From: Collections of the Minnesota Historical Society

Volume X  Part I

Published by the Society in St. Paul, Minn. February, 1905

History of Wheat Raising in the Red River Valley by Hon. George N. Lamphere

Pioneer Farmers Near Moorhead and Fargo

Page 14

In 1875* Mr. Probstfield again raised wheat, and the number who were engaged in the industry considerably increased that year. In the spring of that year a number of Norwegians from Houston county came up and looked at land on the Dakota side between Georgetown and Argusville. Finding the land very wet by overflow of the river, they returned to the Minnesota side, and Mr. Probstfield, meeting them, asked where they were going, and they replied, “Back to Houston County.” He was cultivating potatoes, and he said to them that if they would put two young men to work in his place he would go with them and show them good land that had been surveyed. They agreed, and he took them over to the Buffalo River about six or eight miles east, where they located. There were six or seven families, and among them were Ole Thortvedt, Ole Tauge, Torgerson Skree, Ole Anderson, and others. They were delighted with the location and land, and they or their descendants are still there and prosperous. A. G. Kassenborg, A. O. Kragnes, and B. Gunderson and others, came a little later, and located on the Buffalo River.

*The actual year of the Thortvedt party’s move to Clay County was 1870.