Tormod Hustad: Minister of Agriculture and Minister of Labor (1940-1944)

(15 February 1889 – 19 August 1973)

Architect

In 1910, Hustad was admitted as a student in the first cohort of architectural students at the Norwegian Technical University (NTH). He graduated in the autumn of 1914. During his studies, he was active and held positions in, among other things, the Studentersamfundet and the Studentersangforeningen. In 1914, he won an international competition for the design of the NTH ring, also called the "Høiskolering". This is a training course for civil engineers and civil architects graduated from NTH, now NTNU. As a fresh architect, he undertook a number of study trips in Europe and Morocco.

From 1921 to 1923, Hustad was construction manager for the construction of the Physics Department at NTH. In 1923 he was appointed head of the newly established Bøndernes Bygningskontor in Oslo.[4] He combined the management job with other assignments. In 1924, he assisted the National Archives with the preservation of farms and buildings around the country, and he was responsible for the restoration of, among other things, the stave churches in Lom and Rollag. He also contributed to a work with documentation of old Norwegian building customs and handicrafts under the direction of architecture professors Johan J. Meyer and Erling Gjone.

The Bøndernes Bygningskontor was to promote an aesthetic, practical and economic settlement in the countryside. It carried out information work and developed house drawings based on domestic building practices. The office (with national antiquarian Harry Fett as the first board chairman) sprung among other things from the "Norwegiandomsrørsla", which emerged at the end of the 19th century and which saw the farmers as bearers of the true Norwegian culture. In 1920, the Norwegian Farmers' Association had established a committee for "national style and domestic building customs". The committee was chaired by Hulda Garborg, and other members were Fett and the architects Arnstein Arneberg and Lorentz Ree. His article "national building culture" was included in the masterpiece Det nye Norge, which was written during the war.

Hustad's residence in Ullern Gårds vei 38, Oslo. Hustad also designed several larger buildings, including Mæresmyren's experimental station and the Statens husflidskole at Blaker.

In 1928–29 he designed and had a horizontally divided detached house built in Ullern Gårds vei 38 in Oslo, where he settled. The house has proportions reminiscent of older civil servants' residences, while the facade with standing panels and modest detailing is inspired by trønderloan. The roof is sod. The house is on the city antiquary's "yellow list" of buildings worthy of preservation.

Nasjonal Samling

Hustad joined the Nasjonal Samling (NS) in 1933. He is said to have been very German-oriented, like many in the interwar period with an interest in technical subjects.

In Vidkun Quisling's first government, Hustad was Minister of Agriculture, and he was one of the few in the coup government who actually tried to exercise the ministerial job. In September 1940, he was appointed commissary minister in the Ministry of Labour. In December 1940, Director General Hoff and the NSB executive board agreed to Joseph Terboven's and Hustad's demand that NSB employees, under certain conditions, have to disclose party political affiliation. When the Directorate for Employment Services and Unemployment Insurance advocated the use of prisoners of war on the Sørlandsbanen from the late summer of 1941, the Directorate was under Hunstad. In November 1941, he advocated the Nazisification of NSB by initially changing the structure and transferring to Director-General Hoff all the tasks that until then had been the responsibility of NSB's executive board, in addition to employment and disciplinary authority.

Hustad was minister of labor in Quisling's government from 1942 to 1944. He eventually came into conflict with the Germans and more aggressive NS people, and was dismissed and replaced with Hans Skarphagen on 1 February 1944. He was arrested in connection with the court settlement, and in 1946 convicted of treason, to forced labor for life.