Trunk 1

The trunk that inspired this whole project. Spying it in a neighbor’s yard in South Minneapolis, Jana Velo wondered who H Andersen Bye was, and why his or her trunk had been left to suffer the “Minnesotha” elements. A quick knock later, the homeowners revealed that the trunk had come with the house, so the details of Hans, Hedda or Halvard’s immigrant story are unknown.

My mother’s family had an emigrant trunk with Anne Marie Kristiansdatter Sjøli, Castle Rock, Dakota County, Minnesota, U.S. carved into the side. It contained a formal photo of Anne’s father, and a wedding photo of Anne & her husband Martin Isaksen Moe taken two years after Anne's arrival in Minnesota.

We have no idea about her 1881 journey to America but formed a couple theories as to why she came. Anne’s mother had died when she was 12, so her role became caregiver to her father and baby sister. When her father re-married and had a son, Anne went to work as a tjenestepige, a servant girl, on another farm where she lived with that family. Our family thought that she felt that life was passing her by at age 28 and was looking for a fresh start.

Another theory, since we could not find a confirmation record for Anne, is that she could not marry in Norway without that. The question is whether she had no time to attend confirmation classes because of her duties at home, or that her confirmation record is lost?

Thanks to our lodge’s Genealogy Group super sleuths, records told us that Annie (as she was called in America) hadn’t traveled alone. She emigrated with a couple, Martinius and Oleana Rønning, from the same Sjølirønningen farm in Hedmark, leaving from Kristiania or Oslo, to the same destination in the U.S. We haven’t found a link to know if this couple were relatives, but we were glad to know that she didn’t make the journey alone.

The trunk has been refinished, so we have no idea of the original look.

Helset farm at the end of the Geirangerfjord has a koppen (mountain) and lake on the property with an approach to the seter (mountain farm). Before her departure to America in 1889, Anna Bertha Pedersdatter Helset had worked as a seterjente, (mountain dairy maid) tending livestock in the high summer pasture and making cheese.

Anna Bertha has a rare double emigration story.

In 1889, she left Sunnylven, Møre og Romsdal for Minneapolis, getting her start working at a boarding house in Stillwater, Minnesota, where she met and married fellow Norwegian immigrant Johan Jenssen Sæter.

Her husband died in a tragic logging accident on the St. Croix River. As a young widow with a son and an infant daughter, Anna Bertha had no means to support herself, so she used the money that the logging company paid out to by a ticket home to Norway.

Times were extremely poor in Norway and Anna Bertha’s parents convinced her that she’d have more of a chance to make it in America if she returned with just one child. She made the agonizing decision to leave her son John Peter behind on Helset farm and he was raised by his grandparents.

When Anna Bertha returned to Minnesota, her trunk stayed behind. My cousin Hilde Randi was looking for furniture for her house and went through the family farm’s attic and barn. She found the trunk, had it refinished, and it is now in use again at her home near Bergen.

I am the great-granddaughter of Erik Erikson and granddaughter of Erik’s daughter Wilhelmina, who went by Minnie.

Erik Erikson was born May 15, 1838 in Torsby, Sweden. He married Walborg Jansdotter December 14, 1860 and they had two sons, Erik Gustaf and Johan Emil, and one daughter Maria who died at age one in Sweden. Erik emigrated to America in 1866 at age 28, leaving his wife and children at home in Sweden while he established himself in Minnesota. Erik worked for the railroad, bought land, farmed, and later became the Treasurer of Douglas County, MN. He died March 13, 1915 in Roseau, Minnesota.

Erik’s wife Walborg and two sons, ages 7 and 4 immigrated in 1868 to join Erik in Minnesota. Thankfully, they traveled with Erik’s brother Nils Erikson, as, enroute, Walborg became ill and died on the ship, being buried at sea. Uncle Nils successfully continued on to find Erik and bring his two sons to him in Minnesota

Maria Christina Wallin was born in 1830 in Värmland, Sweden. In 1869, at age 39, she immigrated to America with two brothers. She married the widower Erik Erikson in 1871 in Minnesota and helped raise his two sons. Together they had two more children: Charles and Erica Wilhelmina. Around 1900, they sold their successful farm in Grant County and moved to Roseau, MN near their son Charles. Maria Christina died in 1929 at the age of 99.

We are not sure whether the trunk traveled with Erik, Walborg or Maria Christina on their passage to America.

I do not own the family trunks, but my cousin does. Last year, the family sold the family farm located in Helmar, Illinois. Contents of the house were sold first, and the trunks went for quite a bit of money, but a cousin was able to buy two of the three. We do not have a lot of information on them, but we think the one with the rounded top (above) came over in 1846 with Viar Sjurson (who went by Wier Weeks in America) and his wife Synneva Tollivsdatter Sunde. Synneva and their two young daughters stayed in Muskego, Wisconsin, while Wier came to Lisbon, Illinois, to meet up with an old friend. On his return to Muskego to get his wife and daughters, he found the household to be very ill and the two children had died and were buried somewhere in Muskego. Wier was able to purchase land and gave a portion to Helmar Lutheran Church for their cemetery. Wier and Synneva are, along with many other relatives, buried in Helmar Cemetery.

The trunk with the name Brita Hansd. Sundland (below) we cannot quite make the connection of why her trunk was at the family farm all these years. I've done a little research and believe she was a distant cousin who came to the U.S. sometime after Wier. It's possible that she lived with them for a time and for whatever reason, never took her trunk with her when she left their home.

Above is the trunk that accompanied my great-grandmother Marta Fotland Feyling, her sister and three kids under the age of 5 on their trip from Egersund, Norway, to Duluth, Minnesota, in 1892. My great-grandfather Ludvig Feyling had come a year earlier to find work and save money for the family to come. He was a ship’s carpenter in Duluth. This trunk held clothing and keepsakes, and one other plain trunk held food for the voyage. How these two women managed this with three little kids in tow is amazing to me!

Thorsten Jensen Hoff was my second-great-grandfather, and Helene Thorstensdatter Hoff (his daughter) was my great-grandmother. The photo above is Thorsten’s trunk. I came upon a photo of the trunk online while doing research and was able to meet Roger Kaas (the trunk’s owner) in Pigeon Falls, Wisconsin, during a genealogy festival at the church, so that I could see the trunk in person. It was amazing to meet everyone and see the gravestones!

Thorsten emigrated first, having decided to go to Pigeon Falls, Trempealeau, Wisconsin. Why Pigeon Falls? That is where many of the other emigrants from Biristrand, Norway, were streaming. At the Peace Lutheran Church Cemetery, in Pigeon Falls, four graves are [now] situated in a cluster around a large Hoff tombstone. To the left are the graves of Olava and Thorsten. As I stood gazing at Thorsten’s headstone, I felt a bit sad that my father never knew it was located there. He would have enjoyed seeing it. One time he took a trip through Coon Valley, Wisconsin, and saw how the lush rolling landscape, green with many deciduous and a few pine trees, would have been very comfortable to someone from Biristrand.

The trunk was brought from Leikanger, Norway, to Granite Falls, Minnesota, in 1910. My grandmother Johanna Larsdatter Hauglum (Holum in America) crossed the Atlantic on the ship Lusitania. She was following in the footsteps of her brothers who also came to Minnesota. We granddaughters have no idea who painted the trunk in 1879. It has been passed down through the generations and cared for with diligence.

Inside the trunk is the Kontrakt (contract) with Cunard Linien Steam Ship Co. The Kontrakt was for 280 kroner. According to the Kontrakt, the ship left from Liverpool and arrived in New York. From there, Johanna took the train to Minnesota. There are other items in the trunk as well. Probably the most important is a picture of my grandma’s family before she left. She is the shortest one in the photo.

Above is the wedding picture of Johanna and Gustov Oslund. He was a huge Swede. They married in November of 1912. Grandpa Gus was a lumberman who farmed near Sacred Heart, Minnesota. My grandmother had a hard life, but she and Gus were able to raise three girls to be productive citizens of Minnesota.

The trunk shown above belonged to my mother’s grandparents, Engebret Anders Wiste and his wife Kristianna Sundheim, and his parents, Anders Engebretson Wiste and Anna Sondom, who emigrated from Valdres, Norway. I was told they lost the key to the trunk and had to break into it. I am not sure of the date on the trunk. It may be 1852. Unfortunately, too many moves added to the damage. I intend to donate the trunk to the Becker County Museum in Detroit Lakes, Minnesota. I did make three downsized copies of the trunk, one for each grandchild.

My family and I are recent immigrants to the U.S. My widowed mother, my older brother and I arrived on the Queen Elizabeth I in New York in December 1950. Our primary luggage was an old hand-me-down sea chest that held what we did not want to leave behind in Norway—traditional weavings, silverware, photographs, paintings and other mementos of a life left behind. In Southampton, England, the employees of the Cunard White Star Line attached several labelled paper stickers to the chest. It is not the rosemaling trunk of 150 years ago, but it represents what the immigrants of my generation brought to America. It now sits happily beside me as a makeshift table in an office/spare bedroom in my current home. I look at the sea chest and its labelled stickers nearly every day, and I am always reminded of the day when I lost Norway, and the trajectory of my life changed forever—from Norwegian to American.

My great-grandmother Berit Syversdatter was born in 1853 at Knudslien farm in Valdres, Norway. Her older brother Mikkel Severson lived in Calmar, Iowa, and encouraged her to emigrate, writing "there are many good-looking boys here."

One of those good-looking boys was my great-grandfather Elling Anderson Baarnaas, who emigrated to the U.S. in 1870, settling a claim in Lac Qui Parle County in southwest Minnesota. Elling was from Lunder Parish, Norderhov, Ringerike, Norway. He lived in a dugout for two years until he built a one-room house.

By 1874, Berit decided to emigrate. She would later write, "I got enough of travel when I came to America...I became so seasick I thought I would die,” during her stormy 21-day voyage. Berit worked as a hotel maid in Albert Lea earning $22 a week. In 1877, she wrote her mother, "It was the loneliest Christmas I have ever had because I had to work and didn’t get to celebrate." Berit and Elling were married on December 12, 1878. They had 11 children at the farm.

This Norwegian trunk was brought from Torvik, Norway, by my grandfather Christopher Henry Torvik, a carpenter, and his wife Bertine when they immigrated to Kandiyohi County, Minnesota, in June 1881.

My father Carl Benjamin Torvik, aka Bennie C. Thorvig, inherited the trunk. He was the youngest of a family of nine children. He and seven of his siblings moved from Kandiyohi County, Minnesota, to Lostwood, North Dakota, in 1906 when he was 5 years old. My dad was a farmer.

Growing up in the ’40s and ’50s, I remember the trunk cast aside and stored on the east side of our garage where it was exposed to all the harsh weather elements, including our North Dakota winters.

In the 1970s, I rescued the trunk and brought it to my home. My children and grandchildren used the trunk to store "dramatic play” clothes, which included a vintage flapper dress, women’s blouses from the early 1900s and prairie bonnets. The trunk is currently at home with my daughter, who is at least a fourth-generation owner.

My paternal grandfather Fred was a quiet, gentle man that I remember fondly for his thick Norwegian accent, his impeccable attire and his great love of lutefisk.

Born in 1882 and raised on a small farm near Bergen, Fred caught "America fever” after receiving a letter from his uncle who had emigrated to a small town in northwest Iowa. In 1902, at the age of 20, he packed a large trunk and boarded a ship for the two-week journey to America—the land of opportunity! After processing through Ellis Island, the trunk traveled with him via steamboat and then train to rural Iowa.

Once in Iowa, Fred worked for others as a farmhand until he met and married Anna, another Norwegian immigrant, in 1912. At that time, Fred and Anna packed the trunk and headed back to Norway. After six months in Norway, the couple decided to return to the US, and the trunk accompanied them on their journey via ship, stagecoach and train back to rural Iowa, where they lived a full and family-filled life.

Upon moving into elder care at the age of 92, the trunk settled into my parents’ storage area until my mother passed in 2019. At that time, the trunk took another long journey—via Dodge Caravan this time—to the Pacific Northwest where it now resides prominently displayed in the living room of one of Fred’s many granddaughters.

And soon, that trunk will be traveling back to the Midwest again—this time via moving van—as that granddaughter relocates closer to her family roots.

That big old Norwegian trunk has certainly stood the test of time and has seen a healthy chunk of the world on its many travels. If only it could tell its tales!

This trunk was my husband’s great-grandmother’s. She came over on a boat, as so many did. It is an extremely well-built chest. The keyhole is gone, but her name, Ingeborg Jonsen Buen, is very prominent. I’ve included a letter that her granddaughter wrote, which mentions that the trunk accompanied Ingeborg from Norway in 1879.

Ingeborg’s daughter specified that the trunk should stay in the family and be passed to the oldest granddaughter and then to the oldest great-granddaughter.

My grandfather Ole Nilsen Gunness was born in Rennebu, Norway. At the age of 23, he caught what was called “America Fever.” Hearing about the opportunities waiting in the United States, he followed friends to the logging camps around Eau Claire, Wisconsin, where he worked for three years.

His dream was to have a farm of his own. Upon learning of the rich soil of the Red River Valley, Ole followed other immigrants from Rennebu west to Abercrombie, North Dakota. There he worked on farms for people he knew from Rennebu. During this time Ole met a young woman named Mathea Bergehagen.

My maternal grandmother Mathea Bergehagen was born in Lillehammer, Norway. At age 18, she left Norway since there were hard times economically. Mathea came to Abercrombie, North Dakota because her sister Kari lived there. As was often the case, where young women worked in the households of families, Mathea was a housekeeper, helping farmwives care for their large families. It was during this time that Mathea met a bachelor named Ole Nilsen Gunness. Ole and Mathea married in 1906. He was 36 and she was 21.

The Brekke/Fretheim trunk originally came to the United States with Ellend and Britha Brekke when they emigrated from the area around Flåm, Norway in 1857. Ellend and Britha were both about 30 years old when they immigrated to southeastern Minnesota to farm land north of Lanesboro in Fillmore County. They had a daughter who died at birth in Norway before leaving for the United States and the rest of their children were born and lived their lives in Fillmore County. The trunk was passed down to their son Samuel Brekke and on to his daughter Alma Brekke (married name Eithun). The trunk is now in possession of Alma's daughter Janet (married name Bremseth) who is the great-granddaughter of Ellend and Britha.

While the trunk originally carried the couple's few possessions safely across the North Atlantic and the American frontier and then found utilitarian use within their home, it has also now transported treasured family artifacts safely through time and across generations. Items passed down with the trunk include a wedding tie, collar, and marriage license from 1922, a World War I medal and uniform buttons, and family letters dating back to the early 1900s. Today it stands as not only an important artifact itself but also as a family's mini-museum.

Alfred Julius Olson was born August 14, 1883 to 26-year-old Maren Johanne Johansdatter near Trondheim, Norway. His father was Ole Pederson from the neighboring farm, thus his last name was Olson. When Alfred was 3, his mother married Kristian Ronning and the family grew to 4 more girls and 1 more boy. Alfred remained Alfred Olson.

When Alfred was grown, he became an apprentice baker and met Serena Skjager. Serena and her sister Margaret emigrated to Redfield, South Dakota in 1907 where their aunt Berentina lived.

Alfred followed later that year, with this trunk. Alfred and Serina (American spelling) were married in 1908. Alfred worked as a baker, but later bought a farm north of Salol, MN near the Canadian border, and they experienced the great fires of 1910 in Minnesota.

The family moved back to South Dakota for a time, but again to NW Minnesota where he bought a bakery in Roseau that he named Olson’s City Bakery. They had 3 daughters: my mother Jennie, Agnes, Gladys and one son Other, nicknamed “Bake.”

The family operated a successful bakery, where Alfred baked until it was sold in 1941. He also farmed and built a family cabin on Lake of the Woods. Alfred’s son Other was killed in WW II. Alfred & Serena had seven grandchildren who grew up in Roseau, MN and New Rockford, ND.  Alfred Olson died in Roseau, MN on Dec. 30, 1967.

This is our old family trunk, used by my ancestors Knut and Synevi to come to Canada. I can only imagine that sorry day in 1882 when they had to leave home, and board a boat at Ørstavik, for Ålesund, to begin their long journey.

The trunk was home-made, strong and heavy. It probably held tools and cookware for the new world. Personal luggage would have been more portable, for daily access enroute. The hinges and lock were handmade. Knut had been a blacksmith. The initials carved on the trunk are KMSM. We have his name as Knud Madson Moene. Somewhere along the way the spelling changed to Knut Matson Moene, and our family name in Canada became Knutson.

The attached pictures show a wooden trunk, of one inch pine, with a large key, heavy handle, and parts of the hinges and lock. The lock itself is very dangerous. It is spring-loaded and snaps shut when the lid is closed. The key is for opening, not for closing.  Locking is automatic when you close the lid.

I have often worried about a child crawling into the trunk and getting locked in. There are air holes, but to me that is not good enough. I put strips of wood along the top edge of the front board, to prevent the lock from engaging. I have also inserted a metal sleeve which holds the jaws apart.

I would like to remove the locking hardware completely, but it would spoil the trunk’s authenticity. If I just remove the spring on the jaws, it will remove the risk of some future child getting locked in. No amount of authenticity, or antique value is worth risking a child’s life.

The trunk still holds an honored place in our home. My wife Shirley uses it for linens and blankets. I like to sit on it when I play my accordion.

I bought this trunk off of Craigslist and drove to Iowa to pick it up, because of the similarity to my own name. So, it was not passed to me from a relative. My first name, Christopher, was bestowed by my Irish-ancestry mother, but my great-grandparents emigrated from Norway to Decorah, Iowa in the mid-1800's. My wife, who has researched my family, didn't find any Kristoffers.

My wife and I have been to Norway three times. A few summers ago, we visited the Valdres valley to the west of Lillehammer and found my great-grandparents' farms (they came from nearly adjacent farms but did not marry until in the US). My great-grandfather's farm in Valdres lies in an area with a lot of Kvale surname variants (Kvaale, Kvali, Quales, Qualleys, Qvales, and other spellings). In Valdres, the local pronunciation of Kvale is "Qual-uh," although most other Norwegians pronounce it Ka-volley (or something like that, with a Norwegian accent).

We've read a lot of Norwegian immigrant history (Odd S. Lovoll), found my grandfather's farm near Decorah, and the trunk adds depth to our history.