A record crowd participated in the 13th annual Uffda Day on Sunday, October 5. Co-chaired by Bea Faust, Kathy Brakke and Earl Cramton.

The kickoff event was the parade of more than 65 units including the Viking Shrine Club ship, tractors from the Wild Rice Antique Tractor Plowing Association. Miss North Dakota Roxana Saberi, Miss Sargent County Katie Lubbers, and Miss Rutland Monica Wyum led the parade. Visitors from Norway, Holland, Canada, Georgia, Oregon, California and Indiana joined with local folks and visitors to enjoy the parade and other activities.

Auto buffs exhibited their beautifully restored classic and antique automobiles at the Kulzer Farm Supply lot on Main Street. The Norse Folk Dancing Club from the Bismarck Sons of Norway Lodge participated in the parade and put on several folk dancing performances during the afternoon.

During the day the crowd consumed 4,500 lefse as well as a prodigious quantity of sandbakkels, krumkake, rosettes and other Scandinavian fare, while others enjoyed the scalloped potatoe dinner at the Hall.

More than 250 guests signed the visitors book at the Depot Museum and Pioneer House. Crafters and vendors displayed and sold their wares throughout town. Bill and Lance Gulleson were engineers and conductors on the Uffda train, while Dennis Narum, State Senator Jerome Kelsh, Alvin McLaen, and Clayton McLaen provided horse-drawn wagon and carriage rids for kids and adults throughout the day.

Doris Ann Narum had reported years ago that one of her Uffda Day notebooks had been ‘borrowed’ by someone attending Uffda Day in the 1990s. There is no trace of photographs for Uffda Day for the last three years of the 1990s. If you have found the album in your family belongings, feel free to drop it off at Uffda Day this year so that the Rutland Community Club can reclaim the history that has been lost.