Norwegian dance troupe visits Yorkville

Cross Lutheran Church in Yorkville hosted the Stoughton, Wisconsin, Norwegian Dancers, a traveling folk-dance troupe, Sunday, March 6.

The performance was sponsored by Sons of Norway Polar Star Lodge 4-472, a Montgomery-based social service group of Fox Valley Norwegian Americans dedicated to preserving Norway’s culture and heritage.

The traveling troupe comprises 20 Stoughton-area high school students who perform traditional Norwegian folk dances in authentic Norwegian costumes called bunader.

Stoughton Norwegian Dancers are Stoughton’s goodwill ambassadors. They have performed for millions of people in tours across the U.S., Canada and Norway and have appeared in national folk festivals. The dancers tour a different part of the country each spring. The group has made five trips to Norway.

In a after-show fundraiser, Polar Star members sold homemade prepacked traditional prepackaged Norwegian-style baked goods.

The performance replaced Polar Star’s monthly luncheon meeting on the first Sunday of the month at St. Olaf Lutheran Church in Montgomery.