working with horses and scrapers, wheelbarrows and married Eleanor Fraser of St. Thomas Township. They shovels. The Larsons had four more children, Oscar, had one son, Glenn. The Leruds owned their homestead Ludvig, Dora and Theodore (Teddy). Ole Larson died in in St. Thomas Township and two quarters of land across 1896. Lars and Sophie did not long survive the rigors of the road in Farmington Township, Walsh County. After pioneer life; they died in their youth. Annie Larson long retiring from farming, the Arvil Leruds moved to served the community as a mid-wife, attending the births Grafton. of many babies. She lived to be 94. Submitted by Kenneth Colter, 252 W. 12th St Her son, Teddy, 14, took upon himself the burden of Grafton, N. Dak. 58237. the family and the homestead after the death of his father. He enlarged the land holdings to two and a half FAMILY OF HANS H. LYKKEN quarters. He grew with the times and became a prosperous farmer. He married Lou, the daughter of Henry Donnelly. They had two sons, Alton and Lome. Oscar and Ludvig went to Canada to homestead. Dora married Gust Bang and lived in Minnesota. Lena married Andrew Johnson and lived in Grafton. Submitted by Kenneth Colter, 252 W. 12th St., Grafton, N. Dak. 58237. OLE AND ANNA LERUD On the Glomma River in Norway, not far from the border with Sweden, is the small town of Elverum'where Anna Carina Overby and Ole Lerud were born. In their youth they used to watch the logs go tumbling by in the swift current of the mountain stream. They left Norway for America in 1878 where they settled in the Renvil- Sacred Heart community in southwestern Minnesota. There they worked in the harvest fields to earn money to establish their lives in the New World. They were Mr. and Mrs. Hans Lykken. Hans (1858-1940) and Mrs. married in 1879. Hans (Clara Emily Johnson) Lykken (1859-1926). Ole Lerud homesteaded a claim in St. Thomas Hans H. Lykken left Telemarken, Norway, in April, Township where he built a sod house with walls two feet 1873, with his parents, three brothers (one of whom was thick. He returned to Minnesota to get his wife and their married and had three children), and one sister. One first born child, Tilda. They could have traveled by rail to brother, Gilman H. Lykken, had left in 1872. They Grand Forks at which point they embarked upon a Red boarded a ship in Skien, a sailing vessel which was River steamboat and traveled as far as St. Andrews. named the "Nordhavet" and which was making her From there they walked through tall grass up to their maiden voyage. There were 400 people on board. After a shoulders to their sod house on the claim. Anna carried perilous voyage of seven weeks and two days across the her first born child; Ole carried luggage containing their North Sea and the Stormy Atlantic, they landed in possessions. The railroad reached Grafton in 1881 and Quebec in May, 1873. In the harbor of Quebec, there were pushed on to Auburn and points north. hundreds of ships, theirs was said to be the nicest one and Ole Lerud worked on the railroad with a was nicknamed "The Bride" since it had made its first wheelbarrow. With the money he earned, he hired a voyage. neighbor to break up one or two acres of sod with a yoke From Quebec they took a river or channel boat to of oxen and a plow. Ole and his wife planted wheat. At the Milwaukee, Wise; the boat carried everything from time of harvest, Ole saw a man traveling down the people and cattle to cordwood. They remained in railroad a half a mile away with horses drawing a Milwaukee only a short time. reaper. He ran and intercepted the man with the reaper From Milwaukee they boarded a train for Far­ and engaged him to cut his wheat, which they later mington, Minn., where they remained for two or three threshed with flails. They built a frame house in 1891. The years. Then they left for Yellow Medicine County, but child, Tilda, was kicked by a horse and died as a result of stayed there only one summer because of a grasshopper the severe blow. A second child died while an infant from infestation that destroyed their crops. They returned to whooping cough. The two children are buried in the Farmington at the time of the Jesse James bank rob­ Landstad Cemetery located on the Hans Lykken farm a bery. mile south of the Lerud homestead and a half mile east of My father worked on farms near Farmington until Auburn. The Leruds walked to New Sweden, some ten tales of the rich and fertile land in the Red River Valley miles, for their groceries and supplies, before Auburn in Dakota Territory available to settlers under the 1862 was established. Homestead Act, came to his attention. The ambitious The Leruds had seven children, Tilda, born in young man, then 21, left kindred and friends and took the Minnesota, the first Arvil, Alf, Bella, Lena and Edan who train to Grand Forks, where the railroad ended. In were born in the sod house and the second Arvil, the only November, 1879, he walked to the Grafton area in Walsh child born in the frame house. Ole Lerud died in 1895. County and filed for a tree claim in the spring of 1880. He The family bought an International gas tractor and and Martin Holt homesteaded together after building a an Aultman Taylow separator from Hans Gorder who claim shack that stood half on my father's land and half lived south of Grafton. They did custom threshing in the on Martin Holt's land. They disliked living alone and Nash area. Anna Carina Lerud died in 1940. Arvil Lerud wished to share expenses. 65