Nordic Fest receives a donation of a movie taken at the 1967 Nordic Fest

Carl Svenson works on a Nordic Fest booth in 1967 (Photo courtesy of Nordic Fest 50)

A movie taken at the 1967 Nordic Fest has been donated to the Nordic Fest Board.

LaVerne and Barbara Hanssen of Grinnell visited Decorah that year as part of a tour of Iowa tourism sites, including the Amana Colonies, the Iowa State Fair and the Old Thresher's Reunion.

Recently, Hanssen family members met with Nordic Fest 50 book project volunteers and shared a digitized copy of the 7 minutes, 30 seconds of footage shot at the first Nordic Fest.  Although the film was just recently transferred to digital, the image quality is strong.

The Hanssen family has gifted this footage to the Nordic Fest 50 book project.  Those who purchase a copy of the book will also receive a copy of the footage.

During the meeting, Barbara Hanssen was asked, "You visited all these established Iowa tourism icons in 1967 – how did you select the first Nordic Fest to visit?"

Mrs. Hanssen's response, "We read about it in the Des Moines Register. Nothing we saw made us believe it was the first year – it was just too well organized!"