Well, here I am again trying to complete the finding of the stone line. There are several more accounts regarding this. I start with the translation of Olaus Olson as printed in Blegen (appendix 5), Olaus was a member of a party of 12 who excavated the site of the stone in the spring of 1899 (apparently looking for other artifacts or treasure). Again, in all the following, just the sections pertaining to the finding of the stone are included.

"The undersigned has himself been at the place and observed not only the stone, but also the spot where it lay at its discovery. An aspen tree ten inches in diameter at its root stood just above the stone. Two large roots, one on each side of the stone, had grown down into the earth and shaped themselves along its sides, so that the stone was bound in between them. The tree is at least 25 if not 30 years old, an Mr Oman has been on the land 8 years. When Mr Oman grubbed the tree, the stone, which appeared very large, was discovered, but not the runes. When the father left, one of his boys happened to poke with a wooden stick along the stone, discovered the characters on its side, and called his father to come and seee that there was writing on the stone. Mr Oman, together with a Norwegian [Nils Flaten] who had hleped him in the work, came and pulled up the stone and thus discovered the runes on the flat side, which had been turned downward. " -Svenska Amerikanska Posten, May 23, 1899 (dated by Olson as being sent - Holmes City, May 16, 1899)

Cleve Van Dyke was another member of that same expedition. He writes in 1910:

"I lived some twenty miles away form there and arrived later than the rest of the party so that the work had befun whin I arrived. However, the showed me the stump of the tree and how the stone had lain in some. The tree as indicated by its roots, had undoubtably grown over some flat stone; whether it was this stone I could not say as I had nott seen it in place. As I remember, we judged the tree to be aobut twelve years old. The smaller root seemed to have been bent away under it and the large, or tap root, was slightly flattened. Of course I could not determine wethere or not the stone was there before the growth of the tree." -Blegen appendix 13

The following is a letter by J P Hedberg to Winchell in March of 1910. Hedberg was the one who sent the letter on Jan 1, 1899 to Swan Turnblad with a copy of the inscription, which was then sent on to Breda for translation.

"Dear Sir!
Your letter of the 10th inst in regard to the Kensington rune Stone as it is called. In the first place the stone was brought in to my office in Kensington by the finder Olof Ohman. I took quite much interest in the same. I copied the same and sent copy to S.J. Turnblad, who sent it to the State Univeristy but Prof. Breda thought it was a fake. In the spring of 1890 [1899] I together with some others went out and did some digging where the stone had been found and will try and answer the following questions.
1 Yes I saw the Stump and roots.
2 the big root was grown as a bend and I am quite sure if we have had the stone there it would have fitted in. it could not have grown on side of stone. 3 as said large root run on top of stone. 4 it is hard to say how old the tree was but it was quite large and must have been many years old any way a great deal older than the settlement there. I had quite a talk with one Nels Flaaten [Nils Flaten] an old farmer that was along and helped Ohman to grub. I considered him absolute reliable - he was along and grubbed the tree and gug [dug] out the stone and his statements confermed [conformed or confirmed?] absolutely with Ohmans. While I know very little about runes - I never considered the stone a fake.
Very truly yours, J. P. Hedberg"

It is interesting to note the several gramatical errors commited in this letter. It has been pointed out by some (usually detrimentally) that the copy of the inscription sent by this man eventually to Breda was incorrect - Whalgren even asserting that this copy was a 'rough draft' of the final version. Howver, from this letter it would seem that Hedberg was prone to making errors in his writing, and the inexactness of the copy can more likely be put on his shoulders.