Surrounded by Ancestral History

Across the Fence#583


It was late in the day as I gazed out the window of our house, still under construction, and looked at the cold winter landscape surrounding me. The abundance of December snow and freezing temperatures had added winter problems to our house-building adventure. A temporary heater and fans were keeping the house warm enough for drywall to be applied. I needed to check the house a couple times during the evening to make sure the heater was still functioning properly. The furnace couldn’t be hooked up until the drywall job was completed, or the warrantee would be null and void if it sucked all the drywall dust into the furnace and damaged it. This house building was a real learning experience for me.

I half-jokingly told an old army buddy; I think I had less stress when we were in Vietnam together and getting shot at. I suspect anyone who has gone through the adventure of building a house, and trying to sell one at the same time, knows what I’m talking about.

As I stood alone, looking out the window, in the darkened house that day, I was questioning my sanity. We could have bought a house in town and avoided all the extra expenses and building problems. After all, houses on the market were plentiful and their prices kept dropping as fast as President Bushs’ approval ratings. The sub-zero temperature, and the biting wind forming drifts in the snow around the house, added to the weight that was pushing my spirits down.

I was checking a west window for condensation, when I saw the lights of the Erlandson farm to the northwest. It had a warm, inviting glow with the snow-covered ground surrounding it, and the last brilliant pink of the fading sun peeking through cold-looking clouds in the distance. It was like viewing a gorgeous winter landscape painted by a master artist. My spirits began to lift. Views like that are priceless and one of the many reasons I wanted to live in the country again.

The Sherpe farm as it looked when I was growing up.

That’s when it suddenly dawned on me that I was surrounded by ancestral history. My great, great grandparents, Lars and Bertha Tomtengen, homesteaded the farm I was looking at, when they came to this country from Norway in 1850. My great grandmother, Lisa, who married Hans Hanson Sherpe, was raised there. That ancestral farm now bordered us, just across the road, to the north.

I looked out another window to the southwest. There were the lights of the farm where Syvert Sherpe once lived. He was a brother of my great grandfather. He also married one of the Tomtengen girls. That farm borders us to the west, just across the fence. 

Out the southern windows I could see lights in the house where my grandparents, Oscar and Julia Hanson had lived. They were my mother’s parents.  Just beyond their farm, I saw the farm where an aunt and uncle had lived, Maynard and Jeannette Hanson, and my cousins, Cynthia and Brian.

Across the highway from their farm, I could see the lights of the farm where I was born and lived for the first nine years of my life. I still refer to it as the Hauge farm. 

Just across the road from my grandparents I could see the dark silhouettes of the trees that surrounded Smith School, where I went for eight years. The building was recently moved.

Straight to the south of us I could see Birch Hill on the Thompson farm, where we spent many wonderful days exploring the woods and rocks and playing with neighbor kids.

I went to the front of the house and looked out the north windows. Just over the hill in the distance I could see the treetops of the farm where another uncle and aunt had lived, LaMont and Hazel Hanson, and my cousins, Lyle and Wayne.

To the northeast, about a mile-and-a-half away, I could see the farm where my great grandparents, Hans and Lisa Sherpe lived. Hans bought that farm in the 1860s after coming to America from Norway. My grandfather, Andrew Sherpe was born and died there. My father lived there when he married my mother. It’s right across the road from the Old Towne Motel, where I lived for six months while our house was being built.

Looking out the east window, I could see lights at the Richard and Sharon Gilbeck farm, just across Highway 14. My grandparents, Andrew and Inga Sherpe once owned that farm until they lost it during the Depression. Grandpa Andrew built the barn that’s still standing. My father and his sister, Juna, lived there when they were young.

Halfway between that farm and our house I see the lights of the farm where I grew up, along with my brothers and sister. My younger brother, Arden, and his wife Jan, and their girls, Katelyn and Kassie, live there now. That farm borders us on the east.

Yes, I’m surrounded by ancestral history. It hadn’t dawned on me until I was checking the windows that cold, blustery evening. I’ve always had a deep interest in family history and genealogy. I may be the new kid on the block, but I have very deep roots here. I think it’s only appropriate that I began the New Year in an old setting, surrounded by history, and the ghosts of my ancestors. It felt good. It felt like home.

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