In 19th-century USA, the descendants of the first English settlers, nicknamed Yankees, were considered by many to be the real Americans, while people who immigrated from other European countries were long regarded as guests. Norwegians fell into the guest category, but they soon gained a good reputation because people saw that they were hardworking, decent people. Moreover, they were Protestants, though not members of the Yankee churches, the Congregational or Episcopal Churches, but with similar beliefs and ethics.
Many people believe that Norwegians came to America as poor and backward people with few resources and little initiative. This was far from the case, and in our play, we would like to challenge this myth. In the 19th century, Norway was a progressive country politically and a leading country in technological development, with a high degree of equality, and a universal basic education. Close to 100% were literate, they were vaccinated against smallpox and in good health, all of which were rare in most of Europe at the time. It is thus a paradox that so many emigrated. But agriculture was the most important way to make a living, and when families had many children who reached adulthood, there was not enough land to go around. The prospects in America, with lots of "free" land were a big incentive. As Simon Simerson wrote to Professor George C. Flom in regard to his family’s immigration: “The causes were economic. In the case of my parents, they came here to create the home that they saw no chance of securing in the mother country.” (Letter of Oct. 12, 1904.)
Norwegian immigrants brought with them two things that were of great importance for the life they led in America: experience with democracy and the world's highest literacy rate. They stood out compared to immigrants from countries such as Ireland, Germany, and Italy. The Norwegian constitution of 1814 did not introduce a democratic government as we understand it today. Nevertheless, the constitution gave 45% of men the right to vote, which was a sensation at the time, and in the core emigration period, Norwegian government was democratically developed, local government in 1837, and parliamentary government in 1884, which gave the Storting control over the Prime Minister and Cabinet: if a majority in the Storting votes no confidence to the government, it must resign. And Norway was the first independent country to grant women the right to vote, in 1913.
Nevertheless, many Norwegians felt that the democratization process was quite slow. Political and religious freedom in America was enticing. For example, the Norwegian constitution established freedom of the press in 1814, but experience showed that it did not apply to everyone. With a state church, religious freedom was not a reality. Gradually, emigration became a corrective to the understanding of freedom in Norway and led to changes in laws, norms, and participation in community life. The fact that almost 100% of Norwegians could read and many could write when they arrived provided the basis for the more than 800 newspapers and magazines that were published in Norwegian in Norwegian America from 1847 to 1980.
In our play, we see that community building in Belmond is well underway, just one year after the settlers arrived. People know what they want, they make plans and dig in, using the time-honored Norwegian tradition of common cause and volunteerism, called dugnad, to make their dreams reality.
Important Issues 1870-1880
The play highlights some important issues in American society in the latter part of the 19th century, and how Norwegian Americans related to them: the removal of the indigenous population, the American Civil War 1861-65 and abolitionism, and the struggle for woman suffrage.
The Removal of the Indigenous Population
The removal of the indigenous population of the United States to make room for European immigrants is a shameful chapter in American history. The question of how Norwegian immigrants related to this has until recently largely been ignored. When the folks from Ringsaker arrived in Iowa, the indigenous population had been removed from the area. The censuses for 1870 and 1880 in Belmond show a homogeneous white community consisting of "Yankees" born on the East Coast and in the Midwest, smatterings of Canadians, Irish and Germans, in addition to the Norwegians.
The name Iowa comes from a Dakota word of unclear meaning, via the French form, Aiouez. Before Europeans came to Iowa, several tribes lived there: the Sioux tribes Ho-Chunk or Winnebago, Iowa and Dakota, and the Caddoan tribes Meskwaki or Fox and Sauk.
The first Norwegian to come to Iowa is said to be Ole Valle, who settled in Clayton County on the Mississippi River in 1846. Recruits joined him 1849-50. The four counties in northeastern Iowa, Clayton, Allamakee, Winneshiek, and Fayette, were the first settled by Norwegians. The people from Ringsaker were the first Norwegians to settle in Wright County, where Belmond is located.
The Sauk, Meskwaki and Dakota-Sioux people had inhabited the area and were often at war with each other. This did not sit well with the US government, and in 1830, officials moved the Ho-Chunk people from Wisconsin and settled them between the Sauk and Meskwaki tribes and the Dakota Sioux tribe as a kind of buffer to keep the peace. This solution did not last long, as more and more white settlers moved in and claimed land. The Ho-Chunk Indians were forced to give up their territory in 1837 and resettled in southwestern Minnesota. When Iowa became a state in 1846, the remaining Indians were removed. But some of the Meskwaki tribe remained and in 1857 repurchased some of the land they had lost to create a Meskwaki settlement that still exists.
In March 1857, a confrontation took place in northwest Iowa between while settlers and the Wahpekute Indians of the Santee-Sioux tribe, called the Spirit Lake Massacre. It also left its mark on Belmond. The winter had been unusually severe, and a settler named Henry Lott killed the brother of Chief Inkpaduta. The Wahpekute people then attacked white settlers in the area, killing about 40 and taking four young women prisoner. When the news reached Belmond, the people were terrified. They quickly set up a citizen militia and built a fort of clay. The women and children were herded into a cabin to cook food, while the men stood guard. The enemy never came, and the only war incident was that the militia attacked a cow that had gotten tangled up in the bushes!
When the Norwegians arrived in Belmond, things had been peaceful for over ten years, but they probably came across a few Native American families moving between summer and winter camps. What they thought of these people, we do not know. In the play, we assume that some were curious, some found the Indians scary and dangerous, some even considered these people animals that ought to be exterminated, while others realized that the US policy of expulsion was immoral and shameful.
Manifest Destiny
In the 1830s and 1840s, a doctrine emerged that encouraged settlers to move westward, creating a slogan that justified both the expulsion of the indigenous population and the promulgation of slavery. It was called manifest destiny. According to this doctrine, the United States was predestined by God to expand its borders westward to the Pacific Ocean, based on the conviction that the US was an exceptional nation, God’s own country. Of course, it was the white Europeans who were the chosen people, set above both Native Americans and Africans imported to be slaves. Gradually, the doctrine was expanded to imply that the United States was divinely commissioned to bring freedom and democracy to the rest of the world. The concepts of manifest destiny and American exceptionalism are still evident in US policy today.
Manifest destiny is associated with the presidential election of 1844, when James K. Polk narrowly defeated Henry Clay, and the slogan was used as a rationale for the United States to annex the Oregon Territory (1846) and annex the Republic of Texas as a slave state (1845). The latter soon gave the expression a bitter aftertaste when the Republican Party was founded in 1854 by forces opposed to slavery. Both Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant strongly opposed it. As supporters of Abraham Lincoln and the Republican Party, most Norwegians did not believe in manifest destiny. Nevertheless, Norwegian immigrants enjoyed the advantage of being white Europeans, they could take land under the Homestead Act of 1862, and they eagerly followed the flow of settlers westward.
The American Civil War (1861-65) and Slavery
The action in the play begins just five years after the end of the US Civil War. During the war years there was a sharp decline in emigration from Norway, but a new wave of immigrants rolled in after 1865. Several of the first Norwegians in Belmond immigrated in 1866 and were thus part of the upswing. American slavery was a topic of discussion in Norway, and we can assume that the Norwegians in Belmond were aware of it. The novel Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe, which was published in Boston in 1852, became a world sensation in Norway as well. The book shaped public opinion against slavery in the United States in large parts of the Western world. Uncle Tom's Cabin was available in Norwegian translation as early as December 1852 and inspired countless articles in Norwegian newspapers. This book jumpstarted Norwegian book production and shaped Norwegians' views on slavery in the United States.
The vast majority of Norwegian immigrants were abolitionists. We can assume that the Norwegians in Belmond shared this view. Over 6,000 Norwegian immigrants participated in the Civil War on the Union side. A few supported the Rebel cause; the number is uncertain but estimated at 2-300. Odd Magnar Syversen has documented 55 who lived in Texas. Few Norwegians owned slaves, however, and most of those who participated for the Rebel cause did so because they wanted to be good citizens, rather than because they supported slaveholding. The newspaperman Hans Christian Heg from Lier near Drammen organized a Norwegian Union regiment, the 15th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment, nicknamed "St. Olaf Rifles", "Wergeland's Musketeers", and "Norwegian Bear Hunters". Other Union regiments in the Midwest had a strong Norwegian element.
The play tells the story of the fate of the Kjos brothers Ole (1841-69) and John (1843-1912) Nelson, who served in Company F, 6th Minnesota Volunteer Regiment, organized by students at Hamline College in Red Wing, Minnesota. Ole, John, and their fellow students enlisted to fight against the Confederates and end slavery. But they were in for a surprise when they were sent to fight the Santee-Sioux Indians in the Dakota War (August 18–September 26, 1862). As in Spirit Lake in 1857, impending starvation among the natives, but also treaty violations and US deportation policy, fueled the conflict. The Indians attacked settlers in southwestern Minnesota and killed 359. The number of Dakota casualties is unknown, but certainly several hundred. Minnesota Governor Ramsey announced to the legislature that the Dakota Indians had to be exterminated forever in the state. (In 2019, the declaration was rescinded and the state apologized for 150 years of trauma that they had inflicted on the indigenous people.) The Indians lost the war and were removed from their lands and placed on reservations in Dakota and Nebraska. Minnesota confiscated their land and opened it to white settlers. The war ended with the largest mass execution in American history, when 38 Dakota men were hanged in Mankato, Minnesota.
Soldiers like Ole and John were probably influenced by the prevailing racism and looked down on the Indians as backward and animalistic. But we have a letter from Ole to a friend that shows he sympathized with them: “Almost all of our native brothers have said goodbye to us, and are now on the long and arduous journey to Fort Randall on the upper Missouri River, where they will undoubtedly live out what is left of their lives. I say ‘live,’ but that is not the case. They simply exist, they do not live.”
Company F was busy with the aftermath of the Dakota War until the summer of 1864, when they were ordered to Helena, Arkansas. This was a swampy area, and many contracted malaria, including Ole and John. The regiment lost more men to disease than in battle. Nor did they see combat while in Helena. But in January 1865, they were sent to New Orleans and Alabama and participated in the final battles of the Civil War. Officially, the war ended on April 9 at Appomattox, VA, when Confederate General Lee surrendered to Union General Grant, but the soldiers in Montgomery, Alabama, did not immediately receive the news and continued to fight. The final surrender took place on June 2 in Galveston, Texas. Ole was discharged on June 27, and John somewhat later.
For soldiers like Ole and John Nelson, the Civil War had major consequences, and both suffered a harsh fate. Ole never recovered from his illness and died on January 9, 1869. John lived until 1912 but suffered from mental health issues that affected those closest to him.
Woman Suffrage
The fight for woman suffrage began in earnest after the Civil War. The suffrage movement made common cause with the abolitionists, and many believed that both women and freedmen would gain citizenship and the right to vote as a result of the end of slavery. The 14th Amendment, adopted in 1868, granted citizenship and voting rights to "all persons born or naturalized in the United States." This did not apply to women, who were not considered persons. It was another 52 years before American women gained the right to vote, in 1920. But states in the West paved the way. Wyoming Territory was the first "state" in the world to give women the right to vote, in 1869.
At Hamline College, where women were welcome as students and teachers, Ole Nelson Kjos met Julia Ann Bullard. As a child, Julia lived in Lee County, Iowa, where many were active in the Underground Railroad, a network that helped slaves escape to freedom. The activities of the organization were so secret that no one knows what Julia did. She was only 15 when the family moved to Minnesota, but a brave girl like her could have been a pilot or helped shelter slaves. At Hamline, Julia was educated as a teacher, and after the Civil War she went to Texas and Tennessee to teach freedmen. As slaves, they had not learned to read and write, and southern states prevented freedmen from voting because they were illiterate. Julia also helped several students go on to higher education and find jobs.
Julia threw herself into the fight for woman suffrage at a young age, and was also a leader in the temperance movement, which had woman suffrage on its platform. We believe that Ole Nelson shared her views, since as a widow, Julia emphasized she was dedicating her life to the causes she and Ole had believed in: citizenship for Blacks, woman suffrage, and the temperance cause. She became a leading advocate of woman suffrage in Minnesota and nationally. Julia had learned Norwegian and was therefore sent on lecture tours in Norwegian America. She was convinced that American women would get the right to vote in 1888, but it did not happen until 1920. And she did not live to celebrate the victory; Julia died in 1914 while on yet another lecture tour. But she did experience the Norwegian victory in 1913.
In the play Louise Sigstad, who plays Julia B. Nelson, delivers a speech on woman suffrage in the students' entertainment program for May 17, 1880, and she inspires everyone with a song about the women of Wyoming who got the vote in 1869.