D I S C O V E R I N G D A KO TA
BY
CURT ERIKSMOEN
Brynhild Haugland and half-century of service
A
t one time, a person from North Dakota served in the state House of Representatives longer than any other state legislator in the United States. When you consider that the legislator was a woman, it is even more remarkable. Brynhild Haugland, from Minot, was elected to represent her district a record 26 consecutive times, serving from 1939 to 1990. Haugland lost only one election in her political career – her first try at the state Legislature in 1936. A broken leg kept her from campaigning and she lost by only 100 votes. Haugland chose to run again for the state House in 1938, won, and her constituents re-elected her to the North Dakota House 25 more times in a row. Haugland retired from the state Legislature after the 1990 session. In recent years, her national record of consecutive elections was eclipsed, by Hugh Gillis of Georgia. Haugland was born a twin on July 28, 1905, to Norwegian immigrants, Nels and Sigurda (Ringoen) Haugland, in Minot. When her twin brother died in infancy, she took on the mantle of living up to the expectations of being both a son and daughter. From her parents, she developed a sense of patriotism, and learned the importance of commitment and the need to be sensitive to the feelings of others. Haugland exhibited these qualities throughout her long political career. Haugland entered Minot Model School, now Central Campus School, on its opening day Sept. 30, 1913. She completed her elementary teaching certification at Minot State Normal School in 1924, her two-year standard in 1928, and then taught for two years in rural Ward County. More than 30 years later, she returned to her alma mater, Minot State College (now Minot State University) and received a bachelor of
This portrait of Brynhild Haugland hangs in the state Capitol’s Rough Rider Hall of Fame gallery.
arts degree in 1956. Haugland quit teaching to help her parents develop their dairy business and continued to operate the farm even after her father’s death. She became active in Republican politics in the mid-1920s. Although she remained a Republican throughout her long career, Haugland was concerned with social issues and did not always vote along party lines. The Republican Party dropped her from the ballot as a House candidate in 1962, but she won in the primary, running as an independent, and then went on to win in the general election. Haugland, as a woman, certainly represented an elected minority in state politics in the mid-1930s. The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution had been ratified in North Dakota in a special session of the Legislature Dec. 2, 1919. This not only gave women the right to vote, but also allowed them to seek elective office. The first state election after full women’s suffrage was in 1922. That year, two women – Minnie Craig of Esmond and Nellie Dougherty of Minot – were elected to the Legislature. By the time Haugland began
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serving as a legislator in 1938, only eight women had been elected in the state’s history to serve in the North Dakota House. Only one woman, Minnie Craig, served for more than one term. Haugland was the only female legislator in North Dakota during the 1941, 1943 and 1945 sessions. Throughout her career in the North Dakota House, Haugland’s main causes centered on education, the environment, agriculture and the handicapped. She is given primary credit for establishing the North Central Experiment Station, the North Dakota state prison, and multicounty health units. She received well over 100 awards, culminated by being selected to the state’s Theodore Roosevelt Rough Rider Hall of Fame in 1994. Officials from North Dakota further attested to her accomplishments by naming the largest conference room in the state Capitol the Brynhild Haugland room. She died in 1998, at age 93. Haugland lived by her motto: “Most any good thing can be accomplished eventually, if you are not particular who gets the credit.” However, people certainly did recognize that Haugland was involved in many good things that were accomplished in North Dakota. Former first lady Eleanor Roosevelt, in her 1954 book, “Ladies Of Courage,” best illustrated this by writing: “Go down the list of laws passed by the North Dakota Legislature in the last 15 years to help meet farmers’ problems and improve his living conditions, and you will find that Brynhild Haugland had a hand in every one of them.” Curt Eriksmoen, with his spouse, Jan, publishes articles about noteworthy North Dakotans in history. They have published several volumes of these articles in their “Did You Know That…?” series. For more information, visit www.eriksmoenenterprises.com.
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