Coon Prairie Congregation

Construction was started in 1875 and continued for most of the next 10 years on Coon Prairie’s second church. On Easter Sunday in 1909 this beautiful church was burned to the ground except for the stone walls. Notice the curved balcony.

A pioneer who played an active role in Coon Prairie congregation’s history was Ingebret K. Bjørseth, the church’s first teacher and the township’s first chairman. He was born in Molde in Romsdal, Norway, became a seminary student and then got a teaching position in Biri. Here he married a sister of Syver N. Galstad. When the “American fever” of the early 1850s gripped the Biri area and threatened to depopulate the whole vicinity, he decided also to leave, and arrived summer of 1850 on Coon Prairie. Here he began to gather the settlement’s children and youth at school. He also held devotional meetings the following winter and prepared for the instruction of the congregation. He had a confirmation class of eleven boys and girls who were confirmed by Pastor N. Brandt at his next visit in July 1852.

He was also an expert carpenter, and performed most of the work in building the county’s first mill. This was located in Bloomingdale. For himself he built a house just southeast of the present Westby. The house had two floors, the uppermost was used as a school room. This was the first school in Vernon County.

All the old settlers agree that Bjørseth was an exceptional teacher, but especially strict. He also had a very good voice and conducted singing practice which was popular with the young people. Because of his abilities and careful work, Bjørseth was a highly respected man. But, unfortunately some painful incidents suddenly arose which made it necessary for Bjørseth to quit his teaching and to break his association with the congregation. His powerful voice which had formerly led the hymn singing and had encouraged everyone to join in, was no longer heard and people felt that the devotions had lost half their meaning.

So it was that one Sunday in church the hymn singing seemed especially sluggish. It was not as in the old days, it seemed, when all took part in the best spirit and sang from the heart. Then suddenly there was heard a known and strong voice which filled the church. People looked happily at one another as if to say: “Now you shall see that Bjørseth has straightened out matters and everything will be as before.” But, this was the last time that Bjørseth sang in church for he left immediately after to go north to Dunn County where in the vicinity of Ole Rønning, was one of the first pioneers.

Bjørseth did not stay there, but moved in a few years to Eau Claire. At this time there began a large migration to Dakota Territory and he decided to seek his luck there. He built a large flat-bottomed boat in the middle of which he raised a comfortable cabin. In this he brought his furniture and other necessary things together with his family. Thereupon he departed to travel by water to Dakota. The journey was long – first 100 miles down the Chippewa River, then 700 miles down the Mississippi to St. Louis, and then finally 800 miles up the Missouri River to Yankton in South Dakota – but after a long time he did arrive. Here he got a good farm on the rich Dakota prairie.

But, here too he was not at peace. In a few years he left again, although old and infirm, to become one of the first pioneers in Washington. Here he settled at Paulsbo, out near the Pacific ocean, where he at last died.

Without question he was a descendant of the old, strong-willed Vikings from Romsdal who in earlier days had sailed in every sea.

Another prominent man who came during the first 50 years and who also was a teacher and precentor was Gunder Sørum. He was not grim and aggressive as Bjørseth, but happy and quiet. He had the most thankless task of going around to collect he congregation’s assessments. All members of the congregation were then for many years assessed between three and four percent of their real and personal property for the church’s expenses, and this was a cause for much misunderstanding. The salary would not sustain anyone for he got only a dollar a day for this unpleasant task. But, since this was additional work, he carried it out faithfully as long as this system was in use. And, thanks to his appeasing nature, he was incredibly good at collecting this heavy tax.