Page:History of Goodhue County, Minnesota.djvu/480

 406 HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY hue county, to the congregations of Land and Minneola. The year before the crops of the Northwest were a failure, and Good- hue, with the rest of the counties of this section, were suffering from that failure. With his parishioners, he set to work with a will, enlarging his congregations, establishing schools, forming missions and other societies in connection with the church. He taught the young and the old, visited the sick, assisted the poor and buried the dead. Reverend Biorn was one of the leaders of the Anti-Missourians in the great predestination controversy, and when, after the division of the synod, the United Church was organized ou1 of three Norwegian Lutheran denominations, Rev- erend Biorn became the vice-president of the new body. The North, in 1893, said: "Reverend Biorn has a frank, honest, pre- possessing face. He is a thoroughbred gentleman, a popular preacher, an able writer, and, last but not least, there is a vein of true poetry in his psychical makeup, which has found expres- sion in a number of poems, two or three of which are gems of their kind.*' Reverend Biorn died June 14, 1908, and a grave in Land's church cemetery marks the resting place of his body, but his life still lives, and will continue to live as long as those who knew him live. The result of his labor will live much longer. He was first married to Bollette Fleisher, who died in September, 1881. In 1884 he married Mathilda Johnson, of Wittenburg, Wis. Eleven children survive: Ragnar Biorn, of Minot, No. Dak.; Mrs. Anna Foxen, residing in Norway; Herman, a practicing attorney at St. Paid ; Nels, a physician of Ada, Minn. ; Mrs. Mellby, wife of Professor Mellby, of Northfield ; Sigurd, Aimar, Valborg, Harold, Nina, and Inga, of Zumbrota. Dale Congregation was organized in 1856 or 1857 by the Rev. P. A. Rasmussen, of Lisbon, 111. The church is located in Cherry Grove township. Rev. Fjelstad is the pastor. Vang's Congregation consists of Norwegian farmers who believe in the faith professed by Luther, and who reside in the north of Holden and south of Warsaw. Until 1862 the farmers in that vicinity had no public place of worship, and the log cabins of the farmers had to be used; but in 1862 the farmers in that vicinity organized as a "Sogn," and commenced building a small church. The church was completed in the fall of 1867. and dedi- cated October 18, the following year. It was located one mile south of the town line between Warsaw and Holden, and at the southwest corner of section 4, of Holden. The congregation was not at that time incorporated, and was largely controlled by the Holden congregations, and Rev. B. J. Muus served them all as their minister. They, however, adopted a separate name, and called themselves the Vangs congregation. The word Vangs means in English a wing, and is used here because most of its members