Small
This Community Stories exhibit traces the evolution of Gimli, Manitoba from a colony of rough hewn cabins in “New Iceland” 125 years ago to today’s thriving resort community on the shores of the tenth largest freshwater lake in the world.
In the fall of 1875, Icelandic immigrants arrived in “New Iceland,” an area on the western shore of Lake Winnipeg where the Government of Canada had given Icelanders sole settlement rights. New Iceland had its own laws, its own constitution and its own “capital,” the settlement of Gimli.
Four years later, the tiny province of Manitoba extended its boundaries to include Gimli and all of New Iceland.
Visitors to this exhibit will journey through the milestones of the town’s history as the little colony grew to a village, then a rural municipality, to a town and finally, in 2002, the amalgamation of the town and the rural community around it.
