Lögberg-Heimskringla - 15.09.2006, Blaðsíða 7

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David Jón Fuller
Much has changed in the world over the last 100 years, and that goes
for the Icelandic community in
North America and the newspa-
per business as well as for any
other component of society. In a
very real way, the printed word
has been vital to Icelandic cul-
ture — as a source of stimula-
tion, preservation, and dialogue.
There have been a number
of publications put together by
Icelanders and their descen-
dants in North America, and one
of the earliest newspapers was
Heimskringla, founded in 1886
by Frimann B. Anderson, who
worked with Eggert Johanns-
son and Einar Hjorleifsson to get
the weekly broadsheet going.
The first issue was date 8 Sep-
tember 1886. The name came
from Snorri Sturluson’s history
of the kings of Norway, which
translates as “the ring around the
world.”
In its early years, it ran four
pages an issue; later that ex-
panded to eight pages, with oc-
casional larger issues.
According to Wilhelm Krist-
janson’s The Icelandic People in
Manitoba, Anderson and Hjor-
leifsson soon parted ways with
Hjorleifsson resigning 13 weeks
after the paper was founded. (He
founded rival paper Lögberg just
over a year year later in 1888.)
Money was a problem as well;
from December 1886 to April
1887, Heimskringla did not pub-
lish at all due to financial diffi-
culties.
Icelandic was the primary
language of Heimskringla, as
this was what the majority of
its readership — Icelandic im-
migrants and soon their descen-
dants — understood. The top-
ics covered in the paper ranged
from current events and politics
to literature and history.
The paper went through a
number of editors in somewhat
rapid succession, many staying
no longer than a year or two.
B. L. Baldwinson provided
some stability when he came on
board as publisher in 1898, tak-
ing a businesslike approach to
the operation, and Heimskring-
la prospered. It also began to
reflect Baldwinson’s political
outlook, which was staunchly
behind the Conservative Party
of Canada. Kristjanson notes
that due to the affiliations of the
newspaper’s shareholders in the
United States, it was officially
Democratic in American politi-
cal matters. However, Baldwin-
son’s approach was to publish
contributions whatever their po-
litical opinions.
Divisions in the Icelandic
community were mirrored in
the Heimskringla and Lögberg
newspapers. Lögberg became
seen as the Liberal newspaper,
while Heimskringla remained
Conservative. Both publications
were produced in the same area
of Winnipeg, the West End, and
later even on the same street.
From 1921, Heimskringla was
published at 853-855 Sargent
Avenue; Lögberg (from 1923) at
695 Sargent.
Stefan Einarsson was the
longest-serving editor of Heim-
skringla. He was co-editor from
1921 to 1924, and editor from
1930 to 1959. His son, Ernie Ein-
arsson of Victoria, BC, followed
in his father’s journalistic foot-
steps, first as a photographer for
the Winnipeg Tribune and later
as a cameraman for the CBC.
Ernie remembers that when
both papers published on Sar-
gent Icelanders with Liberal
sympathies walked on the south
side of the street, while the Con-
servatives walked on the north
side. Stefan would often hold
forth on the streets with people
he knew, either on the corner of
Agnes and Sargent or Banning
and Sargent; “but,” Ernie says,
“I never saw my dad hold one of
his impromptu meetings on the
south side.”
He remembers his father,
who was born in 1881 in Iceland
and passed away in 1969, as a
“gentleman and a gentle man. I
never heard him speak ill of any-
body.”
Except, that is, in politics.
“He always called the Liberals
‘damn liberals.’” laughs Ernie.
“For years I thought that was the
name of the party: Damn Liber-
als.”
He adds that though his fa-
ther never brought his job home
with him, except to do some
reading or to write his editorials,
Stefan did tell him once that he
had trouble writing some edito-
rials. He felt he was too Conser-
vative in his opinion pieces; that
he wanted to tell the truth, but
that if he towed the Conservative
line, he wouldn’t always writing
what he felt was true.
In the late 1940s and early
50s, everything from writing to
printing and mailing was done
at one location. The linotype op-
erators at that time were John V.
Samson, and Ed T. Goodmund-
son. Timothy Samson, a lawyer
in Winnipeg, is John’s son and
Ed’s nephew. He remembers well
going by the Heimskringla offic-
es as a young man, and worked
there during the summers.
“There was a real romance
to this,” he says, describing the
process the team went through
every week to get the paper out.
And in those days, it was
every single week — just about.
In its heyday, Heimskringla
published 51 times a year. The
only time off the staff got, says
Tim, was four days after Íslen-
dingadagurinn in August (which
followed a special double-sized
issue for the festival).
To supplement its income,
the company also did print jobs.
Tim describes a normal
week as Stefan writing most of
and editing all of the stories,
which John and Ed set the type
for. This was done on Mondays,
and proofs were printed for Ste-
fan, who proofed them, sending
back the articles for corrections
to be made. The paper was laid
out and by Wednesday noon they
had to have it on the press. Tim
recalls that John and Ed came
home for lunch every day, but on
Wednesdays they didn’t take a
break to eat until the paper was
on the press.
All the sheets of paper were
hand-fed into the press, which
did four pages at a time, and then
the paper was flipped and the re-
maining four were printed. Tim
marvels at the speed with which
they worked. “They went so fast
you could hardly see what they
were doing,” he says. The paper
was then cut and folded, and the
finished issues were ready.
His job, when he worked
there, was to stamp subscribers’
addresses on the papers, which
were sorted according to their
destination. They were bundled
up and taken to the post office by
the end of the day.
The remaining two days of
the week were sent cleaning up
the lead type, melting it down to
be re-used (“In the winter, that
was the only time that build-
ing was warm!” recalls Tim),
and sorting the lead blocks for
compositing headlines so they
could easily be found. Sorting
the “heads” was another job Tim
sometimes did. He notes there
were more blocks to sort than at
an English paper because of the
additional characters in the Ice-
landic alphabet.
Still, as the 1950s wore on,
both Heimskringla and Lögberg
found themselves struggling
to reach a wide enough reader-
ship. Tim recalls that there was
a friendly rivalry between the
publications at that point. Since
companies sometimes advertised
in both newspapers, often and ad
would be sent from one publi-
cation to the other to save time
in re-casting it. He recalls that
Arthur Reykdal from Lögberg
would come by and trade jokes
with the Heimskringla crew.
Financial difficulties even-
tually forced the two papers to
amalgamate at a new publica-
tion, Lögberg-Heimskringla, in
1959, shortly after the Icelandic
Festival in Gimli. The final issue
of Heimskringla was dated 22
and 29 July 1959, and featured
the announcement that the two
papers would amalgamate as of
the next issue.
“In these matters, a new
generation is now master of the
hour!” the editorial read.
“And what is its message?
To the papers, Hemiskringla and
Lögberg, it is this: ‘Forgive now
all forms of the commandments
of God, which have passed be-
tween you, and work now to-
gether towards all that is praise-
worthy.’
“This is now the objective.
And it is not for the worst. But
whether these young masters of
the hour can now live according
to their own commandments, we
shall see!
“But despite this, it is sig-
nificant that this amalgamation
of the papers is being set on its
journey with young sons of bro-
ken Icelandic rock, who have not
seen Iceland and know it only as
a story of their fathers and moth-
ers here. This is greatly impor-
tant as a singular event in our
history as West-Icelanders.”
It is a partnership that en-
dures today, as Heimskringla
continues its tradition begun 120
years ago, as part of Lögberg-
Heimskringla.
Whether due to oversight, a
space that just needed to be filled
or the sense of humour of the li-
notype operators, that final issue
still included the small exhorta-
tion: “BUY HEIMSKRINGLA
— the best Icelandic newspa-
per.”
To read all the back issues of
Heimskringla, visit the Icelandic
Collection, 3rd Floor, Elizabeth
Dafoe Library at the University
of Manitoba; or visit www.ti-
marit.is.
Lögberg-Heimskringla • Föstudagur 15. september 2006 • 7
Ringing the world
The success, failure and new life of
HEIMSKRINGLA
PHOTO COURTTESY OF BRIAN TOMASSON
The Heimskringla building on Sargent Avenue housed the editorial and printing operations.
“Buy, pay, read Heimskring-
la”: an early advertisment.