From WCAL: Items of Historical Significance from the St. Olaf College archives by Rev. Dr. Martin Hegland '04, A.B., A.M., C.T., Ph. D. Hegland was a professor in and, later, chair of the St. Olaf Religion Department. He was the Director of WCAL for a number of years.
As a result of gifts, large and small, the main part of the WCAL radio building (now the Hector R. Skifter Building) at St. Olaf College was constructed in 1939-1940. The building was financed completely by donations from WCAL listeners, not St. Olaf College.
The St. Olaf College Alumni Magazine, Vol. 38 No. 10 October 1942 reported the news of the death of Knut Tormodsgaard on May 28, 1942:
… Knut Tormodsgaard, who died May 28 at the Bethesda old people's home at Beresford, South Dakota. Mr. Tormodsgaard was a good friend of St. Olaf of more recent years. He gave large sums of money to church work. A gift of $10,000 to WCAL [$148,417 in 2007] made possible the erection of the new broadcasting station in 1939. In his honor the large auditorium from which religious services in Norwegian are broadcast every Sunday morning is named the Tormodsgaard Radio Mission House.
