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Moorhead is located in western Minnesota just across the Red River of the North from Fargo, North Dakota. It is not an area that conjures up images of ocean going vessels, but the ancestors of many of these landlocked residents came from the seafaring nations of Scandinavia. The Vikings were the kings of the seas from the 8th through the 11th centuries. It is said that Viking explorers discovered the New World nearly 500 years before Christopher Columbus. The Vikings' main vessel for sailing was the long boat. The long boat was well adapted for sailing the seas and navigating shallow rivers thanks to the flexibility of its hull and its shallow draft. Robert Asp, a guidance counselor at Moorhead Junior High School, first talked of building and sailing a replica of an ancient Viking ship with his brother Bjarne. Bob Asp studied books about Vikings while recovering from a severe fall during the summer of 1971. The dream of sailing a Viking ship to Norway began to take shape. Bjarne Asp studied Norwegian history at Concordia College in Moorhead, MN
in the summer of 1971. Bjarne provided Bob Asp with books about Vikings. Bob Asp based the design of his ship on the Gokstad burial ship. The Gokstad had been unearthed from a burial mound near Sandefjord, Norway in 1880. The ship was dated with a construction date circa 800 AD. |
