first on decorahnews.com: Historic church will be closed to the public

I bet you thought all Norwegians were Lutherans.  Not so.  In fact, there is even a Norwegian Methodist Church in Winneshiek County.

It sits on property on County HIghway W-42, not too far away from the much bigger Washington Prairie Lutheran Church.

After the Norwegian Methodist Church closed its doors, it eventually found it way into ownership by Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum.  A committee of the museum's board now has decided that the church's status will be changed to "closed to the public."

Not that there has been a clamor by the public to visit the old church.  Vesterheim officials believe the last tour of the church was five or six years ago.  They say the change in status will mean little to the building.

Museum officials say they contacted the United Methodist Church Conference of Iowa and the local Methodist church and neither were interested in taking over title to the building. The museum now has found an interested party with experience in historic preservation and Vesterheim is in the process of transferring the title. There will be no financial profit to the museum in the exchange. The new owner will continue to maintain the cemetery and access will remain available to loved-ones of the deceased.