Iceland review - 2019, Qupperneq 20

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Iceland Review
Terminus Norðfjörður
In the years following World War II and during the
Cold War, Icelandic politics mostly looked towards
the west. Neskaupstaður was the only town that
took a different approach. A terminus on Iceland’s
east coast, it was closed off from the rest of the
world and the rest of the world was closed off to
them. “You couldn’t get out of here for the whole
of winter. For 7-8 months per year, Norðfjörður
residents were stuck in Norðfjörður, until the
Oddsskarð tunnel was opened in 1978. The isola-
tion created this massive solidarity. But isolation
can also make people close-minded, we didn’t have
to think about anyone else. It begat this strong
leftist way of thinking, revolving around the fact
that we all have a responsibility to the community,”
says Ingibjörg Þórðardóttir, a town council mem-
ber, substitute MP, and an Icelandic teacher at the
Vocational School of East Iceland.
Lone town in the east
Lúðvík Jósepsson, Jóhannes Stefánsson, and
Bjarni Þórðarson started the socialist movement in
1934, when they were candidates for the town coun-
cil for Kommúnistaflokkurinn (The Communist
Party). They only received a paltry 28 votes (6.9%)
at the time. They kept their resolve, changed
the party’s name, and won a majority in 1946 as
Sósíalistaflokkurinn (The Socialist Party). They
held onto it tightly for the coming years. In fact, it
wasn’t until 1998, when Norðfjörður unified with
neighbouring municipalities to create Fjarðabyggð,
that a non-socialist party would have the majority
again.
The municipality itself was one of the main
employers in the town, ensuring that everyone was
taken care of. Síldarvinnslan, the fish factory in
town, provided a large portion of residents with
employment. Unemployment was unheard of round
these parts. “Everybody in town had a role. It didn’t
matter how much you could do, but if you could
perform this task, then that task was yours. You’d
get work in the fish-freezing plant, and if you could
only work for two hours, then you would work for
two hours. I remember people who worked all day
but achieved very little. But it was better for the
community that this person was there, doing some-
thing for the cause, rather than sitting at home and
not taking part,” says Ingibjörg. “Work was easy to
get, and everything was done for you, if you joined
the party,” says Hákon Guðröðarson, innovator and
owner of Hótel Hildibrand.
Soviet hints
In some ways, calling Norðfjörður’s 20th century
history communist seems like hyperbole. But is it?
The exaggeration is not forced on the town, they
claimed it themselves. Two clocks were put up in
the local swimming pool, one showing the time in
Moscow, the other the local time in Little Moscow.
A cairn was put up, sporting a sign which welcomed
visitors to Little Moscow as well as indicating
the distance to Moscow. A building in the centre
of town, which housed the headquarters of the
left-swinging party, was christened Kreml and
painted red. In 2004, the restaurant Rauða Torgið
(Red Square) was opened. In addition, plentiful
herring fishing grounds to the east of the fjord are
also known as the Red Square. Incidentally, or not,
much of Norðfjörður’s communist past is closely
connected to herring, much of which was sold to
the USSR.
Welcome to Norðfjörður. This beautiful fjord is home to 1,469
people, but its history differs from many of the small towns that
dot the fjords of Iceland. For 50-odd years, socialists controlled
the town of Neskaupstaður in Norðfjörður. Or, as some would
call it – Little Moscow. Today, signs of the townspeople’s leftist
ways might seem like they have been methodically removed.
But, if you look closely, they’re hidden in plain sight.