The Icelandic Canadian - 01.12.1979, Qupperneq 34

32
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
WINTER 1979
ICELANDIC SETTLEMENTS IN NORTH AMERICA
by Eric Jonasson
THE AUTHOR
Eric Jonsson was born 17 November,
1948 in Winnipeg, son of the late Victor
Otto Jonasson and Eileen (nee Dipple)
Jonasson. Educated in Winnipeg, he has
been involved in the mapping industry since
1968, and until recently, was a partner in
the firm ofCarto Graphics in Winnipeg. In
1976 he founded The Manitoba Genealo-
gical Society and served as its first Pres-
ident. He is the author of numerous articles
on Genealogy and of two books TRACING
YOUR ICELANDIC FAMILY TREE and
THE CANADIAN GENEALOGICAL
HANDBOOK (1976, 1978). Recently he
was invited to present two lectures on
GENEALOGICAL SOURCES IN WEST-
ERN CANADA at the World Conference on
Records to be held in Salt Lake City, Utah,
in 1980. He and his wife, Elizabeth, have on
daughter, Erin Dagbort.
FOREWORD
The following transcript contains ex-
cerpts from the author’s publication
TRACING YOUR ICELANDIC FAMILY
TREE which was reviewed by Nelson Ger-
rard in the autumn issue, 1979 of the Ice-
landic Canadian. It is published with the
permission of the author. An example of the
detailed account of each settlement reads as
follows:
1. Spanish Forks, Utah.
Settlement: A few settlers arrived here in
1850 although there was no major influx
until 1855. From this time until 1862, 16
Icelanders settled here. Direct settlement
from Iceland ended by 1892 although some
people moved here after this time from other
American settlements.
Location: Around Spanish Forks in Utah
County, south of Salt Lake City.
Departures: Some family migrations to
Washington State, California, and Alberta.
However, as the limitation of space in this
issue precludes the publication of a detailed
account of each of the settlements. Accord-
ingly. the transcript is limited to an enumer-
ation of the settlements including the date of
their founding, and the two maps showing
their location.
* * *
After their arrival in North America, the
Icelandic people tended to band together in a
few large, well defined areas. However, as
time passed, the desire for better land or
greater opportunities resulted in small
groups breaking away from the larger settle-
ments to establish settlements of their own.
In time, as these smaller settlements grew,
the process was repeated. As a result, it is
not impossible to find that a settler may have
lived in as many as four or five widely
separated places in the period from 1875 to
1900.
To aid the researcher, a list of the major
settlements of the Icelandic people in Amer-
ica follows, arranged chronologically. All
settlements are numbered for easy refer-
ence, each number corresponding to those
included in Maps 1 and 2 to aid in placing
each settlement geographically.