A Boy from Wannaska: Growing Up in Northern Minnesota, 1915-1945 (Voices from History)

True stories of the real Norwegian bachelor farmers and their Danish neighbors. A Boy from Wannaska shines light on a northern Minnesota farming community, where first-generation Scandinavian immigrants built new lives in modern America at the turn of the century. This memoir includes details of farming and household practices, plus hilarious stories of backwoods farmers in a new environment: learning to drive, hunting moose, building new social institutions—and competitive potlucks at the local Lutheran Church, made up of “37 souls and 7 Danes.” Marjorie Wright Mortensen collected the heritage of tales told among the children and grandchildren of Scandinavian immigrants in Roseau County. The text includes historic photos, recipes, and an appendix with genealogy of the Danish forebears and American descendants of Jens and Ellen Mortensen, who immigrated from Odense County, Denmark in 1889.