LaRae Yvonne Robertson was born on March 20, 1931 in a house in Fremont, Dodge, Nebraska to John Ray “Ray” Robertson and LaVon Geraldine (Larson) Robertson. Born on the cusp of Pisces and Aries (the last and first signs of the zodiac), she is impossible to summarize or fully understand. Her husband Hugo describes her as “a very intelligent, religious, hard-working, beautiful, loving lady.” LaRae’s tireless philanthropic work created a quiet legacy that should be a source of pride and inspiration for all of her family.
“Some of my earliest memories are of my mother, of course. I remember as a very small girl in Fremont, NE., playing ‘Mrs. Jones’ with my mom. She worked six days a week, so Sundays she did the ironing. I would crawl under the ironing board and that would be my house. I’d take my doll and then Mom and I would have imaginary visits, and I would be ‘Mrs. Jones.’”
Nickname: Dad called her Snooky, Mom called her Dolly, sheriff called her Little Bit.
LaRae 1931
In her day, kids wore long stockings, rubber overshoes, one and two-piece bathing suits, but not bikinis. People got their food from small grocery stores, and sometimes farmers delivered milk and eggs. You could charge groceries. During the war, they had to have ration stamps to buy canned goods and meat and butter. There were big rolls of paper and groceries were wrapped with brown paper and tied with string.
LaRae and Lars Larson
“My first house was at 1915 N. Park, Fremont, Nebraska. It was an old house that my parents remodeled. We moved to East Grand Fords, Minnesota and lived in a large two-story house with my Aunt and Uncle. Then we lived in the Corlis’s Apartments that were like town houses today. Part of the war (WWII) we lived in one half of a duplex in East Grand Forks. From there we moved back to the large two-story house we lived in before and had an apartment upstairs. In 1947 my mom married Henning Olson and we moved to an apartment in Valley City.”
“It was a different world during the ’30’s. 
I was a very dependable child, and one time when I was five and [my brother] Buddy was 2 ½, my mom left for a few minutes to go to the neighborhood grocery store. It was a Sunday and the Sunday paper was scattered around. I had chickenpox and I was bundled up and sitting in a rocking chair in the kitchen. It was before we had a furnace and there was a pot-bellied stove in the kitchen. After mom left, Buddy decided to shove the papers in the stove even though I was screaming at him. The paper fell out and burned the linoleum. I was screaming so loudly that Mom ran the last block, stamped out the fire and saved us. We had the hole in the linoleum for a long time (but, at five, how long is a long time?)”
She picked potatoes and babysat often as a child. With money she’d saved, she bought clothes, presents, and a record player and records. In the summer, she rode her bike, played kick the can in the evenings with neighbors, and swam every day. She went to the movies once a week. During the winter, she ice skated, went to birthday parties, and played games. She played paper dolls a lot, and her friend had “Gone With the Wind” paper dolls that she always wanted. Her biggest dangers were World War II, ‘fighting with the mean boys,’ and polio. One story about the mean boys: Two bullies older than her tied her up and tried to cut her throat. They missed her throat, but she still has a scar on her chin where the knife hit her.
LaRae and Robbie (Buddy) – 1937
“I remember my Grandma Larson coming to visit us after she moved to California. She would buy me ‘Shirley Temple’ dresses. She also took me on long trips to Wisconsin and Kansas City on the Greyhound bus.
LaRae – 1936
When I finished the first grade, we moved to East Grand Forks, MN. My uncle Ernie Abel had opened a Woolworths store in this town that had 22 bars, two churches, two grocery stores and a hardware store. It should have made a mint. My mom was to be the manager. But, the store didn’t last too long, because World War II started, and small stores couldn’t replenish their inventories because of shortages, and my uncle went bankrupt. Our two families, Robertsons and Abels, lived together in a big house across the street from the school. This is the reason Donna McEnroe and I are like sisters instead of cousins. Her mother and my mother were only sisters.
When the war began, my dad enlisted and went to Ft. Sill, Oklahoma, where he got his commission. He had taken a short engineering course at UND. He was 35 at the time and exempt from the draft, but he loved the army. After he completed his training and got his commission, he thought he was going to be permanently stationed in Mass., so Mom sold all our furniture, big toys, etc. so we could move.
“I didn’t like math and physical ed. I liked almost every other subject, but I liked home economics the best.”
My fourth grade friends had a going away party and then my dad was shipped to North Africa! So we didn’t get to move. We didn’t have a stove, etc., so once again my mom and Aunt Laura moved in together. We also had a lady and her baby that lived with us. There were just no places to rent in those days, so Gerry Cariveau and her baby moved into one of the bedrooms in our place. Her husband was in the army too. Uncle Ernie had gone to California to work in the shipyards. The household consisted of Laura Abel, 39; Sonny Abel, 16; Donna Abel, 11; LaVon Robertson, 30; LaRae Robertson, 12; and Buddy Robertson, 9 ½; Gerry Cariveau and her daughter who was less than a year old.
Robbie (Buddy) Robertson, Sonny Abel, LaRae Robertson, and Donna Abel – 1939
LaRae and Donna Abel
Donna Abel, Robbie (Buddy) Robertson, LaRae Robertson
Donna Abel, Sonny Abel, LaRae Robertson
Sharon, LaRae, Buddy
LaRae and Robbie (Buddy)
LaRae, Buddy, and Friends
“When I was about eleven, my friend Levonne McCullough wanted to go to a movie. I was supposed to go to her house about 2:00, but I went early. They were having a surprise party for me, but I surprised them.”
In 1943, Mom, Buddy and I moved back to the first house we had lived in only in an apartment upstairs. My parents were divorced and my mother married Henning Olson.”
LaRae, Donna (Abel) McEnroe, Sonny Abel, Jimmy Stewart – 1943
LaRae’s son, Craig, explains: “The Great Depression formed the psyche of my parents…they were fairly conservative financially. Careful not to waste. My mom had a very challenging childhood and came through it as a strong, independent person. She was not satisfied by her childhood, understandably. Her father didn’t return from the war by choice, money was very tight, and her mother remarried to a man my mom felt was unacceptable.”
LaRae – 1945
LaRae remembers: “We then moved to Valley City, ND, where Henning was in business for himself as an upholsterer. He was very good at his trade. I was a junior in high school, and I had a steady boyfriend, Buddy Basgard, in East Grand Forks, so I hated moving. I thought Valley City was the end of the world. But, it wasn’t long until school started and I had new boyfriends. One of them was Chuck Taylor who was best man at our wedding. I was also dating Ridgway Koppi and he gave me an ultimatum and I had to choose. So, my junior year we were ‘steadies.’ He graduated, and when homecoming came around my senior year, he went hunting! I was an attendant, Hugo was the king, and Bob Beyer was an attendant. I was flirting with Bob because I was mad at Koppi, so Hugo called me and took me to the homecoming dance. That was the end of Koppi! We were married 2 ½ years later, January 7, 1951.
LaRae at School Dance
Buddy Robertson, Donna Abel, Laura Abel, LaRae Robertson, and Lonnie Robertson – 1946
LaRae and Donna Abel
LaRae Robertson With Donna Abel
Neighborhood Friend With LaRae Robertson
LaRae With Lloyd Olson (Brother of Henning) and Wife
Hugo gave me a ring on October 7, 1950, and we planned to be engaged for four years while he went to college. But, the Korean War started and Hugo was going to be drafted, so we made plans quickly and were married two weeks later. Then the Brown County National Guard was called and filled the quota for Brown County and Hugo didn’t have to go. He always pretended I tricked him! I don’t know if the wedding was legal. Buddy gave me away–he was 16. Joe, 17 and Oz, 15, were the ushers. Hugo and I were 19 and Donna (Abel) McEnroe was 18. Chuck Taylor was 20. I can’t believe we were such children but I knew how to pick ’em!
Valley City Homecoming (Hugo and LaRae’s First Date) – October 8, 1948
LaRae and Hugo – 1949 Engagement Night
At Donna (Abel) McEnroe’s Wedding: (From Left) Ernest Abel, Donna (Abel) McEnroe, Donna Koppenhaver, Ruth Liapis, and LaRae – April 4, 1954 in Grand Forks, ND
Hugo and LaRae – 1950
Hugo and LaRae – 1953
Lonnie Tries On LaRae’s Wedding Dress
LaRae has lived in: Fremont, Nebraska; East Grand Forks, Minnesota; Valley City, North Dakota; Grand Forks, North Dakota; Hibbing, Minnesota; Columbus, Georgia; Tampa, Florida; Flasher, North Dakota; Dickinson, North Dakota; and Aberdeen, South Dakota.
My first job (real job) was in the Brown County Welfare office, Valley City, ND. I started about Christmas of 1948. I had only one semester of shorthand, so it was really hard at first. I’d get a headache every time I walked past the courthouse! Mrs. Koppi was my boss, and she was the mother of Ridgway Koppi who was my boyfriend before Hugo. She liked me and wanted me for her son. I worked with Ruth McLees, and she became my best friend. She is Craig’s godmother and the veil I wore at our wedding was given to me by her. She had bought it for her wedding which she never had. I worked there for two years. I started at $125 and ended up at $190 per month which was pretty good. I also went to Valley City State Teachers College part time during this period.
After Hugo and I got married, he went to UND, and I moved back to my mother’s for one semester to save money. We had lived in a basement apartment from January of 1951 until the fall when Hugo went back to school. He hitchhiked back and forth from Grand Forks on the weekend.
I should tell you one story from the time when Hugo and I lived in Mrs. Kohler’s basement. Apartments were very scarce, because it wasn’t too long after World War II, and there was a housing shortage. She had been recently widowed and she let us move in. It was a nice house and there was a bedroom, bath and rec room in the basement. We set up a little kitchen just out in the middle. Grandpa was working for Culligan Soft Water Co., and I was working in the welfare office. Grandpa came home and took a shower every noon before he ate.
LaRae (Center), her mother Lonnie & Stepfather Henning (Far Right)
I belonged to a ‘sewing club’ which was actually an eating club, and this one night one of the girls came with a stocking and showed us how to put it over our heads for a mask. This was 1951 and this was a new thing. (There wasn’t such a thing as pantyhose then). Anyway, Grandpa took his shower and was getting dressed when I knocked on the bedroom door with the stocking over my face. He knew it was me so he just opened the door up wide, and when he saw this little alien thing, he turned pale from head to toe. (He hadn’t dressed yet, of course, so I could see). I loved it!
We moved to Grand Forks and I went to work for the registrar’s office at UND. Ruby McKenzie was the boss and she would only pay $160, a $30 cut for us. We didn’t have student loans in those days so we needed the money. Our parents didn’t have money for us to borrow. I worked there from August 1951 to July 1952, and by that time I had worked every position in the office and was making $190. I wanted more money, so I quit and took a job with N.D. Vocational Rehabilitation as the office manager at the grand salary of $208. Grandpa worked nights at the Student Union cutting meat at first and later for Gamble Robinson as a night billing clerk so that we could make ends meet. I liked my job at voc rehab and stayed there until 1955 when we moved to Hibbing. I also typed papers at night to make extra money. I typed a doctoral paper for one of the professors. It was about Indians in N.D. and was for a degree from Columbia. I had to type five carbons on a manual typewriter. I wonder why I didn’t get carpal tunnel syndrome.
LaRae and Mother (LaVon Robertson)
Craig was born in Grand Forks at the Deaconess Hospital on June 27, 1955. He was a premature baby. I had a difficult pregnancy and not very good prenatal care. We were lucky he made it. I always told him he might have amounted to something if he’d been full term! He was an adored child. I was very ‘baby hungry’ after almost five years of marriage. He was a beautiful and outgoing child. People would stop me in stores and on the street to comment about his big blue eyes. He was also sickly, and we spent a lot of time in the rocking chair and at the doctor’s office. He gave me one truly big scare when we first learned he was allergic. He was always a poor eater. When it was time to give him his first egg, he loved it. I was only to give him a teaspoon of hard boiled yolk, but since he liked it, I gave him more. He had an allergic reaction and his windpipe swelled shut. I thought he was choking, so I pounded on his back and shook him by his feet with no luck. I tried to reach into his throat and gagged him. He threw up everywhere and the vomit that landed on him raised a huge welt. I was never so scared in my life! From then on, he just had one allergy after another.
Hugo and LaRae Carlson – Expecting Their First Child (Craig), June 1955
We moved to Hibbing, MN., when Craig was four months old. Hugo was working for Lystad’s pest control company. He had graduated from UND, and was a 2nd Lieutenant in the army. There was an excess of 2nd lieutenants, so his service was put off for 18 months. We left Hibbing to go to Columbus, GA., Fort Benning, where Grandpa did his basic officer’s training. While we were there, we visited Tampa, Florida, and decided that’s where we wanted to live.
Sister-in-law Donna Robertson With LaRae, expecting Craig (4-19-55)
After Hugo was discharged, we moved there in January 1958. It was the coldest winter in Florida since 1890, and we froze. Grandpa got a job as an adjustor with Associates Discount, and he really hated it. We stayed eight months, and then headed back to ND. I worked in the office for Honeywell while we were in Tampa. I started at $225 and ended up with $250. They loved me at Honeywell! Those southerners weren’t used to hard-working northern women!
Telegram From Mother Lonnie, Received by LaRae After Birth of Her Son
Hugo, LaRae, and Craig
We moved back to Valley City and Hugo went back to school to get his education requirements. He had a B.S. in business with a law major from UND. His first teaching job was at Flasher, ND, and he started in 1959. I worked for Federal Crop Insurance while Hugo was getting his education requirements. It was the worst job I ever had because most of the time I had nothing to do. Craig was not quite four at this time. Reddi Wip, a pressurized canned whipped cream, came into being about this time and was highly advertised. Craig shopped with me, and he would beg for Reddi Wip. I told him it was too expensive. One afternoon he came into the house with a handful of change and asked if it was enough to buy Reddi Wip. He had been begging on the street! I was horrified. We did buy some Reddi Wip. This incident made a big impression, and when Hugh was old enough to know, Craig would lecture him about not begging.
When we moved to Flasher it was a big adjustment, because it was such a small town–515 people. That first year of teaching is always difficult and Hugo was very preoccupied. We went to every school function, and they always had pie and coffee afterward. Craig loved it and he knew everybody in town. Craig was heavily into imagination games at this time. He was four and his Superman cape and insignia were important props. He also had a Yankee soldier hat and uniform. There wasn’t another child his age in Flasher proper, after the Johnsons moved, so he played with the big kids. He liked to dress like his dad right down to shirt and tie. The Shearer boys, who were probably 12 and 13, would take him to the movie at the townhall on Saturday. Jay and Hal Schulz, the superintendent’s kids, also provided some companionship. They were into “girlie” magazines at this stage, and Craig unwittingly “squealed” on their hiding places!
Hugo, Craig, and LaRae
Hugh was born February 4, 1961, while we lived in Flasher. He was born on Jan Schulz’s birthday. She was my best friend in Flasher and the superintendent’s wife. She took care of Craig when I went to the hospital. He liked the arrangement, because she would cook french fried chicken and potatoes for him. Hugh was born in Elgin, ND, and he was the only baby in the nursery. When Craig was born, I told Hugo he was not to buy me roses, because they were too expensive and we were poor. He bought me a gloxinia plant!
So, when Hugh was born, he drove to Bismarck which was 90 miles east of Flasher, bought a dozen roses, a pair of size 5 ½ Tweedie shoes (very cute and expensive) and drove back to Elgin to deliver them to the hospital. I was thrilled. Everybody else in the hospital had plastic flowers. Hugh was supposed to have been our daughter, since I always believed we were only entitled to replace ourselves on this crowded globe, but there was nothing feminine about this big 8 lb. 3 ½ oz. boy. Craig had always said he wanted a brother, so I told him Hugh was his. Craig was always confident, and the new baby didn’t seem to daunt him a bit.
Hugh, LaRae, and Craig
Hugh and Craig Carlson, Bruce Olson – Mid 1960s
Craig Carlson and Bruce Olson
LaRae’s Son Hugh Carlson
The Johnsons, Phil, Dorothy, Barb, Danny, and Bonnie, were good friends of ours. Phil was the music teacher and Danny was Craig’s best friend. They moved to Dickinson [North Dakota] from Flasher in 1960. Phil contacted Hugo to let him know of an opening at Dickinson High School. We moved to Dickinson in the fall of 1963. Hugo taught biology and bookkeeping and was in charge of the school newspaper. We bought a house and lived there until May 1966. That house was torn down sometime in the ’80’s after the crash of oil prices.
LaRae and Hugo – 1960s
My mother, LaVon Olson, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in January of 1964. Bruce Olson, my half-brother, who was 13 at the time, came to live with us in Dickinson. Dru Olson went to Hawthorne, Nevada, to live with my brother LaRoi “Buddy” Robertson. This was a terribly sad year for me, as I went back and forth to Grand Forks while my mother was in the hospital. She stayed with my Aunt Laura Abel during recovery period. Hugh was three so he went with me, and Craig and Bruce stayed home with Hugo. Hugo had to learn to cook, so they had some adventures at the table. My mother died December 11, 1964. I was 33 years old. She was my best friend (not counting Hugo who is also my lover) and I still miss her.
LaRae and Hugo Carlson, Janice and Dean Johnson – April 1981
Hugo and LaRae With Grandson David – 1981
Hugo Carlson, Janice (Spencer) Johnson, Craig Carlson, LaRae (Robertson) Carlson, David Carlson, Teresa (Johnson) Carlson, and Dean Johnson – 1982
You’ve heard the stories about your dad and Bruce’s adventures with bike rides, snow forts and tree houses. I’m sure you’ve also heard about all of Hugh’s mishaps after Hugo went to Aberdeen the second semester of 1965-66 including falling out of Holte’s barn and cutting his head and locking himself in the bathroom with his arm caught between the wall and the tub. The day we were to leave for Dickinson for Aberdeen, the moving company had loaded our bigger furniture, the boys and I had loaded a U-haul trailer and slept on the floor the night we were to leave. When we came out to leave in the morning, someone had smashed into our Ambassador station wagon and crumpled the fender against the wheel. I, as usual, had slept through the crash, because, as you probably know, I sleep like the dead. The police came, but no one was ever apprehended. I had the fender pulled out so we could drive, and we moved to Aberdeen.
Craig, LaRae, and David – Early 1980s
We moved to 512 North Arch, Aberdeen, SD, in May of 1966. I had been a legal secretary in Dickinson where I worked for Freed, Dynes, and Malloy. I was making $350 per month. I had quit that job in August of 1963 when Hugh was unhappy at the baby sitter’s. During this period I worked part time helping Ferron Halvorson who was instrumental in setting up public television in the USA. It was called Educational Television at that time. It was a crazy job, and there were times when I was going to get mail on the train at 2:30 in the morning! I also acted as a temp for other law firms in Dickinson. I went back to Freed, et al in 1965 and worked there until we moved to Aberdeen.
Hugo and LaRae in Maui
My plan was to go to NSC and complete my B.S., but Stan Siegel learned of my impending move. He called me in Dickinson and wouldn’t take no for an answer. I ended up working for Agor, Siegel, Barnett & Schutz for the next four years, and I would probably be there still if I hadn’t developed pre-cirrhosis of the liver. I quit in June 1970 and went back to school. I was earning $425 per month at this time.
The summer of 1968 brought another crisis in our lives. Grandpa had what is called a Wallenberg Syndrome. He was in great physical condition having trained all winter for a pending family reunion and the usual competition with the brothers. He and the neighbors were laying cement for a driveway at 512 N. Arch. It was a terribly hot day. That evening, he was in the backyard and I brought him some watermelon. He turned to give a piece to Hugh and he lost his voice, vision in his right eye and sensation on one side of his body. He managed to get into our VW, and I drove to the emergency room. He wouldn’t go in and swore he was alright. He promised he would go to the doctor the next day. I went to work. He was sitting on the front step when a neighbor came over to check the cement job. When he looked up, he lost everything again. He managed to drive himself to the doctor and stagger to his office. The doctor wasn’t there and he drove to the hospital! He was hospitalized at St. Luke’s and had several diagnoses during the two weeks he was there, with the last being myasthenia gravis. His parents and Oz came, and we managed to get him to the University of Minnesota where they told us immediately that that was not a correct diagnosis. His doctor in Aberdeen was Spanish and I thought he said Hugo had “mastenits grabits,” so that’s what I told them at the U of M. There were no beds, but I told them we didn’t have any more pills for the “mastenits grabits,” so they made room in the hall. He was there, flat on his back, for 45 days. They never knew what caused his problem. It might have been a blood clot or a muscle spasm, but he has a spot in his brain stem the size of a dime that died. He was very fortunate to have survived because if it was a blood clot, he was treated very improperly in Aberdeen. We didn’t get a prognosis, so we asked God for at least five years, so that his sons would be old enough to remember him. Craig was 13 and hugh was 8 at the time. Our prayers were answered.
Bruce didn’t move to Aberdeen with us. He went back to is dad and ended up living with Shirley Stokka in a foster home arrangement. She had been a friend of Henning and Mother. Bruce didn’t graduate from high school, but went to some vocational training in Bismarck. One weekend our family planned an outing to Valley City where we were to meet Great-grandpa Hugo and Great-grandma Julia and Julie Elsie. As we drove into Valley City we spotted Bruce and a weird guy hitchhiking. We picked them up, and Bruce said they were going to Minneapolis. Bruce was 18 at the time, so he could do as he pleased. We fed the two and they ended up sleeping in the park. The next day, they were still around and I found out Bruce had left everything he owned in Bismarck and didn’t have any money. We talked him into riding back with Hugo and Julia, so he could get his check, etc. Grandpa and I went home. We got to bed about midnight, but I couldn’t sleep for worrying about Bruce, so I asked Grandpa to get up and go get him in Bismarck. He, being the saint that he is, did leave right away and brought Bruce back to Aberdeen. Bruce enrolled at Central High School and graduated. Then he went to Vocational School in Watertown where he did very well and earned a couple of scholarships. He married Rhonda Dunker February 14, 1975. She was perfect for him. They bought a house and got a dog. Bruce worked for the Adjustment Training Center as foreman of the shop, but, as you know, he became mentally ill and his world fell apart. They were divorced in 1978. I always felt the hand of God when we found Bruce in Valley City. He was given another chance, but somehow he was not slated to live the good life. He has a bad set of genes and nurture couldn’t overcome them.
I got my B.S. in the summer of 1972. There were no teaching jobs for me that fall, and I ended up working for Rev. Salem at the Baptist church. That summer of ’73 was the time of Craig’s first long bike ride. We were very apprehensive, but he made it. That’s his story so he can tell you about it.
I started teaching in the Catholic schools the fall of 1973, and I stayed there until 1988. I never made a lot of money even though I earned my MS in 1980. I was making less than $17,000 when I quit. I quit because it wasn’t fun anymore, and I had high blood pressure and cholesterol problems and was generally not feeling too perky. Our sons were on their own, so money wasn’t a number one priority. I did teach the fall semester at Presentation College and one semester a couple years later.
SHORT FILM STARRING HUGO & LARAE BY THEIR GRANDSON DAVE (2002) –
Hugo, LaRae, Craig, and Hugh
I’ve omitted Craig’s and Hugh’s weddings, and the births of our wonderful grandchildren. Those stories belong to Craig and Hugh even though they are great events in our lives.
I also haven’t told the story of the reunion with my father in 1978 after a 30 year hiatus because I realize there are only so many bytes on your computer.
Great-grandpa Hugo died in June 1976 and Julia Elsie died in May 1990. Great-grandma Julia came to live with us in September 1992, and I think you know the rest of this story.“
Craig, LaRae, and Hugo – 2017
LaRae passed away on August 28, 2021.
