Muskoka Community Named After Volcano

Photo by Fred Schulz

MUSKOKA COMMUNITY NAMED AFTER A VOLCANO IN ICELAND

FROM STEERAGE TO HOMESTEAD

     BACK IN 1990 I WORKED ON A PROVINCIALLY FUNDED RESEARCH PROJECT, WITH A REGIONAL HERITAGE GRANT PROVIDED BY THE MINISTRY OF CULTURE AND COMMUNICATIONS, TO PROFILE THE ICELANDIC SETTLEMENT IN MUSKOKA IN THE 1870'S. IT WAS ENTITLED "FROM STEERAGE TO HOMESTEAD," AND WAS PUBLISHED FOR THE BENEFIT OF LOCAL LIBRARIES, SCHOOLS AND ARCHIVES.....LOCAL AND PROVINCIAL. THE PAPER WAS PUBLISHED IN AN ICELANDIC MAGAZINE SHORTLY AFTER IT WAS RELEASED. IT WAS GREAT TO WORK WITH ALL THOSE OF ICELANDIC  HERITAGE, AND I WAS WELCOMED INTO MANY HOUSEHOLDS AND EVEN A SPECIAL CHURCH SERVICE, IN THE HAMLET OF HEKKLA, IN NORTH MUSKOKA, TO HONOR THE COURAGE OF THE HOMESTEADERS TO THE ONTARIO WILDS.

     IT HAS BEEN A LONG TIME SINCE IT WAS BEING CIRCULATED, SO I THOUGHT IT WAS A WORTHWHILE PROJECT, TO FOLLOW -UP THE GRANNY BOWERS' STORY, OF LAST WEEK. IT IS A FASCINATING STORY, AND THE INITIAL RESEARCH GOES BACK TO MY DAYS AS AN ASSISTANT EDITOR OF THE MUSKOKA SUN, WORKING FOR MUSKOKA HISTORIAN, ROBERT J. BOYER. I WILL BREAK IT UP INTO CHAPTERS, AS WITH GRANNY BOWERS' JOURNAL. HOPE YOU ENJOY THIS IMPORTANT STORY ABOUT THE SETTLEMENT OF MUSKOKA.

AN EXPLANATION; HARDSHIP AND PROMISES

     The steamship crashed its human cargo down hard, as it dipped into the deep chasms of waves, miraculously sliding safely up the other side of a turbulent ocean.

     Raging, tumbling North Atlantic swells seemed endless to passengers, many sick and vomiting, clinging onto the hard reality of the lurching ship, and a dream of new land full of potential.

     The same savage blast of wind that ripped apart and toppled many trans-Atlantic voyages, spared the immigrants aboard this vessel. In the steamship's wake, the spreading white foam memorialized the graves of those poor souls, victims of the unpredictable, powerful northern sea. The weathered hulk would arrive at a Canadian port after an excruciating voyage, riding the cauldron of twisting currents in the North Atlantic. The Icelanders escaped the watery grave. Captives of the sea for weeks on end, they were finally free. Some historians would argue, they were freed of one form of imprisonment, and  confined to another......this time, the frontier of their new home, that itself would claim many settlers lives, over the coming decades.

     As the stormy Atlantic had nearly suffocated the life out of its passengers, in the silent hollows of the thundering waves, the anticipation of the new homeland became exceedingly uncomfortable. They had been forewarned by some others, on the ship, about the dense forests they would face, and the unfavorable topography of rock, with thin soil, and bitterly cold winters......and most precarious of all, short growing seasons. These stories, that were told by frustrated homesteaders, were much different than the glowing reviews of the new homestead lands, in the District of Muskoka, being boasted by government land agents, and in the editorial reviews of "Settlers' Guide Books," of which there were numerous being sold at the time.

     As their passage by rail, got them closer to the hinterland they would eventually settle, the band of Icelanders became consumed by the landscape, as treacherous as it was, with narrow cartways, hills, and large connected bogs, imposing slow and difficult travel. Settlers often had to disembark the carts at the bottom of hills, so the horse or oxen could pull the wagon and luggage up the incline. Outside of later journal accounts, we will never know how fearful the immigrants felt about the ominous transformation of topography from Quebec City, onto the tiny hamlet of Rosseau, in North Muskoka. But what we do know, is that the dramatic changes from Iceland to Canada forced a massive human adjustment in expectation, that became impossible for some of the settlers, who abandoned the idea of homesteading in Muskoka shortly after arriving. The success, for many, was the establishment of Hekkla, six miles east of the Village of Rosseau, in North Cardwell. When a number of settlers abandoned the fledgling hamlet, to seek out more established Icelandic communities, many of their stories are inspiring to the student of history, following their journey to more suitable agricultural land.

     To judge the immense challenge to settlers seeking the promised land, it is necessary to examine the tragedy experienced by those who left Hekkla, seeking refuge in the Village of Kinmount. A year after the first settlers arrived in Hekkla, in 1873, the Victoria Railway was looking for labourers. The demand for labourers spread to immigration depots where the news found willing listeners. News also made it to the practically stranded Icelanders, chopping out the first homesteads in Hekkla. Unemployed and disenchanted with the opportunities on the swamp, tree and rock covered terrain, news of railway hiring and settlement in the established community of Kinmount, in Haliburton, found equally willing bodies to join the cross-district migration.

     Those who stayed in Hekkla maintained a modest existence. Icelanders who chose to abandon the isolated settlement, were cheated again from achieving the dreams they had clutched to their hearts through North Atlantic storms, pounding rail and cart passage to the interior of wilderness, that would become their new hamlet. Failure was pioneer reality and no immigrant lived unscathed. In perspective, the study of the Kinmount tragedy is an important latitude, from which to begin the investigation of the Hekkla settlement. It was, in fact, failure that set historical record for both the further development of Hekkla, and the migration of surviving Icelanders from Kinmount.

     Author-historian, Guy Scott, who wrote the text entitled "History of Kinmount - A Community on the Fringe," summarized the economic failure that led to the tragedy. "The Icelandic settlement of Kinmount was well meaning idea that failed. It might have succeeded had not work on the Victoria Railway halted for a year. The new immigrants were suffering from culture shock and could not acclimatize themselves to hacking a farm out of the Snowdon Bush." In earlier testimony, the author noted the following; "Soon after their arrival in October, 1874, tragedy began to stalk the beleagured immigrants. A major epidemic of diarrhea and sickeness dogged them. A Doctor Fidler was dispatched by the railway to check out the situation. In a report of Nov. 7, he reported that sixteen children had died in the one night he spent among them. Dr. Fidler maintained the diarrhea was caused by the overcrowded shanties, poor sanitation, bad ventilation, and an unbalanced and strange diet."

     The author quotes an article published in the Fenelon Falls Gazette, accusing the Icelanders of being "lazy, drunken bums, better gone from the area." Mr. Scott clarifies by writing, "the local residents rallied to their defence. In the tough times, during the summer of 1875, many local farmers employed out-of-work immigrants out of sympathy. Curiosity soon gave way to acceptance and the relations between the locals and the Icelanders remained cordial down to the end."

     "The Icelanders depended upon the railway as their source of income. Normally work on the line was suspended for the winter months, but the Icelanders were kept working through the winter of 1874-75. Then in March, disaster struck. The Victoria Railway Company ran out of funds and was forced to suspend operations. The Icelanders were thrown out of work. They were suddenly destitute and desperate. After anxiously waiting for the railway construction to begin again, the colony began to dissolve. Many who could afford to, moved away in search of work. Others gallantly took up land and began to clear their farms. They tried to make ends meet until work on the railway began again."

     The historian, Scott, concludes the study of the settlement in the following paragraph:

     "The lots they abandoned were later occupied by other settlers and successfully farmed. The Icelanders also wanted to remain together in a tight body, and there was just not enough available land in Kinmount to satisfy their desire. Most were destitute and desperately poor when they left Kinmount, and somewhat disillusioned with local back-township economics. Had they stayed, in a few short years, they would have seen the local economy boom as the railway brought new economic vitality. Maybe the Kinmount of today would have been graced with such surnames as Jonasson, Gilison, Thorlakeson and Bjarnson. The Icelanders must have felt no grudge against their former friends in Kinmount for they continued to correspond with the locals after their move. One such letter in January 1876, informed their Kinmount friends that the new colony had been established. All they left behind were memories, legends and about thirty unmarked graves, of those Icelanders who made Kimount their final stop."

     The story of Hekkla is not without its own sense of tragedy. Much of what the Kinmount settlers experienced, in poverty and unemployment, the Hekkla settlers also suffered. But as Kinmount settlers gave up their homesteads, the Hekkla Icelanders remained, surviving by sheer tenacity in one of the most adverse locations in the province. Fifteen years after Hekkla was first carved from the dense Muskoka forest, newly arrived immigrant Pall Snaebjornsson wrote home to Iceland about the wretched homestead conditions, the depressing isolation, and the struggle to survive against economic and physical adversity. When noted Icelandic researcher and historian, Nelson Gerrard, of Manitoba, visited Hekkla, in November 1989, he confessed the community had not been given the historic distinction it deserved. "Hekkla progressed well," stated the researcher. "They changed the woodland into well fenced fields with impressive buildings. The work of settlers is apparent today." Meeting with the original descendants of the Hekkla Icelanders, Mr. Gerrard discovered many fascinating facts about local family history in the small Cardwell community, and ties with many other North American Icelandic settlements. "I did not realize Hekkla had survived. But you are living proof it existed and survives today," Mr. Gerrard told his audience, during the historic meeting of descendants, and the Icelandic-Canadian historian. The assistance received from family members of the original Icelandic settlers, in Hekkla, provided a majority of research from the completion of this heritage project.

     In tomorrow's blog, I'll begin the study of Icelandic immigration to Hekkla, beginning in the year 1873. By the way, the Icelanders thought so much of the topography of their new settlement lands, in North Cardwell, that they named it after an active volcano in Iceland, known as "Hekkla." I'm still not sure, after all these years, whether it was named in honor of the volcano, or as a more unfortunate reference, signifying the hardship they were about to endure.....as settlers in a new and inhospitable environs. All of it, different than they had been promised, before they agreed to come to Canada, and onward to the Free Land Grants of Muskoka. The story is about community and the cultural strength that held it together. The Icelanders stuck it out, and adapted to each new challenge, including the serious language barrier. They cleared trees for the province to build new roads. They found pockets of arable land, and when the soil was too poor, or thin on top of the rock base, on some farmsteads, they found the livestock that was best suited to graze the hills and valleys of the rugged terrain of North Cardwell.

     Please join me again tomorrow, for part two of this fascinating chapter of Muskoka history.