Exploring American Histories: Printed Page 477

Document 15.4

Gro Svendsen | Letter from a Homesteader, 1863

Many of the settlers who moved to Minnesota and the Dakotas migrated from northern Europe. Most did not speak English, left behind family members, and experienced geographical and emotional isolation. Women played a significant role in running farms, as shown in the following letter that Gro Svendsen wrote to her family in Norway about her life as a homesteader in Minnesota in 1863. Svendsen offers a typical account of the challenges many settlers faced.

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Source: Gro Svendsen, Frontier Mother: The Letters of Gro Svendsen, ed. Pauline Farseth and Theodore Blegen (Northfield, MN: Norwegian-American Historical Association, 1950), 39–40.

  • Question

    What emotions does Svendsen express about her life in America?

  • Question

    What differences between life in Norway and life on the Great Plains does this letter indicate?

  • Question

    Why would Svendsen’s relatives think she might be exaggerating?

Put It in Context

Question

What particular challenges did homesteaders who emigrated from other countries face?