Norwegian Settlers Memorial - Norway, Illinois - Wikipedia Entries on Waymarking.com

According to Wikipedia, "The Norwegian Settlers Memorial, located in Norway, Illinois, is the official memorial of the U.S. state of Illinois maintained in honor of immigrants from the European country of Norway. The memorial celebrates the arrival, in 1834, of a pioneering band of farm-seekers led by the peripatetic ethnic leader Cleng Peerson. Peerson's vessel, the Restauration, is often credited with bringing the first group of immigrants from Norway to the young United States. Scandinavian farm life had been devastated in 1816 by the Year Without a Summer, and younger sons and daughters from farm families in northern Norway were looking for new opportunities".

"Dedicated in 1934, the Memorial celebrated the centennial of the arrival of Peerson's group. At the time the Memorial was dedicated, many of the descendants of the Peerson band were still farmers working the land their ancestors had taken up in 1834. Today, the Memorial is an unstaffed historic site of the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency. It is located by the roadside of Illinois Route 71 in Norway, 9 miles (14.5 km) northeast of Exit 93 on Interstate 80 in rural northern Illinois".

Source: Wikipedia

Text on the marker:

HERE IS TO COMMEMORATED THE
100TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE FIRST
PERMANENT NORWEGIAN SETTLEMENT
IN THE UNITED STATES BY
CLENG PEERSON
AND OTHER PIONNEERS FROM NORWAY.
THEY AND THEIR DESCENDANTS WHO
STILL LIVE HERE HAVE CONTRIBUTED
LARGELY TO THE DEVELOPPEMENT OF
THIS SECTION OF ILLINOIS.
ERECTED BY THE STATE OF ILLINOIS
1934.

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Date Logged Log User Rating   06/01/2013 Leader1 visited it