Ride, Ride , Ranke

Sigfrid Ohrt is ten years old when she emigrates to America with her mother and siblings in 1901, after her father had gone ahead—fleeing debt, the police, and a forced auction. Sigrid starts school. «Skulen var annleis. Språket endå meir. Læraren forbaud norsk» (p. 43 in Remember the Ladies!).

This resembles what the Sámi experienced in Norway from the mid-nineteenth century until a new law in 1959 permitted the use of Sámi as a language of instruction in schools. But even after this, Sámi children were punished for speaking Sámi.

Sigfrid “missed the fjord, the mountains, and Grandfather’s voice” “(p. 44), and the grandfather who sang” «Ride, ride, ranke» to her. She marries and has four children who are given English names and speak only English. She has “no time to maintain the language” (p. 45).

Sigfrid visited Norway in 1971—like so many other emigrants to America—and died in 1985, after having lived most of her life in the United States: in Bremerton, where she ran a hotel, and in Tacoma, Lynnwood, Seattle, and Bellingham.

^{In the days leading up to Christmas, we meet one of the book’s ten Norwegian women each day. They represent a large and diverse group of female voices that are only now, at the 200th anniversary of Norwegian emigration to America, beginning to be heard.}

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