Oddmund Andersson Vambheim

On a fjord extending back from Bergen, Norway is the small village

of Ulvik in the province of Hardanger.

Ånders Larson Wambheim lived there with his wife Bretta Leone. Of

this union six children were born, Lars the oldest, then John, Anna

Iver, Edmund and Martha. ‘

I, Edmund, the fifth child, born July 18, 1853, was six years old

when I was sent over to my grandparents “Leone” to live and help them

as they were getting old and needed someone to run errands. The older

boys in the family had tried the job and did not stay long, but I got

along fine. I had to do the chores and errands and when I was older I

hauled hay and feed for the cows and looked after them. When I was

thirteen my grandfather died and willed me ten dollars in payment for

the last two years I had worked for him.

I was confirmed the next year and later hired out for a year to an

uncle on my mother’s side, Nus Hakestad. I was about fifteen years

old then and my uncle paid me twenty—five dollars for the year.

01e Howheim who was married to a sister of my father’s had a sloop

and when he went fishing he needed a boy around the packing house to

help and also to go out on the boat once in a while. So I worked for

him two or three months and then had a chance to go out and learn the

carpenter trade, which appealed to me, as I wanted to get into something

that would give me a trade. I went with my sister Anna’s husband and

the two of us worked for a contractor for about two years for twenty-

four cents a day, plus board and room. We also took a job for a man

from Bergen who had a bakery and wanted it remodeled and an addition

built on. We were paid fifty cents a day for that.

I was nearing twenty-one years of age and knew I would be listed

for military- service. So to avoid that I decided I would like to go to

America where my oldest brother John had been for ten years and brother

Iver seven years. I wrote them saying I was planning on going to the

States and my- sister Martha would accompany me. Just at that time they

decided to make a trip home to Ulvik, which they did, and when they were

ready to leave again the four of us left together the latter part of

March, 1875. The fare from Bergen, Norway to New York was about thirty

dollars.

The boat we left on was a small sailing boat having an auxiliary

steam drive. We went by way of England. It took us fourteen days from

Liverpool to New York. There were around four hundred persons to a

compartment on this boat and a hammock was hung for each. A young man

I knew accompanied us. He had had a rough time trying to get out of

Norway. He had stowed away on the boat from home to Bergen as he had

beat up a guy at Ulvik and the police were looking for him.

He wanted to go to America then but did not have enough money and

he had to clear the police in Bergen before he could get passage. I

finally broke down and gave him five or ten doUars. He was the happi

est man I ever saw when we pulled out of Bergen. His ticket only called

for New York and when we arrived there and were about to leave him he

cried and wanted to borrow money to get to Stoten, Wisconsin where he

said he had relatives. I finally broke down again and gave him enough

for hi5 ticket. When we got to Madison, Wisconsin, where we parted, he

gave me his overcoat and a watch for security on the loan. I told him

I would leave them at Lodi, Wisconsin with my Uncle Leone and when he

got enough money he could redeem them. After I had been up in the

Pineree country for about a year, I went back to Lodi and sure enough

he had been back and left the money. I never got to see him again, but

heard he had gone to the eastern part of South akota and taken up a

claim and made good.

Arriving in this country, we went to Lodi, Wisconsin as I mentioned

before, John, Iver and I. John and Iver stayed a couple of days visit

ing and then went up to Weeks ‘ Mill, northwest of Stevens Point. They

had worked there before they went back to Norway, so their jobs were

waiting for them. But as they did not know whether I could get a job

there, I stayed around Lodi to wait for a letter from them. After a

couple of weeks, word came to take the train and come up. They told me

to take the train to Wisconsin Valley Junction and then change to the

train for Nassau and get off at the first station (can’t remember the

name). Not knowing any English I could not read the signs so I had to

memorize Wisconsin Junction so as not to miss it.

In all of the excitement, time seemed to drag on the train and I

was beginning to think I had passed the station. It was pitch dark

outside and I could see nothing out of the window. Finally the train

came to a stop, and just as it was starting up again the Conductor

called out “Valley Junction”. I thought he was calling the stop we had

just left, so I grabbed my satchel and made a run for the door and down

the steps. The train had gotten up some speed, but I made a big jump

into the darkness. It so happened to be a high grade and I landed,

rolling over and over with the satchel still in my hand, down the bank

into a marshy ditch. In the darkness I picked myself up and climbed up

the bank again to the tracks only to find that the train had gone but a

few hundred yards and stopped at the station. The conductor and brake

man came running back towards me, with their lanterns, trying to find

me. I don’t know what they said but they did a lot of talking. At this

crossing there was a hotel, and as the other train was not due until the

next afternoon, I got a room and went to bed.

At the designated station the next day Brother John was there to

meet me. We had to walk out to the Weeks’ Mill which was nearly ten

miles. John had gotten me a job to build a house for a man by the name

of Campbell, who lived ten miles west of the Mill. Campbell had bought

his lumber from Weeks, but could get no one to put it together. The

next day he came with his oxen to pick me up and to get more lumber.

The trip back was through dense virgin forest. Campbell was a Pennsyl

vania Yankee and was a grand man. His wife was a good cook and I

enjoyed staying with them and liked the job very much. They had a lot

of fun trying to teach me English. All we went by to begin with was

signs, but made out just fine. I believe Campbell paid me two dollars

a day with board and room. When the job was finished, I went in to the

Mill to see the boys, but Iver had gone to Iowa. He had been running

the rotary saw, but somehow they had replaced him with another man, so

he quit rather than take another job. John was also ready to leave the

mill, but instead of going to Iowa, he had another job to finish a house

for a widow and her daughter, who were Irish. The house was partly

built, so we went out and finished it. They were very nice people and

both the mother and daughter were very much in love with John. The

mother tried her best to soften up old John, but he couldn’t see it.

After that job was done, John went back to Weeks’ Mill and I got

a job to finish a log house for a fellow about ten miles away. I was

to get two dollars per day with room and board, but the board was ter

rible. The woman baked bread as hard as rocks. She gave us lots of

beans and burned coffee and as it was in the fall of the year, she gave

me roasted corn three times a day until finally I caine down with

dysentery. I had the house far enough along so the family could move

in, so I told them I was going to quit. The man got mad and would not

pay me and as he would not take my tools back to the mill for me, I had

to go over to a man who lived about two miles away and bargain with him

to take me and my tools back to Campbell’s place, which he did in a few

days. I walked back to the mill about twenty miles and stayed there

for a couple of days, when the man came in and paid me in full.

Campbell came in about that time and had a deal on to trade his

oxen for a pair of horses, but had no cash. So he asked me if I could

help him out, which I was glad to do, without a note or security of any

kind. In a few months he came in and paid me in full with interest and

a bonus.

Weeks then put me to work building a store, with four rooms above

for living quarters, and as soon as it was finished, John and I had one

of the rooms and they kept it up for us, changing and cleaning it up

every Sunday. I was now getting 2.5O per day. After I finished the

store, I wanted to go out to Washington as one of my chums from Norway

by the name of Nels Haweheim, who lived near Stanwood and was doing

quite well, had written me to come out. But when Weeks heard I was

quitting he said, “Is it more money you waritV’ When I told him the

reason, he said he would give me fifty cents more a day if I would stay.

So I got soft and stayed.

About two years after I went to Weeks’ Mill, Weeks asked me one

day to make a bull saw. It was a large saw they used for cut-off pur

poses. I was to make the frame out of some heavy timbers like 6xS. I

was cutting up one of the pieces and found that it was too wide, so I

proceeded to rip it down to size. The piece was several feet long,

maybe eight feet, and the saw I was using was not large enough to make

it in one cut. I thought I would make the one cut, then turn it over

and make the other. As it came to the end of the piece, the saw let go

and the timber overbalanced, tipping up. My hand slipped off and down

on the turning saw, cutting off my entire thumb. I grabbed my left

wrist with my right hand to stop the flow of blood and then walked up to

the house where Mr. Weeks’ daughter was, who had had some experience in

first aid. She got a small rock and tied it on the artery up near the

elbow. This did not stop the bleeding entirely. They got a pair of

horses and a sort of wagon that had two seats on it, and with Brother

John and Weeks we started for Stevens Point thirty miles away. The

first eight miles was nothing more than a trail so it was slow going,

but we finally made it. I had lost a lot of blood and the blanket they

gave me to cover up with was badly covered with it. The only doctor in

Stevens Point was an old army doctor who had retired and did not have

much to work with. He had no anesthetic to give me, but put me on a

bed and was going to cover up my face so I could not see what he was

doing, but I told him I could stand it. First he had to find the main

artery that had been cut, and when he did, he had to pull it out so he

could tie it up. That really hurt, but the rest of the operation was

not so bad.

I stayed in Stevens Point for two weeks and my hand healed fast.

In the meantime, I went down to Lodi for a visit, then went back to the

mill and on the job again.

On my many trips to Lodi I had become acquainted with the Moses

Johnson family that was farming just out of Lodi. He had a lot of girls

and they were all very popular. )&y interest turned to Bergetta, and in

the fall of lS7S we were married and moved to Northwood, Iowa. Brother

Iver was working in this town in a wagon works factory. I aleo got a

job there. It was in this town that I became acquainted with so many

Norwegians who came from the same place in Norway as I did.

In the fall of lS79, Haldor and Per Sponheim had gone up to the

Goose River country in North Dakota and taken up some land and everyone

was talking about going west. I made up my mind to go too and as I had

heard that my good friend, Mike Hylden, was going, I sent word down to

St. Ansker to ask if he had any extra room in his emigrant car for my

cow and some furniture. It was agreeable to him, so we made our plans

to go the next spring.

Sister Martha, who was working just across the Minnesota line,

heard about our going and she decided to go too. We loaded the car

with machinery, feed, tools and a pair of horses and a cow which be

longed to Mike. He went with the car, while his wife Breta and my

sister Martha and ¡ny wife Bergetta and our first baby Matild and I went

by passenger train. It was a mixed train, some freight cars.

We had planned to go to Grafton, North Dakota as the Torblaas’ were

already there and we understood there was land available to the west of

them up near Park River.

This was the spring of lO when we arrived in Grand Forks and

unloaded the car along side of the tracks and took the horses and hitched

them to the wagon, loaded the wagon with what provisions we needed and

tied the cows behind and with the rest of us on top, we started out.

The snow was mostly gone, but when we got north of Grand Forks to

the First River, they used to call it Turtle River, we stayed over night.

From there on was a lot of snow, but somehow we managed to borrow a sled

so we made it up to Torblaas the next day. The following day I walked

to a settler’s place to see if he knew where there were accommodations.

It so happened that across from his place there was a log house put up

by Gunder Midgarden who had gone away for the winter and had not returned.

So we thought we might as well take over until we could get settled on

our own places. This Midgarden cabin had a log floor, and as the snow

was melting rapidly, due to a recent chinook, everything was about under

water. We could not step out of the house d.thout wading in knee—deep

water. The poor cow had found a small straw stack that was little more

than a manure pile close by at Ljones’ place, and she could stand on

that and be above the water, but had nothing to eat. Ljones told me a

man to the east had put up some hay in cocks in the fall, but had never

done anything with them. He told me to take the cow down there, which

I did and it did make good forage. I had to go back and forth every

day wading in the water.

Due to the soft ground, we could not take a team and wagon back to

Grand Forks to get our feed and machinery. We left our familes in the

log house and Michael and I started out on foot. The i.šlking was bad

as we had to wade in the mud and water all day. Mike had high boots on,

but these filled up with water as quite often we had to wade through

places that were knee deep. This made quite a load for him, while I

just had ordinary shoes, and got along better.

We made Christiana the first day. We tried to wash the dirt out

of our sox, but the water was so full of gumbo that I gave up and put

them back on and went into the vacant cabin there and lay down on the

floor. The next day we made it into Grand Forks, which was about six

teen miles. As I had had some experience in the use of river barges,

we decided to float our equipment down the Red River to Acton. We made

two rafts out of twelve-inch boards, twelve feet wide and the same in

length, with twelve-inch sides. These I caulked and pitched so they

were fairly tight. At least we could keep them bailed out. These we

built on the banks of the river, and when they were completed, several

men, who had been watching us, helped us put them in the water. The

tops of the rafts had only loose boards on which we piled the five wagon

loads of provisions and machinery. It was rather a big load, but we

managed to get it all on, including a lot of oat sacks that Mike had

taken along. We had bought many provisions with what money we had, so

we only had about a dollar and twenty-five cents between us. We had

been told that it would only take a day and a night to make Acton, our

destination.

On Sunday evening we were all set and with a box of •crackers and

some cheese we set out, steering the raft down the middle of the stream

by some improvised oars. Everything went fine but it was a pitch black

night and the river banks were heavily wooded so all we could see was

straight up. About midnight a cloud came up and how it did thunder and

lightning,then rain. It came down in big drops and soon we were all

wet and sleepy. We spied a cabin on the bank by the light of the light

ning flash so we headed our raft for the bank, tied up and bailed out

the water. The cabin was empty so we tried to build a fire to dry out

and then get some sleep, but the wood was so wet all we got was smoke.

We thought we might as well go on, but as we were so sleepy we finally

made a bed out of the oat sacks. A canvas from the machine binder

served as a cover to keep the rain from pelting in our faces, for by this

time we had left the cabin and used the raft. One of us kept the raft

in midstream while the other slept. At dawn we sighted another house

and thought we were nearing Acton. We stopped and walked up the bank.

A lady came to the door and we inquired about something to eat, but she

said she had nothing. We finally got her to sell us a loaf of bread,

which we went away eating dry.

The next night we were passed by a river steamer which came near to

being a disaster. We knew that the waves would wash overboard and swamp

the raft. To avoid this, we steered for land and then used boards held

on the wave side to stop it from coming over. By this method we saved

At the end of the second day we Sighted Acton and pulled into shore

about a mile below the dock where there was a cabin On the bank and the

bank was not as steep as at the dock. After tiei.ng up and bailing out

again we walked up to Ato. The town had two lodging houses. We passed

up the first one, but went to the second and inquired about something to

eat, as it was after dinner time. We were told they would fix us some

thing, so we sat down. All they brought u a few doughnuts and some

bread and coffee. We had not had anything to eat for twenty-four hours

and were very hungry. We ate that, then demanded more, but to no avail.

They said they had no more, so we refused to pay fifty cents each for

the meal. We were going to leave for the other lodging house, but the

proprietor, a big Irishman, jumped from behind his counter and pulled

his gun on us which changed our minds. So we paid him. This took all

of our money and we were still hungry.

We went back to the raft, tired and hungry but decided we had

better unload and get on our way. We piled all of the machinery and

supplies alongside the empty cabin on the bank. When this was done, we

started to walk west to Torblaas’ place, and after we had covered about

five miles we were too tired and hungry to go any farther. Just then a

dog started to bark, so we walked toward him and found the cabin; but

the dog would not let us near the building. After some time the owner

came to the window and wanted to know what we wanted. We pleaded for

something to eat and told him we were broke. He called to his daughter,

who was sleeping in the attic above. She said there was only a pan of

sour milk and some bread. The pan of sour milk was set before us and

the man started to cut the bread. The race was on--we ate bread as fast

as he could cut it and drank the sour milk. We both agreed we had never

tasted anything better. While we were satisfying our hunger, the owner

came over close to me and took a good look, inquiring if I had been in

Grand Forks last Sunday, building a raft. Then I remembered that he had

been sitting on the bank of the river, watching me while he was waiting

for the boat to take him down the river. We thanked and blessed the man

as we felt so good after getting the food.

We started out again on our journey, but we were so tired and

sleepy that we decided to use the man’s haystack, which we had noticed

‘when we approached his place. We felt that if we could just get a little

sleep we could go But his dog kept barking, so we had to move on

and come back when the dog had gone to sleep. As we walked farther on,

we came to another haystack, which was surrounded a regular lake of

water, but we waded out to it and climbed up on top and dug in. It was

nice and warm and we were SOOn fast asleep. We had gorged ourselves on

the sour milk and bread and we will never forget what a stomachache it

gave us that night.

Our next move was to find some land for our future homes. We spent

a day walking up north of the river and to the west, but that section

was fairly well taken up. The next day, Ljone took us in his wagon,

south and west. We found several pieces of land down near the present

town of Vesteville, but Li one talked US out of it, saying it was too

sandy. He told us to put some of the dirt in our mouths and chew it--

that was the y to tell. We had heard that out by Devils Lake there

was a lot of land to be had, Mike and i walked out there, taking some

food with us this time. The first day we followed the river west and by

nightfall came to what the north end of Golden Valley and to the home of

of John Saul. We stayed there that night and in the morning we could

see a forest of trees to the south, so we thought we should look it. over.

We came up to Christianson’s place. He was clearing and fixing up

a saw mill. From there we went down to where Borgeson now lives. He

was digging himself a cabin in the side of the river bank. Ramsey-s had

built a cabin to the south. We decided to give up the idea of getting

some timber land but were satisfied with the valley. We started going

back north to Peter Johnson’s place. The old people had a very- small

cabin and suggested we go over to John Pederson’s place to the west,

which we did. He had a fairly large cabin, partly built under ground.

It was almost like coming home for they had come from the same place in

Norway as we did. An enjoyable evening was spent with them. They let

us sleep on the floor. However, we did not sleep much, as the bugs were

bad. When dawn came, I nudged Mike and whispered, “Let’s go.” We slid

out without waking them, starting east. We got up on the hills over

looking the valley and immediately stopped to strip off all of our clothes

and give the few bugs that were left the air, at least we never felt

them after that.

Having decided to build in the valley, near Park River, we had to

go back to Acton for our supplies. It had been several weeks since un

loading our goods there, but when we arrived back there we were very

much surprised when we found all of our belongings intact. Nothing had

been touched since we left them.

I hired a. man, by the name of Jorgenson, who had a pair of oxen to

haul mine. While in Acton that day, we stopped at the Acton Hotel--the

one we had passed up on our first visit——and who should I see in the

barroom but the man who had given us the sour milk and bread. This was

our chance to repay him for his hospitality and food. As he was a German and liked beer, we saw to it that he had his fill that day.

On our way back to the valley, just east of Grafton, there was a

large slough that we had to cross and when we got about to the middle of

it, we got stuck fast and I had to go for help while Mike and Jorgenson

carried the lighter things across. There was a man a short distance

away who we learned had helped many a man out of the slough. He was

very willing to help us, so in a short time we were on our way- again and

he would not take any money for it. In after years he ran for a county

office and I was more than glad to campaign for him.

When we got our supplies to our land, we helped each other to build

our crude log and sod homes. We were anxious to get them livable so we

could get our families and be able to build and plan for the future.

Not too many years later we built a substantial home on this place

in the valley and reared our eight children, Matilda, Andrew, Iver, Lars,

Johanna, Johnnie, Eddie and Martha.

Originally our name was spelled Wambheim, but when I arrived at

Island, not being able to speak English, the Immigration Officer

made out the passport with my name spelled Wambem, which I accepted and

never changed.

My father died in Ulvik, Norway, our old home, at the age

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