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The Danish Immigrant Experience In The Fiction Of Enok Mortensen, Rudolf J. Jensen

The Bridge

Here are several short quotations from Enok Mortensen 's fiction for the purpose of showing its primary themes: " . .. for you emigrants, nothing is ever as good as it was in Denmark . .. you always have to compare . .. Over here one always possesses a peculiar unrest-only another hundred dollars, a thousand, or a million dollars more. In the old country everything was ordered and secure . .. Sons followed in the footsteps of their fathers, but as a rule they didn't get any farther either . .. Here in America it was the Golden Chance …

Enok Mortensen As Preacher, Thorvald Hansen

The Bridge

Unless one were aware of it, one would not be likely to guess that Enok Mortensen was an immigrant. Even when one was aware of it, one tended to forget the fact. In his speaking and in his writing, Mortensen did not portray the usual marks of a Danish immigrant. His pronunciation of English was flawless and he was no stranger to English grammar. He was as much at home in one language as the other and he was as much a part of America as he was of his native Denmark.

Danebod Fall Meeting, Elsie S. Hansen

The Bridge

In 1943 when Enok Mortensen and his family arrived in Tyler, Minnesota, to begin his pastorate at Danebod Lutheran Church, they were greeted by a severe blizzard which prevented them from moving into the parsonage for several days. The parsonage, located across from the church, had been redecorated, cleaned, insulated and made ready for their occupancy and soon they were comfortably ensconced. This was to be their home for almost 18 years.

Danebod Family Recreation Camps, Otto G. Hoiberg

The Bridge

"The family that plays together , stays together !" Implied conversely in this generalization , one finds at least a partial explanation of the troubled waters presently navigated by the family in America. Whereas in years gone by , much recreational activity was enjoyed jointly by the various members of a family , in this day and age each member tends to go his own way to satisfy his leisure time needs and desires. After the dinner hour , Dad has a bowling engagement , Mom goes to a meeting of her Study Club , Susie heads for a Girl …

Enok Mortensen And Askov, Hans Henningsen

The Bridge

The connection between Enok Mortensen and Askov Folk High School in Denmark came about accidentally, as it were, in the middle of the 1950s. The background was that rector Knud Hansen made some critical remarks, in an interview, about the United States and American foreign policy. This caused a great to-do in the press, so much so that the American ambassador decided to visit Askov Folk High School to judge for himself whether it were possible that Askov had "gone communist." Shortly thereafter Knud Hansen received an official invitation to spend three months in the United States. The visit, which …

Enok Mortensen As Archivist, Thorvald Hansen

The Bridge

One cannot say with any degree of finality why Enok Mortensen became the historian and archivist of the Danish, later the American Evangelical Lutheran Church. This much, however, is obvious--he was interested in it. Only a genuine interest could have caused him to work diligently at it for a long period of time and to write the history of the church with which he had become intimately familiar. The records do not indicate that he received any monetary reward for his efforts, nor that he sought any. He hoped that others would share his interest and do whatever was in …

Enok Mortensen And The Danes Worldwide Archives, Inger Bladt

The Bridge

Enok Mortensen, whose death was a loss not only for the Danish community in America but also for Denmark, was one of the last of Denmark's sons to have intimate connections to immigrant activities at the beginning of the century, for he spent his life in a close bond with the Danish American colony.

Enok Mortensen And The History Of Danish Immigration To America, Eric Helmer Pedersen

The Bridge

Enok Mortensen is probably best known in Denmark through his activity as a guest lecturer at Askov Folk High School in the 1960s and 1970s. Within the confines of a small group of Danes with friends and family in America he also had a name as a writer of fiction. It is true that his first work Mit Folk (1932), a collection of short stories, was published in Askov, Minnesota, but his next, the novel Saledes blev jeg hjeml0s (1934) was published in Holb

Enok Mortensen As A Danish-American, Erling Duus

The Bridge

Many years ago, Enok Mortensen wrote about the impact of the first singing of Kristian 0stergaard' s "Bag B0lgende Have" 1at a meeting at Nysted Folk School. For the first time, Danish-Americans had a song which moved beyond nostalgia to affirmation. It filled a need which had become powerful. It gave expression to the fact that the kind of rich cultural and spiritually generative Danishness which came to flower in the Grundtvigian movement had become implanted in the spaciousness of the plains and the prairies, and was transformed in this liberating new environment. This article 2 was characteristic of the …

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Saviours And Savages: An Italian View Of The Nineteenth-Century Maori World, Hazel Riseborough

Pacific Studies

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He Came, He Saw, He Conquered, Aase Bak

The Bridge

Every morning when President Reagan leaves the White House and casts worried glances to the left toward Capitol Hill where Congress sits and impedes life for him, he can hardly avoid seeing the equestrian statue in front of the Treasury Building. The statue is one of the great heroes of the United States, a victor from the Civil War, General William Tecumseh Sherman. He is shown mounted and surrounded by symbols of war and peace.

Christmas Letter To My Daughter In Denmark, Cynthia Norris Graae

The Bridge

Twenty years ago, when I was a student (from the USA) at Someroille College, Oxford, a Danish student at Someroille invited me to her home for Christmas. My father had visited Denmark when he was fifteen, and the next year was a host to a Danish student at his home in Portland, Maine. I'd grown up with stories about his trip and his Danish guest, and I gladly accepted this invitation. Recently, my fifteen year old daugh- r ter spent a school year in Denmark. She lived with a family and studied at a Danish-speaking school, although she spoke almost …

Book Reviews

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Sketches Of My Life, Karl Larsen

The Bridge

There will be a Christmas greeting card on the drawing board in Danish-born artist Karl Larsen's Detroit studio this fall, just as there has been every year since 1932 when he began the tradition. But today , at age 97, his Christmas list has grown to between 400 and 500 names and it takes longer to address and stamp all the specially designed cards than it does to make the original.

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Right Place, Right Time: The William S. Knudsen Story, Robert Vanderkloot

The Bridge

"You talk funny." The little boy stood awkwardly, the peak of his cap pointed sideways, looking up at the tall, thin young man seated on the top step of the main entrance to the eight-story apartment building which covered the entire block at 152nd Street and Eighth Avenue.

Ua35/11 Student Honors Research Bulletin, Wku Honors Program

WKU Administration Documents

The WKU Student Honors Research Bulletin is dedicated to scholarly involvement and student research. These papers are representative of work done by students from throughout the university.

• Padilla, Anne. First and Second Language Acquisition: A Comparison
• Scott, Angela. Salted and Unsalted Snacks: Taste Preferences of Second Grade Students in a Rural Area School
• Fuqua, Nancy. Acceptance by High School Students of Muffins Containing Supplemental Soy Polysaccharides
• Mans, Glee. Preference Levels of High School Freshmen for Four Cheese Food Products
• Denney, Pam. Consumer Acceptance of UHT Choclate Lowfat Milk
• Harris, Carla. Jacques-Louis David: Raphael of the Sansculottes
• Vaughn, James. Corporate Reorganization …

Front Cover

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The Danish Immigrant, Signe Nielsen Betsinger

The Bridge

In 1979 I had the opportunity to travel with a group to China where I had the good fortune to visit Tachai, a model agricultural commune. Up until the mid-1940s, generations of the inhabitants in this area had been impoverished. They had lived in caves in hills. Their crops had been destroyed over and over by drought, flooding, insects, and hailstorms. In 1945 land reform was insituted and the peasants set up the first mutual aid team in China. By 1953 they had a ten-year plan for reclaiming the land and building new homes. Just when the plan was finished …

Reflections On Denmark As It Was, And Emigration To America, Arlow W. Andersen

The Bridge

In the late medieval and modern periods the histories of Denmark and Norway paralleled each other. During much of that interval the Union of Kalmar (1397-1523), which included also a dynastic tie with Sweden, practically insured common political, economic, and religious development. On the threshold of the modern age Sweden broke away from the Union (1523), but Norway was obliged to remain under Danish rule until 1814.

Contents

The Bridge

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The Grass Is Always Greener On The Other Side Of The Fence .... About The Early Life Of Peter Lassen, Rene Weybye Lassen

The Bridge

Years ago, when I was a young boy, I remember my grandmother was telling about her grand-uncle. His name was Peter and he went to America many years before she was born. Just being a schoolboy at that time, I didn't pay much attention to what she was talking about. For me it was just the talk of old people, about their old folks, who were not alive any more. That couldn't really fascinate a twelve year old boy. Today I know I should have been listening with much more interest. One thing is for sure, however; I remember she …

Table Talk, L. C. Laursen

The Bridge

Table Talk was prepared for the wedding of Margaret Hansen and Harvey Phillip of Enumclaw, Washington, at which L. C. Laursen was to have officiated. Laursen's sudden illness, an illness from which he did not recover, precluded him from delivering the talk. Table Talk comes from a Notebook Laursen presented to Margaret and Harvey Phillip, which was shown to Ruth and Ove Nielsen. They thought it deserved a wider readership and received permission from Betty Miller, daughter of L. C. Laursen, and Mr. and Mrs. Phillip to submit it for publication in The Bridge.