Lögberg-Heimskringla - 27.08.2004, Blaðsíða 6

6 • Lögberg-Heimskringla • Friday 27 August 2004
Hooked on
the heritage
PHOTO: STEINÞÓR GUÐBJARTSSON
Dennis Cardiff works at Malen Framing in Ottawa, where
some of his paintings can been seen.
PHOTO: STEINÞÓR GUÐBJARTSSON
Ruth Thorkelson in her office in Ottawa.
Nicknamed 6the
Icelandic viking’
Ruth Thorkelson has been working for Canada’s
Prime Minister Paul Martin for 10 years and is the
Deputy Chief of Staff in the Prime Minister Office.
Steinþór Guðbjartsson got hold of her in Ottawa.
Steinþór Guðb jartsson
Ottawa, ON
Dennis Carter is an artist in
Ottawa of Icelandic descent.
The interest in his roots led to
the creation of his own website
and he is also the webmaster of
The Friends of Iceland.
His matemai grandparents
emigrated from Iceland to
Canada in 1900. His mother
Guðfríður Ingimarsdóttir was
bom there and gave birth to
him in Saskatoon,
Saskatchewan. “She did not
learn English until she entered
school,” Dennis says. “She
tried to teach me Icelandic but
I was not a good student. My
grandmother lived with my
aunt when I was growing up
and they spoke Icelandic all the
time.”
Dennis moved to Ottawa in
1978. He studied Fine Arts in
Toronto, Ottawa and Saska-
toon, and has been an active
artist since 1972. “I mainly do
portraits and I have had numer-
ous exhibitions,” he says.
It goes without saying that
Dennis is very proud of his Ice-
landic heritage. His websites,
http://cardiff.history.wetcan-
vas.com/ingimarsson.html and
http://cardiffpaintings.wet
canvas.com are a sample of
that. “I created my own web-
site so I could share the geneal-
ogy with other family mem-
bers. I got interested in geneal-
ogy, visited many genealogy
websites and decided to create
my own. It is a great way of
First Lutheran Church
580 Victor Street
Winnipeg R3G 1R2
204-772-7444
www.mts.net/~flcwin
Worship with us
Sundays 10:30 a.m.
Pastor Michael Kurtz
sharing information, text and
pictures, between family mem-
bers living all around the
world. I was looking into my
Irish ancestory and I have rela-
tives currently Iiving in Ireland,
in Australia, in
Puerto Rico, all
over the United
States, and all over
Canada.”
His mother
was from Kinder-
sly and his father
from Dauphin,
Manitoba, but they met and got
married in Saskatoon.
“Although I had always won-
dered about it I was not really
much interested in my Ice-
landic background until a few
years ago when I started doing
my research,” Dennis recalls.
“My cousin had visited Iceland
a number of times and he put
me in touch with some rela-
tives in Iceland who were able
to send my information about a
lot of my ancestry. After hav-
ing read about it, done some
research and created the web-
site I was hooked on my Ice-
landic heritage.
Shortly after we
got the Icelandic
Embassy here in
Ottawa and the
Friends of Iceland
started. When I
was a child I was
told about Iceland
and my Icelandic heritage and
now it is a big part of my life.
Thanks to number of things
that came together at a similar
time to make this a priority. I
want to know more and more,
about the history, about the lan-
guage, and next year my wife
and I plan to visit Iceland for
the first time. I’m sure it will
be a great experience.”
There are not many Cana-
dians of Icelandic descent
working at the Parliament
Hill in Ottawa, but those who do
seem to be well known in the
area. Ruth Thorkelson from
Riverton, Manitoba, is one of
them. She has worked in Ottawa
since 1991.
Ruth’s office takes care of
parliamentary affairs and
appointments. When Paul Mar-
tin became the Minister of
Finance in 1994 she was his
political assistant and she has
worked for him since, except
during the period of 2001 to
December last year, when she
worked in the private sector.
Ruth says that she likes
politics very much. “I think it
is an Icelandic trade. There are
nol many Icelanders who do
not have an opinion on politics
and they all seem to be very
politically engaged.” She adds
that she comes from a conser-
vative family and “I’m the only
Liberal in the family.”
When Ruth was four years
old, she moved with her par-
ents Laura (nee Thorvaldson)
and Sigurjón (Sam) Thorkel-
son to Edmonton. All her
grandparents were born in Ice-
land or were of 100 per cent
lcelandic descent and her par-
ents have been very much
involved in the Canadian-Ice-
landic community. “My whole
life has been infused with
being Icelandic,” Ruth says.
“My parents speak Icelandic, I
took Icelandic lessons in
Edmonton and went to the lce-
landic Cainp in Hecla, Manito-
ba. I even took a Norwegian
course to get closer to Ice-
landic. From the age of 10 to
23,1 went back to the Icelandic
community in Manitoba
almost every summer but 1
have only been once to Iceland.
I spent a weekend in Reykjavík
as a part of a long trip I took
after I left the minister’s office
in 2001.”
Of course Ruth is a Cana-
dian, but she says that jokes are
made about her roots at her
office. “People in the office
call me the viking, I talk about
being Icelandic, and when my
dad comes to visit me I say that
the senior viking is coming to
town,” she says. “1 think that I
have a very progressive left-
wing outlook, and sometimes
people attribute that to my Ice-
landic heritage.”
Ruth says that since Cana-
da is built up of many cultures
Canadians are quite often
descendants of many different
nationalities. Therefore it is not
very common to have roots in
only one country, as she has.
“I am very proud of my
heritage and I talk about it
quite a bit,” she says. “I am just
Icelandic, nothing else. People
tend to be a bit of a mixture
when it comes to my genera-
tion.” She says that people
around her are aware of her
origin and when her minister
would stop in Iceland he would
bring her a gift from Iceland.
‘“Here is a little bit l'rom your
homeland,’ he would say when
giving me a rock from Ice-
land,” she says.
“After having read
about it and done
some research,
I was hooked on
my lcelandic
heritage.”
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