HISTORY

Between 1825 and 2000, about 1 million Norwegians emigrated to overseas destinations. Seen as a percent of the total population, no other European country except Ireland had such large numbers of emigrants. Because of this massive movement, the size of the "Norwegian" ethnic group worldwide easily surpasses the population of the old country itself. In the United States, for example, 3.9 million people indicated on the 1990 census that they had ethnic roots in Norway; and there are similar groups in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and other emigrant destinations in Africa and South America.

Perhaps as many as a quarter of all these emigrants later returned for good to Norway. After 1890 the emigration took on the character of a labor migration rather than a permanent settlement in new lands. In more recent times, many older emigrants have returned to spend their retirement years in the land of their birth.

Indeed, it was among returnees that the idea of a museum for the emigration first appeared. This was in 1914, when Norwegians returned to the old country from all over the world to celebrate the centennial of the Norwegian constitution. But not until 38 years had passed, in 1952, was such a museum established as a part of the Norsk Folkemuseum, Oslo. In 1973 the museum was moved to Hedmarksmuseet and Domkirkeodden in Hamar and in 1988, it became an independent national institution named The Norwegian Emigrant Museum.

It is commonly known that emigrants and their descendants have always been interested in finding relatives and "roots" in Norway. Recently, however, many Norwegians have begun to search in the other direction. They wish to find their relatives in other countries. In other words, while the emigrant's descendants search the old country for relatives, those who once stayed home are beginning to search for family offshoots in other lands.

Thus the Norwegian Emigrant Museum is not designed solely to show present visitors how past generations lived (although the museum does that, too). Rather the museum's purpose is to reveal the workings of a process - emigration, immigration and return migration - a process with historical depth and space, yet with personal impact upon many individual human beings. To fulfill this purpose, the museum intends to be a meeting place between the past and the present, between the "family at home" and the "family out there", to be a symbol for all Norwegians and their descendants at home and abroad, and a place where they can confirm their identity and their connections to Norway.

In keeping with this point of view, the Norwegian Emigrant Museum is international in scope and multi-faceted in purpose. Research conducted here is designed to increase our knowledge about migrants and Norwegian emigration, immigration and return migration. The research efforts concentrate on emigrants' backgrounds, their cultural development in the lands where they settled, and their relationship to the homeland and culture they had left behind.

The museum also studies the impact on Norway of the returned migrants, and will use this question as a springboard to the study of immigration to Norway and migration movements in general. In pursuit of it research purposes, the museum collects and preserves relevant historical material and disseminates the research results through exhibitions, publications, lectures and other media.