816 Vesterheim; Atlas Obscura Curiosities; Lessons Learned

0:00It was a brave group of Norwegian pioneers that started an emigration boom and planted roots in the American Midwest. The head of the Westerheim Museum in Iowa reminds us of their influence. There are people walking around today who are descendants of those original, what they call the sloopers. Coming up, we're honoring 200 years of Norwegian culture in America. You can travel far or just look around closer to home to find delightful oddities in the Atlas Obscura Cabinet of Curiosities. Wherever you're looking, the weird things in the world are both, you know, a block from you and 1 ,000 miles away from you.

0:37wherever you are. Be sure to have a few things on hand to promise you friendship, good luck, and to greet the New Year like they do in Scotland. You have to have a piece of black coal, a wee piece of cake, and a wee bottle of whiskey. And tell us what lessons you've learned from your travels. Come along for the hour ahead. It's Travel with Rick Steves.

1:00So what have your travels taught you about life? I'm Rick Steves. We'll check in with you, our listeners, in the hour ahead to hear what you've been up to. We'll also look at some curious, one-of-a-kind sites to visit recommended by our friends at Atlas Obscura. And we'll remind you of the time-tested traditions they practice in Edinburgh to usher in the new year on the right note. But let's start today's travel with Rick Steves with a historical celebration that's dear to my heart. I'll never forget finding my great-grandfather's name on the Ellis Island Ship Registry. He was one of nearly a million Norwegians to emigrate into the United States.

1:39This year, we've been celebrating the 200th anniversary of those first Norwegian pioneers. Chris Johnson is president of the National Norwegian American Museum in Dakara, Iowa, also known as Vesterheim. Chris, welcome. Rick, it's a pleasure to be here with you today. You know, tell us, first of all, before we get into the celebration of the 200th anniversary, tell us a little bit about what is Vesterheim. Well, Vesterheim is a couple of different things, one of which is it's a museum. It's a museum that has about 33 ,000 objects. It's the largest collection you're going to find anywhere here in North America related to the Norwegian immigrant experience.

2:19experience it's also a folk art school where we teach classes on a regular basis both in person and online of different handcrafts whether it be wood carving or maybe weaving painting using the techniques called rosemaling metalworking and a host of other classes as well we also and we're not trying to compete with you rick we do tours to norway as well where we we specialize in the folk art experience and talking about the immigrant experience with a lot of our tour groups. We also produce a publication that comes out twice a year where we delve into other topics of Norwegian-American history.

3:01This must be an interesting challenge as our world becomes more and more homogenous and more and more mobile, is protecting the heritage of a culture and keeping it alive. And I find it fascinating that for a lot of immigrant communities, If somebody from the old country came here, they'd find that certain dimensions of their culture are actually more old-fashioned and traditional in the new land than in the old land. Is there anything to that? That's exactly the case. I think of Norway and Norwegians, Americans in the United States, as twins separated at birth. There's about an equal number of Norwegians as there are people of Norwegian ancestry living here in the United States, around 5 million or so on either side of the Atlantic.

3:44and the people that are here in the United States, many of those folks still use words and phrases that maybe are sort of 19th century in a way compared to Norwegians today. So Norway has obviously come into the 21st century as is the United States, but some of the things that we hold dear here as far as Norwegian Americans, like you described, some of them are back from the immigrant period. The big news for me, as far as I can understand it, in your work is this 200th anniversary of Norwegian immigration in the U.S. It's an exhibit that's running the rest of this year through January of 2026, right?

4:24That's correct. Tell us, in a nutshell, what would we find if we go to Dekoron and want to see that exhibit? This exhibit looks at that 200-year anniversary, not necessarily in a chronological way, but rather thematically. So it looks at, for example, how Norwegians impacted effects like the U.S. Civil War, how it affected higher education, different groups that were organized here in the United States as a result of Norwegian immigration. So it explores a number of different themes. Let's just dive right into this amazing historical event. What was life like in Norway, and what would drive a group of people to risk everything to cross the Atlantic and settle in this new world?

5:11Well, in 1825, Norway was a lot different place than it is today. You know, we think of Norway today as a place that's highly advanced Western culture, wonderful health care, education, a great social structure. In Norway at that time, this is a place that is still actually under the somewhat rule by Sweden. They have a lot of their autonomy for local affairs, but I guess what I would say as far as international affairs, they're still connected with Sweden, but they have a strong Norwegian identity, these people. I guess you could say life was so tough that in the toughest corners, people fled for a better life.

5:54They did. They did. There was not only for reasons of economics, but also, for example, with the story of the Sloopers, that group in 1825, this was because of religion. This was a group of individuals, primarily Quakers, who made the voyage across the Atlantic. And the State Church of Norway was not Quakerism. And so these folks decided they were going to come to the United States to start a new life over here. But for many people in the subsequent years, a lot of it was economics why they came here. Let's talk about the voyage itself. Okay, the ship was called Restoration. And what was the vessel like?

6:33How many people were on it? How long did the trip take? So the ship was, it was something that the group decided they were going to make this voyage. So they purchased a vessel. They refurbished it, outfitted it, and then decided to make the trip. They left Stavanger on the 4th of July in 1825, and it was a voyage that took approximately three months to get to the United States. Three months? Three months. I mean, it's not like they stopped in Iceland for a little hike. They were just waiting for the wind to blow them to Boston. This is one thing that's illuminating about this is the voyage they took.

7:10It was not a direct route from Stavanger, you know, through the North Sea, across, you know, past Iceland and Greenland. But instead, they went down along the coast of England through the English Channel, down along the coast of France, Spain, eventually along the West African coast and then across to Brazil. Chris, is that because they were following the wind patterns? The trade winds, the ocean currents, exactly. Not because they wanted to see the Azores, but they just had to go that way because the wind was dictating how they go. Exactly, yep. Chris Johnson is helping us celebrate the 200th anniversary of Norwegian emigration to the U.S.

7:47right now on Travel with Rick Steves. Chris is the president of Westerheim, the National Norwegian-American Museum in Dekera, Iowa. Their bicentennial exhibit runs through January 31st. They also feature historic and contemporary folk art, plus the furnishings, tools, houses, and art from early settlers. And they offer folk art classes online and in person. Their website is westerheim.org, spelled V-E-S-T-E-R-H-E-I-M. And people were huddled on these boats for a long time, even just 100 years ago. It was a tough sailing for a lot of people. And these were poor people, generally. Right. One thing that was sort of amazing about this voyage was they left Stavanger with 52 people.

8:32and when they arrived in New York in October, there were 53 people. A baby had been born along the way. The first Norwegians that sailed from Stavanger to the United States, and they grew in population by 2 % in that three months. Exactly, yeah. But you're right about, you know, some of the immigrant vessels later on. You have stories of, you know, disease, exploitation, things like that that occurred. I mean, these are storylines that are similar to what you read about some days today with people making voyages like this. I would imagine there's literally nothing left physically from that first voyage.

9:09Are there any artifacts at all that survive that to this day? We have a few. We have a few objects in our own collection here. We also have, of course, the memories of those people. There are people walking around today who are descendants of those original, what they call the Sloopers. and they have a group that meets usually once a year down in Illinois, and they celebrate the fact that they are descendants of this original group of, you know, 53 Norwegians who made it across. So tell us just the 53 come to the United States. They end up, where do they end up? And then give us a quick swing through the story of the Norwegian community in the last 200 years.

9:53Sure. They made it to the United States. One of the first problems they encountered, of course, was if you think about the voyage over here, they were actually overloaded, their boat. There was too many people for that size of vessel. And so they got into some legal trouble when they got over here. That was eventually settled, but they made it up to upstate New York. That was where they had identified a settlement to begin their time here in the United States. They only stayed there for a brief period of time, and then many of them moved further west into Illinois. and settled in that area. But then if you look at a hundred year period between 1825 and 1925, you see these successive waves of Norwegian immigration coming through, kind of leapfrogging across the country.

10:40So, you know, from Illinois, you have people then going into Wisconsin, you have people going into Minnesota, Iowa, the Dakotas out to the West Coast. So by the time 1925 rolls around, about a third of Norway's population had made the decision to come to North America. Meaning times were tough in Norway, I think. Whenever we look at immigration, I think it's interesting to psychoanalyze that immigration. Why do we... There's a huge Italian community in our country. Where are they from? Well, from southern Italy, because that was the poorest part of Italy and Sicily. A lot of the clichés that we think about Italy are really unrecognizable in Bologna and Milano, but they're what's all about the poor part of Italy.

11:20The middle of Sweden, that's where you have the Immigration Museum at Vecsiu. and they lost more people per capita than almost any place in Europe because times were so difficult in the middle of Sweden. And the same with Norway. It would have been the poor people, I think, that were driven out of there. Exactly, yeah. That's my own family history. They were people that were from more rural parts of Norway that made it here to the Midwest. Now, they must have had some dreams about the land of plenty and friendly and easygoing neighbors and a delightful climate and quick social mobility. Did all those little utopian dreams pan out?

11:56Not in every case. I mean, in some cases it did. I mean, there was some opportunities for people where certainly from the standpoint, if you came over here to farm, there was much better farmland opportunities in this part of the world. But for many Norwegians who came over here, a significant portion of them decided to go back to Norway, either because, for example, maybe they had eventually inherited the family farm or they felt like they needed to get back home and they didn't like the conditions here. It wasn't 100 % of them stayed. There was a significant amount who decided to go back. Chris, it was such an inspiration for me to be in Decorah and going to this museum, especially with the wonderful opportunity I had to walk with you through this.

12:39And it's so great to have you on this program to remind our listeners of this wonderful parallel evolution culturally of the old world and the new world and how we can be mindful of that, we can support it, and we can enjoy taking advantage of it by visiting it. Best wishes with your work at Westerheim. Thank you, Rick. It was a pleasure talking to you, and best wishes with your future endeavors as well.

13:08Westerheim's 200th anniversary exhibit runs through the end of January. In just a bit, we'll connect with listeners to hear what you've learned from your travels. But first, the co-founder of Atlas Obscura recommends uncanny places you can visit to add a delightfully peculiar twist to your next trip. You're listening to Travel with Rick Steves.

13:31It started out as an online collection of bizarre and obscure places and things all around the world. Now, Atlas Obscura is also a series of best-selling books and a growing community of people whose curiosity about the world sparks opportunities to explore its mysteries and its surprises. To take us inside the world of Atlas Obscura, we're joined now by its creative director and co-founder, Dylan Thuras. Dylan, thanks for joining us. Thanks for having me on, Rick. For people who don't know Atlas Obscura, give us the backstory. What prompted you and your friends to start this, and when and where did that happen?

14:06Yeah, so it's been a project we've been working on for some time now. It started back in 2009. I was actually moving abroad for a while. I was moving to Budapest, and my friend Josh and I, we'd worked on another project together, and we started talking about travel. He'd spent months traveling around the U.S. going to sort of small museums and outsider art projects. And we just sort of were lamenting the fact that there wasn't a guidebook for the kinds of travel that we really liked to do. And then we sort of said, oh, what would it be like if we made that place? And it really didn't start out, you know, there was no business plan.

14:42And we basically just said, OK, what would it take to build this? And while I was living in Hungary, I traveled around. I wrote about places that I saw there and sort of slowly seeded about the first 300, 400 entries into the website. And then we launched and invited other people to come and suggest the places that they thought were incredible wonders but that people didn't necessarily know about. So it's sort of a chance for people to celebrate places that they think are special but overlooked. You mention in your book, it's kind of like the old Wunderkammer, the cabinet of curiosities that kings and powerful people did centuries ago.

15:20Did you realize that there's that sort of connection and that continuity? Definitely. I mean, I think Josh and I, well, first off, in the Atlas, we list those kinds of Wunderkammer, the ones that still exist, so you can go visit them. But I think we wanted to do a sort of an update on that idea, whereas in the past it was sort of Wunderkammer. They're kind of the proto-museum, you know, collecting every odd thing that, you know, natural philosophers could find and showing them to people. And we sort of felt like, well, we, the internet, all of us kind of live in one giant Wunderkammer together now, and we can share the wonders both near and far.

15:58And I think part of what is important for us about Atlas Obscura is the idea that Wherever you're looking, the weird things in the world are both, you know, a block from you and a thousand miles away from you, wherever you are. And that's kind of the nature of what makes Atlas work is that I think everything, things that seem normal to one person are profoundly interesting to another. You know, that's sort of that's so that's so basic and it is so underappreciated. I mean, yeah, things that seem normal. I was hiking in my uncle in Norway's backyard and I came upon a Viking burial ground. And it was not even a historical monument.

16:34It's just a bunch of stones that for 1 ,000 years have cut through the turf in the shape of a Viking ship. And I can imagine at twilight a burial ceremony there, you know, 1 ,000 years ago with the Vikings. Or you can find your own private Stonehenge. There's hundreds of them around England. That's right. Or in Atlas Obscura, you've got this wonderful bit about the Communist Convention Center that's like perched up on a ridge high in Bulgaria, just rotting away. Oh, yeah. Tell us about that place. That is amazing. Basludza is incredible and I think actually may end up being saved because of some of the international attention to it.

17:10So, yeah, it was one of a number of what were called Spominics, which were these really pretty, incredible, daring, gigantic sculptural art pieces made across the sort of Soviet reach. So Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, all over Russia, each one of them. And they have these very distinct looks, sort of almost like alien. But the one that you mentioned, Basludza, quite literally looks like a giant UFO, a city block-sized UFO. You drive up this endless little winding switchbacks to the top of this mountain, and then it looks like it was poured in concrete in the 1970s, which I think it was. And you've got Marx and Engels and Lenin that is rotting away on the ceiling.

17:56And we had to crawl through something, and it was just, like, covered with insulation that had fallen down and sun rays cutting through the broken roof. And I thought, this has got to be appreciated. And apparently you've heard that they're going to fix it up because I think it's a quirky site that needs to be saved. Yeah. Luckily, the sort of good part of this attention is that previously there was really no effort to stabilize or save the location, Mostly because it was associated with communism. And in Bulgaria, that sort of is a period of history that's not particularly fondly remembered. And so, but all the interest, I think, from outsiders has alerted people to realize, oh, this has some real value.

18:39And so, yeah. And that's one thing that Atlas Obscura can celebrate. We're taking a second look at some of the world's hidden wonders compiled by Atlas Obscura to add some spice to our travels. Co-founder Dylan Thuras is joining us from his home in New York's Hudson River Valley and the Travel with Rick Steves archives. Their latest books are The Atlas Obscura Explorer's Guide to Inventing the World, looking at 50 of the world's most interesting inventions, and Atlas Obscura Wildlife, featuring the world's most surprising wild species from all seven continents. Now, I like the thought that you write in your book, Dylan, that when you're talking to your readers, You are all co-authors.

19:21Talk about the Atlas Obscura community and how that helps you out in your work. Yeah. So from from day one of starting the website back in 2009, you could submit a location. You know, there was always sort of an editorial pass through. So we would look at it and fact check it and try and find usable photos and that kind of thing. But but basically we knew from the start if the whole project was just Josh and I putting in what we knew, we would come to an end pretty soon. And I think the way you find great wonders is because a local or someone who happened to stumble upon it says, hey, you know, if you're in this area, you should really check out Basludza or you should go to this little museum because that's, yeah, that's the way you find things.

20:05Like I was thumbing through the book and it's so much fun to read because it's little tiny. It's just like little bits here and there so you can have so much fun just bouncing around. And I came to Gallup's pottery shop in Avanos in Turkey And I remember for years we took our tour groups there, and everybody, he was kind of a Romeo in Turkey, and girls that visited would snip off a bit of their hair, and he would lift them up, and they would pin it to the ceiling. And today it is a museum of human hair. His whole pottery shop is mossy on the ceiling with the hair from tourists who have visited from all over the world.

20:39And once a year, I understand, he picks randomly somebody's hair, and they get a one-week tour on a donkey with Gallop the Potter. I don't know if people actually take him up on that. I don't know if you know about that. I don't know. That's new to me. That sounds great. I found the entry in Atlas Obscura, and I thought, that is really obscura, and it must have been the work of somebody who sent you an email, and I could have done it. I could have sent it to you. I had I regularized it. That's fun. For all I know, it was someone who went on one of your trips and then said, hey, this is a special spot.

21:10I mean, it's funny because it sort of has a mirror in Independence, Missouri. I hope it's still up and operating. There was something called Lila's Hair Museum who she collected Victorian hair art. So there was a period of time where Victorians got very into braiding hair into these elaborate wreaths and shapes. And so these are the little kinds of places that you stumble upon. Now, there's a fine line between a freak show and something that's quirky but not in bad taste. And you've been doing this for quite a while. And standards change, you know, and you could do something that was just kind of quirky 10, 20 years ago that could be considered.

21:48You don't do that now. Have you ever had to reconsider anything in your book that came off like celebrating a freak show or has that been an issue at all? We started out very specifically trying to not do some of the kind of things that a Ripley's Believe It or Not or even a Guinness Book of World Records kind of did because our premise was basically like I'm from the Midwest and every year I'd go to the Minnesota State Fair. And it never occurred to me that the butter carving competition or event where someone sculpts 12 busts of the local county beauty queens in butter was particularly unusual.

22:30But I think it turns out I brought people and they said, you know, this really is an odd experience. And I thought, I guess it is. If you grow up with it, maybe it's just normal. But it's kind of like if you grow up in Hungary, you would not be bedazzled by human bones. It's just they stack bones over there. I mean, we were talking about you got started in Hungary. Kutnohora has this bone something, bone house, and they have a chandelier made with every single human bone. Well, that's its sedlets in the Czech Republic or Czechia. Oh, you're right. That's in Czech Republic. Yeah, Kutnohora. But it's not far.

23:04And the area generally does have a lot more bones than the Americans are used to, at least. But there is a ghoulishness that is kind of appealing to a lot of people. And you've got, well, let's talk about human bones. Yeah, sure. I noticed you had this amazing cemetery in Naples, Fontanelle. Yes. This is where people come to, like, bring kind of wishes to the dead. And then their hope is that they'll come true, like that there's a kind of relationship with all of the skulls and bones in there. Is that right? Yes, you adopt a skull. Yes, yes. And then this skull kind of advocates for you in the afterlife.

23:40I love that idea. This is an amazing site, and it's in an amazing neighborhood. But also, you have a cemetery in your book from Romania, which is kind of a happy cemetery. Do you remember that one? Yeah, of course. Yeah, that was it. So this is a small town in Romania, and they developed this practice of painting. There was sort of a town grave painter. They'd be these wooden grave markers, and they would have kind of the person's life story on them, including how they died. And they'd often depict kind of the moment of death. So there'd be a car crash. But they were sort of playful and humorous and fun.

24:19And the guy who did most of those paintings passed away, was buried in the cemetery, had his own grave marker made by his apprentice who now does that same work. And so, yeah. It's a joyful – I've been to a lot of cemeteries. It's funny and fun and, yeah. I just thought it's very stimulating to have something a little different in something that we're raised might be one way or another. Americans are the odd ones out in their discomfort with death. Most other cultures in the world have a much more comfortable relationship with death. So I think we're the odd ones. I don't think I've ever seen a dead body in my world.

24:55You know, it's just not part of our culture. But when you go to a lot of cultures, you see dead bodies embalmed and behind glass. I mean, think of some of the embalmed bodies that might be in your book. What are some of the examples of that? Well, we have a whole kind of area of communist mummies. This odd thing happened, which was at the end of various autocratic leaders' time, it started with Lenin. And they were embalmed, even though it wasn't necessarily actually any of their wishes. None of these leaders actually particularly wanted to be embalmed. But there was a kind of a desire to preserve this kind of almost, you know, godlike figure and continue sort of that relationship.