Helgi Ásmundur Sveinsson moved west just 12 years old and first came to Winnipeg. His interest in all kinds of machines was awakened almost immediately upon arrival, and his interests grew when he was settled in that city. In the anniversary book “Lundar Diamond Jubilee”, published in Manitoba in 1948, this is what is said about him:
Winnipeg and abroad: “He started working for himself early on, he was taken in by a Scottish couple, Mr. and Mrs. Pennwarden of Winnipeg. They proved to be good as the best parents to him. When they recognized his talent, they encouraged him to study mechanics. He graduated with a degree in Marine Engineering. He worked for quite a few years as an engineer on ships. He was a co-owner of the steamboat Ida together with J. H. Johnson and Captain Kjartan Johnson. He also worked on household plumbing with Stefán Davíðsson in Selkirk. Those fellows had such a workshop in town. In the winters he was an engineer at the whitefish hatchery in Selkirk. Later he moved to Minneapolis and worked for some time at the Moline Farming Tool Company. The company had such confidence in his abilities that they sent him as their agent to Argentina in South America. There he was to manage the introduction of equipments, especially threshing machines, and instruct the farmers on their operation. He stayed in Argentina for two years. It was nice to have a conversation with Helgi later about his experience in the south. He was an intelligent man and knew how to talk about life and the circumstances in the beautiful and rich Argentina.”
Home to Canada: “After Helgi came back from South America, he set up a car repair shop in Lundar, he also ran a sawmill there in company with others. He became the first person to set up a lighting store in the village and operated it for several years. It is safe to say that everything was simple in his hands. He was also the greatest inventor and invented many kinds of tools for construction. It happened that when his tools were sold at an auction after his death, there were many things that people had not seen before, but which turned out to be handy things for various construction. Helgi made many inventions but there are no reliable reports about it now. Of course, the difficulties of the pioneer settlers were many, not least in clearing and breaking the forest land for cultivation. First the roots of the trees had to be dug up and then cut them free them from the soil. It was a very slow and difficult work. Then the land had to be plowed with a special split plow, which oxen usually pulled in the early years. Oxen were very suitable for this plowing, even though they were slow. They were strong enough to pull the heavy plows and could be adjusted and balanced most of the time. In addition, they were much lighter on fodder than horses, which, however, began to be used more widely as the economy improved. But the horses had to be large and heavy, and they required more forage than the oxen. Later, tractors came into play, and they had much more power than the draft animals. Now many people began to think that all this engine power could be used to plow up the roots. The problem was making sure that the roots did not reach up under the hitch and thereby pull the plow out of the furrow. Helgi said he invented such a plow and thought it was so good that a tool company in Winnipeg was going to buy the exclusive rights to the construction for a payment of fifty thousand dollars to the inventor in 1914. Then the First World War broke out and therefore the transaction was not completed.”
(The authors of the article about Helgi were John Sigurjónsson and H. E. Johnson: ins. JÞ)
English version by Thor group.