Lögberg-Heimskringla - 05.11.2004, Qupperneq 9

Lögberg-Heimskringla • Föstudagur 5. nóvember 2004 • 9
Journey to
Hekkla
David Jón Fuller
Huntsville, ON
The Hekkla Cemetery has
a champion in Earl Marchand.
Earl, who is descended
from Icelandic settlers in
Muskoka, has organized
images and transcribed infor-
mation from the gravestones of
the cemetery. The Hekkla
Cemetery is among the sites in
Ontario’s Muskoka and Parry
Sound area which Earl has
researched.
Earl’s interest in Hekkla is
personal. He was born in Parry
Sound, Ontario, in 1932 and
lived the fírst seven years of
his life in Hekkla, before his
family moved south during the
Second World War. His career
with Bell Canada saw him
travelling across many parts of
Ontario, including the north-
west. “I worked for the tele-
phone company for 32 years;
the last seven I worked on the
road,” says Earl. “I worked 13
years in Toronto, and approxi-
mately the rest of it out of
Huntsville.”
As he drives through the
area leading to the Hekkla
cemtery, it’s clear he knows
the area intimately. Though
the forest has obscured most
traces of human settlement,
such as farms and an airstrip
— even a region devastated by
forest fire in 1999 is barely
noticeable — Earl can name
places such as family home-
steads, the old school, and a
former community hall along
the old Hekkla Road. “This
place is new,” he says from
time to time, pointing out a
house here or there.
The Hekkla Cemetery is a
small clearing in the woods
beside the road. The Hekkla
United Church stands nearby,
where it was moved from
Ashdown and rebuilt in 1900.
Earl fírst got involved in
his research after correspon-
ding with Don Gislason of
Toronto.
“Don Gislason had a list
of who was married to who,
and it was kind of wrong, and
Dorrie [Nowak] and I went out
and straightened it out, and I
sort of got interested. Fifteen
years ago we did the correc-
tion. And we started, well a
friend of mine started a web-
site called pio-
neercemetaries.com and we
started photographing tomb-
stones and epitaphs and I just
PHOTO: DAVID JÓN FULLER
Earl Marchand has worked to preserve the memory of the Hekkla Cemetery.
went further with Hekkla.”
Earl has sought out cor-
roboration for the information
on the tombstones to make
sure it is accurate, though he
admits not everything is per-
fect yet.
However, he’s well aware
of the consequences of errors
in the records. “The Humphrey
Township has no record of my
grandfather in the Rosseau
Cemetery,” he says. “They
denied his being buried there,
but because I went to the
funeral I told them that he was.
But there’s still no marker.
Nobody knows where to put it.
I suggested to my cousin, I
wanted to put the marker on
the [family] plot, because you
know where that is, and we’d
be somewhere near.”
Earl seems to know the
Hekkla gravestones like old
friends. He should — he has
been researching the names on
them for years.
The oldest gravestone is
that of Gisli Thompson, 1840 -
1918, which also marks his
wife, Margaret, 1830 - 1917.
The disastrous effects of the
influenza epidemic can be seen
in the death dates on many
graves — 1918 and 1919 are
common. Though, as Earl
mentions, many who caught
the flu didn’t die from it.
Earl points out his own
family gravestone, where his
father Wilford A. Marchand
and mother Mary Pearl Shortt
are buried. Earl’s own name
and birth date are inscribed as
well, but, as he says,
“Fortunately there’s no other
date on that þart yet.”

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