Irgens Olai Tynning

Irgens Olai was born at Tynning on 12 August 1905, the fifth of Isak and Brita's nine children. In the 1920 census the fifteen-year-old is registered as doing farm work at home. It was a childhood close to farming, to the family and to the practical work that kept a western Norwegian farm going.

A class photograph from the continuation school in Brekke in 1920 also places him in the young people's community of the village. Newspapers show his name in the results from shooting competitions in 1927 and 1936. These are small pieces of information, but they make Irgens visible as more than a name in a family tree: he was part of the youth, working and organisational life of Brekke.

In 1935 Irgens married Kari Wergeland. A surviving wedding photograph shows Andreas A. Wergeland, Irgens' brother Tormod Tynning and Lars Østerbø among the guests. The photograph ties the Wergeland and Tynning families together.

From 1938 to 1950 the family lived in the bank house in Brekke. Irgens had several kinds of work. The local history material mentions road work, the repair of rubber boots and the trading of goods connected with the Salhus weaving mill. It draws a picture of a practical and adaptable family man at a time when many combined several sources of income.

In 1950 Irgens and Kari made the great decision to leave Brekke. They did not travel as young and unattached adventurers, but as an established family with three children. That made the emigration a break for an entire branch of the family.

For the first two years they lived with Kari's sister Bertha and her husband Helge Bue. The family connection gave them a first foothold in the new country. In 1952 Irgens and Kari bought a farm near Kindersley in Saskatchewan. Later they worked two properties.

Irgens and Kari built their life through farm work and family community. That they eventually ran two properties shows that the new start was not merely temporary. In 1972 they sold up and moved to Saskatoon. Later Kyle was an important place for the family.

Kari Kristine Tynning died on 29 January 1996, the year before her husband. Irgens died in Kyle on 26 May 1997. Both are buried at Horse Butte Cemetery in Kyle, beneath the same stone.

The gravestone tells the story in two languages. The ears of wheat on either side belong to the prairie, while the Norwegian words «Takk for alt» — thank you for everything — stand at its centre. Norway and Saskatchewan meet in the same granite.

Their son Ansgar Kåre became a visible community builder in Saskatchewan. Public sources document him as mayor of Kyle, a member of the West Central Health Subcommittee and co-leader for West Central in 2001. By then he had already worked for fifteen years to bring a modern hospital to Kyle.

Ansgar stood as a candidate for the Progressive Conservative Party in the provincial elections of 1991 and 1995. In 1991 he received 2,581 votes and was only 85 votes behind the winner in Rosetown–Elrose. Later he was a central advocate for a regional water supply. In 2017 the town invited him to tell the story of the Saskatchewan Landing Regional Water Pipeline.

Ansgar married Norma on 23 July 1960 at White Valley Church. They lived in Kyle and had the children Joy, Ann and Ryan. Norma, born Hanson on 11 May 1937 in Shaunavon, the daughter of Peder and Helga Hanson, taught for twenty-four years. She died on 14 December 2018, following a car accident in 2015; Ansgar cared for her at home in the years that followed.

A third generation of Tynnings now takes part in Canadian public life. Their son Ryan Tynning owns Swift Plumbing & Heating Ltd. in Swift Current and on 17 April 2018 was introduced in the Saskatchewan Legislative Assembly as part of the construction industry's delegation.

The Canadian death notices for Irgens (1997) and Kari (1996) are behind a paywall at the Leader-Post and Ancestry. Norma Tynning's death notice from 2018 is reproduced further down this page.