You Can Go Back Home, Even a Half Century Later

We started where it all began for me, the town of my birthplace where I was actually delivered by a mid-wife way over a half century ago, Oslo, Minnesota. The little town with around 300 residents bears the name of its descendants from faraway Oslo, Norway. It is situated along the banks of the Red River on the North Dakota-Minnesota border, which has flooded the little town more times then the folks in Oslo care to remember.

We had breakfast in the towns only restaurant, a quaint little "Ma & Pa" type cafe where the locals, mostly farmers, come and pour their own cup of coffee while waiting for the waitress to take their order. The breakfast was great, real country style style choices with farm fresh eggs, bacon, ham, biscuits & gravy, homemade rolls etc.

After breakfast we drove through the streets of Oslo trying to locate any familiar buildings like the school or church we had attended as children. Many of the businesses that were their when we were growing up like the LB Hartz grocery store, the one and only doctor's office, and the bank weren't there anymore of course. They were either replaced by newer businesses or simply closed and no longer existed.

From Oslo, we headed to the "old farm", which was on the North Dakota side of the Red River. The roads to get there in places were almost as bad the ones you see on TV that horse and buggies used to drive on. There was no stimulus money allotted to fix up these roads. It wasn't needed because nobody lives along these roads anymore. It's just a few curious individuals like us who ever use these so called roads anymore. The house, what's left of it, still stands out there on the North Dakota Prairie. It could very well be described as "The Little House on the Prairie" very similar to the house on the TV series by that name. Flat rolling fields of wheat and other grains surround the little house I called home for the first 12 years of my life, along with 9 brothers and sisters and our parents. Almost unnoticeable from any major road or highway, one would never know it even existed if you hadn't lived out on that North Dakota prairie.

From the "old farm" we head to the next small North Dakota town I lived for the next 4 years, which was about 50 miles away. Along the way we make stops at some small cemeteries where many of my ancestors are buried. The most heartwretching stop we made was at a small cemetery near a country church where my mother breathed her last breath. She was attending the funeral of a relative when she sustained a massive heart attack and died. My husband and I were at her side when that happened. She was within a few miles of where she was born and raised when the good Lord called her to her permanent home.

We finally arrived in Hamilton, N. Dak. There were more changes in Hamilton since I left there then there was in Oslo, I felt. The school I went to was gone and so was the house we lived in. The only familiar site that I really remembered was the county fairgrounds. Other then that, everything else seemed to have changed. The little town of about 200 just wasn't the same anymore. Life goes on, I guess and everyone in Hamilton seemed to have moved on just as I had.

From Hamilton, N. Dak., my parents moved us to Mora where I still reside. I'm the only member of my family who still lives here in Mora. My brothers and sisters all moved elsewhere and my parents have passed on.

Our little end of the summer vacation lasted only a few days, but the memories will live on. My desire is to someday take my grandchildren back to where their grandmother lived for the first years of her life. They like history and what a history lesson this would be. It was "way before" cellphones, ipods, computers, the Internet etc.

I found out that yes, you can go back home no matter how many years you've been gone. It may have changed over the years, but the memories are still their even though they may have faded a little.

Source: Shirley Norling