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[Olafson, Eric]My grandfather [Bjarni Olafson] came here with his brother [Gudlaugur Olafson] and he was 19 years old and his brother was 17. They came to Sheho because that's as far as the rail went. In 1905 the rail line went to Sheho. So they came there, and came across country, about 60 miles. I don't know if they had a team of horses or a team of oxen or what they had, but they came to the homestead south of Dafoe in September and built a shack and stayed there and lived on oatmeal porridge.
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Fridrik Gudmundsson estimated that Vatnabyggðin consisted of 866 homesteads, plus 334 other farms (the land would have been bought, not homesteaded). No date is given for this estimate, but probably it was for around 1920 or 1930 once settlement started to decrease.Gudmundsson was a Mozart pioneer, who learned to type after he went blind and wrote one book, Endurminningar (Recollections) and began another before he passed away.
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