By the door, carefully set in a frame, are also two letters, both written in Norwegian. The first is an invitation from the Sonja Lodge to the royal couple to stop by for lunch at the lodge on their next tour to the United States. The second letter is the short response, written by some administrative assistant at the Royal Palace. It says thanks for the offer, but their highnesses won’t be able to make it.

The Sons of Norway has its roots in the height of Norwegian immigration to this country at the end of the last century. Though Norwegians generally had a less-difficult experience than most other immigrant groups, it wasn’t always easy. The Sons of Norway started in 1895 as a community self-help organization. Its members helped harvest crops if someone was ill, lent a hand to out-of-work neighbors and chipped in with funeral expenses. Now the Sons of Norway sells insurance. But the organization’s greatest attraction has always been the fellowship and the sense of identity it offered immigrants in a new land, far from home. It gave them a way to hold on to Norwegianness.

What exactly is this immigrant concept of Norwegianness? By far the most common characterization is that Norwegians are skinflints, that they are cautious and untrusting with their money. Also Norwegians eat a lot, drink a lot or, conversely, are temperate. Norwegians get two shots off the tee in golf, they are better than Swedes and Danes, and they are slow to anger. Norwegians like to eat lutefisk, lefse and goat’s cheese. They are patriotic, and they are proud of their heritage. In the two years I lived in Norway with my Norwegian wife and in the time I spent with the Sons of Norway, I have found all of these claims to Norwegianness—immigrant or native—to be true. Except for the golf thing. I never played in Norway, and when I played with a few of the men from the Sonja Lodge, the only one who took more than one mulligan was a Dane.