Great Uncle Bennie

Uncle Bennie is the man is left and front with the white tie. Grandpa Benhard Ranum is in the back row right with the curly coat. Old Trunks does not know the identity of the other two gentleman.

Uncle Bennie was the fifth son of Knute and Siri Ranum. He was born in New Solum Township, Rosewood, Minnesota on October 10, 1982.

1899. Mentions Bennie Ranum. Bennie and friends were at some one's farm. The teenagers were playing with guns. Bennie's step nephew, Greenley, (a child of Karen Greenley who married Knute Ranum after both of their mates died), shot his friend.

January 1922
Rosewood News Mr. and Mrs. Benhard Ranum entertained 18 guests at a whist party. First prize went to Bennie Ranum which was a cockerel. Cards were played at four tables and lunch was served at midnight.

December 1922
Rosewood News Christmas Day supper guests at the Benhard Ranum home were Mr. and Mrs. James Thompson, Mr. and Mrs. Dols, Chester and Delmar Dols, Bennie Ranum and for dinner last Tuesday in compliments of Mr. A Opseth, Mr. and Mrs. Westby, Even Anderson and Ingrid Nordhagen.

June 1923
Rosewood News Benhard and Bennie Ranum motored home from Northland last Sunday to spend the day with the home folks.

Winter 1926
Rosewood News Benhard and Bennie Ranum were the successful bidders for a $2000 contract of repair work on the school building in District 6, three miles northwest of Warren and will commence work there as soon as conditions permit.

May 1926
Rosewood News Benhard and Bennie Ranum left Monday for Warren where they will be employed.


January 1928
Benhard and Benny Ranum are employed at Thief River Falls this week building an addition to the O'Hara ice house. O'Hara was the father of Lorine, who married Otto, Bennie's half brother.

July 1928
Benny and Fred Ranum attended the state fair at Grand Forks last week.


January 1929
Benny Ranum returned home on Friday evening from Great Falls, Montana where he has spent the last month in an effort to secure carpentry employment. Ranum together with the Dahlin boys from Warren made the trip by car, and report no difficulty or snow on the way. It appears there is more snow here than for 900 miles west. Carpentry work however was not the best, and the cold weather also prevented the boys from making a longer stay there


Thanksgiving 1929
Mr. and Mrs. Benhard Ranum and Benny Ranum were entertained at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Otto Ranum in Warren at Thanksgiving.


April 1930
Benhard and Benny Ranum are in the employ of WW Prichard Jr. this week doing barn repair work east of Thief River Falls.

May 1930
Benhard and Benny Ranum are employed at Thief River Falls remodeling the seats of the fair grounds grandstand which they erected last summer.

June 1930
Benny and Benhard Ranum and Ted Thompson have been employed at the Radium the last week dismantling the cheese factor which has been purchased by a farmer there and will be remodeled into a dairy barn.

March 1947
Visitors at the Benhard Ranum home recently were Mr. and Mrs. Harry Ranum and children, Bennie Ranum, and Clarence Hall and Mitzi.

As we know from the story about the rhubarb, Bennie lived over a ditch/creek. We know that he moved his trailer to town, and either built a house or moved a house on to the property at the corner of 13th Street and Knight Avenue North.

We know that Bennie was, for the most part, a carpenter, as was his brother Benhard. We know that he never married.

Bennie was a quiet soul. Perhaps that is why Old Trunks doesn't know much about his early years. He may have been a guest at several holidays. We do know that, as the younger brother, he helped Benhard build several houses after Benhard and Julia moved to Thief River Falls.

What I do remember is his little house on Knight Avenue. I was one of those tag-a-long kids who always liked to go with my Dad. We would visit all sorts of places on Sunday mornings, including Bennie's house.

It wasn't until a discussion with my Sweet Thomas recently that I recognized the odor in the house at Bennie's; it was the smell of fuel oil!

The house had two rooms. If their was an indoor toilet, it would have been off the kitchen. One entered through a small built on porch directly into a simply furnished kitchen with a stove and refrigerator. There were no cabinets as we know them today. The bedroom was to the left of the kitchen. It appeared, as I remember, to be the same size as the kitchen. That is where we always found Bennie, resting on an open spring bed which was on a metal pipe-like frame. The bed was covered with a patch work quilt. His clothes, as I remember, were the same dark colors.

The walls, windows, and shades all had the same sort of sooty yellowed color. There were no chairs, Daddy would bring one in from the kitchen. A small table sat by the bed with a radio on it. Bennie would sit on the edge of the bed and talk to Daddy. We didn't stay long and there were no conversations in the car as we drove away.

It appeared to be the simplest form of existence of anywhere I had ever been. Is this what he wanted? Or was his frame of mind all that he needed?

Was Bennie always at holiday gatherings and no one remembered? Or did he just start coming to them later? In the early sixties, he attended Christmas at my grand parents house. He would sit quietly in a chair and said very little.

We know he was social with his family in his sort of way. We know he had friends.

Bennie died in September of 1978 in Thief River Falls, MN. He is buried at Rindal Cemetery near Rosewood. Of the eleven children born to Knute and Siri, now, only Johnnie was left.

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