Happy New Year!

Dear Friends,

Happy New Year! Greetings from the entire Icelandic Roots team. You can click on the video below to see many wonderful photos along with the narrated story. If you would rather read the text, just scroll down below this video link.

Thanks for a wonderful year. We look forward to 2019.

(Click on the picture below for the video.)

Dear friends Happy New Year,

As 2018 ends, the entire Icelandic Roots Team sends greetings and best wishes to all our supporters across the world. The volunteers live in Iceland, the United States, Canada, and Australia. We’re committed to the IR mission. Through research and your contributions of living people, We connect the pieces of our shared heritage. Over the past 5 years, the accomplishments have been remarkable and we can pay it forward” to invest in the future with scholarships, support to Icelandic organizations, education, and various heritage preservation efforts.

The IT Team provides us a wonderful, high-tech environment to store the information, updated privacy policies, terms of service, and an excellent management system with complete backups of all this valuable information for your entire family to enjoy.

Currently, more than 500 people are supporting members with special access to the incredible database. Working together – collaborating – this is the key. Thanks for contributing and keeping your family up to date for the next generations to come.

With dedicated volunteers and your help, the numbers in the database continue to grow daily along with 1,800 sources, 13,400 Media like photos, documents, letters, and recordings. There are 1,240 cemeteries, Over 5,000 obituaries, 546,000 Notes plus much more.

Almost 12,000 people like our Facebook page and over 1,000 people are in our closed special Facebook group page where we can interact privately. There is Pinterest, Twitter, and Instagram … for anyone to join. Our revenue is up from increased memberships and donations. We keep the costs low and increase benevolence.

15 young people have received Snorri Scholarships over our short time in existence – most to Canadians. Icelandic Language Scholarships are helping people study at the University of Iceland and at the Gimli Icelandic Camp for youth. We helped with all the Snorri Programs including Snorri West and the new Snorri Deaf. Other organizations benefitting are the INLNA, INL Iceland, Logberg-Heimskringla, New Iceland Heritage Museum, Viking Festival in Virginia, Gimli Icelandic Camp, August the Deuce in North Dakota, in Iceland we are in cooperation with the Hofsós Emigration Center, and the Vopnafjörður Emigration Center. We have given grants to both these organizations and assisted with other projects over the years.

Working together, paying it forward, and helping people discover their story has been key for the growth and improvement of Icelandic Roots over these past 5 years. We thank each of you for working with us to create such a wonderful and fun community.

Look for our new website in a few weeks, updated software for the database, visit the store for merchandise, interact on social media, and stay tuned for more exciting additions, events, and activities in the future.

Our heartfelt appreciation to all who have strengthened relationships and kept the connections strong. Thank you for being a part of this journey, for volunteering, donating, collaborating, and being a supporting member. We will continue on the hunt and document all people of Icelandic Roots wherever they may live. We look forward to the new year and continued growth of the entire IR Community. Alone we can do so little. Together we can do so much. And now … we send our very best wishes for a wonderful New Year to come. Happy New Year Gledilegt nytt ar.