Lavik Images #81-#120
This page is part of the sequential posting of the 319 Lavik Photograph Images, and contains Images #81 - #120. The first pages in the Lavik section provide the context for these photos - by describing the background on this collection, the Lavik ancestry in Norway, the biography of Rev. Rasmus Lavik and his family, a listing of all the extended family members and the locations where they lived, and an index to the 319 images. The image at right is #82, of four students at Concordia College, one of whom is Ingvald Lavik, is posted below with an explanation.
The Lavik Photograph Items
Items #81-#120
Item #81 - Unidentified Woman, O. E. Flaten, Moorhead, Minnesota. This photo, taken in the O. E. Flaten Studio in Moorhead, Minnesota, is undated. This is a duplicate of Item #34. I once thought this was Dora Lavik Grimsrud, but the woman in the photo does not have her distinctive features. As stated before, O. E. Flaten had a studio in Moorhead from 1884 to 1928 – so the fact that it is from his studio does not help with dating the photo.
Item #82 – Four Concordia Students in School Sweaters - Ingvald likely second from right, undated. This is the photo placed at the header of this page. Mike Collins suggested that the third from the right – who I knew was a Lavik brother – was probably Ingvald. Ingvald attended Concordia College from 1914 to 1917, which probably dates this photo. Joyce Tsongas added the identification “four men from Concordia” in her photograph ID assistance. In the adjoining giographical page for Rasmus Lavik, there is a news article that “Rudolph” Lavik was elected Team Captain of the Concordia basketball team in 1916. In the article, both “Ing” Lavik and Anton Lavik are listed as members of the team.
Item #83 - Anton, Rudy, and Likely Anton's wife Borghild, undated. This photo looks like it was taken at a farm – likely the Lavik farm, given Anton dressed in overalls. The unidentified woman is likely Anton’s wife, since it is not Rudy’s wife. Mike Collins has sent a photo, posted below, taken in the same location That photo includes Rudy’s wife Charlotte and their mother Antonette – as well as Rudy and Anton - that might even had been taken at the same time. Rudy seems to be wearing the same outfit in both - but is wearing a tie in one and not in the other.
Item #84 - Anton Lavik, undated. Could be a photo from the time of his legislative service. He was born in 1895 and served in the North Dakota legislature - representing Sargent County - from 1927 to 1944.
Item #85 - Unidentified older woman, no studio, undated. For some reason, I thought this was linked to Moorhead, MN - maybe through another photo, but there is no studio shown with the photograph. Does not look like Dora, which for some reason I had originally thought.
Item #86 - Niels Thorbjornsen Ylvisaker – Zumbrota Pastor, shown below right. He served in Zumbrota, Minnesota from 1868 to 1877, and died on April 16, 1877. Rasmus Lavik lived near Zumbrota at this time. The back of the photo with the Oleson Studio is posted below, as is the matching photo from the 1924 Norwegian Pastor Directory, which confirms the match, and states that the photograph was taken in 1875. I posted this photo and the directory photo in the Lavik Photograph Collection introduction page to show one of the ways I have been able to identify photos.
In the Minnesota Photographer Directory, there is a listing for John H. Oleson, who ran a business – Oleson Gallery – at this address in 1874-75. The business continued in other iterations, but the name and date fit this photo. I have wondered if this was a photo that was developed from a negative after Pastor Ylvisaker had died, but the date the Oleson Studio operated indicates that it probably was a photo of the time the studio operated and the directory indicates. I have gotten to know Anne Ylvisaker, a descendant of Rev. Ylvisaker who lives in Monterey, California.
Item 87 – Unidentified Man, photo taken by M. Selmer, Bergen, Norway. The back is scanned above and has two hand-written notes, one states “R. Lavik” and the other “49 aar gammel”. The first note translates to “49 years of age”. The note R. Lavik most likely is an indication that it was Rasmus’ photo, rather than he was the subject of the photo. The photo has printed on the back – M. Selmer, photograph, Bergen. Above that is written, “London, 1852; Stockholm, 1866; Paris, 1867; Kjobenhavn, 1872; and Wien, 1873”. The inference is that this was taken after 1873. Rasmus immigrated in 1871. The man in the photo does not resemble Rasmus, so the note must represent that it was his photo – and the person in the photo was 49 years of age. For reference, Rasmus was not 49 years of age until 1890.
In researching Marcus Selmer from the information on the back of this photograph, a new world opened up. The work of Marcus Selmer has been the subject of expositions in museums and is considered an early influence on Norwegian cultural history. Selmer has his own Wikipedia page, and the biographical information that went with the various expositions explains his role. It’s really unclear how Rasmus got this photo and who is in it - but it was likely taken after he immigrated to America. The photo links to an interesting history.
Marcus Selmer - Historic Norwegian Photographer
Marcus Selmer was born in Randers, Denmark – on the Jutland Peninsula – on October 6, 1819. The “Public Domain Review” website takes it from here: “It is not immediately clear what drew Marcus Selmer (1819 – 1900), a Danish portrait photographer, to spend most of his life working in Norway. He trained as a pharmacist in his native Denmark, and was working in a chemist owned by his uncle when he discovered daguerreotype photography. He experimented with this new technology in his spare time and began sending his pictures in to local exhibitions. In 1852, Selmer travelled to Norway, to visit some of his uncle’s family in the city of Bergen. He never returned.
He soon found work as a photographer in Bergen and, within a year, was able to establish his own studio. This became the first permanent photographic studio in Bergen, as few photographers who visited would stay all year round. Photographers often visited Bergen in the summer, hoping to capture the fjords and mountains that surround the area, but, as they needed good light for their work, the dark and cold weather had driven most of them away by the time winter rolled around. Selmer ingeniously built his studio almost entirely out of glass, allowing enough light into the space, which enabled him to continue working throughout the year.
Selmer’s work quickly became well-known throughout Norway. He sold many books of his photographs, and sold individual images to the press and the burgeoning tourist industry, before eventually being appointed the royal photographer in 1880. Although his career was varied, Selmer is primarily remembered today for his portraits of local people in national folk costume, . . . . These photographs depict the customs, traditions and culture of the Norwegian people, and reflect Selmer’s interest in his adopted home. . . .
Selmer’s long career spanned almost half a century, and it can be assumed he took many thousands of photographs during this time. However, as much of his negative archive was destroyed after his death, only a handful of his daguerreotypes remain.” Some of the most striking of these, beautifully colored by hand are now in the collection of the National Library of Norway. [The google images page for Marcus Selmer has a large array of photographs by him that demonstrate what this biography has said.]
The narrative with a 2015 Selmer exhibition at the Preuss Museum in Norway adds to the story: “Marcus Selmer (1819-1900) was a central figure in Norwegian photography from the 1850s until his death in 1900. With his urban and landscape-prospect photography, together with his series presenting Norwegian national costumes, he came to have great influence in shaping the concept of the Norwegian.
Selmer was originally from Randers, Denmark, where he was educated as a pharmacist. He also taught himself photography. In 1852 he moved to Norway to be a full-time photographer and became Bergen's first resident daguerreotypist. Selmer established a studio in the city but also traveled widely around Norway to photograph the landscape.
In spite of increasing competition in the profession Selmer did well. He quickly became Bergen's favorite photographer: he was adaptable and kept up with developments in technology. His international orientation and contacts made him an important conduit of international trends for the Norwegian photographic community. He was quick to adopt the new photographic negative-positive technology—the wet plate. With this technology images could be reproduced in several copies and sold more inexpensively, in contrast to the daguerreotype, which is a one-of-a-kind process (only one photograph per shot).
. . . . . Selmer was a popular landscape and cultural photographer but also an accomplished portraitist. A year after he came to Norway he began to take pictures of national costumes, an already established genre. While others collected traditional music, dance, and folk tales and painted what was typical of recently liberated Norway, Selmer created these studies of national costumes, pictures bought by Norwegians and tourists alike. At the beginning of the 1860s the painter Adolph Tidemand made use of some of these national-costume photographs in several of his larger compositions. Selmer's costume pictures were published in 1872 in «Catalog of Photographs of Norwegian National Costumes, Landscapes, and Stereoscope Pictures. From Nature taken by M. Selmer in Bergen». Those costume photographs unquestionably became an influence on our view of Norwegian nature and folk life.”
The lettering on the back of Rasmus’ photograph, as shown above, states: “London, 1852; Stockholm, 1866; Paris, 1867; Kjobenhavn, 1872; and Wien, 1873.” Given the biographical references that indicate Selmer moved to Bergen in 1852 and “never left” – these references must be to exhibitions or shows in these places in these years. The items on the left seem to include Danish Kings – Frederick VII is one, Norge is listed next to another, Christian seems to be another. Frederick VII was King of Denmark from 1848 to 1863. Christian VIII was king from 1839 to 1848 and Christian IX was king from 1863 to 1906. On the right seems to be medals or awards. One of the them is dated 1872, which indicates that this photograph was taken that year or after – and with the Wien reference being dated 1873 – it is clear that this photograph was taken after Rasmus left Norway.
Item #88 - Unidentified Family from Benson, Minnesota. The studio is listed as Hoiland & Brandmo, Benson, Minnesota. There are ten children shown with the parents. Unknown at this time who this family is. A. J. Hoiland is shown in the Minnesota Photographer Directory to have been operating in Benson in the 1878-79 period. He is said in the listing to have worked in Minnesota in the 1880’s, but no further detail on that fact is offered. There is a listing for R. E. Brandmo as a photographer in Benson, but the company is shown as Brandmo & Pederson, operating in Benson in 1894-1906, 1910-1914, 1922. It seems that Hoiland and Brandmo, therefore, would have operated between 1880 and 1894. Benson is in Swift County, Minnesota.
I tried a number of research angles to see if I could place this photo. I looked at the Benson 1900 census for every family where the mother showed that she had had ten or more children, with many being boys. One Norwegian Lutheran minister, Christoffer Peterson, fit the bill – but his photo in the 1913 pastor directory does not match. I also looked in the Norwegian church directory for pastors in this period, and then looked in the 1913 pastor directory to see if their photos matched. I could not find a match that way.
Item #89 - Unidentified Family in an undated photograph, Bergen, Norway. The back of this photo is above right, and reads “Fotografisk Atelier [Translates to: Photographic Workshop or Studio], Max Behrends, Bergen.” I will include a biography of Behrends just following, which might help us date this photograph. Item #91 was taken by the same photographer
Maximilian Behrends was a noted Norwegian photographer. He is the subject of a biography in Wikipedia and at the Preus Museum in Norway. Combining the major parts of these two histories, gives a flavor of history of Maximilian Behrends in Bergen, where he was when he took this photo (and a later one in the Lavik batch), which were in Rasmus’ possession. It will give a general period in which he was photographing in Bergen.
Maximilian Alexander «Max» Behrends (born 16 September 1839, in Berlin died 1 June 1903 in Steinkjer, was a photographer. He was the son of court photographer Johan Ferdinand Behrends (1804-66) and Marie Phister (1810-42). In 1870, Max Behrends married Margrethe Mathea Wold (1852-1928).
Behrends came to Norway as an assistant at Marie Bull in Bergen. After a newspaper feud with her, he started his own studio in 1867 with Johan Dahl . Then had a studio alone on the Mural Memorial and in 1884 in Kortpilsmuget. In 1888 the address was Torvalmending 10, and before 1891 he disappeared from Bergen. On the back of some of his first pictures he advertised with "Max Behrends. Portrait painter. Bergen. Largest Selection of Norwegian National Pictures".
Item #90 - Unidentified Young Man, Bergen, Norway. The photo reads B. Jorgensen, Phtoograf I Bergen. I have not been able to find anything out about this photographer online.
Item #91. Unidentified Young Woman, Bergen, Norway. Taken the exact same place as #89 in Bergen. The same thing is on the back of the photo. I scanned the back of the photo as 91a, which shows the identical match to the back of photo 89. There is no date, and the biography of Max Behrends with Item #89 shows this was probably taken in the 1870’s or 1880’s. It is unclear how the photo ended up in Rasmus Lavik’s collection.
Item #92. Unidentified Couple, Bergen, A. M. Anderssen Studio, undated. Above right is the back of the photograph. Just above is the studio identification from the bottom of the front of the photograph.
This photo was taken by A. M. Anderssen in Bergen. On the back it states Fotografisk Atelier James Hansen’s Gaard Strandgaden. A. M. Anderssen. Bergen. There is then an unclear Norwegian phrase at the bottom: “Pladen opbevares for Efterbestillinger”[an online translator translates this to: The record is stored for Post-orders]. Mike Collins got there first and found “translation is likely the name of the photographer. The rest is ‘the plate (negative) is retained for re-orders and enlargements.”
Photografisk Atelier translates to photographer’s room or studio. The information contained on the back of the photograph, A. M. Anderson, James Hansen’s Gaard, Strandgaden. Strandgaden is a major commercial street in Bergen, and was formally named as such in 1857. As described in the caption of the photograph, the line at the bottom indicates that the plate (or negative) would be retained for re-orders or enlargements.
I found an article about this photographer in Norwegian, indicating that his full name was Andreas Mathias Anderssen, born in 1849 and died in 1943. He has his own Wikipedia page in Norwegian, and I can glean he started photographing in 1875 and was at a different address in Bergen by 1885 – giving a ten-year window in which this photo was likely taken. Once again, the photo was taken after Rasmus left Norway, so it probably contains family members or friends who sent the photo to him.
Item #93 – Unidentified Middle Age Couple, P. A. Gausemel, Kenyon, Minnesota, undated. Above right is the back of this photo. which shows P. A. Gausemel, photographer, Kenyon, Minn. [in Goodhue County]. Paul A. Gausemal is shown in the Minnesota photographer directory as having photographed on Main Street in Kenyon in the 1909-1910 period (although it appears this photo could have been older than this period – he was born in 1854 and died in May 1911). Of the extended Lavik family members, the Peder Tuff family – into which Rasmus Lavik and Simon Ofstedal married – lived in Kenyon. Peder Jonson Tuff arrived in 1867 with his wife and then nine children and was in Holden Township, Goodhue County by the 1870 census. He was 38 at immigration (born ca 1839). Rasmus married Ingeborg Tuff in 1873 and Simon married Kari Tuff in 1878. Peder’s wife Marit died sometime before he remarried to Gunhilde in 1878. They moved to Polk County sometime after 1885. There were other family members in the area at this time. I had wondered at one point if this could possibly be Anders Ofstedal and Agate Lavik Ofstedal.
Item #94 - Unidentified Middle Age Woman, Northfield, Minnesota., undated The photo studio is listed as A. J. Lawin, Northfield, Minnesota – in Rice County. The Minnesota photographer directory states that he took photos in three Minnesota cities. The first in time was in Northfield, where his office was at 21 Mill Square, and he took photos from 1888 to 1896 – then New Richland and the last four years of his life in Waseca, where he died. In the time he was taking photographs in Northfield – the home of St. Olaf College – Rasmus, his son Andrew, and briefly his future son-in-law Carl Grimsrud were students there. In the Find-A-Grave database, he was shown as Albert Julius Lawin, born in Germany in 1860 and drowned in Waseca in May, 1904.
Rasmus lived in Northfield while studying for the Priesthood in the 1887-1888 period. At least four of his children were baptized there in the later half of the 1870’s.
Item#95 - Likely Andrew Lavik, Northfield, Minnesota, undated. The studio at the bottom of the photo is E. N. James, Northfield, Minnesota. Edward Newell (E. N.) James is shown in the Minnesota photographer directory, as having taken photos in Northfield in the 1886-1887 period. In the previous item, it is noted that Northfield was the home of St. Olaf College – where Rasmus was listed as a student in 1887-1889. Ingeborg died in 1886, so Rasmus probably lived in Northfield with his children. Andrew was born in 1874 and Peter in 1877 – so of his sons of age in that period to be the subject of this photograph, this is likely Andrew - who was born in June 1874 and would have been about thirteen at the time this photographer was taking pictures in Northield. Paul Lavik’s photo of Andrew, at an older age and shown in the introduction to the Lavik Photo Collection, compares to this photo.
Item #96 – Unidentified Middle Age Woman, J. D. Kellogg Studio, Red Wing, Goodhue County, Minnesota. The back of the photograph is posted above left. This is the same studio that took the photo of Anna Markuson Ofstedahl, shown at the end of the Lavik Collection Introduction page. As was stated earlier – there were four Kelloggs in Red Wing in the Minnesota Directory of Photographers. James D. Kellogg has Kellogg’s Photography Gallery, and appeared to operate as early as 1876 to after 1900. The other Kelloggs were probably related to him: Mrs. J Kellogg; C. A. Kellogg; and Mrs. C. A. Kellogg. The studio markings on this photo are different from the markings on other photographs from the same studio. There were Ofstedahls, Tuffs, and Laviks in this region at this time, and this person could be of one of those families. There is a slight resemblance to the photo of Ingeborg Tuff Lavik that came from Paul Lavik and is included in the Lavik Photograph Collection page, but not enough of a resemblance to draw any conclusion.
Item #97 - Unidentified Young Woman, Taken by Wm. Brown, Red Wing, Minnesota, undated. The back of the photo, posted above right, states: “Photographed by Wm. Brown, Red Wing, Minn.” The only possible match in the Minnesota photographer directory shows a W. H. Brown doing stereographs in Red Wing in the 1870’s and 1880’s. I cannot find a matching William Brown in a census or other record from that time in Goodhue County. In the discussion of Items #94, #95, and #96 there is a list of family members who were in the Goodhue County area at the time, as well as the page on the Lavik portion of this website listing the locations of extended family members.
Item #98 - Unidentified Middle Age Woman, A. P. Holand Studio, Grand Forks, North Dakota, undated. Photographer A. P. Holand of Grand Forks is shown in the Dakota directory as taking photos there from 1892 to 1910. I have not found any Lavik family member who lived in Grand Forks, but it is across the Red River from Polk County, Minnesota. There were many extended family members in that County, including Rev. Andreas Oefstedal from 1892 to 1897, Simon Ofstedal from the 1880’s until his death in 1922, and Peter Lavik ran for District Attorney here in 1906. Simon Moen, the son of Dorothy Ofstedal Moen, lived in Niagara Township, Grand Forks County, from about 1901 until his death in 1970.
Item #99 - Two Unidentified Young Women, Peck Studio, Zumbrota, Minnesota, undated. This photo was taken in the Peck [Studio], Zumbrota, Minn. As previously mentioned, C. S. Peck is shown as a photographer in Zumbrota in the 1882-83 period. Picture #64 indicates that maybe Peck was photographing a few years after the 1883 period, but the information below doesn’t seem to make that possible. No Lavik child was old enough to be of age for this photo. As previously mentioned and shown in the section on locations of the extended Lavik family, there were many extended family members in Goodhue County during this period. There is a Clarence S. Peck buried in Zumbrota Cemetery, having died in 1884 at age 33 – he is shown in Dodge County, Minnesota in the 1880 census as a photo artist. So it is likely that he was in Zumbrota just for a relatively brief period in the early 1880’s.
Item #100 Knut Lavik and Ingeborg Flatekval, Rasmus’ brother, quite likely with their youngest son Hallvard (born 1882), with a O. E. Flaten Studio, Moorhead, Minnesota marking. That photo on the upper left was from the Rasmus Lavik Family collection. Posted on the upper right is Item #100a – a digital copy of the same photo as in Item #100 - emailed to me by Helge Morken from Norway. This interesting situation, discussed in the opening page on the Lavik Photograph Collection, presents the likelihood that the image was taken in Norway and suggests that the American-tagged image that Rasmus had was from a negative and developed in the United States. While there is a discussion of this situation below, it also raises the question of whether there are other photographs in the collection that traveled a similar path.
I had not identified the subjects of this photo until Helge provided the second photo. As stated on the Lavik family ancestry and history page, Rasmus and his sister Agate Lavik Ofstedal were two of nine siblings in Norway. Agate was the oldest, and Rasmus the youngest. The next youngest was one of two Knuts in the family - the Knut shown above with his wife and son. The resemblance between Knut, just a year or two older than his brother Rasmus, is noticeable.
Knut was one of the Lavik siblings who remained in Norway – while Rasmus, Agate, Tjorborg, and the other sibling named Knut (I don’t understand why two siblings had the same name) – all immigrated to the United States. This second Knut was connected to the Ofstedal/Lavik family in an interesting way. He purchased the Ovstedal farm from Anders and Agate in 1873, and became Knut Andersson Ovstedal. He later lived in Vaele, and in the last two decades of his life lived on a farm in Dagestad, just outside of Voss. I used his change of names due to the different farms on one of the other pages to help explain the Norwegian naming system. Over the course of Knut’s life, he was Knut Anderson Lavik, Knut Anderson Ovstedal, Knut Anderson Vele, and Knut Anderson Dagestad.
Knut’s family is listed in the Ovstedal farm section of the Evanger bygdebok because of his time on that farm, shown on the Lavik family history page. He is also referenced in the Dagestad section of Volume Four of the Voss area bygdebok, which is also quoted on the Lavik family history page. Ingeborg and her Flatekval family are shown in the Modalen bygdebok.
Given the listing above for Knut’s family, and the statement below from a Norwegian relative that this is Knut and Ingeborg – then it is likely that the child in the photo is one of theirs. The youngest boy is Hallvard, born in 1882, and given that both Knut and Ingeborg do not look young, it is likely that this is their youngest child in his pre-teen years, which would put this photo in the first half of the 1890’s.
The first photo shown above, marked with the O. E. Flaten Studio, Corner of 4th and Front Sts., Moorhead, Minnesota. There are other photos from this studio in the group of Lavik family photos, including the next one, and there is a photo of O. E. Flaten on the Lavik Photo Collection introductory page. He is shown in the Minnesota early photographer directory for Ole E. Flaten, of Vanders Norway, who was in Moorhead, Minnesota in various locations from 1884 to 1928.
The second photo was not part of the Lavik group of photos. It was emailed to me in digital format – obviously a photo of the same original photo – by Helge Morken from Norway. The name of the studio is Sostrene V. D. Fehr, and Helge stated that this was a photographer from Voss in Norway.
The Sostreme V. D. Fehr studio was in the Preus Museum’s online register of Norwegian photographers. The translated version of that entry follows: “The Sisters Fehr , also referred to as the Sisters by Fehr, was a photography company at Voss. It was established by Anne Dorothea von der Fehr and her sister Charlotte Rebekka von der Fehr in 1891. Mimi Jansen took over the company around 1895, and then sold it to Per Braaten in 1939.” It is unclear if the company held the same name through the changes in ownership. Given that Knut and family were always in Norway, the original photograph was likely taken in Norway, and then likely re-printed from a negative in Minnesota. And given that the Norwegian shop was not established until 1891, it means the photo was likely taken in the years just after that.
It is very interesting, because - as I have already stated - it means that one copy of the same photo was likely the original and a second printed by a different studio from a negative, and marked from that studio. This raises an interesting possibility that there were other photos in the collection with the same process having taken place. There’s no way of knowing unless a second photo emerges just as this one has. But it means there just might be one or more photos that were originally taken in Norway but have markings of a studio in America.
Item #101 - Unidentified Young Woman, O. E. Flaten, Moorhead, Minnesota. This photo was taken by O. E. Flaten, Photographer, Moorhead, Minnesota, as shown by the backside of the photograph which is posted above right. This image from the back of the photograph is shown in the Introduction to this Photo Collection as one of the good examples of photographic marking - as well as of O. E. Flaten, who took many of the photographs and whose photo is shown in the introduction to the collection. Moorhead is the location of Concordia College, where many members of the extended Lavik family attended. The woman does look familiar, and she looks young enough to have been a student. There is a description of Ole Flaten’s history in the discussion of the previous item.
Item #102 - Unidentified Young man, J R. Thomas, photographer, Madison, Wisconsin. John R. Thomas is shown in the index of Wisconsin photographers as being in Madison from In 1868 to 1892 – and he is shown as having been born in Norway. In 1876 the Lutheran Church established the Luther Seminary in Madison, Wisconsin – and it was there for the next fifteen or more years until it moved to Minnesota. It is possible that this is a student photo from that period. Andreas Oefstedal was at the seminary from 1878 through 1881; Nils Ofstedahl was there from 1880 through 1883 and John Ofstedahl was there from 1881 through 1884. The only photos of the Ofstedahls we have, are after this period and each of the three has a beard. In fact, we do not have an identified photo of any of the three without a beard.
Item #103 - Postcard Format Photograph of two young children, with a note naming Elvira and Henry on the back, Elkjer and Stoll, Willmar, Minnesota. This item was a postcard, with a note written on the other side of “Merry Xmas to you & all from Elvira & Henry”, which is shown above to the right of the photo. The photo was taken at Elkjer and Stoll, Willmar, Minnesota. An R. A. Stoll photographed in St. Paul in the 1920’s; Erick Elkjer was in Willmar from 1918 to 1928 according to the Minnesota photographer directory. Willmar is in Kandiyohi County, Minnesota. It is unclear from this note whether Henry and Elvira were the parents of the children sending holiday greetings, or whether that was the names of the children in the photo. Given that the photographer worked in Willmar in the 1920’s, I searched the censuses on both sides of that period – looking for an entry in Willmar or Kandiyohi County that had the names Elvira and Henry in them in some combination. I couldn’t find one. I also checked the Willmar Tribune through 1922, and there were plenty of Elvira’s, I just couldn’t match one. So it’s still a mystery who these children were and how the Laviks knew them.
Item #104. Unidentified Couple, no date or location. Woman appears to be in traditional dress. No identifying information. This photograph is the same style as photograph #93, which was taken in Kenyon, Minnesota. The woman’s head item looks like the same one of the woman in Item #89 – which was taken in Bergen. It could be related to either photograph. The style and coloring does look like some of the photos taken in Norway.
Item #105 - Unidentified Middle-aged couple, no date or location. This photograph is very similar to the previous one in quality and form, as well as the items #89 and #93, also referenced in the previous item.
Item #106 - Unidentified Man, No date or location. This is similar in style and format to the previous two items as well as Items #89 and #93.
Item #107 - Unidentified Woman in Mourning Clothes at Graveside by O. H. L. Rolin, Esbjerg Denmark. Who might be in this photo and how it’s in the Lavik collection is a mystery. Originally, I thought that this was taken in Norway, but I find that Esbjerg is in Denmark in the southwest part of Jutland. An online listing of photographers in and from Denmark to 1920, lists Otto Hans Lassen Rolin, born in September 1860 in Pjedsted, married in 1881 in Ribe, was a watchmaker in Ribe, and then was a photographer in Esbjerg. He died in 1905. He appears to have taken photos in the 1890’s. The three photographs by him that I have found online are from 1893, 1895, and 1898.
Item #108 - Antonette Lavik and older man, no date or location, post card format. The other side has no identifying information of any kind, nothing about the studio, location, or identification. Given the appearance of Antonette, it is likely that this photo was taken in the period after Rasmus died in 1927, and before Antonette died in 1940. Antonette had three brothers, Andrew, John, and Ole Hagen – none of whom married, and all who lived near Devils Lake, North Dakota. All three were in the 1930 census – and Find-A-Grave shows them all in the Grand Army of the Republic Cemetery in Devils Lake, with Andrew dying in 1933, John in 1934, and Ole in 1936. Antonette’s 1940 obituary indicates that she was the only surviving sibling. It is quite possible that this is one of those brothers. It is possible that this is the man from Item #76, taken between 1889 and 1892 in Red Lake Falls.
Item #109 - Anton Lavik and Howard and Dorothy Nelson. Joyce Tsongas, the daughter of Dorothy Nelson Monson, identified the two children as Howard and Dorothy Nelson. Dorothy and Howard were the two children of Karen Matson’s daughter Antonette (Nettie) Matson, Antonette Lavik’s niece, and Anton’s first cousin. This style of photo, a black and white print on slick photo paper, is part of a group of similar photos that are the latest dated in the entire batch – from the 1930’s. It looks like it could be the same location as Item #83 above.
Item #110 - Unknown Man in undated photo, taken at I. Lindegaard, Christiania (Oslo), Norway. The studio listed for this photo was I. Lindegaard, Christiania. Christiania was the name of the capitol of Norway for three centuries until it was changed to Oslo in 1925. There is a printed address of the studio in script on back, shown below and Norwegian that appears to be that negatives are kept. I have been unable to find an online reference to this photographer, although there is a reference to a John Lindegaard, an early photographer in Christiania. It is unknown who this man is in this photo, and whether there was a relationship to Rasmus Lavik in some way.
Item #111 - Unidentified Woman in Undated Photo from Peck Studio, Zumbrota, Minnesota. One of a number of photos - #64, #99, and #119 – from the Peck Studio. Additionally, one of the Rasmus Lavik photos provided - of him in a period where he was without a beard - was also taken at the Peck Studio. The back of the photo is shown below. It is possible that this is Ingeborg Tuff Lavik, as it looks somewhat like the photo that Paul Lavik sent of her. Peck is shown in the early Minnesota photographer directory to have photographed in the 1882-1883 range, but some of his photographs look like they might have been a few years later. Ingeborg died in 1886. Of the three other photos in the Lavik Collection taken at the Peck Studio, the only one where the subject(s) have been identified, is Item #64, which is a photo of all six children of Rasmus and Ingeborg. That also dates the time photos were being taken at the Peck Studio.
Item #112 - Unidentified Young Man, undated, P. A. Gausemel, Kenyon, Minnesota. This is the same photographer that took a photo of a middle-aged couple in Item #93, and the man just below in Item #116. Item #130 is of three children, not at the Gausemel studio, but taken by another photographer in Kenyon.
The back of that photo showed P. A. Gausemel, photographer, Kenyon, Minnesota – the same as listed on the front of this photo. As stated then, Paul A. Gausemal is shown in the Minnesota photographer directory as having photographed on Main Street in Kenyon in the 1909-1910 period. This photo seems older than that. As stated in the discussion about Item #93, both the Ofstedahls and the Tuffs lived in Kenyon in the 1870’s and first part of the 1880’s.
Item #113 - Johan Arndt Bergh, Barlow Studio, Janesville, Wisconsin. The photographer was shown in the Wisconsin directory of photographers in Janesville from 1895 through 1936 and in Elkhorn in Walworth County – adjacent to Rock County where Janesville is – in the eight years before 1895.
This appears to be Johan Arndt Bergh, Sophie Bergh (Mrs. John R.) Lavik’s father. This photo is very similar to the image of him in the 1927 Norwegian Pastors” book, shown below, with that photo dated 1892, and is also shown in the introduction page to the Lavik Collection. as a method of using the pastor’s book to help identify photos in the Lavik collection..
Bergh was pastor at Luther Valley, Wisconsin from 1882 to 1912, and Janesville, Wisconsin, where this photo was taken, is just over fifteen miles from Janesville – where Barlow photographed in the late 1880’s and early 1890’s. The Steinberg’s, who shipped the Lavik photos to me originally, were Bergh relatives, and obtained the photos from the Sargent County Museum because they wanted a Bergh photo. For whatever reason, they did not take this one.
Item #114. Unidentified Couple, P. O. Naess, Bergen, Norway. Peder Olsen Naess was a photographer born in 1840 in Lavik (ironically, not Lavik in Eksingadalen) and died in 1928 in Trondheim – having been a photographer Bergen, Tromso, and Trondheim. It appears he did his photography in Bergen up to 1876, when he lost his photographic equipment in a fire. That means this photo was likely taken before that fire. Rasmus immigrated to the U. S. in 1871. It is unclear who this is and how they were related to Rasmus. If this was taken in the first half of the 1870’s, it is likely that the two were born in the 1840’s or before - and it might be of value to go to the Lavik family records file and see what couples were living in this period that were born in that time and were still in Norway. The back of the photo is posted above right.
Item #115 - Likely Three Ingvald Lavik Children, Anderson’s Studio, Milnor, North Dakota, undated. This photo was taken at Anderson’s Studio in Milnor, which is where the photo of Antonette and many children was taken, shown as Item #73. The children in the two photos appear different. The photo studio does not seem to have made the Dakota directory – which covered Dakota photographers through 1920. Milnor censuses of 1920, 1930 and 1940 list Haldor O. Anderson, a photographer born ca 1869 in Norway, who had a “photographic gallery”. The photo ID
was on a flap to the frame, posted above. The one Lavik with children of the right age to be in this photo was Ingvald - with a girl born in 1923 and boys born in 1927 and 1929. That matches the genders of the children in the photo, and since the fourth child was born in 1932, would place the photo between 1929 and 1932 - probably, given the youngest child’s appearance, about 1930.
Item #116 - Unidentified man, A. P. Gausemel, Kenyon, Minnesota, undated. The backside of the photo is above right. Items #93 and #112 were taken at the same studio., #93 of a couple and has the same studio markings as this photo. #112 is a younger boy or man – and has different studio markings. This photo could connect with the couple in #93. As said in the discussion with #93, Ofstedals and Tuffs lived in Kenyon and might be related to whomever are the subjects of these photos.
Item #117, Unidentified Man, Kellogg Studio, Red Wing, Minnesota. This is the same studio listed with Item #96, a photo of a woman, and of the photograph of Mrs. John Ofstedahl shown in the Lavik Photo Collection Introduction page. The markings on each of the three photographs are different, possibly indicating that they were produced at different times. Directory information seems to indicate that this photographer operated between 1876 and 1900. This photograph - in appearance - seems to be near the beginning of that period rather than at the later part.
Item #118 - Hannah Lavik, no studio or date indicated. Paul Lavik provided and identified certain photos that are posted in the introduction page to this Photo Collection. This photo matches a photo of Hannah Lavik in that group – and I am relying on Paul’s identification to make the identification of this photo. This photo seems to match the person in Item #60 - which was taken in Enderlin North Dakota when Marie had died. This is clearly not Dora - so all evidence points to this being Hannah Lavik.
Item #119 - Unidentified Young Man, Peck Studio, Zumbrota, Minnesota. It is possible that this photo shows one of Rasmus’ children by Ingeborg. There is a group photo of them at the same studio in Zumbrota – Item #64. C. S. Peck is shown as a photographer in the Minnesota directory, photographing in Zumbrota in the 1882-83 period. The back of the photograph is posted above right – showing the exact same pattern as the back of Item #111a, but a different color. As mentioned with Item #64, there were many family members in this area at the time of this photo – so there are many possibilities as to who this is.
Item #120 Unidentified Man, J. Lund Studio, Christiana (Oslo) Norway. There is no identification of the person in the photo, but has a small printed notation at the bottom left corner that states “Phot. Af J. Lund”. There is nothing in writing or printed on the back of the photo. The Preus Museum listing of early Norwegian photographers has a listing for J. Lund, showing at least one reference ca 1865, showing he had taken a photo in Christiania, Kongens Gate 25. That is still an address in Modern Oslo. If the photo was taken ca 1865 – that was before Rasmus immigrated to the United States.