Obituary: Roland Caspersen Dec. 16, 1936 – Jan. 3, 2021
ROLAND CASPERSEN Dec. 16, 1936 – Jan. 3, 2021
A man of intellectual curiosity, laughter, love and friendship left earth Sunday, January 3, 2021, to join the heavenly hosts. He struggled with cancer for two years.
He was born to Roy and Astrid Caspersen on December 16, 1936, in Oslo, Norway. Worried about the war clouds looming over Europe, in January 1940, Roland’s grandfather, William Caspersen, joined his American born daughter, Astrid, in New York to prepare a new home in the United States.
Roland and his grandmother, Dagmar Caspersen, were to come in mid-April. Germany invaded Norway on April 9, 1940, just days before the family’s departure. The Occupation began a 5-year period of brutal deprivation, terror and hardship in Norway. Dagmar refused to join the Norwegian Nazi Party, which meant she was unable to secure a good job. Hers was a difficult and principled choice which Roland admired throughout his life.