Norwegian Woods (OT)

As a young student in 1950, Professor Nils Christie was assigned the task of finding out what happened to the Yugoslav prisoners in Norway.

His publication in 1952 pointed out gross cruelties, but at that time the report raised little attention. "We didn’t want to accept that such a thing could happen here too," he said.

"My research started when I was asked to come to Professor Johs. Andenæs office. There was Attorney General Andreas Aulie. "There's something terrible we want to know more about," he said. "My first thought was that Norwegians do not do such things."

"But my investigations showed that Norwegians had worked with German SS and carried out the most cruel actions against vulnerable and defenceless people, Christie says.

"What struck me at that time was that there was no interest in Norway. This was a disgusting piece of history that no one touched. My master's degree contained a lot of new material, but nobody cared, says the professor.

In 1972, his work appeared as a book at Pax publishing house, still the interest was lacking.

Stetind had several attempts at first ascents. First was the German Paul Güssfeldt and the Norwegian Martin Ekroll in the summer of 1888. The Dane Carl Hall and the Norwegian mountain guide Mathias Soggemoen attempted in 1889.

Neither group succeeded, but Carl Hall built a cairn on the lower summit about 500 metres (1,600 ft) southeast of the main summit. That cairn is now called Halls fortopp (elevation 1,304 metres or 4,278 feet). Around 1900, William Cecil Slingsby also failed to reach the summit.

It was not until 30 July 1910 that Ferdinand Schjelderup, Carl Wilhelm Rubenson, and Alf Bonnevie Bryn finally reached the summit of Stetind. The weather conditions were good. It was Rubenson's 25th birthday, and he was given the honor of being first in the rope. The hardest part was to pass the smooth crag "Mysosten", which Rubenson finger traversed along a tiny crack. After this passage there was an easy climb to the summit. The same three climbers continued their 1910 tour by making first ascents of the Lofoten summits Svolværgeita and Trakta. Arne Næss, Ralph Høibakk, and K. Friis Baasted did the first winter climb of Stetind in 1963 on the eastern wall. In 1966, Arne Næss and four others were the first ones to summit via the west wall.

From around 1630 Forest Finns began to emmigrate from Sweden to Norway. In Norway, Forest Finns mainly resided in forest areas uninhabited by Norwegians, especially Finnskogen, a district from Trysil in the north to the central parts of Østfold in the south.

In the census of 1686 we can see that Finns had also settled in the Eidsvoll area, in the forests around Oslo and Drammen, in Aurskog-Høland, Hurdal, Hadeland, Ringerike (Finnemarka), Romerike and in the eastern part of Telemark. At the end of the 1700s, Forest Finns from Trysil also settled in Verdal in Nord-Trøndelag.