The Icelandic Canadian - 01.06.1973, Page 17

THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
15
REMINISCENCES
Stephan G. Stephansson (1853-1927)
FOREWORD
Stephan G. Stephansson, the Rocky Mountain poet, generally regarded as the “Poet
Laureate” of the North American community of people of Icelandic descent, was also a prolific
writer of prose. A series of books entitled "Letters and Articles” (Bref og RitgerSir) published
in Reykjavik, 1948 contain his prose writings. This article consists of a translation of excerpts
from a section entitled “Reminiscences” (LitiS um 6x1) of Volume IV of the series. Parts of
this section are omitted. In the opinion of the translator a number of details, while no doubt
of interest to the writer’s contemporaries, are probably of little or no interest to the majority
of present-day readers, whose knowledge of the background is scanty, perhaps non-existent,
nevertheless the article may reveal to the reader not only some interesting aspects of the life
of this extraordinary man, but also glimpses of the life style of a bygone age.
PART I.
An Autobiographical Sketch
I was born October 3, 1853, at
Kirkjuholl (Church Hill) in Skaga-
fjorSur, Iceland. At the age of 15 I
was hired as a laborer by my uncle,
J6n Jonsson, at his homestead, Mj6a-
dal (Narrow Valley), in the district
of BarSardal. (The ancestral habitat
of the well-known Bardal family of
Winnipeg and elsewhere.)
My parents along with my sister,
Sigurlaug Einara, and myself, emigrat-
ed to the United States in 1873. We
settled near Staughton, in Dane
County, Wisconsin, about 20 miles
south of Madison. During our stay
there I worked as a hired man on
various farms. At that time I did my
utmost to teach myself English and
Norwegian, but never attended school.
In 1874 we homesteaded in the wood-
ed country of Shawano County, Wis-
consin. That winter I worked as a
lumberjack about 50 miles north of
our home, and as a hired man on a
farm 75 miles south of our homestead
the following summer, remaining at
home during the in-between seasons.
The only means of transportation for
me was walking. My wages on the aver-
age were $18 per month, the working
day being from sunrise to sunset.
On August 28, 1878, I married my
cousin, Helga SigriSur, the daughter
of J6n Jonsson of Mjoadal (Narrow
Valley) and Sigurbjorg, my father’s
sister. At that time I nominally
owned 160 acres of land, 148 acres
being virgin forest and twelve acres
cleared, also a fairly good house and
3 or 4 cattle. The minister, the Rev.
Pall Thorlaksson (an uncle of Dr.
P. H. T. Thorlakson of Winnipeg),
who married us, adamantly refused to
accept the customary fee in view of
the fact that this was the first time
he had married an Icelandic couple.
In 1878 we moved from Wisconsin
to Gardar, N. Dakota. That summer
I worked on the railway and with a
threshing gang. The remaining 9 years
of our sojourn there I spent my time
in farming with indifferent success.
In 1888 we moved to Markerville, Al-
berta, where I worked on the railway
for a number of years. Subsequently
my occupation has been farming.