Recollections of a Norwegian Immigrant (Norwegian Emigration Literature)

In his book Andreas Ueland recounts his life and experiences as a young Minneapolis lawyer who served as a local Judge of Probate Court and became a prominent attorney for several Federal and State banks. Andreas Ueland came from the Stavanger region in western Norway. He was the third son of a farmer and famous politician, but because of the old Norwegian inheritance laws he would be without any rights to a share in his father’s farm. He thus had to make his fortune otherwise.
So in 1871, 18 years old, with a few dollars in his pockets, he left for America, the promising land over there west of the Atlantic. He was uneducated beyond a few years of schooling where he learned to read and write, but he had a bright mind and was of sound disposition. Arriving in New York, not knowing anybody or anything, he headed out west by train, buying a ticket to Rushford, Minnesota, a name he had once heard mentioned by an emigrant on visit home in Heskestad.
On Minnesota farms he found work and began to learn English, to begin with mostly for Norwegian farmers. Later he worked hard in saw-mills, lumber-yards, and in the city sewers. While he worked and carefully saved his money he struggled to achieve a high school equivalence diploma. With this in hand he worked as a legal assistant and studied law at night in Minneapolis. In 1877 he passed the Minnesota bar at his first try, being number one of five candidates; this was only six years after his arrival in the states.
Ueland's legal practice developed from his activities as a middleman and mediator between Norwegian-Americans and their churches. In this book he has devoted several chapters to discussing some of those key Lutheran issues, doctrines and church controversies. His first legal case of some importance won him international fame when he secured for a Norwegian wife in Minnesota her rights to an inherited fortune which her husband had claimed he had the rights to. Even the Norwegian author and orator Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson applauded this victory for women’s rights, in a letter he wrote.
Andreas Ueland was an avid reader of classical and modern literature. He was also an active participant in local literary and fine arts societies. From his background and experience as an immigrant he maintained a broad interest in ethnic matters and became increasingly involved with the city of Minneapolis at large.