The Science Channel has a new series titled America’s Lost Vikings that premiered on February 17, 2019. I don’t have access to cable TV, so I’ve been unable to view all of the episodes. However, I made it priority to purchase access to Episode 4 “Ghosts of the Great Lakes.” Archaeologists have known since the 1960s that Vikings briefly settled North America around the year 1000 in northeastern Newfoundland, at the site known as L’Anse aux Meadows. However, the question that has obsessed many observers is how much further south or west did these Vikings manage to travel?

Episode 4 follows archaeologists Blue Nelson and Michael Arbuthnot on their journey to Minnesota to research the popular claim that Norse explorers reached what is now Minnesota prior to explorations of Christopher Columbus. The source of this claim is an artifact known as the Kensington Rune Stone, which was unearthed in a…

My book, Myths of the Rune Stone: Viking Martyrs and the Birthplace of America, was published by the University of Minnesota Press three years ago. I’m pleased the book is still getting attention and I look forward to several upcoming events.

My first stop will be in Uppsala, SWEDEN for the The 19th Biennial Conference for the International Society for Religion, Literature and Culture held at Uppsala University from September 28-30. The theme of the conference this year is “The Place of Truth” and I’ll be presenting a paper titled “The Sacralization of the Kensington Rune Stone: Constructing a Myth of America’s Birth.” This will be for the Material Religion section. Thanks to S. Brent Plate, the editor of the Material Religion journal for hosting this session.

During the first week of October, I’ll be headed to MINNESOTA for a series of three lectures sponsored by the Jay Phillips…