Until selling the business to his brother and sister-in-law January of 2014, Eric Bergeson was the third generation owner of Bergeson Nursery in Fertile, MN, a business started by his grandfather in 1937. He wrote a weekly column for several newspapers in northwestern Minnesota for fifteen years. He has published five books, including Pirates on the Prairie, which the Minneapolis Tribune called a Minnesota cultural and historical treasure. His sixth book, A Treasury of Old Souls, became available for purchase on September 1st 2015. Eric graduated from Fertile-Beltrami High School in 1982. He attended Northwestern College in Roseville, MN, and received his bachelor's degree in history from the University of North Dakota in 1986. After completing a Bachelor of Science in Social Studies at Moorhead State University in 1988, he returned to UND where he earned a master's degree in history. During college, Eric studied at Cambridge University in England, student taught in Wellington, NZ, and studied in Warsaw, Poland. Over the years, Eric has been a frequent speaker and performer in northwestern Minnesota. When needed, Eric has taught American history courses at the University of Minnesota, Crookston. Eric recently finished a five-year tenure as Chairman of the Board of the Northwest Minnesota Foundation. He is acting chair of the Fertile-Beltrami Community Fund. In 2011, Eric was awarded a prestigious two-year Bush Fellowship to study eldercare. During the fellowship, he revisited New Zealand to study that nation's system of eldercare. He also worked to bring a new assisted living facility to his hometown of Fertile. He lives in Fertile, MN with his partner Lance Thorn. He is currently working on new writing projects, including a book about his years spent tending his great aunt Olive, a colorful character who passed away at age 103 in February of 2015.
