Home Tours at Nordic Fest: Norwegian and Decorah History

The Wright family home, one of the homes on the first Nordic Fest homes tour in 1967, photo taken September 2014

One of the favorite attractions during early Nordic Fest years were the Historic Home Tours sponsored by the Tuesday Evening Hospital Unit. Tickets were $1.00 each in 1967. Shoes and smoking were not permitted in the homes. A total of 1,224 people attended tours at four homes at the first Nordic Fest. 

Among the homes on tour the first year was the resident of Dr. D.W. and Peg Wright at 404 Fifth Avenue in Decorah. Those who toured this home in 1967 received an information sheet that read as follows:

This home was built in 1892 by Dr. Axel Christian Smith, an immigrant from Norway, and one of the first physicians for Luther College. Dr. Thrond Stabo was the next owner of the house for a period of forty years. During that time, the Stabos entertained Crown Prince Olaf, the present King of Norway. Mrs. Wright has a plaque in the front entry of this house commemorating the event.

Dr. Stabo was the Norwegian Vice Consul for Iowa.  In that capacity, he entertained many celebrities from Norway in addition to the Norwegian royals, among these were Roald Amundsen; Fridtjof Nansen; Norwegian Bishops Stoylen and Lunde; Ambassador Wilhelm Morgenstierne; C.J. Hambro, President of the League of Nations Assembly; Arne Kildal, General Secretary of Nordmanns-Forbundet; and many others. 

Dr. Stabo was chairman of the Luther College Board of Regents and was knighted by King Haakon VII of Norway. He founded the Symra Literary Society in the front room of the house at Fifth Avenue and Center Street. 

Peg Wright shared the extensive Norwegian history of the home she and her late husband purchased in 1954, which is now occupied by her son and daughter-in-law, David Jr. and Jeanne during a lovely recent visit with the #nordicfest50 team. 

Additional homes on the 1967 tours were:

• Residence of Tom and Florence Lynch at 301 Upper Broadway
• Residence of L.J. and Helen Bodensteiner at 509 West Broadway
• Resident of Mr. and Mrs. B.B. Anundsen, 709 East Main Street 

The Historic Home tours continued at Nordic Fest until 1980, creating 13 years of impact for unfunded needs at the Winneshiek County Memorial Hospital in Decorah. These tours served as a predecessor to Decorah distinctions like the designation of the Broadway-Phelps Park Historic District in 1976.