Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1942, Side 29

DANISH EMIGRATION TO NORTH AMERICA 19
An institution with a special character of its own, which has
exerted great influence in this respect, is the American Scan-
dinavian Foundation, founded in 1911 by the manufacturer Niels
Poulsen. For this purpose he set aside $600,000, a sum which
has subsequently been increased by contributions from various
other sources. The Foundation devotes itself to the exchange
of scientists, scholars, business men, and students between Amer-
ica and the Scandinavian countries. In the course of time this
exchange has assumed very considerable dimensions, and has
received the support of special organizations in the Scandinavian
countries — in Denmark “Danmarks amerikanske Selskab” —
which have succeeded in procuring additional means for the
endowment of bursaries. In this way several hundred Scan-
dinavian scientists, scholars, business men, engineers, etc. have
been given an opportunity to pursue professional studies in Amer-
ica, while a large number of Americans have been enabled to
visit Scandinavia for the same purpose. In addition, the American
Scandinavian Foundation has published English translations of
a number of Scandinavian classics, and it brings out a magazine
called The American Scandinavian Review.
In 1904 was founded the “Dansk-Amerikansk Selskab” (the
Danish-American Society), which among other things has ar-
ranged for a number of Danish lecturers and artists to visit the
Danish settlements in the U.S.A.
An important contribution to the work of maintaining the
connection of Danish Americans with the old country was the
creation of the Rebild National Park. At the time of the National
exhibition at Aarhus in 1909, a Danish-American festival was
held there on July 4th, at which 1000 Danish-born Americans
were present. On this occasion Dr. Max Henius advanced the
project of establishing a permanent meeting place in Denmark
for Danish Americans visiting the old country. This project was
realized in 1911, when a committee bought some 200 acres of
land in the Rebild Hills, a grandiose piece of scenery near
Skorping, between Aalborg and Hobro. The Rehild National
Park was inaugurated on August 5th, 1912, and here Danish-
Americans are given facilities to hold an annual festival on the
4th of July, while the territory is otherwise to be preserved in
a state of nature. Such festivals have in fact been held every
year, with a few exceptions due to the war of 1914—19 and the
present war, and the attendance has reached 40,000. Even though
only a few thousand of these were Danish-born Americans —