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In 1864, two Swedish families had homesteaded near Oscar
Lake in Holmes City Township, Douglas County. The A. G. Solberg and Ole Fahlin
families built log homes and began to clear their land. Each Sunday they came
together in one of homes and read the Bible and sang hymns.
When other families moved into the area they were
invited to join them at this Sunday worship. A licensed lay preacher and
student, Jona Magney, came to the wilds of west central Minnesota. He was
seeking out Swedes, but also ministered to anyone needing his services. On
August 8, 1866 Pastor Magney held an organizational meeting using an immigrant
trunk as a desk to begin the Oscar Lake Evangelical Lutheran Church. A decision
was made November 1 of that year to build a church one mile north and one mile
west of the present day church. The first cemetery was located south of the
church where a monument was erected in 1921 in memory of the more than 1,000
buried there.
The church was received into the Augustana Synod in
1867. In 1871 the Wennersborg and Norunga congregations were organized and
united with Oscar Lake to make a parish. In 1879 the first parsonage was built
and in 1884 plans for a new church were made.
In 1885, the old church was sold for $30. In 1886, the
Minnesota Conference held its convention in the new church and it was
dedicated. The first parsonage was sold in 1889 and a new one built in Holmes
City. The Wennersborg congregation left the parish, leaving Holmes City,
Norunga and Oscar Lake.
In 2009 an addition was added to the existing all
purpose room. A furnace was added in the basement and another furnace in the
storage room. The doors to the bathrooms were made handicapped accessible as
well as four other doorways leading into the all purpose room.
The church has an active membership, which includes the
WELCA ladies group, Bible Study, Sunday School (shared with Trinity Lutheran
Church), and a Hand Bell Choir shared with Trinity. The ladies of the church
have an excellent reputation for the Swedish meatball dinner served each year
in September.
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