Nini Haslund Gleditsch (28 June 1908 – 25 July 1996) was a Norwegian

political activist A political movement is a collective attempt by a group of people to change government policy or social values. Political movements are usually in opposition to an element of the status quo, and are often associated with a certain ideology. Some t ...

and advocate for peace.

Personal life

Nini (née Ingrid Margaret Haslund) was born in

Moss Mosses are small, non-vascular flowerless plants in the taxonomic division Bryophyta (, ) '' sensu stricto''. Bryophyta (''sensu lato'', Schimp. 1879) may also refer to the parent group bryophytes, which comprise liverworts, mosses, and hor ...

as the daughter of deputy education officer Johannes Emmanuel Haslund and Aagot Mathilde Løken. She married fellow Mot Dag activist and

geodesist Geodesy ( ) is the Earth science of accurately measuring and understanding Earth's figure (geometric shape and size), orientation in space, and gravity. The field also incorporates studies of how these properties change over time and equivale ...

Kristian Gleditsch in 1934. They were the parents of

Nils Petter Gleditsch Nils Petter Gleditsch (born 17 July 1942 in Sutton, Surrey, Great Britain) is a Norwegian sociologist and political scientist. He is Research Professor at the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO). In 2009, Nils Petter Gleditsch was awarded the ...

. Her sister-in-law was

Ellen Gleditsch Ellen Gleditsch (29 December 1879 – 5 June 1968) was a Norwegian radiochemist and Norway's second female professor. Starting her career as an assistant to Marie Curie, she became a pioneer in radiochemistry, establishing the half-life of radiu ...

radiochemist Radiochemistry is the chemistry of radioactive materials, where radioactive isotopes of elements are used to study the properties and chemical reactions of non-radioactive isotopes (often within radiochemistry the absence of radioactivity leads to ...

and Norway's second female professor. Nini Haslund Gleditsch died in

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of ...

in 1996.

Career

Pre-war career

While working as a

joiner A joiner is an artisan and tradesperson who builds things by joining pieces of wood, particularly lighter and more ornamental work than that done by a carpenter, including furniture and the "fittings" of a house, ship, etc. Joiners may work in ...

's mate in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

in the late 1920s, she was part of the circle around the organization Clarté. She moved to

as a student in 1930. In the early 1930s, she joined the leftist organization

Mot Dag Mot Dag (, 'Towards Day') was a Norwegian political group. The group was active from the 1920s to the early 1930s and was first affiliated with the Labour Party. After World War II, many of its former members were leaders in Norwegian politics and ...

. She worked full-time with publishing house Fram Forlag, and contributed to the development of the workers' encyclopaedia ''

Arbeidernes Leksikon (''The Laborers' Encyclopedia'') is a Norwegian encyclopedia published in six volumes in the 1930s. It was the first reference book in Norwegian to have a pronounced class bias, and the first encyclopedia outside of the Soviet Union to be direc ...

''. She participated in the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, lin ...

from 1937 to 1939, by organizing international humanitarian aid.

World War II

During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

she participated in the

flight of the Norwegian National Treasury The National Treasury of Norway consisted of 50 tonnes of gold worth in 1940 (approximately in 1940, or in 2015.) When the German invasion began, the gold was evacuated from Oslo first overland to Åndalsnes and then by ship to Tromsø. From Tro ...

to England in 1940, on the stage between

Åndalsnes is a town in Rauma Municipality in Møre og Romsdal county, Norway. Åndalsnes is in the administrative center of Rauma Municipality. It is located along the Isfjorden, at the mouth of the river Rauma, at the north end of the Romsdalen valley. ...

and

Tromsø Tromsø (, , ; se, Romsa ; fkv, Tromssa; sv, Tromsö) is a List of municipalities of Norway, municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the Tromsø (city), city of Tromsø. Tromsø lies ...

. She and her husband were responsible for the transport of two coffins of the "light luggage" (banknotes) by car from Åndalsnes to Molde. One third of the gold was sent with the British cruiser HMS ''Galatea'' from Åndalsnes to the United Kingdom, while 24 trucks brought the rest to

Molde Molde () is a town and municipality in Møre og Romsdal county, Norway. It is located in the traditional district of Romsdal. It is located on the Romsdal Peninsula, surrounding the Fannefjord and Moldefjord. The administrative centre of the m ...

. Nini followed the transport of four truckloads of gold by ships from Molde to Tromsø, first part with the coastal steamer , and later the ten tons of gold was distributed on smaller

fishing vessel A fishing vessel is a boat or ship used to catch fish in the sea, or on a lake or river. Many different kinds of vessels are used in commercial, artisanal and recreational fishing. The total number of fishing vessels in the world in 2016 was es ...

s. During the transport, ''Driva'' was attacked by German bombers, but managed to escape from the bombs. She then worked for Minister

Anders Frihagen Anders Rasmus Frihagen (28 January 1892 - 5 April 1979) was a Norwegian politician for the Labour Party. He was Minister of Trade 1939–1940, government representative in Stockholm Stockholm () is the capital and largest city of Sweden a ...

at the Ministry of Trade in

Balsfjord Balsfjord ( sme, Báhccavuotna ; fkv, Paatsivuono) is a municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Storsteinnes. Other villages include Mestervik, Mortenhals, and Nordkjo ...

. When

Terje Wold Terje Wold (23 August 1899 – 6 September 1972) was a Norwegian judge and politician for the Labour Party. Terje Wold was born in Evenes. He graduated as cand.jur. in 1921. He worked as a jurist, becoming a Supreme Court Justice of Norway in ...

took over the Ministry, Haslund Gleditsch started working for

Trygve Lie Trygve Halvdan Lie ( , ; 16 July 1896 – 30 December 1968) was a Norwegians, Norwegian politician, labour leader, government official and author. He served as Norwegian foreign minister during the critical years of the Nygaardsvold's Cabinet, N ...

at the Ministry of Supply. She followed the British cruiser from Tromsø to

Greenock Greenock (; sco, Greenock; gd, Grianaig, ) is a town and administrative centre in the Inverclyde council areas of Scotland, council area in Scotland, United Kingdom and a former burgh of barony, burgh within the Counties of Scotland, historic ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

, along with part of the Norwegian Government and the Norwegian Royal Family. From 1940 to 1945 she worked as a secretary with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the Norwegian government-in-exile in London.

Post-war career

In the 1950s, while a housewife with young children, she was active in feminist organizations, and also co-edited the magazine ''

Kvinnen og Tiden ''Kvinnen og Tiden'' (meaning ''Woman and Time'' in English) was a Norwegian magazine for women published between 1945 and 1955. History and profile ''Kvinnen og Tiden'' was started in 1945 with Henriette Bie Lorentzen and Kirsten Hansteen as ...

'' from 1953 to 1955. Along with her husband, she wrote the memoir book ''Glimt fra kampårene'', published in 1954. She worked with the

Statistics Norway Statistics Norway ( no, Statistisk sentralbyrå, abbreviated to ''SSB'') is the Norwegian statistics bureau. It was established in 1876. Relying on a staff of about 1,000, Statistics Norway publish about 1,000 new statistical releases every yea ...

( no, Statistisk Sentralbyrå) from 1960 to 1978. She was a co-founder of the political publishing house

Pax Forlag Pax Forlag is a Norwegian publishing house, established in 1964. The first manager was Tor Bjerkmann, who chaired the company from 1964 to 1972. Starting with Bjerkmann's new translation of George Orwell's ''Animal Farm'', Pax published 150 qu ...

in 1964. In her older days, she was active in the anti-nuclear organization Bestemødre mot atomvåpen (Grandmothers against

nuclear weapon A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions ( thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bom ...

s).

Selected books

* (with Kristian Gleditsch) *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gleditsch, Nini Haslund 1908 births 1996 deaths People from Moss, Norway Mot Dag Norwegian activists Norwegian feminists Norwegian women activists Norwegian memoirists Norwegian people of the Spanish Civil War Norwegian women in World War II Norwegian expatriates in the United Kingdom Norwegian socialist feminists Women in war 1900–1945 Women in war in Spain 20th-century Norwegian writers 20th-century memoirists