Danish Sisterhood Online Archive Campaign

The Museum of Danish America is honored to be the caretaker of the national Danish Sisterhood archival collection. With support from DSS members and lodges across the country, this important collection was organized, processed, and cataloged in 2019-2021. The next priority for this collection is to make the most unique and valuable contents accessible online. Your contributions to this campaign will directly support the development of an online library of DSS archival materials.

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Hans Poulsen Egede, the Apostle of Greenland

by Donna Christensen Thomas, National DSS Historian

My DSS newsletter article in February article focused on Omaha's Lodge #6 longtime member of 67 years!, Jean Marie (Katzenstein) Davidson. She had shared that her family is descended from Hans Egede. But who was he? A summary from Wikipedia follows as well as his legacy in modern day.

Hans Poulsen Egede (31 Jan1686-5 Nov 1958) was a Dano-Norwegian Lutheran missionary. He was born in Harstad, Norway, nearly 150 miles north of the Arctic Circle. His paternal grandfather had been a vicar in Vester Egede on southern Zealand, Denmark. Hans was tutored by an uncle, a clergyman in a local Lutheran Church. In 1704 he travelled to Copenhagen to enter the University of Copenhagen, where he earned a Bachelor's degree in Theology. He became ordained and was assigned to a parish on the remote island of Lofoten. He married Gertrud Rasch (or Rask), who was thirteen years his senior. Four children were born to the couple, two boys and two girls.

While at Lofoten, Egede heard stories about the old Norse settlements on Greenland. Contact had been lost for three hundred years. He sought permission from Frederick IV of Denmark-Norway to search for the colony and establish a mission there. (Denmark ruled Norway for about four hundred years until about 1800). He gave his consent to at least partially re-establish a colonial claim on the island. Egede established the Bergen Greenland Company with monies given by Bergen merchants, Frederick IV, and the Royal Mission College. Egede, his wife and four children departed Bergen in May 1721 along with forty other colonists for a two months long voyage. Searching for months for descendants of the old Norse colonists, he found only the local Kalaallit people and began studying their language.

A common myth states that, as the Inuit had no bread nor any idea of it, Egede adapted the Lord's Prayer as "Give us this day our daily seal".

By the end of the first winter, many of the colonists had been stricken with scurvy and most returned home as soon as they could. They were supplied with provisions sent by the king every few years. He established a whaling station on Nipisat Island in 1723, a fort named "Godt-Haab" or Good Hope," which became the future Godthåb. In 1724 he baptized the first child converts, two of whom would travel to Denmark and there inspire Count Zinzendorf to begin the Moravian missions. The Moravians established a station which became the nucleus of modern Nuuk, Greenland's capital. Unfortunately, a ship also brought the island smallpox which became an epidemic among the Inuit and in 1735 it claimed Gertrud Egede. Hans carried her body back to Denmark for burial the next year, leaving his son Poul to carry on his work.

Egede's book The Old Greenland's New Perlustration appeared in 1729 and was translated into several languages. In Copenhagen he was named Superintendent of the Greenland Mission Seminary and in 1741 the Lutheran Bishop of Greenland. A catechism for use in Greenland was completed by 1747. He died on 5 Nov 1758 at the age of 72 in Stubbekøbing, Falster island, Denmark.

Egede's legacy according to Wikipedia: Egede became something of a national "saint" of Greenland. The town of Egedesminde (meaning "Memory of Egede") commemorated him. It was established by Hans's son, Niels, in 1759 on the Eqalussuit peninsula. It was to the island of Aasiaat in 1763, which had been the site of a pre-Viking Inuit settlement. His grandson and namesake Hans Egede Saabye also became a missionary to Greenland and published a celebrated diary of his time there.

The Royal Danish Geographical Society established the Egede Medal in his honor in 1916. The medal is in silver and awarded 'preferably for geographical studies and researches in the Arctic countries'.

A crater on the Moon is named after him: the Egede crater on the south edge of the Mare Frigoris (the Sea of Cold). The historical fiction novel "The Prophets of Eternal Fjord" narrates a tale of a missionary priest under Egede's instruction embarking upon Greenland to convert its indigenous peoples to Christianity."

Statues of Hans Egede stand watch over Greenland's capital in Nuuk and outside of Frederik's Church (Marmorkirken) in Copenhagen. Egede's statue at Frederick's Church was vandalized with the word "Decolonize" spray-painted on its base on June 20, 2020, during worldwide protests against memorials of colonial figures. Another Egede statue in Nuuk, Greenland was likewise vandalized ten days later. In a subsequent vote, 921 voted to keep the statue while 600 wanted it removed.

Hans Egede gave one of the oldest descriptions of a sea serpent, now believed to have been a giant squid. On 6 July 1734 he wrote that this ship was off the Greenland coast when those on board "saw a most terrible creature, resembling nothing they saw before. The monster lifted its head so high that it seemed to be higher than the crow's nest on the mainmast. The head was small and the body short and wrinkled. The unknown creature was sing giant fins which propelled it through the water. Later the sailors saw its tail as well. The monster was longer than our whole ship."

Updates from Amber Lodge, Brainerd, MN

The March meeting of the Danish Sisterhood Amber Lodge was held at the Good Shepard Lutheran Church in Brainerd, MN.

Linda Buck presented a program on Danish knitting. Along with Danish knitting traditions, she spoke about the general history of knitting, highlighting early orgins and commonalities among regions and countires. It was fun to hear about her observations and experiences with different fiber art finds while traveling. Linda also shared several books, magazines, patterns, needles and examples of yarns. The following picture shows Linda demonstrating a holder that allows the knitter to create on the go, whether walking or doing other tasks.

Following the program, we enjoyed a potluck lunch with many delicious options. The business meeting then closed out our March gathering.

Jane Matthies-Holtan, Correspondant