The Icelandic Canadian - 01.10.2002, Page 34

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THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
Vol. 57 #2
Emma
by Christine G. Best
When I look back to my childhood, special peo-
ple stand out vividly in my memory. Emma Renesse
was such a person.
We were neighbours in the Icelandic community
of Arborg, Manitoba. In 1928 our family moved into
a bungalow that my father, Mundi Johannson, a car-
penter, built on a five-acre lot, adjacent to the Renesse
property. Our mothers became close friends and our
homes were open to each other at all times. I was the
middle child of five and as Mattie Renesse and I were
close in ge, we were together a lot of the time. We
both felt that we more or less shared our mothers - a
very special privilege for a youngster to have.
The Renesse home was a neat white cottage, built
in 1933 by my father to replace the house that was lost
to fire in March of that year. It was not long until the
area around the new home was a maze of colour with
a variety of flowers and window boxes which over-
flowed with pink and purple petunias nestled between baby’s breath and pansies. Sweetpeas
climbed the walls around the house. Hummingbirds, although rare in the area, occasionally
feasted in these gardens. A lilac hedge lined the sidewalk leading from the front gate. Families
of squirrels nested high in the spruce trees to the north of the house, and Kayo, the pet crow,
spent each summer on the property, migrating for the winter months, to return the following
spring.
Emma was a great cook and she would create wonderful meals with ease. For many years
she baked and decorated tiered wedding cakes for friends. She was well-known for her culi-
nary expertise, gained from having cooked in hotels in Winnipeg in her early years. In 1908
she and her first husband, Barney Eyjolfson, opened Barney’s Restaurant, Barbershop and
Pool Room in Gimli, Manitoba. They sold the business in 1914 and moved to a farm north of
Arborg. The restaurant was later named “The Falcon Cafe.”
Gardening and flowers were of special interest to Emma. She grew a wide variety of gar-
den produce. Rows of asparagus were a great favourite for their delicate shoots, and later in
the season, as ferns for floral arrangements. She also created an orchard with an assortment of
fruit trees. In former years, she grew on the same property, mushrooms which she shipped to
Winnipeg restaurants by train. I was told that she had been one of the first beekeepers in the
area. She was always open to new ideas and ways of doing things.
Beyond the fenced area around the house, Hanna, the prize milker Holstein cow grazed
in the back acres. From her bounty Emma produced skyr, ice cream, butter and mounds of
whipped cream which she lavished on her rosettes and desserts. Chickens were raised for eggs
and meat, and ham was cured in the smokehouse each fall from the hogs raised during the
summer months. In the winter Emma turned out on a hand operated cylindrical knitting
machine dozens of pairs of woolen socks and mittens. These were sold to the local Lake
Winnipeg fishermen.
Emma, who had been widowed in 1924, was in her forties when she married Hermann
von Renesse, a widower who had immigrated from Germany several years earlier. Hermann
was the manager of the North Star Co-Op Creamery in Arborg. They started their married