Valdres Samband
The Oldest Bygdelag in America - 1899
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WANTED: Participants
Can
you help tell the story of how your family and Norwegian-American society
evolved?
Terje Hasle Joranger (a
Norwegian member since 1991) wrote his doctoral dissertation on the
migration from Valdres to the Upper Midwest, tracing 22 families to two
settlement areas in Minnesota and Wisconsin. Terje studied events based on
oral interviews and archival sources at the State and County levels - using
church histories, County histories, family histories, etc. in order to learn
the history of the areas of study they kept Norwegian traditions tied to
inheritance and intergenerational land transfers for three generations in
the USA.
Terje has now started a new project; he is
currently researching the Norwegian population in rural America at large. He
is studying the identity formation and the ethnicization process among
Norwegian immigrants and their offspring from the time of settlement through
three generations. He will be comparing Norwegian settlements in the
Midwest, in the Rockies region including the states of Montana and Utah, the
Pacific Northwest, and in the South including Texas. As for areas of study,
he will concentrate on the strongholds of Norwegian settlement in Illinois
(few Valdres immigrants here), Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, North and South
Dakota, and Nebraska. The states of Montana, Idaho, and Utah are
representative of the Mountain region of the Great Divide. In the Pacific
Northwest, the Willamette Valley and Puget Sound regions are areas with a
large concentration of Norwegians. Terje is also looking for areas where
Norwegians made up a minority of the population, such as in Kansas and in
Texas. Sources on Norwegians in Canada are also welcome.
Terje is looking for primary sources (original
sources) from various parts of the USA, especially narratives such as
diaries, letters, autobiographies, also including literature that relates to
the Norwegian presence in the local area. He will be looking at the farm
population as well as people who resided in small towns and who were engaged
in non-agricultural pursuits. His primary interest is getting in touch with
people that live in the areas mentioned or know about the source material
that relates to the Norwegian-American presence in these areas. Terje would
be happy to interview individuals that possess knowledge about the
Americanization process of their own family. Among others, Terje would ask
questions that relate to the use of the Norwegian versus the American
language, socializing with Norwegians or other ethnic groups, if the family
attended Norwegian ethnic or American festivals, etc.
We hope some of you would be interested in contacting Terje to share your
experiences with him and to help with his research. It would be greatly
appreciated. In advance, thank you very much and you may contact Terje at
tmh-jora@online.no