Settlement Patterns/demographics
Settlement patterns during the second half of the nineteenth century placed Icelanders mainly in the upper Midwestern states of Minnesota and Wisconsin, and in the Dakota Territory. However, by the end of the twentieth century, settlement patterns had shifted from rural to urban communities. Early twentieth century industrialization transformed the United States from an agrarian culture into an urban one, affecting traditionally agrarian-based Icelandic communities. By 1970 over half of the second and third generations of Icelandic immigrants had taken up residence in urban areas.
The 1990 Census of the U.S. Department of Commerce revealed a total count of Icelandic-Americans and Icelandic nationals living in the United States as 40,529. Two-thirds of those lived in the West and the Midwest, with 19,891 in the West and 10,904 in the Midwest. Almost 6,000 lived in the South, while 4,140 resided in the Northeast. California, Washington state, and Minnesota were the most heavily populated with Icelanders and Icelandic-Americans. North Dakota was home to the fourth-largest number of persons with Icelandic backgrounds.
According to the 2000 U.S. Census, there were 42,716 Americans that claimed partial or full Icelandic ancestry, of which 6,760 were born outside of the United States. Also, in the Census 2000 report, 5,655 over the age of five spoke Icelandic at home. By the twentieth century, approximately twenty percent of Iceland's population had emigrated, mostly to North America. The Embassy of Iceland claims there are about 100,000 Americans of Icelandic ancestry. Icelandic Americans tended to follow similar settlement patterns as Norwegian Americans but to a much smaller degree, with many in the Upper Midwest and Pacific Northwest, where many Americans of Scandinavian and German descent reside. There were, however, some who converted to Mormonism (like many Danish Americans) and settled in Utah. Notable historical Icelandic settlements include Spanish Fork, Utah, the first permanent Icelandic settlement in the United States, and Washington Island, Wisconsin, the second Icelandic settlement and one of the largest outside of Iceland.
Reportedly, many Icelandic Americans are Lutheran. The Icelandic American community in Spanish Fork, Utah, was settled by Mormon Icelanders.
The states with the largest reported Icelandic Americans are:
California 6,512
Washington 5,976
Minnesota 3,165
North Dakota 3,161
Utah 2,970
New York 1,427
Florida 1,348
Oregon 1,200
Ohio 1,156
Texas 1,147
Illinois 981
Read more about this topic: Icelandic American
Famous quotes containing the words settlement and/or patterns:
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—David Hume (1711–1776)
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—Joshua Meyrowitz, U.S. educator, media critic. “The Blurring of Public and Private Behaviors,” No Sense of Place: The Impact of Electronic Media on Social Behavior, Oxford University Press (1985)