Gripla - 2019, Page 7

7
KATELIN PARSONS
ALBERT JóHANNESSON
AND THE SCRIBES OF HECLA ISLAND
Manuscript culture and scribal production
in an Icelandic-Canadian settlement1
nothing remains of the Flugumýri homestead. On a hot summer’s
day, flies buzz lazily overhead, and a strip of neatly mowed picnic ground
cuts through the waist-high grass leading to the head of the Black Wolf
Trail. Be sure to tell someone, says the notice board, if you plan on hiking
the entire way. Not far along the trail, facing the eroding lakeshore, stands
historian Nelson Gerrard’s interpretive sign, which commemorates the
Icelanders who once lived here and gave Flugumýri its name. A grainy,
black-and-white photograph of a man is superimposed onto the image of
a leaf from a handwritten book. Here, in this most unlikely of places, is a
monument to a forgotten scribe: Albert Jóhannesson of Hecla Island.
Albert Jóhannesson (1847–1921) was one of thousands of Icelanders
who arrived in North America in the late nineteenth century.2 For the
vast majority, their economic situation meant that the trip would be one-
way. Many brought prized family heirlooms with them in anticipation
1 Thanks to Nelson Gerrard, Tammy Axelsson, Jan Magnusson, Julianna Roberts, Katarzyna
Anna Kapitan, Hólmfríður Tómasdóttir, the two anonymous reviewers, the Honorary
Council of the Icelandic National League of Iceland, the manuscript division of the
national and university Library of Iceland and the Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic
Studies for invaluable assistance and support. Funding for the research was received from
the Eimskip University Fund, Eimskip, Landsbanki, Icelandair and the Manitoba Heritage
Grants Program.
2 Júníus H. Kristjánsson’s Vesturfaraskrá 1870–1914 (Reykjavík: Sagnfræðistofnun Háskóla
íslands, 1983) records 14,268 immigrants in the period 1870–1914, of a national population
of under 100,000. The actual total is higher, cf. Sigurður Gylfi Magnússon, “Sársaukans
land,” Burt og meir en bæjarleið: Dagbækur og persónuleg skrif Vesturheimsfara á síðari hluta 19.
aldar, ed. by Davíð ólafsson and Sigurður Gylfi Magnússon (Reykjavík: Háskólaútgáfan,
2001), 51–52. The íslendingabók database contains 15,557 entries for individuals with the
phrase til Vesturheims “[went] to North America,” Svava G. Sigurðardóttir, personal com-
munication, 6 November 2017.
Gripla XXX (2019): 7–46