But this picture of development, culture and progress is not confined to this settlement, for countless other Scandinavian, settlements in the west and northwest have made as great progress within a comparatively short time.
On my arrival in 1852 the Mississippi river was the north-western boundary line of civilization with the exception of the state of Iowa, which then had only a small population. Since that time twelve new states further west have been peopled and admitted into the Union. There was no railroad west of Chicago; now the immense distance between the Mississippi and the Pacific ocean is spanned by four giant railroads, while more than a hundred trunk and branch lines intersect the country in all directions, and lakes and rivers are navigated by hundreds of steamers, which compete with the railroads in carrying the products of the West to the Atlantic, whence they are distributed over the whole civilized world.
Hundreds of cities that did not exist, even by name, have since sprung up as if by magic, and some of them have already become renowned throughout the world for their industry, commerce and culture. Among them are Minneapolis and St. Paul, already intertwining their arms around each other in an embrace that will soon unite them into one. The former did not exist when I first gazed on St. Anthony falls, which now furnishes motive power for its magnificent mills and factories, and the latter was a town of about two thousand inhabitants.
Their combined population is now one-third of a million. St. Paul contains a large number of Scandinavians, but Minneapolis seems to be their favorite city, the Swedes alone numbering over forty thousand. They have many churches, private schools, academies and other institutions of learning.
FLOUR MILLS IN MINNEAPOLIS.
The three Scandinavian nationalities agree pretty well in our good state, and have united their efforts in several enterprises of some magnitude. In Minneapolis there are several banks and other monetary institutions owned and controlled by them, not to mention hundreds of other important commercial and manufacturing establishments due to the enterprise of our countrymen. Having gradually learned the language and the ways of this country, a surprisingly large number of the Scandinavians who began their career as common laborers have engaged successfully in business on their own account, and many have devoted themselves to professions demanding a higher education, which is greatly facilitated by a number of excellent academies and colleges established and supported by them in several of the western states. A great number of county offices are filled by the Scandinavian-Americans; in our legislature there are generally from thirty to forty members of that nationality; many of them have occupied positions of the highest trust and honor as officers of the state and of the United States, and no one can deny the fact that they have universally proved themselves fully equal in ability and trust-worthiness to the native born.
But it is not only in Minneapolis or in Minnesota, but throughout the whole country that the Scandinavians have gained such a good name, that in all the recent agitation against foreign emigrants, not one voice has been heard against them. They learn the English language well and quickly, and assimilate readily with the native American element, which is natural enough considering that they are to a very large extent of the same blood and ancestry as the English people, and that the English language is borrowed to no small extent from the Scandinavian.
Americans often express astonishment at the ease and correctness with which the Scandinavian immigrants acquire the English language. A little study of philology will readily account for it. If we take, for instance, the names of household goods, domestic animals, and other things appertaining to the common incidents of plain every-day life, we find the English words almost identical with the Scandinavian terms, only varying in the form of spelling or perhaps pronunciation, as those are apt to change with time and locality. For example: English—ox, cow, swine, cat, hound, rat, mouse, hen, goose, chicken; Swedish—oxe, ko, svin, katt, hund, rotta, mus, höna, gås, kyckling. Of implements: English—wagon, plow, harrow, spade, axe, knife, kettle, pot, pan, cup; Swedish—wagn, plog, harf, spada, yxa, knif, kittel, potta, panna, kopp. Or the part of our own bodies, such as: English—hair, skin, eyes, nose, ears, mouth, lips, teeth, shoulders, arm, hand, finger, nail, foot, toe, etc.; Swedish—hår, skinn, ögon, näsa, öron, mun, läpp, tand, skuldra, arm, hand, finger, nagel, fot, and tå. Or of the occupations of the common people, such as: English—spin, weave, cook, sow, sew; Swedish—spinna, väfva, koka, så, sy, etc. In this connection it may not be out of place to quote one of England’s most eminent authors and scholars, Edward Bulwer Lytton, who says:
“A magnificent race of men were those war sons of the old North, whom our popular histories, so superficial in their accounts of this age, include in the common name of the ‘Danes.’