Bits and pieces of Rindal and Haggelokken ancestors

 

I revisited research done on the Rindal line by a relative in Norway (Svein Botterud) that I had forgotten about. He writes that third great grandmother Lisbet Olsdatter Kaldor arrived in New York with her son Johannes in May of 1888. According to other sources, the ship named the Geiser (above) left Christiania (present Oslo) on May 24th. Steam powered ships made the journey much faster than in the age of sail just a few years before. She died in 1912 in Seattle, Washington living with her son Eric.
He also notes my 2nd great grandparents Mikkel Olson and Elizabeth Rindal left in 1873 as part of a group travelling together from Oyer. He lists them leaving Norway on May 22nd, so the arrival in New York June 11th matches with the travel time of the day, but I have yet to find her name.

Possible Rindal and Haggalokken farms

Another possible Haggalokken farm near Oyer

The whole area sits at a bend in the river

Possible Rindal farm. Rindal possibly is the name from a valley off the edge of a valley surrounded by cliffs as this map illustrates.

2nd great grandfather Mikkel Olsen Haggelokken left Norway from a farm called Haggelokken near Oyer in Norway. He somehow got to Glasgow, Scotland and then stopped in Derry (modern Londonderry Northern Ireland) arriving in New York on June 11th, 1873. He traveled aboard a very steampunk/Jules Verne like ship named Columbia. He married fellow Oyer area immigrant Lisbet Rindal in Wisconsin in 1879 though they seem to have arrived separately (I haven't found her journey yet). The distance from Rindal farm to Haggelokken/Haggelykkja (if I have the right places) is almost next to each other, so they probably knew each other before coming to America. Old Norse place names like Rindal and Haggelykkja can be found other places, but. there is only one Rindal near Oyer. There is another Haggelkykka closer to town, so it could be that one instead. Mikkel died in Traill County, North Dakota in 1884 after great grandmother Anna Olson Wick was born in 1882.

Norgestkart (map) has a location listed as Haggalykkja not far from Rindal (see picture) Lykkja would be Old Norse for a sort of enclosure or hedged field with its root in the name of the trickster god Loki meaning something like (tangled). Trickster gods create "tangles" for mortals and so the root is interesting. The place could have been called "lokken" in the time of Mikkel which refers to a farm with the same root, but I am unsure if this is the place. 19th century Norway was undeveloped, and everything moved at the pace of a walk, so it would have had to have been close to Oyer. It would have been astonishing for these rural people to transit through industrial Britain and then the U.S. at that time.

This may be Mikkel Olson, but Lisbet Kaldor is not listed. (she is possibly on another page)

The meaning of Hagga in Haggalokken could mean an enclosed field, a nice place (similar to the popular term hygge) or a name for an old woman or witch. More interesting place name etymology. Imagine a farm called something like Tangled Trickster Witch Farm? Someone with more facility with old and new Norwegian may be able to shed light on this

3rd great grandfather Ole Jorgenson Rindal was born in Ringebu, Norway in the Hallingdal in 1818 and likely baptized in this famous Stave church that is almost a thousand years old in parts. He later moved south to Oyer, where my second great grandmother Lisbet Olsdatter Rindal was born in 1847. Ole's father may be buried here, while his mother is listed as dying at Rindal in 1874.

As I dig further into finding my immigrant roots, I find my third great grandmother Elizabeth Olsdatter Kaldor Rindal on my paternal mother's side living near downtown Seattle in 1900 at 1321 Dexter Ave with her son? Eric and his wife. She might have arrived in the U.S. from Oyer, Norway in 1887 because it was the year her husband Ole Jorgenson Rindal died at Rindalskeven (cliff edge over the valley farm?) near Oyer. I love these ancient norse place names. I am still looking for this voyage. In 1912 she died and is buried across the bay at Poulsbo Lutheran Church Cemetery.

She was born in 1822 on Kaldorgard (cold farm) which is a still a working farm and one can stay there at an Airbnb today. It is also a pilgrim stop offering accommodations on the ancient St Olav's Way pilgrim route from Oslo to Nidaros (Trondheim) which is similar to the more popular Camino De Santiago in Spain. If you hike the pilgrim route, you get this cool stamp on your passport