The Icelandic Canadian - 01.03.1974, Síða 22

THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
SPRING 1974
20
has for many years been a leading and
very influential member of the Ice-
landic parliament.
The settlement of Iceland by people
from Norway on account of the tyr-
rany of Harald Haarfager dates from
the year 874, and in 1874 the Iceland-
ers celebrated their millennial. The
King of Denmark attended the cele-
bration in person and brought with
him as his millennial gift a new con-
stitution for Iceland providing for
home rule. The celebration was at-
tended by many distinguished visitors,
among whom was Bayard Taylor from
the United States. Willard Fiske of
Cornell in the east and I in the west
made a large collection of books which
we sent to the library at Reykjavik in
honor of the millennial. No other
people in the world appreciate books
more than the Icelanders. On hiis re-
turn home Bayard Taylor published
his very readable book on his journey
to Iceland and I made all this aid me
in the campaign I was conducting to
get the Scandinavian languages, in-
cluding Icelandic, recognized at the
University of Wisconsin.
Icelanders came to America in in-
creasing numbers. Early in the ’70s we
find a whole colony located on Wash-
ington Island outside of Green Bay.
Quite a number had located in Mil-
waukee and others had found their
way into various Norwegian settle-
ments on both sides of the Mississippi.
Among these there were bright and
ambitious young men who wanted to
attend school and such were assisted
by the Synod ministers and sent as stu-
dents, first to Luther College, and
thence to St. Louis to study theology.
I kept one of these young men by name
Thorlaksson, who afterwards became
a pastor in Canada, in footwear dur-
ing his course at Decorah and then St.
Louis. I had promised to take care of
his “understanding.”
Then, I think it was in 1874, Luther
College added an Icelander to its fac-
ulty. This was Jon Bjarnason. He was
a graduate of the college at Reykjavik,
in Iceland, a gifted man and ripe
scholar. Unfortunately, he was found
by Rev. V. Koren of the Synod and
by his colleagues in the faculty to
entertain theological views that were
not strictly orthodox. He was thought
to be too liberal. This caused friction
and at the end of the school year he
lost his position.
With me it was still the petit done
and the undone vast in Icelandic, ai>
in many other things, and so I invited
Prof. Bjarnason and his wife, Laura
Pjetursdottir, to come and make their
home with us for a year or pending
his finding some other position. Laura
was a daughter of the organist at the
Reykjavik church, a musician of note.
She too was an able musician and an
expert on the guitar. She assisted Mrs.
Anderson in doing the housework,
while Bjarnason gave me a rigid
course in reading, translating and
speaking Icelandic and in assisting me
in various ways in my literary work.
Fie helped me prepare for publication
my “Viking Tales of the North”. Be-
fore the year was out he got a position
as editor of a Norwegian paper, publ-
ished in Madison by Lars J. Grinde,
but Jon and Laura continued to live
at our home. The next spring I got
him a position on “Skandinaven” in
Chicago. He worked there a short time
and from there was called to be editor
in chief of “Budstikken” in Min-
neapolis. Then he went to serve as
one of the pastors of the Icelanders
who had settled in Manitoba where
he has done a great and noble work
in building up the Lutheran church