Personal inquiries among men from all parts of Northern Europe confirm in a general way these figures reported from Europe. The European rates are reduced to gold values, while those for the United States are in paper money values, and should be discounted 10 % or 12 % to put them on a par with the other rates.
197
Ibid.
198
Personal interviews with a large number of Swedes and Norwegians in northwestern Minnesota, in May, 1890, brought out the fact that many of them worked in the construction of the Northern Pacific and Great Northern railroads, and then invested their savings in railroad lands in the Red River valley, where they were prosperous farmers.
199
Mr. Powell. General Immigration Agent of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad, in the Milwaukee Sentinel, Dec. 30, 1888, p. 10.
200
Northwest Magazine, XX. 7, 11 (1902).
201
Such pamphlets were issued by the Wisconsin Central, the Chicago & Northwestern, the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul, and the Northern Pacific railroads. Some of them were printed in Swedish, Norwegian, German, Dutch, and Polish.
202
Mattson, The Story of an Emigrant, 118 ff.
203
Laws of Wisconsin, 1852, ch. 432; Ibid., 1853, ch. 53; Wisconsin Documents, 1853, 1854, Reports of Commissioner of Emigration.
204
General Acts of Wisconsin, 1853, ch. 56.
205
Ibid., 1855, ch. 3; 1867, ch. 126; 1868, ch. 120; Governor’s Messages and Documents, 1870, 11.
206
General Acts of Wisconsin, 1869, ch. 118.
207
Ibid., 1871, ch. 155; 1874, ch. 238; 1879, ch. 176; 1887, ch. 21; 1895, ch. 235; 1899, ch. 279. The abolished Commissioner of 1874 declared the repeal was “conceived in vindictiveness and brought about by third-rate politicians, and followed my refusal to appoint to place in my office” certain incompetents. Report of Commissioner of Immigration, 1874, 2.
208
Annual Report of Board of Immigration, 1880, 6.
209
Laws of Iowa, 1860, ch. 81; 1862, ch. 11; 1870, ch, 34.
210
Mattson, The Story of an Emigrant, 97, 99, 101.
211
Mattson, The Story of an Emigrant, 100-101.
212
Ibid., 99, 102; Wisconsin Legislative Manual, 1895, 133.
213
See Bibliographical Chapter, under the names, Hewitt, Listoe, and Mattson, for Minnesota.
214
See Statistical chapter, tables 5, 6, 7.
215
Kapp, Immigration and the New York Commissioners of Emigration, 146; Mayo-Smith, Emigration and Immigration, ch. vi.
216
Young, Special Report on Immigration (1871), vii-ix.
217
“According to other statistics, the average annual earnings of a workman amount to $625, and one may safely presume that every able-bodied workman contributes every year 1/5 of his earnings to the increase of national wealth. Taking into consideration the period of time of a full working capacity of emigrants according to their age, and considering the much less working capacity of females, and the cost of raising the children which they bring with them, one may fairly presume that, during the last few years, not only considerable cash capital has been taken to the United States by emigrants, but that every one of them carries to that country, in his labor, a capital which may be estimated at $1200. The total value of the labor thus conveyed to the United States during the last five years, may therefore be estimated at about $700,000,000. No wonder that the United States of America prosper.” Hamburger Handelsblatt, March 18, 1881, quoted in translation from this “leading trade journal of Germany”, in Annual Report of the Wisconsin Board of Immigration, 1881, 14.
218
J. B. Webber, in North American Review, CLIV, 435 (1892).
219
Forum, XIV, 810.
220
Report of the Board and Commissioner of Immigration of Maine, 1872, 6; F. L. Dingley, “European Emigration,” Special Consular Reports, II, No. 2, 1890, 260.
221
Annual Report of the Board of Immigration of Wisconsin, 1880, 4. A writer in the Milwaukee Sentinel, Sept. 10, 1889, states, “Many of them (Germans and Scandinavians) bring abundant means to secure large farms and stock them well.”
222
Brace, The Norsefolk, 146; Harper’s Weekly, Sept. 1, 1888; Gamla och Nya Hemlandet, Jan. 14, 1903 (Malmö correspondent).
223
Special Consular Reports, XXX, 116 (1903, Christiania).
224
Amerika, Jan. 8, 1904.
225
Letter of the Secretary of the Treasury, etc., 1892, 45, 50, 65.
226
“In an average year the Italian bankers of New York City alone sent to Italy from $25,000,000 to $30,000,000. This is said to have an appreciative effect upon the money market.” Lippincott’s Magazine, LVIII, 234 (1896).
227
“An Act to secure Homesteads to Actual Settlers on the Public Domain,” U. S. Statutes at Large, 1861-2, 392.
228
History of Houston County, Minnesota, 481.
229
History of Goodhue County, Minnesota; History of Houston County, Minnesota; Sparks, History of Winneshiek County, Iowa. See the numerous biographies in Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, II.
230
Report of the Industrial Commission, XV, 301-302. Mr. R. C. Jones, assistant superintendent of Castle Garden, New York, estimated, according to an interview in the Milwaukee Sentinel, Dec. 30, 1888, that about one Swede out of a hundred went to a city.
231
See Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 246.
232
History of the Upper Mississippi Valley, 281, 312, 416, 440, 511; History of Fillmore County, Minnesota, 344, 346; Northwest Magazine, Oct., 1899.
233
History of Houston County, Minnesota, 286.
234
The Northwest Magazine, Oct., 1889, p. 32.
235
See the testimony of John Anderson, editor of Daily Skandinaven, before the Select (Congressional) Committee on Immigration and Naturalization, 1891. House Reports, No. 3472, 51 Cong. 2 Sess., 679-683.
236
Bremer, Homes of the New World, I, 242.
237
Mayo-Smith, Emigration and Immigration, 146.
238
Ibid., quoting a letter from Fargo, Dakota, July 24, 1887, to the New York Times.
239
Langeland, Nordmændene i Amerika, ch. xi; Strömme, Hvorledes Halvor blev Prest, – an excellent picture of life among the Norwegians in Wisconsin and Minnesota; Foss, Tobias: a Story of the Northwest.
240
Scandinavia, I, 142.
241
History of the Upper Mississippi Valley, 228.
242
Söderström, Minneapolis Minnen, 204; Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 466.
243
Ibid., I, 504, 467; II, 160, 164, 193, 229, 233, 248, 261; Söderström, Minneapolis Minnen, 202, 203.
244
S. A. Quale, a Norwegian immigrant of 1869, and C. A. Smith, a Swedish immigrant of 1867. The North, May 21, 1890; Söderström, Minneapolis Minnen, 191.
245
Kæding, Rockfords Svenskar, 67, 95; The North, Jan. 8, 1890, July 12, 1893.
246
Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, II, 209; Söderström, Minneapolis Minnen, 181-189.
247
Söderström, Minneapolis Minnen, 206; Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, II, 164, 228.
248
The Chicago papers for August, September, and October give full details of the wrecking of the bank and the career of its president. See Chicago Tribune, August 9 ff., 1906.
249
Hall, Immigration, ch. viii.
250
Dr. E. Kraft, “The Physical Degeneration of the Norwegian Race in North America,” The North, Jan. 3, 1893, – translation from Norsk Magazin for Lægevidenskaben; Ch. Gronvald, “The Effects of the Immigration on the Norwegian Immigrants,” appendix to the Sixth Annual Report of the State Board of Health of Minnesota, (1878), II, 507-534.
251
The North, Jan. 18, 1893, translating the article mentioned.
252
Bryce, American Commonwealth (3rd ed.), ch. lxxx; Matthews, American Character, 20-34; Roosevelt, American Ideals, ch. i, ii.
253
Statesman’s Year Book, 1900, 1049; Kiddle & Schem, Dictionary of Education, 452. In the latter work, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Switzerland are marked with asterisks, signifying that they are practically without illiteracy. The contrast of these figures with the percentages of illiteracy of some other European countries is very striking. In 1890 the percentage of illiterates in Austria was 40 %, in Hungary, 54 %, in Italy, in 1897, among conscripts, 37.3 % (reduced from 56.7 % in 1871), and among those persons marrying, males, 32.9 %, females, 52.13 % (reduced respectively from 37.73 % and 76.73 % in 1871). For Russia the percentage is probably about 80 %, perhaps as high as 90 %. See Statesman’s Year Book, 1900, 374-375, 392, 744-745. Statistical returns relating to German army recruits indicate that in 1896-7 only about .11 % could neither read nor write. Ibid., 592. See also, Hall, Immigration, 46, 48, 54, 61, 141.
254
History of Fillmore County, Minnesota, 346, 463, – a Norwegian school for one year in a private house, then an English school; Sparks, History of Winneshiek County, Iowa, 16-17.
255
For a discussion of the Bennett Law in Wisconsin, see pp. 167 ff.
256
Beretning om det syttende Aarsmöde for den Forenede norsk lutherske Kirke i Amerika, 1906, – “Parochialraporter for Aaret 1905.”
257
“Sammendrag af Parochialraporter”, Beretning om det syttende Aarsmöde for den Forenede norsk lutherske Kirke i Amerika, 1906, LVI; J. J. Skordalsvold, in Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 241.
258
See catalogs of these institutions.
259
Several of the Norwegian and Swedish weekly papers supported by the different denominations publish regularly lists of donors to particular schools, stating the amount of money, or the nature of the articles given, enumerating the books, quantities of fuel, clothing, etc.
260
Bille, History of the Danes in America, 20-24, – an excellent account of some of these attempts.
261
(Transcriber’s Note: This footnote does not exist in the original work.)
262
Nelson, Scandinavians in the United States (2nd ed.), 317 ff.
263
The World Almanac and Encyclopedia, 1914, 599-609.
264
Interview with Professor G. O. Brohough, August, 1906. See Nelson, Scandinavians in the United States, I, 179-180.
265
Catalogue of Bethany College, 31st Academic Year (1912), 54.
266
A. Estrem, “A Norwegian-American College,” Midland Monthly, I, 605-611.
267
The Statesman’s Year Book, 1900, 491, 1048, 1062.
268
Gjerset, “The United Norwegian Lutheran Church,” in Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 229-242.
269
Twelfth Census, 1900, Population, Pt. I, Tables 33 and 39; H. H. Bancroft, Utah, 441, 431; Montgomery, The Work Among the Scandinavians, 8. Mr. Montgomery, the superintendent of Minnesota for the American Home Missionary Society (1886), laments the fact that very large numbers of the Scandinavians “have become converts to Mormonism, and have ‘gathered’ to Utah,” and adds further: “I have before me the official statistics of the Mormon church (not easily obtained) giving a report of their missionary work in Scandinavia for each year from 1851 to 1881. They report that their converts in these lands during these thirty-one years reached the enormous total of 132,766 persons, and that of these 21,000 emigrated to Utah.” From a beginning of four elders of the Mormon church at work in Denmark, Sweden, and Norway in 1850, the force increased to sixty-one missionaries at work in 1881.
270
Rosenberg, Jenny Lind in America, 79.
271
Simpson, Cyclopedia of Methodism, 785.
272
The North, Aug. 30, 1893, quoting from The Workman.
273
Jensson, American Lutheran Biographies, 25 ff; The Home Missionary, XXII, 263, 264; XXIII, 119. In Anderson’s report for 1850 is an account of a visit to Dane County, Wisconsin, where ‘one of the Formalists,’ after five years of labor had failed to bring much enlightenment. “There are some four thousand or more Norwegians in one settlement, about three-quarters of whom are members of this man’s church, and the rest are sheep without a shepherd. They had had preaching there for the last five years, but such gross immorality I had never witnessed before… We have no reasonable ground to hope that a single individual of those three thousand souls is converted to God; for all are intemperate and profane… Of all I saw (and I saw a great many) two out of three were intoxicated, or had been drinking so that it was offensive to come within the sphere poisoned by their breath; and of every two I heard talking together one or both profaned their Maker.”
274
The Home Missionary, XXIII, 250, 263.
275
Ibid., XXIV, 238; XXIV, 287.
276
The Home Missionary, XXVI, 73.
277
Ibid., XXV, 77; XXVI, 268.
278
Liljegren, “Historical Review of Scandinavian Methodist in the United States,” in Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 208; The Methodist Year Book, 1912, 42-45.
279
Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 337; The Methodist Year Book, 1912, 90-92.
280
Newman, A Century of Baptist Achievement, 126; Nelson (and Peterson), History of the Scandinavians, I, 202; Annual of the Northern Baptist Convention, 1913, 189.
281
Congregational Year Book, 1914. Cf. Nelson, Scandinavians in the United States, I, 346; Montgomery, Work among the Scandinavians (1888), and a “Wind from the Holy Spirit” in Norway and Sweden, 7-8, 109-112.
282
Söderström, Minneapolis Minnen, 231-236.
283
Cosmopolitan, Oct., 1890; Nelson, Scandinavians in the United States, I, 337; Söderstsröm, Minneapolis Minnen, 249-250.
284
Söderström, Minneapolis Minnen, 237-241.
285
Year book of the Chicago Theological Seminary, 1906; Montgomery, The Work Among the Scandinavians (1888), 9-12, 22.
286
Catalogue of the Northwestern University, 1913-1914, 379-380, 478.
287
Annual Register of the University of Chicago, 1904-5; 1912-1913, 311.
288
Nelson (and Skordalsvold), “Historical Review of the Scandinavian Churches in Minnesota,” History of the Scandinavians, I, 335-349.
289
Ibid., I, 236 ff.; Jacobs, History of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the United States, 513; Minneapolis Tribune, June 14, 1890.
290
Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 217-224, 263; U. S. Eleventh Census, 1890, Churches, 452.
291
Beretning om det syttende Aarsmöde for den Forenede norsk lutherske Kirke i Amerika, 140 and LVI.
292
World Almanac and Encyclopedia, 1914, 538-539.
293
Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 219.
294
Ibid., I, 217; Carroll, The Religious Forces of the United States (rev. ed.), 190.
295
Nelson, History of the Scandinavians, I, 339.
296
Beretning om det syttende Aarsmöde for den Forenede norsk lutherske Kirke i Amerika, 1906, XLIV.
297
Ibid., II-LV.
298
Daily Skandinaven, May 24, 1893.
299
Gamla och Nya Hemlandet, Apr. 8, 1903.
300
Gamla och Nya Hemlandet, April 8, 1903 (translated).
301
“Bidrag til vore Settlementers og Menigheders Historie.”
302
This valuable little book bore the title Skandinaverne i de Forenede Stater og Canada, med Indberetninger og Oplysninger fra 200 Skandinaviske Settlementer. En Ledetraad for Emigranten fra det gamle Land og for Nybyggeren in Amerika.
303
Translated from Fæderelandet og Emigranten, July 21, 1870.
304
Schröder, Skandinaverne i de Forenede Stater og Canada (1867), 53.
305
Ibid., 53; also a two-and-a-half-column article “Vink til Nysettlere i Minnesota,” in Fædrelandet og Emigranten, June 29, 1871.
306
Langeland, Nordmændene i Amerika, 94-107. Langeland succeeded Reymert as editor of Nordlyset. A few copies of Nordlyset, Demokraten, Emigranten, and some fifteen other early Norwegian papers were found some years ago in the hands of an old Norwegian, Christopher Hanson of St. Ansgar, Iowa. By him they were turned over to Rasmus B. Anderson, then editor of Amerika. Amerika, Jan. 4, 1899. Anderson sold the collection for $100 to the United Church in whose Seminary Library it now rests. “Raport fra Komiteen til Indsamling af historiske Documenter,” Beretning om det syttende Aarsmöde for den Forenede norsk lutherske Kirke i Amerika (1906), 126-128.