Pastor O.B. Anderson Family

ANDERSON, OLSON, NESHEIM

Posted By: Connie Swearingen- Volunteer (email)
Date: 4/22/2015 at 13:30:24

Monona County History
1982

Pastor O.B. Anderson Family, p 94

Onawa is the birthplace of our son David L, who is Senior pastor at Trinity Lutheran Church in Moorhead, Minn. The Onawa Lutheran Church and Skein Lutheran (Albaton) were served by the same pastor and these parishes became our first call and served them from 1931 to 1938. In addition to the ministry to the two parishes and living in Onawa, we were extending our ministry to the Danish group, in Moorhead, started a Sunday School in Turin and while serving at Sloan, organized a Sunday School and public school on Flower’s Island.

Although we labored during the depression years and struggled with ‘gumbo’ roads and constantly had to worry about the budget, these years were perhaps the most joyful and satisfying that we experienced in these 50 years of ministry. We remembered that one of those depression years one of the deacons from Skein Church, Gus Dahl, went with me to every farmer in the parish and we gathered 1000 bushels of corn – then President Roosevelt put a ceiling on the corn so that each member received a special credit of about 87 cents a bushel.

Times were difficult, but it seems that during those days the response of the people and everyone participating in the work of the church made every task joyful and we might even say that perhaps there were no financial problems. Oscar Vik, manager of Youman Lumber Company, member of the Onawa Church would see that there was fuel at the parsonage and permitted the fuel bill to be paid in the spring.

We should mention that the wife or mother of the two boys, Nina C. Olson, was privileged to be with us the entire ministry at Onawa and Sloan, Iowa. When Wayne was born in Humboldt, Iowa in 1940, June 3, the mother was called home to the Lord. We had moved to Humboldt, Iowa in 1938 and served this parish until 1946 when we went to Sioux City, Iowa. Two years later in 1942 the Lord sent Ingeborge C. Nesheim of Thor, Iowa, to be the mother of David and Wayne – we were blessed with two daughters, Lois Marie, teaching at the Metropolitan Community College of Nursing in St. Paul, Minn. and Roelyn Jane, married to William Ahrens at Bettendorf, Iowa, part time teaching at St. Catherine College in Davenport, Iowa with two children, Kirsten and Rachel. Wayne is a pilot for Northwest Airlines, married to Ann Esse of Hayward, Minn. and have two boys, Sigurd and Erick.

David L. is Senior Pastor at Trinity Lutheran Church in Moorhead, Minn. We continue to live here at Minneapolis, Minn. From Onawa we went to Humboldt, Iowa 1938-1946 – to Sioux City, Iowa, serving from 1946-1955 – in 1955 we were privileged to begin a new congregation at Janesville, Wisconsin and stayed there until 1967. In 1967 we went to Lutheran Deaconess Hospital in Minneapolis as Chaplain for two years—1969 we retired and continue to work as Visitation Pastor at Christ the King Lutheran Church in Bloomington, Minn. when Mrs. Anderson retired from teaching.