Virtual Voyage

Week 1: The Launch

Overview of Migration to America

Few events in Norwegian history have met with greater fascination from Norwegians and Norwegian emigrants than the story of the Restauration and the crossing to America. The course of the departure, the arduous journey across the Atlantic and the drama the emigrants experienced upon arrival in New York have been described in countless novels and non-fiction books. The Restauration is considered to be the “Norwegian Mayflower.”

The voyage in 1825 marked the beginning of organized Norwegian emigration to America, with more than 850,000 Norwegians following in the wake of the Restauration over the next hundred years.  

The Restauration crossed the North Sea on a southwesterly course, passing through the English Channel, and continuing south to Madeira. On this Portuguese archipelago west of Morocco, they stopped over and took on provisions before the captain set off west to cross the Atlantic. This southern route was carefully planned and was a common route for merchant ships sailing between Europe and America. It had its clear advantages in that it could take advantage of the trade winds and sail into a warmer climate.

On July 4, 2025, a replica of the Restauration sets sail from Stavanger, seen off by HM King Harald and HM Queen Sonja, other members of the royal family, dignitaries, citizens of Stavanger, members of Sons of Norway and a large contingent of well-wishers.  

Follow the virtual voyage of the Restauration as we await the ship’s safe landing in New York and learn about the historic journey along the way!

Sources:
https://www.restauration.no/
https://ryfylketrebaat.no/

Week 2: The Name

Cleng Peerson and the First Wave of Emigration to North America

In 1821, Klein Pedersen Hesthammer made a research trip to the United States to prepare everything for Norwegian emigrants in collaboration with American Quakers. He traveled with a man from Finnøy, Knut Olson Eide.

Klein Pedersen – or Cleng Peerson, as he came to call himself in America, used the time to familiarize himself with the country and the conditions there. Among other things, he found an area around Kendall in Orleans County on Lake Ontario in the northwest of New York State that he thought was well suited for a Norwegian colony. When he returned to Norway in 1824, Cleng gave a report on what he had found to the Quakers in Stavanger, and they began to equip an expedition to establish a Norwegian colony, a "settlement," in North America.  

Cleng Peerson knew the Quaker Lars Larsson Geilane from Stavanger, originally from Time. The latter is identified as the initiator of the first known organized emigration from Norway to the United States on the sloop Restauration. The boat sailed from Stavanger on July 4 or 5, 1825 with 52 passengers on board, who were called "sluppefolkene” [“the sloop people” in Norwegian], and Sloopers in English.

The Sloopers landed in New York on October 9, where they were received by Cleng Peerson. They settled in the area that Cleng Peerson had located at Kendall, New York. It was an area with great population growth, and an important reason was the construction of the Erie Canal from the Hudson River to Lake Erie, which was completed in 1825.

The Sloopers remained in Kendall for a few years, but after Cleng Peerson surveyed conditions in the upper Midwest of Illinois in 1833, most of the settlers from Kendall moved to a new Norwegian settlement on the Fox River in LaSalle County west of Chicago in 1834–1835. With its founding, Fox River became a destination for Norwegian immigrants when regular emigration began in 1836. The upper Midwest thereafter became the main area of Norwegian immigration to the United States.

Follow the virtual voyage of the Restauration as we await the ship’s safe landing in New York and learn about the historic journey along the way!

Excerpted and translated from source: 
https://snl.no/Cleng_Peerson