Minnesota is getting a brush with royalty this week as the crown prince of Norway visits the state to mark 200 years since the first organized Norwegian emigration to the U.S.

Crown Prince Haakon — heir to the throne of Norway — arrived in the Twin Cities on Monday night and took part in a series of events on Tuesday. That included a stop at Norway House in Minneapolis and a meeting with Gov. Tim Walz at the State Capitol in St. Paul.

A goal of the trip is to highlight the continued close ties between Norway and the U.S. — and specifically Minnesota, where hundreds of thousands of residents have Norwegian ancestry.

At the meeting with Walz, Haakon called that the “backbone” of the relationship between the two nations — noting how Norwegian Americans “are very proud of their heritage, an

See Full Page