Knutson, Harold, 1880-1953

Harold Knutson, a Republican congressman serving the sixth congressional district of central Minnesota (1917-1948), was born on October 20, 1880, in Skien, Norway, and immigrated with his parents to a farm near Clear Lake (Sherburne County), Minnesota during the 1880s. After graduating from agricultural school, he edited several rural Minnesota newspapers including the Royalton Banner and Foley Independent (1901-1902), the Wadena Pioneer Journal, and the St. Cloud Daily Journal Press (1907-1908).

Knutson was elected to The U.S. House of Representatives in 1912 from Minnesota's sixth congressional district. While in congress, he served as majority whip and chaired several committees: Pensions, Indian Affairs, Insular Affairs, Ways and Means, and Internal Revenue and Taxation. Politically, Knutson was an isolationist and also opposed many of the Roosevelt administration's domestic policies. He was defeated by Democratic-Farmer-Labor candidate Fred Marshall in 1948 and returned to Minnesota. He died in Wadena in 1953.

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