The Old Church on Walnut Street: A Story of Immigrants and Evangelicals

In the late 1800s, Norwegian immigrants began flooding into the Red River Valley. As they moved into the Grand Forks area, they brought their Old World folkways and religious practices. On the corner of Third and Walnut, Norwegian Lutherans built a small sanctuary to house their services. The building mirrored the simple worship of the Hauge Synod, the organization to which this congregation belonged. After merging with two other Norwegian churches in town, the old Trinity Lutheran structure passed into the hands of the Grand Forks Church of God, a congregation that echoed the revival fires of the Second Great Awakening. This is the story of a church building and the two assemblies that utilized it over a 100-year period.