YCGL - Minnesota - Day 9 - Monday, April 25 - 81 miles - Hayfield - Updated

 So, today I got to Luther and the Vesterheim.  I walked around the campus for a while before going into the bookstore.  Always dangerous for me, but the bookshelves were cleared out for the end of spring and beginning of summer semesters.  So I got a couple of sale books and called it good.  I had lunch in the student union (a very good Cuban sandwich) and then walked some more.  I took a number of pictures around, but only a few showed up tonight.  They will probably be here in the morning.

Some more pictures came in.  Some views of the 

campus and the library, 

the student union and Admin building

The chapel

and the pipe organ.  I love pipe organs.  Hard for me not to take pictures of them.  

From there to the Vesterheim Museum.  

It is a museum about the Norway to America experience.  The first floor is about life in Norway  Again, some pictures still did not come through from my iphone.  You start out looking at some Bunads from different regions in Norway.  

Wedding Bunads from Hardanger

A Hallingdal Bunad.  (The price of $2795 on EBay seems ridiculous, until you actually see the detail of the embroidery.  

When you start adding the cost of the silver ornaments, the shoes, the cap and the other pieces, typical bunad sets in Norway run $3000-$5000 dollars.  Now days, they are typically worn for weddings, baptisms, Syttende mai (the 17th of May, Norways Independence Day, etc.

Sally and I attended a church service at the church in Malvik, Norway where her grandfather had been baptized.  It was Baptism day and four babies were baptized.  Most of the women in the church wore their bunads.  Sor-Trondelag's bunads are a royal blue and just gorgeous.  I was planning on getting one for Sally, Liz may get one yet.

Back to Vesterheim.  Next, you walk into a Norwegian home.  I think they made it look a lot nicer than what we saw what their live would have been like in Norway 150 years ago. 

Folding table ready for a travel trailer.

A butter mold.  Every farm house had these.

.  

A Dresser.  The painting is called Rosemulling or Rose Painting.  Different areas have different styles

The second floor is life in America, especially those of us who have ties in Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin.  It is largely furniture.  A lot of neat stuff and too many to show.

The third floor is about fabrics and inventions.  Again, still missing a lot of pictures.  

Spinning wheels from different areas.  There are a lot of spinning wheels.  These look like the one Sally's grandmother brought with her.

Once the linen or wool is spun, it's woven.  Very little cotton.  

Or is made into lace for the bunads.

These are Mangle Boards.  They are used like an iron to press linen flat.  The typical handle is the Norwegian horse.  They are usually very ornately carved because they are standard gifts from fiancés to their intended.  The more beautifully carved, to more time and hence the more love.  They were cherished (but used) in the families.  

The last area was invention.  Mostly American inventions or design.  I though two were good.

Remember Ole Evenrud from Pioneer Village? A Norske.

For you engineers, Tinius Olsen invented the  universal testing machine, capable of loading in both tension and compression.

Yep, Norske                                                                 

Tonight, I was supposed to stay in Rochester, MN, home of the Mayo Clinic and of a couple of my cousins.  I have been corresponding with Michele Edgar, daughter of my dad's brother Maurice.  She is into genealogy and we've compared notes and dates over the last couple of years.  I had sent her my Christmas card in December and she wrote back inviting me to come and get together.  I wrote her again a couple of weeks before the trip, but hadn't gotten anything back.  I mentioned that to my aunt and she informed me that Michele died in February but she didn't know any details.  So, rather than go to Rochester, I came straight to the farm.  

The farm.  [This is not required reading.  You can skip ahead.  A little family history.  My grandfather Oscar Edgar married Thea Bungum in 1913.   Oscar was able to purchase the farm next to Peter and Martha Bungum, Thea's parents.  Dad was born the following year and Maurice in 1916. The farm was good and they prospered.  But Oscar had epilepsy, and in 1927, during a seizure, fell off a spreader and was run over by the horses.  About the same time, Richard Kyllo's wife Amanda died in 1925.  They had had three children.  Richard had purchased the farm across the road from his parents.  Richard Kyllo and Thea Bungum Edgar married in 1932 and they had two sons, twins, Ralph and Raymond.  Thea lived on Richard's farm while still owning the Edgar farm.  Richard died in 1954 and I really don't remember him other than through pictures.  Raymond eventually bought Richard's farm and Ralph bought his grandparents farm across the road. So, the farm I remember  as grandma's farm is now owned by Ray and Darlene and  Ralph and Wilma live across the road.  When we would come to visit grandma, we stayed in the old house which had a lot of character (and no insulation and stairs  steep enough you thought you were climbing a ladder, and the outhouse was out back...an old farm house.)  BTW, my dad and mom ended up buying the Bungum farm after his grandmother Martha died in 1943.  They only owned it for several years.]

This is the farm now.  It looks different but the same.  

The brick pig house.  The big open space was where the barn and silo were located.  (More about the barn below.)  The buildings are all metal now, they were wooden and painted red with white trim back then.  The first white building was attached to the barn and was where the big cooling tank was located for the milk cans.  The second building was the chicken coop.  Next, the granary.  Behind the motorhome was the garage.  Two new metal silos and the new machinery barn.  Grandma's old house was located where the machinery barn is now.  Finally, the "new" house, built in the early 60s.  When the old house was torn down, we stayed in the new house.  So many stories....

When I drove up this afternoon about 5:30, two of Ralph and Wilma's daughter's and spouses drove in at the same time.  I've seen the uncles and aunts several times over the years, but I think this is the first time I've seen Kathy and Lisa since Ralph and Ray hosted the Bungum family reunion in 1986, 36 years ago.  (I remember the date because Lizzy was the youngest child there about five months old.  I also remember that Thea, her sister Mabel and sister-in-law Elsie were all still alive for the reunion.  Thea and Mabel died in 1987.)   

It was so good to see them and their spouses.  Kathy is seven years younger and Lisa is 13/14 years younger.  (No I won't tell you my age so you can back up theirs...)  I was working (ehhh, kinda) on the farm the summer when Lisa was born.  (Poor Ray and Darlene, I was not particularly useful on the farm like Mike and Pete had been.  For one, I never got the concept of waking up with the chickens so I could go out and work.  Yuck.  Bad Idea. But I did provide some good comic relief.  I helped two of my older cousins paint the old red barn.  And it was at least 150-200 feet tall.  OK, the peak was probably 40 feet, but it seemed that tall to me.  And I was scared of heights, and I didn't like being on the ladder, and I spilled so much paint trying to hug the barn wall that my T-shirt had a great big red bulls-eye on it.  And I tried washing myself in the stock tank.  Even the mention of painting the barn always brings a good laugh.  And shoveling the pig pens, and the calf pen.  I think the only job I was successful at was getting the eggs from the hen house.  

So, we all went out to dinner tonight.  

Kathy and Randy Demmer, Ralph Kyllo, Darlene and Ray Kyllo, Me, Lisa and Doug Gerhart

Ray Kyllo, Me, Lisa and Doug Gerhart, Kathy and Randy Demmer, Ralph Kyllo, Darlene Kyllo

Oh, its good to see these people!!!

This really is a second home.

Good night.