Steinar Halvorsen Gladheim

Steinar Halvorsen was born at Gladheim in Veggli in January 1802, a short walk south of Kjemhus, and baptized on January 17. For years he traveled as a peddler. In Seljord he met Guro Vefall, who had a child about 1830 and named him the father. He denied it, and the paternity case that followed was long and ugly, the farm history says; both villages talked, and someone made a song about it. A complaint against "Stener Halvorsen Glaim" was heard at the Rollag parsonage on October 8, 1834, and sent on to court.

He was something of a wild man for a while, summoned before the conciliation commission and the court for reckless conduct. He was also a good fiddler. In 1833 Hellek Gunnulfsen Vindegg smashed his fiddle. They settled: Vindegg paid 7 speciedalerdaler The silver money Norway counted in before the krone of 1875: the riksdaler, and from 1816 the speciedaler. In the 1830s a farm in Veggli sold for a few hundred speciedaler. All the words 2 ort in damages and a fine of 2 speciedaler 3 ort. Some old fiddle tunes from West Telemark are still called Gladheimen, and NumedalNumedal A long valley in southern Norway, running north-west from Kongsberg, where Flesberg, Rollag and Veggli lie. Numedal and its farms →'s folk musicians think they may be his.

In 1832 he married Kari Tollefsdatter of Kjøntveit in Nore, and on June 25, 1835, he bought Nordre Kjemhus from Ole Knudsen for 300 speciedaler. The deed survives in the land register. In 1839 he bought Landrud at auction too, and in 1862 passed it to his son Tollef. He and Kari, the farm history says, lived in a style that tasted of a large estate.

Steinar died at Kjemhus on August 7, 1864, aged sixty-two, and was buried in Veggli churchyard on August 13. A cast-iron cross was put on his grave, perhaps the first in the old churchyard, the farm history thinks. It was still there in 1981, when Norges kirker, the national survey of Norway's churches, listed it: open Gothic tracery in the ends of its arms, over "Stener Halvorsen Kjemhuus d. 1864". His brother Per's cross, from 1878, is its twin. In April 2014 it was still standing in the long grass of the old churchyard, west of the church: "Here beneath rests the dust of Stener Halvorsen Kjemhuus, baptized 17 January 1802, died 7 August 1864. Blessed be your memory."

Kjemhus, his farm

The farm he bought, its house and its market, and the family after him.