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Danish Immigration to America: Danes in AmericaDanish Americans were unlike Americans of other Scandinavian descent, in that while others congregated with their own countrymen, Danes spread nationwide and comparatively quickly disappeared into the melting pot. The disproportionate surplus of male immigrants caused many Danish men to marry non-Danish women, and of all the Scandinavian immigrants the Danes were the least cohesive group and the first to lose consciousness of their origins. The mother tongue, too, experienced significant changes on the new continent. Danish activity in America before
the nineteenth-century includes Danes in the Revolutionary War,
and travelers to Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Lake Michigan. The
period between 1800 and 1840 includes seamen, artisans and adventurers,
but immigration in large numbers began in 1840, when the Mormon
Danes arrived. While Norwegian emigration began in 1825 as a flight
from religious persecution and was followed by a mass migration
of rural folk, Denmark's laws were comparatively benign toward dissident
sects and once the movement began in the mid-nineteenth-century
it included both rural and urban emigrants. Indeed, religion was
a relatively minor factor compared to the increase in the birth
rate and the economic difficulties of a small country faced with
a rapidly increasing population. Only Danish Mormons can be said
to have emigrated for religious reasons, and theirs was not a flight
from persecution so much as a gathering-in to "Zion" of
co- religionists. Other Danish religious life in America was characterized
by the pervasive influence of the Gruntvigian/Inner Mission schism,
a phenomenon unique to the Danes, and by familiar religious symbols
brought from Denmark. After 1850, non-Mormon 1) Bille, John H. Reprint of the 1896 ed., which was issued as v. 11 of the A thirty-nine page essay describing the Danish experience
in America up to the time of publication (1896), when Danish The author elucidates the differences in the circumstances of life in Denmark and other Scandinavian countries. A six-page appendix lists 1890 Federal census statistics on
numbers of Danes, Swedes and Norwegians in each county of A bibliography and bibliographic footnotes indicate further sources. 2) Bridge (Salem, Or.) As of this writing, the Library of Congress has five volumes
of this periodical, covering the years 1978-1993; this number 3) Danes in North America / edited by Frederick Hale. Includes bibliographical references and index. Letters to Denmark from immigrants in America, translated
by the author. They are presented in chapters intended to show
the various factors that caused Danes to emigrate and the variety
of conditions they found in North America. The The index lists personal names and place names in both Denmark and America. 4) Danske i Amerika. - Minneapolis og Chicago : C. Rasmussen Danish churches and Danes in the arts, Danish ethnic organizations,
businesses, and schools are described with many 5) [Henius, Max], 1859- comp. On the occasion of the first gathering of a representative group of Danish Americans, Henius compiled articles by sixteen authors on the history of movements and institutions founded by Danes in the United States. Subjects are the geographical spread of immigrants, Danish churches, schools and newspapers, Danes in cities and in rural areas, and a study and list of Danish-American organizations. Personal names mentioned are those of founders, directors and other prominent figures. A 12-page bibliography lists Danish language books published in America. 6) Kvist, Anton, 1878- ed. The immigrant experiences of Danish-born Americans as told
to the author. States represented are Michigan, Illinois, 7) Nielsen, George R. 8) Pope, Wiley R. Includes index. Bibliography of books on Danish emigration and immigration,
some family histories, specialized dictionaries, handbooks, 9) Simonsen, Henrik Bredmose. (Studier i Indre missions og de religiþst-folkelige
bev‘gelsers historie ; 1) Includes bibliographical references (p. 245-250) and indexes. The story of Danish churches in North America and the attempts to establish Danish communities in the new lands in order to preserve Danish culture and language. The author points out differences between the flourishing Norwegian and Swedish American churches and the struggle of Danish churches to maintain unity and a sense of "Danishness" among immigrants who, more than their Scandinavian neighbors, tended to spread out geographically and assimilate rapidly. This is a unique view of immigration from the points of view of the churches. The bibliography provides copious, up-to-date sources, and there is an index of personal names. 10) Salomons almanak ... : De Forenede Staters danske almanak, Begins in 1914 and continues through 1917. The researcher may want to request all four volumes at the same time. This almanac presents information of interest to Danes in
America, including lists of parliamentarians elected in Copious personal advertisements give names and addresses of
advertisers, and statistics of the U.S. government provide an
excellent idea of the geographical and demographic distribution
of Danes in America. In addition, the articles None of these volumes contain indexes, so that the researcher must browse page by page. 11) Vig, Peter Sorensen, 1854- |
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