Myths of the Rune Stone: Viking Martyrs and the Birthplace of America by David M. Krueger (review)

David M. Krueger takes a new perspective on an old, and arguably tired, debate about the Kensington Rune Stone, one of Minnesota’s most curious cultural artifacts. Krueger’s fields of research as a scholar are religious history and theology. As opposed to the “myth-busters” style approach that questions the Kensington Stone’s linguistic, historical, and geographical legitimacy, Krueger instead explores what he terms “the cult of the Kensington Rune Stone”—the popular devotion to the stone and its mythic narratives (p. 7). Myths of the Rune Stone uses the Kensington Rune Stone as a way to explore Scandinavian American collective identity, religious history, and American founding myths. Krueger’s study relies on Robert Bellah’s work on American civil religion as well as Émile Durkheim’s work on forms of religious life to explain how popular belief in the Rune Stone is a form of American civil religion.

Myths of the Rune Stone is a chronological examination of various enduring Kensington Rune Stone myths, which show “how belief in the Kensington Rune Stone helped Minnesotans cope with a variety of social challenges in the twentieth century” (p. 10). Chapter 1, “Westward from Vinland: An Immigrant Saga by Hjalmar Holand,” details the history of the Kensington Rune Stone and its gallery of characters. The chapter focuses most attention on Hjalmar Holand’s “rediscovery” and enthusiastic “crusade” for the recognition of the rune stone’s acceptance (pp. 26, 29). Chapter 2, “Knutson’s Last Stand: Fabricating the First White Martyrs of the American West,” analyzes the significance the 1862 Dakota War had on the stone’s inscription and how this expanded its importance to a broader white population. This chapter details how the inscription’s claim that the Viking migrants were found “red with blood and dead” was commonly believed (or, in Holand’s words, “is so plain that it scarcely needs an explanation”) to be at the hands of native Indians, or “skrælings,” the term used in the Icelandic Vinland sagas of North American natives (p. 41). This belief bolstered the then-emergent argument for pre-Columbian American migration and origin myths as a way to confront external enemies. Chapter 3, “In Defense of Main Street: The Kensington Rune Stone as a Midwestern Plymouth Rock,” explores the regional and economic appeal of the Kensington Rune Stone. The marginalization of Main Street, as put forth in Sinclair Lewis’s 1920 novel, justified flamboyant marketing of the rune stone as an ancient American artifact. The chapter enumerates the monuments, pageants, plays, and traveling promotions—from Minneapolis to Washington, DC—that were dedicated to the Kensington Rune Stone. Kreuger’s chapter makes it clear that the promotion of the rune stone contributed to a positive reputation of rural, small-town Minnesotans as well as the local tourist economy. Chapter 4, “Our Lady of the Runestone and America’s Baptism with Catholic Blood,” details how the Catholic Church capitalized on the national publicity of the Kensington Rune Stone’s visit to the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, DC. As Scandinavians worshipped in the Roman Catholic Church in 1362, the alleged time of the inscription’s carving, “local Catholic leaders used the rune stone to claim Minnesota as a uniquely Catholic place and demonstrate that Catholics were true Americans” (p. 93). Chapter 5, “Immortal Rock: Cold War Religion, Centennials, and the Return of the Skrælings,” addresses the US Christian resurgence of the 1950s and the way this national trend appropriated the myth of the Kensington Rune Stone. For those of the era who claimed Christianity to be the original religion of the United States, the story of the Rune Stone provided fodder for, or “resurrected,” new imaginative narratives defending the Christian faith. This chapter also discusses how these new, enthusiastic narratives questioned the credibility of academia and depended on popular distrust of academic institutions. Kreuger’s conclusion also touches on contemporary Kensington Rune Stone enthusiasts...