David Alan Ashby

SPANISH FORK, UT — The 110th annual Iceland Days Festival was held June 22 – 24. It was planned by Icelandic Association of Utah President Jack Tobiasson, in keeping with the IAU’s mission statement, to celebrate Icelandic heritage and culture, promote better relations with Iceland and preserve the memory of the Icelandic pioneers at Spanish Fork. Icelandic flags were placed on the Icelandic emigrants’ gravesites in the Spanish Fork City cemetery.

Icelandic descendant Jerron Orton, who located and documented gravesites of Icelandic emigrants in the Spanish Fork cemetery for his Eagle Scout project, placed, along with his family, Icelandic flags purchased by the IAU on the gravesites.

Iceland Days began June 22 with a presentation by Susan Evans McCloud, a local author of 45 books, one of which was the historical novel Anna, about a girl who emigrated from Iceland to Spanish Fork. Susan shared several insights about the Icelanders from her book, which is now out of print; however she indicated that it may soon become available. Other events on Friday evening included workshops on doing your genealogy and writing family histories, by Bliss Anderson, Rick Mathews and Brent Haymond; how to use the two-CD set of historical information created by the Icelandic Association in 2005 by David Alan Ashby; spinning wool by Carol Miller; and making Icelandic pönnukökur by sisters Vina Foster and Lil Shepherd.

On Saturday Tyler Shepherd chaired the fun-filled Icelandic Family Festival, held at the Spanish Fork City Park from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. The presentation of the flags was by the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post at Spanish Fork.

The national anthems of the United States and Iceland were sung by Tammy Hutchings. Icelandic pönnukökur were available for purchase made by the family of Art S. Johnson. John Johnson guided a bus tour of Icelandic historical sites in Spanish Fork. Displays included Icelandic artifacts and memorabilia, family history, Icelandic sheep and spinning.

A lamb lunch was served at noon, following which was the presentation of Icelandic honorees, Richard Johnson and Bruce Hall, both local contractors who helped with the restoration of the Icelandic Memorial, as part of the Utah Sesquicentennial Celebration in 2005.

They were honoured for the volunteer work on that project. Entertainment for the day included a children’s choir and two western bands. Iceland Days concluded with a religious meeting (Fire-side Chat) with featured speaker Dr. Richard Williams, Associate Academic Vice President at Brigham Young University, President of the Provo Utah Grandview East Stake, and past president of the Icelandic Association of Utah.

Richard took us on a journey of his heritage. His slide-filled presentation guided us to his great-great-grandfather Samúel Bjarnason, the first Icelandic emigrant to Spanish Fork, then through a heritage of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that came from Iceland, other Scandinavian countries and England.

He shared personal accounts and showed what he has learned from his heritage. The IAU provides the instrument for descendants of Icelandic immigrants to Utah to develop a cultural sense of Iceland. Our ancestors left us a legacy that belonging to the Icelandic Association of Utah is belonging to something that has a history of over 100 years and has accomplished a few great things.

Through genealogy, descendants of the immigrants from Icelanders can make that connection of place to Iceland. It is not difficult to find Icelanders in the homeland that we are related to. My experience has given me several acquaintances who live in Iceland and who have become my dearest friends. Once we make that connection we have a different sense of place.

We, who have descended from great and faithful fore- bears, have the right to say, “I’m proud of my Icelandic heritage.” We too, have a need to continue to honour our Icelandic ancestors and the land of our forebears as we have been shown to do by those that have gone before us.