Ties from Iceland to Wisconsin

I received this email recently and if anyone would like ho help this student please feel free to email me so I can connect you with him!

My name is Nicholas Sepúlveda. I am currently a fourth year biology and anthropology student at Juniata College, PA, but a resident of Green Bay. I am writing because I have great interest in Washington Island’s cultural history and your website seemed to be the only real source of information that was not part of a library collection.

I spent my third year of university abroad at Aberdeen, Scotland where I met Karen Milek, a professor of archaeology there. I took interest in her work–which is largely about Viking Age homes in Iceland. My interest was so great that I was able to secure a position at the Icelandic Archaeological Institute’s (Fornleifastofnun Íslands) field school. To this end, I have spent the summer digging in Iceland. Currently, I am assisting with excavation of a modern farmstead in Skagafjörður. This site is interesting because it is one of a family that emigrated to North America.

Of course I developed an interest in these migrations, and I was able to locate from census data that many Icelanders settled in Wisconsin, mostly in Door County and on Washington Island (please see the attached census document and a newspaper article from the 1920s).

Because my interest in iceland is so great, I have decided to prepare an application for a Fulbright Scholarship to study abroad and complete my master’s degree in Medieval Icelandic Studies in Reykjavík. One of the large components of the program is interaction with the host country and fostering host/US relations.

I thought a great way to accomplish this might be to explore the ties between Wisconsin and Iceland and learn more about their historical relationship. To this end, I hoped I might be able to contribute some way to the presentation of Washington Island’s presentation of its history.

I would greatly enjoy any opportunity to complete an article about the settlement of the Island, trace genealogies, design presentations, or simply prepare a small newsletter to help more people understand the history of the island. I thought it might be a good idea to contact you about these possible opportunities.

If I were to receive a Fulbright, I would have considerable access to historical resources here in Iceland. I am typing this letter for example, in the Emigration Museum in Hofsós, a tidy building with a large library full of books and friendly Icelanders who enjoy genealogy.

I look forward to hearing from you and your thoughts of about Iceland or individuals I may contact in Wisconsin who may be interested, the Fulbright Program, and my ideas about Washington Island.

Best wishes,

Nicholas  email: SEPULNB06@juniata.edu