First Years in Minnesota

Tosten, Sigrid, and their children were now living in Hayfield, Minnesota. We pick up the story inTosten's autobiography.

"I rented a house from Ole Vastvt, called 'jalgan huset," for the family while I continued working for others. I bought two cows in the spring and one in the fall, because we could use the pasture on the place we stayed. Here we stayed for three years.

In the fall of 1887, I went to Dakota Territory, Nelson County. I had friends there so was going to visit, and I stayed through threshing. Wages were good. They paid $2.00 a day. So I earned enough to pay my fare both ways and a little besides.

There was still free land to be had. But I did not decide then but thought about it through the winter, and the outcome was that we decided to move to Dakota."

Excerpt from Tosten's autobiography, written in 1917