Note: Only the first column of a three coulumn article is here excerted, as it deals with a direct observation of the stone and weathering in 1929.
The Kensington Stone
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Reply to a part of some comments made by Prof. A. W. Brogger in Oslo Dagbladet, Dec 15, 1949, regarding the Kensington Runestone
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By Harold S. Langland
---------------------Prof. A. W. Brogger's article reviews briefly the history of the Kensington Runestone's discovery and some of the discussion concerning its authenticity, adding certain opinions of Prof. J. A. Holvik of Moorhead, Minn.
In spite of the confidence with which Prof. Brogger rejects the stone's authenticity on the strength of the statements made in his article, there are several matters regarding it which to the careful student are not explained, if the assumption is accepted that the inscription on the stone was made in our time, as he states.
Although Prof. Brogger cites several authorities to the effect the stone is of recent origin, it is difficult for me, at least, to believe this in light of severl facts, some of which I have learned from close observation and study. The stone was sent to me from Alexandria in 1929 by Constant Larson and Morris Franzen of that city, my firm having contracted to make a metal display stand and case for the stone. For two months the sstone lay at my elbow every day. Having no previous knowledge of the stone, I was inclined to the idea that very little credence could be attached to its being centuries old. Nevertheless, with great care I studied the appearance of the surface of the stone and the interior surfaces of the runic letters.
Having had an engineer's scientific training, including chemistry and physics, and considerable experience on the prairies and lakes of Minnesota, I am not without knowledge of the weathering of stone surfaces. I observed the perfectly clear evidence of newly scratched marks on the surface of the stone; some fo these scratches were on the surface and some were down in the runic groves. They were very obvious, as the stone's outter surface is many shades darker than the interior. These scratches were recently made, that is within a much shorter time than the runes themselves.
The inner surfaces of the runes were as dark and weathered as the stone's exterior surface; it is beyond the bounds of sound reasoning to believe that those characters could have been recent cut and then have weathered down to the color of the stones exterior surface within a few years.
The stone was found in 1898, and lay in Ohman's yard with most of the chareacters face down for six or seven years, and since 1908 has been protected from weathering. This observation must be satisfactorily explained before the stone's fraudulent origin can be sustained.
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