Photo – A very young pioneer family. Left to right Gustavus, John, Berthine, Kristi and Joseph Thompson.
The first white child born in Minnehaha County????? Weird sounding now but Berthiine Beroline Thompson was the first white child born in Minnehaha County. I think most of us have heard some part of this story.
On 26 May 1867, Berthine was born in John and Kristi’s Sod shanty on the side of the Sioux River North of Sioux Falls. Berthine is my Great Grand Aunt.
In 1867 John received a letter from his previous pastor B. J. Muus dated Feb 19th, 1867. Muus was the pastor of the Holden Church in Goodhue County, Minnesota where he and Kristi had been married. The letter was a reply to John who had asked about his marriage certificate. The pastor was concerned about John and his impoverished soul and wanted to make sure John did not settle in a place that they could not also set up a church. A small group of Norwegian’s settlers met in the sod hut or dugout of John Thompson’s on Aug 11, 1868, and had divine services in the Lutheran faith conducted by the Rev. Emil Gustav Andreas Christensen. Two infant children were baptized that day. Berthine Thompson (first white child born in Minnehaha County) and Anne Nelson. On the following day Aug 12th, 1868 a group of 50 Norwegian settlers gathered again at the sod hut of John Thompson and to organize a church. John Langness made the motion to name the new church the Nidaros congregation.
They would later build a church…which eventually became three, which included a world famous traveling church on the prairie which I’ll tell you about soon.