Thoughts on the Egge-Koren Home

Thoughts on the Egge-Koren Home

by John P. Nelson 22

Vesterheim

When I take a group on a tour of Heritage Park, I am always looking forward to the point in the tour when we reach the Egge-Koren log home. I grew up in Decorah and our home was adjacent to the Luther College campus, where many of the buildings now in Heritage Park were sited until their transfer to the present location at Vesterheim. The area around the buildings was one of our favorites for playing “hide and seek” and other children’s games. At that time, I knew little of the rich history that the logs used in the construction of the buildings could tell. When I became a guide at Vesterheim, I finally took the time to learn that history; not only of the buildings as historical artifacts, but also about the lives of the people who lived in them. I had read The Diary of Elisabeth Koren 1853-1855 years earlier, but never related her diary to the building in the sense of how the house, too, told the story of what it was like for the early immigrants coming to the Midwest.

I always start my tours with the Valdres House, a log home that was built and sited in Heggenes, Norway, and in 1976 was moved to Vesterheim for the collection. I point out the nice straight logs and how they are tightly fitted. The house was built in the 1790s and is still a home that would be comfortable to live in. Even though it may be bigger than the homes many of the immigrants had when they left Norway, it does give us an idea of what their living conditions might have been. We then move on to the Egge-Koren House and start by comparing the construction.

Erik Egge arrived in the Decorah area in 1848 and built his home in 1850. When we look at the house and see that the logs are not the nice straight logs we would think of using in a log home, we wonder why they built in this manner. But then, looking at the corners mortised with such precision and care, it is obvious that the homes were built to stand, even though the building materials may have been found in haste. Nobody had the luxury of taking a great amount of time to construct a home, but rather had to build something as quickly as possible due to the cold winter coming and little time to spare away from the work of developing their farm. Even now, looking at the building, it is hard to imagine that it is over 150 years old and still in such good condition.

In 1853 Erik married Helene Egge. Helene had been married previously to Anders Egge, who had died in the spring of 1852, while they were crossing the Atlantic on their way to America. When she married Erik, she already had four children —two stepchildren Anders had brought with him from an earlier marriage, and two of her own with Anders.1 So it was that this log home—just 14 feet by 16 feet, with a loft—was home to the Egge family of six. The Egges were part of the Norwegian immigrant community that wanted to have their own pastor living in their midst. With the aid of Nils O. Brandt, a pastor in Wisconsin who often visited and had organized three congregations in the settlements, a letter of call was sent to Norway for a pastor.

The call was answered by Ulrik Vilhelm Koren. He had just finished his training at the University of Christiania and on August 18, 1853, he married Elisabeth Hysing, a young woman from Larvik, whose father was headmaster of the local high school. On September 5, 1853, they set out from

Egge-Koren House interior Norway for America, where Vilhelm would become the pastor for the Little Iowa Congregation. They arrived in Winneshiek County, Iowa, 15 weeks and two days later, on December 21, 1853, to learn that there was no parsonage nor church yet constructed and that they would stay with parishioners until other arrangements could be made. On December 24, 1853, they moved in with the Egges.

A little background on Vilhelm and Elisabeth gives us an idea of what this transition must have been like for them.

Vilhelm was 25 years old, had been educated in Christiania, now Oslo, and lived much of his youth at his uncle’s home.

His father, a sea captain, was away from home a great deal and died at Cape Haitien, Haiti, in 1842 during an earthquake.

Vilhelm, the second of five children and only 16 at the time, managed to help support the family and get his training at the University of Christiania. Elisabeth was 21 years old and lived in a large manor house in Larvik. The school of which her father was headmaster was situated on the second floor of the large home. Although the school was only for educating boys, the teachers also gave Elisabeth the opportunity to become well educated. When Vilhelm and Elisabeth set out for America, I’m sure neither of them knew what to expect upon their arrival in the settlement in Iowa. Elisabeth started keeping a diary from the date they left Europe until nine days before her first child was born on December 12, 1854. An English translation of the diary, made by David T. Nelson, was

Opposite: Interior of the Egge-Koren House Vol. 4, No. 1 2006

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Ulrik Vilhelm Koren

published by the Norwegian-American Historical Association in 1955. In his introduction to the diary he writes: Elisabeth Hysing Koren, who had been brought up in a sheltered home in Norway, kept a diary of their voyage across the Atlantic, their journey inland to Iowa, and their life together during most of their first year in the Little Iowa settlement. Not many accounts have been written, or have survived, dealing with the earliest experiences of Norwegian women transplanted to the frontier of the Midwest. Elisabeth Koren’s diary is a remarkably full account of her experiences as a pioneer. It gives a vivid picture of the primitive conditions that the twenty-one-year-old wife encountered in Iowa after coming directly from her comfortable and cultured life in Norway. Not least of the hardships was the lack of privacy and the long wait for a home of her own. From December 21, 1853, when she and her husband arrived in the Washington Prairie settlement southeast of Decorah, until October 1, 1854, when they finally moved into the parsonage, the young couple had only temporary lodgings.2 Elisabeth’s first description of their new home is when they arrive at the Egge home on Christmas Eve, 1853.

Obviously the change in circumstances was great compared to the homes they both left.

Christmas Eve, 1853. This was a strange Christmas Eve, indeed; so different from any I have ever known before. Here we sat, Vilhelm and I, separated for the first time from relatives and friends, in a little 24

Elisabeth Koren

log cabin far inland in America. For supper we had spareribs and coffee. As we sit here now, we get a little light from a lead dish in which there are tallow scraps and a little rag for a wick, placed on an overturned salt container. Vilhelm is studying his sermon for tomorrow. We are expecting Erik back from Decorah any moment; he is bringing the bed in which we are to sleep, as well as some candles....

The house is fourteen by sixteen feet, divided by curtains of calico into two rooms, one of which affords space for two beds, which extend along one wall of the house and are separated from each other by a second curtain. Nils put our things in the loft, said “Go ‘long!” to the oxen, and drove home again.

Helene, who appears to be a kind, friendly woman, brought out beer and fattigmandsbakkels for us; after that, accompanied by Per and Kari, three and four years old, we went up to the loft to put our things somewhat in order. I cannot imagine how Vilhelm will get any quiet for study here, it will be so crowded.

What a contrast between this evening and a year ago! I am happy and content that we are here in time for the Christmas festival — there is such joy over the pastor’s coming — but it grieves me to think of Father and the others whom I miss, for the first time, on this Christmas Eve. Vilhelm took a walk with me.

The evening is lovely; it was good to get outside a little. Oh, how beautiful the sky is! The stars are much brighter and seem larger than at home.3

Vesterheim

Elisabeth and Ulrik Vilhelm Koren in their later years.

Even though Elisabeth finds herself in circumstances totally different from those she has grown up in, she shows herpioneering spirit by closing her entries as follows.

My pen has been resting a little, while I sat thinking of Father and all the dear ones in our distant native land; and I am sure we have been constantly in their thoughts this evening. On such occasions they are doubly missed. May God bless this year for them too!

Last year I began the new year clad in bobbinet, dancing away with roses in my hair. This year I am sitting here with Vilhelm in this bare room, where tomorrow he is to conduct divine services for all these people who so long have lacked a pastor. Still, this is best.4 Because of Elisabeth’s education, she was able to capture the stories of life in this new settlement and the joys and problems the people experienced. When one stands in the house, looks at the dimensions and the living arrangements and thinks of what life must have been like for these immigrants, we come to appreciate the building for its rich and telling history as well as the manner of construction and the artifacts that it holds. One can point to the cellar trapdoor in the floor and talk about how they stored their

food and what they ate. One can point to the floor boards and talk about the visitor, who, apparently not having a wooden floor in his home, felt quite comfortable spitting on the floor even though it had just been washed. One can look at the walls and think of what it must have been like to have wind, snow, and rain blowing in between the logs. One can look at the two beds, end to end, and wonder how these two newlywed couples could have any sense of privacy with those arrangements. One can go on with many stories that the building can probably tell. Think how many other stories there must have been when you realize that the Egges continued to live in the house another 20 years, raising six more children born to their union. I think one’s imagination of what life must have been like in the building is much more interesting than the physical dimensions and appearance of the building. Next time you visit Vesterheim, go into the EggeKoren house and try to imagine what your life would have been like. I think it is a real learning experience.

Endnotes David T. Nelson, in Elisabeth Koren, The Diary of Elisabeth Koren 1853-1855, (Northfield, Minn.: Norwegian-American Historical Association, 1955), p. 157 n., p. 121 n.

2 Diary, p. ix.

3 Diary, pp. 101-02.

4 Diary, pp. 114.

1

About the Author John P. Nelson was born and raised in Decorah, Iowa, the great-grandson of Elisabeth and Vilhelm Koren. He was a partner with the accounting firm of Hacker, Nelson & Co., P. C., for about 25 years, and subsequently taught accounting at Luther College for about 10 years. John has been a guide in Vesterheim’s Heritage Park has supplied much-needed assistance in the museum’s project to reprint The Diary of Elisabeth Koren 1853-1855.

Vol. 4, No. 1 2006

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