Lincoln Statue in Norway Funded/Dedicated by North Dakotans

[Eva Elisabeth]

Seems it's time for a cruise to Oslo...I just found out there is a Lincoln statue in Frogner Park. How exciting to learn! Strangely, I've never heard of this before!
   
I found the following info on this site:
http://history.nd.gov/events/lincolnconnections.html

"In 1914, as part of the 100th anniversary of Norway adopting its constitution and declaring itself an independent nation, a group of Norwegian-Americans in North Dakota collected enough money to erect a statue of Lincoln in Oslo, Norway. The idea for the heroic sized bust of Lincoln was inspired by a similar sculpture North Dakota Governor Louis Hanna had seen on a trip to Gettysburg to attend the 50th anniversary of that battle in July 1913.

A delegation traveled to Norway to present the bust as a gift from the people of North Dakota, with the unveiling taking place on July 4, 1914. The delegation included Governor Hanna, former Grand Forks Herald editor George B. Winship, who sent frequent reports via cablegram to the newspaper, and Smith Stimmel, a Fargo man who had once served as a bodyguard to President Lincoln. A poem was read, entitled Abraham Lincoln, written by North Dakota poet laureate James W. Foley, Jr., and Stimmel delivered a eulogy to the late President. Winship reported in a July 4 cablegram that “the presentation of the statue further cements the friendship between Norway and the United States, and especially North Dakota, about one-third of the population of which is Norwegian.” Governor Hanna's daughter, Dorothy, unveiled the statue, which still stands today in Frogner Park in Oslo. It was accompanied by two engraved bronze tablets. One featured an excerpt from Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and reads “Government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” The other reads, “Presented to Norway by the people of North Dakota, U.S.A., July 4th, 1914.”

During Germany’s occupation of Norway in World War II, the Lincoln bust became the site of silent anti-Nazi protests. Each July 4 beginning in 1940 until the war ended in 1945, Norwegians gathered at the site by the thousands, their heads bowed in silence to pay tribute to the ideals of Lincoln and their bonds with Norwegian Americans. Typically, the Germans forbade any public gatherings or demonstrations, but did not halt this annual event.

The statue was done by 21-year-old Paul Fjelde (pronounced Fell-dee) (1892-1984), an artist living in Valley City who had a long and successful career as a sculptor and was known for his sculptures of famous Norwegian-Americans like Charles A. Lindbergh. Fjelde was selected by a committee chaired by Governor Hanna to create the bust of Lincoln, which was cast in bronze in Chicago. This is the only statue in Oslo’s Frogner Park that is not the work of Norwegian sculptor Gustav Vigeland (1869-1943). A replica of the Lincoln bronze bust is located on the front lawn of the Traill County Courthouse in Hillsboro, where it was dedicated in ceremonies on September 8, 1918. A second bronze replica, now at the Geneseo Historical Museum in Illinois, was originally located at the Union Stockyards in Chicago. When the stockyards closed in 1971, it was moved elsewhere in the state before being purchased by a former resident of Geneseo and donated to the museum in 1998. The original plaster cast of the bust is housed in the Allen Memorial Library at Valley City State University. Fjelde was a student at then-Valley City State Normal School when he created the statue."

Here's another nice article and photo:
http://digitalhorizonsonline.org/cdm4/it...X=1&REC=20