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51. Interview with Nancy Jensen and Aurine Casey

Creator:
Casey, Aurine
Date Created:
1999-09-04
Description:
Beginning in 1998, the City of Duluth (Minn.) Sister Cities Commission collaborated with the Iron Range Research Center to record a series of oral history interviews. Independent scholar Dr. JoAnn Hanson-Stone acted as the lead interviewer. The voluntary, self-selecting participants were second-generation Swedish Americans whose parents settled in northeast Minnesota in the early 1900s. The interviews were initiated to create supplementary material for a planned exhibit, "A Long Way Home: Swedish Immigrant Life in Duluth and Northeast Minnesota, 1890-1940."
Contributing Institution:
Iron Range Research Center
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

52. Interview with Matthew Casillas

Creator:
Casillas, Matthew
Date Created:
1975-06-23
Description:
Matthew Casillas was born Aug. 24, 1931, the fourth of ten children. He was educated locally and entered the armed services. For ten years he lived and worked in California, where he went to college and earned a degree. He returned to St. Paul and went into business for himself in 1965. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: St. Paul's West Side community - Our Lady of Guadalupe Church - the Neighborhood House - new programs by and for Mexican Americans in the local community - family history - family ties - and community cohesiveness. COMMENTS ON INTERVIEW: Much traffic noise from Concord Street. Three or four interruptions from customers entering to do business required recesses from the interview.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

53. Interview with Martha Castanon

Creator:
Castanon, Martha
Date Created:
2010-02-15
Description:
Martha Castanon was born in Moorhead, Minnesota. Castanon traveled between Texas and Minnesota in her youth, but chose Minnesota for better opportunities. She graduated from Moorhead High School and completed two years of vocational technical school as an accounting clerk. She later served as an election judge pushing the importance of voting. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Family background - education differences from Texas and Minnesota - childhood - being bilingual in Spanish and English - struggles fitting into predominantly White schools - technology such as Facebook for communication - Latino culture in food, Tejano music - racism and stereotypes in Moorhead - being multicultural - quincea
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

54. Interview with Leo Castillo

Creator:
Castillo, Leo
Date Created:
1976-07-02
Description:
Leo Castillo was born in Venadito, Texas, on Aug. 19, 1945. He left Texas in May of 1964 to work in Nebraska and Minnesota. He worked in Minnesota and returned to Texas annually until 1968, and in 1969 he became a welder and lived in Litchfield to the time of the interview. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Work experience, including field work, self-employment as a trucker, and welding - social gatherings - and plans for the future. COMMENTS ON INTERVIEW: In Spanish, transcribed into English.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

55. Interview with Amy Cerna

Creator:
Cerna, Amy; United States
Date Created:
2/25/2013
Description:
Amy Cerna was born in 1983 in Big Wells, Texas. At the time of the interview Cerna was studying business at Minnesota State Community and Technical College. She was married with three children and was a volunteer at Mujeres Unidas [Women United]. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Family - marriage - moving within the United States - education - Latino identity and community - Community services - working at MET, Inc.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

56. Interview with Emiliano Chagil

Creator:
Chagil, Emiliano; United States
Date Created:
4/7/2010
Description:
Emiliano Chagil was born in Guatemala in the city of San Lucas Tolimn. Chagil went to college in the city of Solol where he completed his bachelor's degree and later received his engineering degree at the University of San Carlos. He moved to Minnesota in 1980 because of the civil war in Guatemala. He later proved to be an influential leader for Latin communities in Minnesota and Guatemala. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Family - Guatemalan community and culture - financial struggles - Mayan and Christian religions - civil unrest - identity - landscape differences of Minnesota and Guatemala - Latino community in Minnesota - immigration - education - and refugees.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

57. Interview with Huai-Chang Chiang

Creator:
Chaing, Huai-Chang
Date Created:
1981-10-08
Description:
Chiang was born February 15, 1915, in the city of Sunjiang, which was later incorporated into the municipality of Shanghai, China. His father was a technician employed by the Chinese Bureau of Engraving and Printing. Chiang arrived in Minnesota January 9, 1945, to enroll as a graduate student in entomology at the University of Minnesota's College of Agriculture in St. Paul. He received a master of arts degree in 1946 and a doctorate in 1948. From 1948 until 1953 he served as a research fellow in a project on biological control of the European corn borer, which entered Minnesota in 1943 and had become a troublesome pest by 1947. In 1953 Chiang left the project to become an assistant professor of biology at the University of Minnesota, Duluth. From 1956 to 1958 he studied as a Guggenheim Fellow at Cambridge University in England. In 1957 he became an associate professor in Duluth, and in 1960 a full professor. In 1961 he returned to the university's St. Paul campus to teach ecology in the entomology department and to head continuing on the corn borer. In 1968 Chiang initiated international cooperative research on the corn borer at the International Entomological Congress in Moscow by bringing together entomologists from ten countries and designing field tests to be carried out in their own countries and reported annually at fall workshops. The group met in Minnesota in 1974. Since 1975 Chiang has played an important role in initiating scientific exchanges between the United States and the People's Republic of China. In 1975 he was a member of a delegation organized by the Committee for Scholarly Communication with the People's Republic of China, jointly sponsored by the National Academy of Science, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the Social Science Research Council. This early delegation presented lectures and visited Chinese academic institutions. In 1978 Chiang took his family to China and lectured in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou. In 1979 he was delegation leader for a group from the United States Department of Agriculture that concluded an international agreement with the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture. Also in 1979 Chiang coordinated a visit to Minnesota by Chinese entomologists and plant pathologists who attended the International Congress of Plant Protection in Washington, D.C. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Student life in China during the Japanese occupation, 1937-1945 - arrival of Chinese students at the University of Minnesota during and after World War II, and their relatively large number in the entomology and plant pathology departments at the College of Agriculture - research on biological control of insect pests both at the University of Minnesota and various universities in China - international exchange of scientific research through visits of Chinese scholars to the University of Minnesota and reciprocal visits of University faculty to Chinese universities. COMMENTS ON INTERVIEW: Chiang is an important source of information on the intellectuals in Minnesota's Chinese community, particularly those who studied at the University of Minnesota during the post-World War II period. He also provides material on the many scholarly exchanges between University faculty and Chinese scholars that began in the late 1970s.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

58. Cast of "Det Lykkelige Valg," Franklin, Minnesota

Creator:
Chamberlin, Louis C.
Date Created:
1929
Description:
Group picture of the cast of "Det Lykkelige Valg."
Contributing Institution:
Norwegian-American Historical Association
Type:
Still Image
Format:
Black-and-white photographs

59. Members of the Alpha Delta Society, St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota

Creator:
Chamberlin, Louis C.
Date Created:
1931
Description:
Group photograph of the Alpha Delta Society at St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota. Julia Rognlie is picture in the third row from the bottom, second from the right.
Contributing Institution:
Norwegian-American Historical Association
Type:
Still Image
Format:
Studio portraits

60. Interview with Satveer Chaudhary

Creator:
Chaudhary, Satveer
Date Created:
1997-03-27
Description:
Satveer Chaudhary was born in Minnesota. He attended high school, college, and law school in Minnesota. Presently he is serving in the Minnesota legislature. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Parents, familiarity with parents' language, schooling, extracurricular activities, travel in England, India, and South Africa, political work and law school, running for state office. Importance of education, loyalty to family, friends, hospitality, and Indian-American identity.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

61. Interview with Frank Chavez

Creator:
Chavez, Frank
Date Created:
1975-07-07
Description:
Frank Chavez was born in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1928. He moved to Minnesota in 1934 and worked in the beet fields with his parents. After high school he joined the Navy, and in 1960 he went into the printing business in St. Paul. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: His family - business - and the Navy.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

62. Interview with Cheng-Khee Chee and Sing-Bee Ong

Creator:
Chee, Cheng-Khee
Date Created:
1979-12-07
Description:
Cheng-khee Chee was born in 1934 in a rural village near the city of Xiamen (Amoy), in the Xiangyu District of Fujian Province, China. He attended the village school for four and a half years before his family immigrated to Malaysia in 1948. Chee completed elementary and high school in Penang, Malaysia, and graduated from Nanyang University in Singapore. He arrived at the University of Minnesota in 1962 as a graduate student in library science. He completed a master of arts degree in 1964, and in 1965 he took a position as librarian at the University of Minnesota, Duluth. Chee is an active member of the American Watercolor and Midwest Watercolor Societies. He paints in watercolors in both Asian and Western styles, has exhibited in both national and state exhibitions and won numerous awards, including the Gold Medal of Honor from the Allied Artists of American, 1980, and the Colorado Centennial Award from the Rocky Mountain National, 1976. Sing-bee Ong was born in Penang in 1934 of a Chinese family. She and Chee were classmates at Nanyang University. Ong arrived at the University of Minnesota, Duluth, for graduate study in education in 1965. Chee and Ong were married in August of 1965, and all their four children were born in Duluth. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Family background in China and Malaysia - Chee's decision to seek professional training in the United States - the later decision of Ong and Chee to remain in the United States and to raise their family in Duluth - their feeling of acceptance by the University community and townspeople - concerns on bringing up children in an area where few other Chinese live - Chee's work and recognition in the field of watercolor painting in addition to his work as librarian. COMMENTS ON INTERVIEW: The family background of both Chee and Ong illustrates the traditional pattern of emigration from Fujian Province in China to Malaysia. Their later experience also exemplifies the secondary migration from Malaysia to the United States that has occurred among overseas Chinese since the 1950s. Their interview provides material on the experience of Chinese in Minnesota who live outside the Twin Cities metropolitan area.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

63. Interview with Dr. Bingkun K. Chen

Creator:
Chen, Dr. Bingkun K.
Date Created:
2012-02-03
Description:
Bingkun Chen was born December 4, 1961 in Hegang in Heilongjiang province China. He earned a PhD in pathology from Kochi University in Japan and an MBA from the University of Minnesota. At the time of the interview he was working at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Subjects discussed include: Early life in China - religion - early education and medical school in China and then Germany and Japan - coming to the Minnesota to work for the Mayo Clinic - working for the Mayo Clinic - family in Minnesota - going back to China - living in Rochester, Minnesota - the Chinese community in Rochester - being grateful - diversity.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

64. Interview with Pennamma Cherucheril

Creator:
Cherucheril, Pennamma
Date Created:
1993-07-22
Description:
Pennamma Cherucheril was born in India. As a teenager, she and a sister traveled to Wisconsin to join a relative and to study nursing. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Background, arriving and adjusting to the United States, education, visiting India, marriage, family values, religion, mixing Western and religious customs, India Club, Malayalee group, North American Knanaya Catholic group, experiences attending Indian cultural events, future plans and aspirations.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

65. Interview with Thaly Chhour, part 2 of 2

Creator:
Chhour, Thaly
Date Created:
1992-08-14
Description:
Thaly Chhour was displaced from her home village during the fighting that preceded the Khmer Rouge regime. She moved with her family to Phnom Penh City where they lived until 1975. She was 14 when the Khmer Rouge came to power. Her father and brothers died in 1976. Her sisters and mother survived, despite starvation and repeated illnesses, but were not better off in the refugee camps near the Thai-Cambodian border. After they arrived at Khao I Dang refugee camp, they were sponsored to come to the United States. Chhour describes her experience adapting to life in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

66. Interview with Thaly Chhour, part 1 of 2

Creator:
Chhour, Thaly
Date Created:
1992-08-14
Description:
Thaly Chhour was displaced from her home village during the fighting that preceded the Khmer Rouge regime. She moved with her family to Phnom Penh City where they lived until 1975. She was 14 when the Khmer Rouge came to power. Her father and brothers died in 1976. Her sisters and mother survived, despite starvation and repeated illnesses, but were not better off in the refugee camps near the Thai-Cambodian border. After they arrived at Khao I Dang refugee camp, they were sponsored to come to the United States. Chhour describes her experience adapting to life in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Moving Image
Format:
Oral histories

67. Interview with Margaret Woo Chinn

Creator:
Chinn, Margaret Woo
Date Created:
1982-05-27
Description:
Margaret Woo Chinn's father and some of his brothers (including Woo Yee Sing, whose son Howard Woo was also interviewed for this oral history project) came to the United States in the late 1870s and 1880s and worked in laundries and on railroads. Chinn was born in China in 1912, and in 1914 her father brought the family to the United States. They settled in Minneapolis and were involved in running a gift shop and a family restaurant, the long-popular John's Place that closed in 1967. Subjects discussed include: Family history and the early Chinese community in Minneapolis.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

68. Interview with Tenzin Chodon

Creator:
Chodon, Tenzin
Date Created:
2005-09-05
Description:
Tenzin Chodon was born in Nyigo, Tibet. She moved with her parents to India in 1959. Chodon was a teacher in India until moving to the United States as part of the U.S. Tibetan Resettlement Project. She is one of the principal founders of the Tibetan Women's Association (TWA) in Minnesota. Subjects discussed include: Parents, family, traveling from Tibet, Tibetan Institute for Performing Arts (TIPA), Tibetan Children's Village (TCV), school in India, teaching in India, death of husband, separation of family, deciding to come to the United States, first jobs in the U.S., transportation, translating, community, immigration clinic, Tibetan Woman's Association (TWA), Tibetan Youth Congress (TYC), preserving culture, community, challenges, children, adjusting to the U.S., food, Buddhism, activism, differences and similarities between India and the U.S.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

69. Interview with John Choi

Creator:
Choi, John
Date Created:
2011-01-17
Description:
John Choi was born in Seoul, South Korea but immigrated to St. Paul, Minnesota with his parents at the age of 3. He received his bachelor's degree from Marquette University and his law degree from Hamline University. John was the Saint Paul City Attorney from 2006-2010, and is currently the Ramsey County Attorney. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Early life - family - the importance of education to Korean immigrant families - embracing American culture as a child - college - practicing law - becoming socially and politically active - becoming St. Paul Attorney and his achievements at the job - getting more Koreans active in society and politics - campaign for Ramsey County Attorney - similarities between all immigrants to the United States.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

70. Interview with Marvel H. Chong

Creator:
Chong, Marvel Hum
Date Created:
1979-06-08
Description:
Marvel Hum Chong was born in Minneapolis in 1910. She is the youngest daughter of Bing Hum, an immigrant from China who arrived in Minneapolis before the turn of the century. He was a native of the Taishan District of Guangdong Province in South China, and before he came to Minnesota he worked on a railroad in Montana. He married an Irish Canadian, Sarah Cassidy, and they settled in Willmar, Minnesota, a railroad transfer center west of Minneapolis. Hum opened a laundry in Willmar and later purchased the Glarum Hotel, which he operated for many years before moving his family to Minneapolis in 1908. In Minneapolis Hum opened another laundry and three different restaurants in succession. Marvel Hum Chong attended Marcy and Wittier schools in Minneapolis during her elementary years and West High School in her first year of high school. She then moved to Hibbing, Minnesota, to live with her older sister and brother-in-law and graduated from Hibbing High School in 1927. She attended the University of Minnesota from 1927 to 1931, and following graduation she worked as a hostess at John's Place Uptown and the Chinese Gift Shop, both Chinese-owned businesses in Minneapolis. In 1941 she married the owner of the Gift Shop, Stanley Chong, a Chinese immigrant's son from the West Coast. The shop was sold when Chong was drafted into the army for a brief period during World War II, and after his discharge the couple lived on the West Coast for a few years. In 1944 they moved back to Minneapolis and established the International House of Foods, a highly successful wholesale and retail business in Asian foods. Their daughter, Siu-linn, was born in 1946. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Marvel Hum Chong discusses her father's background in China and the United States - his varied interests in such fields as Christianity, Western law, and languages - his role as interpreter for Chinese in court in the Twin Cities - his part in the organizing of the Chinese Students Club, which included students from China at the University of Minnesota and the children of Chinese immigrants of high school and college age. She also discusses Chinese activities in the 1970 Aquatennial in Minneapolis - Chinese community organizations - and discrimination in housing for Chinese immigrants. COMMENTS ON INTERVIEW: This interview is particularly interesting because Marvel Hum Chong grew up in one of a half dozen intermarried families in the Chinese community in the Twin Cities during the pre-World War II days. She provides considerable insight into their experience as an interracial family.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

71. Interview with Stanley V. Chong

Creator:
Chong, Stanley V.
Date Created:
1979-06-28
Description:
Stanley Chong was born in 1912 in Yakima, Washington. His father, Sam Chong, had immigrated to the United States from a rural village in the Taishan District of Guangdong Province in South China. His mother, Yut-tai Lee, was an American-born daughter of a Chinese pioneer immigrant to Portland, Oregon. Stanley lived on his parents' ranch in the Yakima Valley until the age of about seven, when he was sent to live with his maternal grandparents and a widowed aunt in Portland. He attended Shattuck Elementary School and Lincoln High School in Portland and graduated from the University of Oregon in 1933. In 1934 Chong moved to Minneapolis, where his aunt operated a small enterprise known as the Chinese Gift Shop. Later he managed the shop with the help of Marvel Hum, whom he married in 1941. (See interview of Marvel Hum Chong, also in this oral history project.) During World War II the shop was closed when Chong was drafted into the army and the couple moved to the West Coast. In 1944 they returned to Minneapolis and opened the International House of Foods, a successful wholesale and retail business in Asian and Middle Eastern foods that they operated until 1981, when it was destroyed by fire. Chong was one of the organizers of the Chinese American Club in the Twin Cities in the post-World War II years and became the first president of the Chinese American Association in Minnesota (CAAM), organized in the 1960s. He was also active in the Chinese Chamber of Commerce, organized in the early 1970s. The Chongs have one daughter, Sui-linn, born in 1946. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Chong compares the differences in childrearing methods of early immigrants such as his parents and maternal grandparents, and those used by himself and his wife in rearing their own daughter - he also describes the Chinese community in Minnesota from the 1930s to the 1970s, including community organizations of the post-World War II years. COMMENTS ON INTERVIEW: Stanley Chong is one of many Chinese from the West Coast who have settled in Minnesota. He makes several observations about the differences between the West Coast and the Midwest in terms of discrimination and business opportunities for Chinese during the pre-World War II years.
Contributing Institution:
Minnesota Historical Society
Type:
Sound Recording Nonmusical
Format:
Oral histories

72. Choir and orchestra performing in Scandinavian folk dress during Bethel's Festival of Christmas, Bethel University, St. Paul, Minnesota

Creator:
Christenson, Kurt
Date Created:
1980-12
Description:
Choir and orchestra performing in Scandinavian folk dress during the 1980 Festival of Christmas. Conductor in foreground and horse drawn sleigh landscape mural in the background.
Contributing Institution:
The History Center, Archives of Bethel University and Converge Worldwide - BGC
Type:
Still Image
Format:
Color photographs

73. Female students dressed for Bethel's Festival of Christmas in St. Lucia costumes, St. Paul, Minnesota

Creator:
Christenson, Kurt
Date Created:
1980-12
Description:
Six female students in white robes and silver tinsel belts around female student in white robe, red belt and wreath with lighted candles around her head. This dress is for the traditional celebration of Saint Lucia, which is a Scandinavian celebration of Christmas.
Contributing Institution:
The History Center, Archives of Bethel University and Converge Worldwide - BGC
Type:
Still Image
Format:
Color photographs

74. Four female student musicians in Scandinavian folk dress for Bethel's Festival of Christmas, Bethel University, St. Paul, Minnesota

Creator:
Christenson, Kurt
Date Created:
1980-12
Description:
Four female student musicians in Scandinavian folk dress playing from book of ""Christmas Strings"". Full-length bulletin board about Bethel in background.
Contributing Institution:
The History Center, Archives of Bethel University and Converge Worldwide - BGC
Type:
Still Image
Format:
Color photographs

75. Norwegian-American Centennial Cantata

Creator:
Christiansen. F. Melius; Rothnem, B.J.
Date Created:
1925
Description:
Cantata for soprano, baritone, chorus and orchestra created for the Norse-American Centennial with text by B.J. Rothnem and Music by F. Melius Christiansen.
Contributing Institution:
Norwegian-American Historical Association
Type:
Notated Music
Format:
Sheet music
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