News of Norway, issue 7, 1998
How the Norwegian immigrants created a new home with old and new artifacts, how they continued old traditions and adopted new ones. The exhibit, comprised of large panels, a few textile samples and rosemaling artifacts, will be on display at Union Station in Washington, D.C. in December.
When setting sail in search of their dreams, the Norwegian immigrants knew little of what would become their new western homes in America. Some might have heard about large farms and wheat fields as far as the eye could reach or of poor men who became rich over night or of the Native Americans that roamed the prairie; but very few knew what it actually would be like to live and make their homes in this new world.
Most of the Norwegian-Americans settled in the Midwest, where, with a few exceptions, the landscape stood in gold contrast to the coastal or mountainous regions the immigrants inhabited in Norway. For many Norwegians, getting used to the new physical environment was one of the hardest transitions. Norwegian immigrants attempted to make their new home as close to what they had left behind.
In their trunks, the immigrants had brought with them items typical of their Norwegian traditions, like trunks and bowls painted in traditional rosemaling patterns. With these and other dear items, they decorated their new home to resemble the old one left behind.
According to the museum's Executive Director Janet Pultz, in addition to showing how the immigrants built a new home, "Vesterheim, Our Western Home" exhibit is also an effort to let people know that Vesterheim exists and convey the mission and purpose of this museum. The title's dual meaning-Vesterheim is Norwegian for Our Western Home-reflects the museum's ability to bring two very different worlds into one.
The Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum is the largest museum in the country dedicated to a single ethnic group. Each year, about 20,000 people visit the museum which began its history at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, in 1877. Considering that Decorah is a little town of 7,000 people in Northeast Iowa, this is a pretty impressive number.
Vesterheim became an independent non-profit organization in 1964. The museum's main building is an elegant hotel built in 1877, in which visitors can travel through an immigrant's life, beginning with their old life in Norway, through the Atlantic crossing to pioneer life in America and the building of a new home.
The main building is located in downtown Decorah, a small picturesque community with a distinct Norwegian flare. At the local McDonalds, you are properly welcomed in Norwegian. "Velkommen," the sign reads.
In addition to the main building, there is a restored stone mill, dating from 1851, two pioneer log houses, a log parochial school, a blacksmith shop, a stabbur, a shed for frying hops, an early Decorah house of unusual stovewood construction, a prairie house and a Lutheran church. The museum also owns two properties outside Decorah that holds a Washington Prairie Methodist Church and the Jacobsen Farmstead. In addition, Vesterheim runs a genealogy center and the Naeseth Library in Madison, Wisconsin.
"I think our mission really is to collect and preserve and interpret the experience of Norwegian-American immigrants," Pultz said. But Pultz also finds that the Vesterheim purpose is a little bit broader than that and has relevance for today's America.
"By understanding the immigration experience of Norwegian-Americans, it is not too much of a stretch of imagination to think about the immigrant experience of people who are immigrants today," Pultz explained. "They still have gone through the experience of leaving their home, leaving familiar landscapes and smells and sites for this brand new landscape."
Fitting in or finding a place to belong is not only of importance to new immigrants, but is also a desire within all Americans. Pultz said that in her opinion, the resurge of interest in ethnic traditions and backgrounds is in part because of the general lack of community in the United States. According to Pultz, Americans want to belong, but high rates of migration as a result of out-of-state job opportunities make this more difficult than before when people stayed in one place surrounded by grandparents, aunts and uncles and some time great grandparents.
"I think in America there is a great, great myth of self sufficiency," Pultz said. "You know Daniel Boone is one of our heroes who really organized his life around getting away from people, keep moving west."
But even in the wild west, people would stick together. Pultz explains: "I call it a myth because we haven't quite resolved our need for community. You know in immigrant societies or pioneer, frontier societies, you had to depend a lot on your neighbors to help you. You helped each other build houses, you helped each other when somebody was sick or died, and we never really were as self sufficient as we thought we were."
In light of this, it seems clear where the future for ethnic museums like Vesterheim lies: giving people a place to belong and helping them understand their own identity. Where you come from and where you fit in the world, as Pultz put it.
But for Vesterheim to survive, it is important to be innovative and expand. One vital step is to get the younger generation interested in the past, their heritage. Pultz said that they have seen an increasing interest among children. Vesterheim is trying to explore this by staging combined crafts workshops for both children and adults. The first classes will be held this coming spring or summer.
"You know, if you don't grab the imagination of the younger generation, you are going to be dead in a couple of generations," Pultz said.
Her mother grew up with Norwegian as her first language. The church services were conducted in Norwegian and she was confirmed in Norwegian. When Pultz mother visits Vesterheim, the artifacts will strike her nostalgic cord because they are things she remembers from her childhood.
The younger generations do not have this preprogrammed memory. "So nostalgia is not going to cut it," said Pultz, referring to the time when her mother's generation is going to be gone. "So, we have to really teach people to appreciate this history which is part of their heritage, instead of being something we can assume is already there as in my mother's generation."
Pultz said that some of the channels she sees being used are educational outlets like after school programs for kids, day camps, and the YMCA.
In addition to teaching and introducing more Norwegian-Americans to their heritage, Pultz also sees the museum growing intellectually. "There are a lot of intellectual discussions we have not even touched," she said. "One of those-a good example I think-is how the Norwegian-Americans related to the land and the people they met as they came here, such as the Native Americans. What was their attitude to Native Americans? Did they coexist together or not coexist together? What was their experience with other ethnic groups?"
The bottom line for Vesterheim is a very simple concept: How you tell the story and where you tell the story?
"You always have to make your story relevant to the people listening," Pultz said. "Some times you can do that just because it is a good story... and we have a lot of good stories. But you have to tell it in such a way that people listen."
CONTACT INFO
Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum
502 W. Water Street
P.O. Box 379
Decorah, IA 52101
Ph.: (319) 382-9681
Fax: (319)382-8828
www.vesterheim.com