The Icelandic Canadian - 01.12.2003, Side 19

Vol. 58 #2
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
61
University of Toronto Quarterly 5/2
(January 1936), 277. In the introduc-
tory paragraph of his essay,
Kirkconnell predicted that when
Canada began the “place-worship” of
establishing literary shrines, as was
the custom in Europe, Markerville
would have “a strong claim to recog-
nition,” owing to the poetic genius of
Stephan G. Stephansson. The estab-
lishment of the Stephansson House
Historic Site in 1976 fulfilled this pre-
diction.
4. F. Stanton Cawley, “The Greatest
Poet in the Western World: Stephan
G. Stephansson,” in Scandinavian
Studies 5 (1938), 101-105.
5. Richard Beck, 210.
6. Emerson, op. cit.
7. Stefan Gudmundsson adopted the
name Stephan G. Stephansson while
homesteading in Dakota Territory.
While it would be most appropriate to
refer to him as Stefan Gudmundsson
until sometime around the period
when he organized the Icelandic
Cultural Society, this essay will use
his adopted name throughout in order
to minimize confusion.
8. Richard Beck, 201.
9. Skuli Johnson, “Stephan G.
Stephansson (1853-1927)” in The
Icelandic Canadian 9/2,1. This article
was the printed text of Johnson’s
address at the unveiling of a monu-
ment and dedication of a provincial
park in honour of Stephan G.
Stephansson at Markerville, Alberta,
on September 4, 1950.
10. Stephansson, Bref og ritgerdir,
trans. Kristjana Gunnars, in Stephan
G. Stephansson: Selected Prose and
Poetry (Red Deer College Press,
1988), 15-16.
11. Stephansson to Baldur Sveinsson
(July 10, 1910), quoted in Jane
McCracken, Stephan G. Stephansson:
The Poet of the Rocky Mountains
(Alberta Culture, 1982), 39. The New
Theology movement among
Icelanders in North America was led
by Rev. Fridrik J. Bergmann, who was
minister of the Gardar congregation
before taking up the pastorate of
Tjaldbudin (The Winnipeg
Tabernacle) in 1903. Advocating an
increasingly liberal and modernist
theology, Bergmann led nine congre-
gations out of the Icelandic
Evangelical Lutheran Synod after a
dramatic confrontation at the synod
convention in 1909. In 1921, The
Winnipeg Tabernacle amalgamated
with the First Icelandic Unitarian
Society to form the First Federated
Church of Unitarians and Other
Liberal Christians (literally, “other
religious liberals”). Two years later,
the United Conference of Icelandic
Churches was founded, bringing
together the Unitarian and New
Theology congregations under one
denominational umbrella. Ironically,
it seems probable that Bergmann was
behind Jon Bjarnason’s challenge to
Stephansson when the Icelandic
Cultural Society was organized.
12. Stephansson to Baldur Sveinsson
(July 10, 1910) in Bref og ritgerdir,
vol. 1 (Reykjavik, 1938), trans. Ninna
Campbell, in Selected Translations
from Andvokur (The Stephan G.
Stephansson Homestead Restoration
Committee, 1982), 68.
13. The Icelandic Cultural Society
ceased to exist in 1891, largely because
of the removal of its leaders to other
places. Stephansson himself moved to
Alberta in 1889, while Bjorn
Petursson moved to Winnipeg the fol-
lowing year with his new wife, Jennie
Atkins&Pearce
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