After his confirmation, young Reinert Reinertsen Maeland, a good student, took the examinations to become a teacher but began to farm as well. Though he later did some substitute teaching and tutoring, he was a farmer the rest of his life, especially after his marriage. Some years later he sold his first farm and bought one in Nernaes in Etne, Norway. Twenty years later he sold that and bought a farm in Maeland in Etne. He continued to help people learn to read and write. He was a kind teacher, and teaching was good for him too. He was also known for developing a method to teach writing to old people, taking just 30 hours for the entire course. His great memory brought him renown as an entertaining storyteller. People came for miles to hear him recite stirring incidents from his wide reading or experience. His good humor and light touch made him welcome everywhere. Children liked him and he liked them.
Father of eight children, he lived a long and peaceful life, active in mission work and contributing to church papers until his peaceful death at age 87. He said he was ready to die. His wife, Gunhild, survived him by 13 years, living to be 95.

It's interesting that his eight children have four different last names:
The girls, of course, Metha and Martha, were "Reinertsdatter".
Peder and Thor Reinertsen took their father's first name plus "sen".
Reinert and Assmund Nernaes took the place-name of Nernaes.
Herman and Johannes Maeland took the place-name of Maeland.

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In 1931 Reinert Reinertsen (b. 1877 in Skudesneshavn) published a small genealogy book called SLEKTEN REINERTSENS STAMTAVLE which documents the lives of Reinert Reinertsen Maeland and his descendents up to 1930. Its entry for Reinert Reinertsen Maeland, not translated here, differs in many small ways from the document below translated by Linda Sivesind.

At the same time he also published a large accompanying family tree chart which incliudes hundreds of additional names going way back to Hr. Jon Ragnvaldsson Smør living in 1295.

Additionally, Synnøve Ulvenes has researched the family from Jon Ragnvaldsson Smør as far back as Halvdan “Kvitbein” Olovson (715-750), who was followed ten generations later by King Harald III of Norway (1015-1066) of Harald Sigurdson (Harald Hardrada).

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The following is from a local history of Etne, translated by Linda Sivesind:

Reinert Reinertsson was born in 1828 at Agdestein on (the island of) Stord, and died in 1913 at Maeland. He was married on Stord to Gunnilla Persdotter, who was born in 1830 at Lønning on Stord, and died in 1923 at Meland. He bought Ola's farm a little at a time, but the price was extremely high. It wasn't long before Reinert had to scale down a bit just as Ola had done: In 1858, he let Halvard Gotskalksson to take over the west part of the farm, which left him (Reinert) with the Lidups and Tre areas.

Reinert Reinertsson and Gunnilla Persdotter moved to Lindups or Lindupsflåto in 1858. It had previously been a cotter's farm. Even though it had been expanded by adding the area called Tre, and assessed as farm number 3 at Nernes, it did not provide much of a living. According to the land register of 1867, they were allowed to keep 4 cattle and 15 sheep, goats or pigs, they could sow 1.5 barrels of grain and 3 barrels of potatoes, and they could harvest 7 barrels of grain and 12 barrels of potatoes. Reinert and Gunnilla raised a large family, and he earned some extra income by writing for people. He was not very good with his hands: His son (Peder), who was a teacher at a prison in Christiania (Oslo), tells about the time his father fell for the temptation to float large amounts of cord wood down the river to the sea. Very little of the wood reached its destination. In 1869, they sold the farm for 400 special dollars (the currency in Norway at that time), and bought a larger farm at Maeland.

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Records Available For Reinert Reinertsen Mæland - MyHeritage