The Town of Hafnarfjörður, 110 years old on 1 June 2018

The town of Hafnarfjörður is celebrating its 110th anniversary this year.
and will therefore be celebrated with various events in Hafnarfjörður now over
the May Day weekend. The anniversary is on 1 June, but on that day 110 years ago
When Hafnarfjörður was granted borough status, the first election was also held.
held at the Good Templar Hall.

On 1 June 1909, 1,469 people lived in the town and 109 children were in
enrolled in the town's primary school. Two police officers were hired who were „hellmen'
“The uniforms drew a lot of attention for their robustness," the statement says.
from the City of Hafnarfjörður. Today, 29,606 residents live in Hafnarfjörður and all of them
Everyone is invited to celebrate at the harbour and in the centre of Hafnarfjörður this weekend.

There will be a host of events in town this weekend.
but many of them give a good account of the town's history. Hafnarfjörður Folk Museum
has set up the photography exhibition „Hafnarfjörður from Sovereignty to the Republic“
but there is a photography exhibition on Strandstígnum. The exhibition features 50 photographs which are
descriptive of the town's character and life in the town at that time. In the Packhouse,
At 6 Vesturgata is the exhibition „That's How It Was...“, which tells the story of the fishing village.
The history of Hafnarfjörður is traced from the settlement period to the present day.

Then there will be an exhibition of proposals in an open competition for ideas about
Future planning for Flensburg Harbour and the Ø-area in Hafnarborg Hall
Over the Seaman's Day weekend, open 12:00-17:00.

But then there's a hell of a programme all weekend that you can
to look here https://www.hafnarfjordur.is/mannlif/vidburdir/vidburdir-framundan/sjomannadagurinn-2018

 The aerial photograph was taken by Gudmundur Fylkisson.

The beginning of settlement and
Shopping in Hafnarfjörður

Hafnarfjörður was in the settlement of Ásbjörn Asgrímsson.,
son of Ingólfur Arnarson's brother. Hafnarfjörður is first mentioned in Hauksbók. The Settlement of Iceland,
which tells of the departure Hrafna-Flóki and his fellow travellers
from Iceland. From the beginning of the settlement of Iceland until the beginning of the 15th century, comes
The place otherwise features little to nothing.

Due to the naturally favourable harbour conditions,
Hafnarfjörður, one of the country's main trading and fishing ports, from and including
at the beginning of the 15th century, as crawling took over from matter which
Iceland's most sought-after export. At the beginning of the 15th century, the English began
fishing and trade with Iceland. In 1413 the first English merchant ship arrived at
land of which legends are told at Hafnarfjörður. The Icelanders took the English merchants
Well, but King Canute tried to prevent the English from trading with Iceland.
and that is why there were often clashes between the English and the envoys of the King of Denmark.
As the years went by, the English became less well-liked because
aggression. They also tended to steal seal from the Icelanders.

Around 1468, the Germans began Hanse merchants navigation
to Iceland from Bergen in Norway. For the next two decades, there was fierce competition between
of the English and Hanseatic merchants, who often got into fights and brawls. German
The merchants prevailed in the end. They could offer cheaper and a wider variety.
goods than the English. In the latter half of the 15th century, Hafnarfjörður
Has become the main port for the people of Hamburg in Iceland.

By the middle of the century, the Danish kings were still trying to prevent
to sell the German shop in Iceland and hand the business over to the Danes
merchants. In 1602, gave Christian IV.
King of Denmark to issue a directive on Monopoly trading and so it came to an end
Trade agreement between Iceland and Germany.

During the first half of the monopoly period, Hafnarfjörður
The main trading post in Iceland. From 1602-1774, the trade was in Danish hands.
of merchants and trading companies, but in 1774 the king took over the trade.
In 1787, the assets of the King's Company were sold to its employees. Then
A rudimentary form of competition in retail emerged when itinerant traders began to
compete with the successors to the King's Company. However, nothing more came of this
competition, in which the Danish merchants had the upper hand. In 1795, they complained
The farmers blamed the Danish merchants for the high price of imported goods and demanded
that trade would be made completely free.

In 1794, bought Bjarni Sívertsen Warehouse
of the Royal Company. He soon became a prominent merchant and
a shipowner. He bought old farms in the land of Hafnarfjörður and established
shipyard. Bjarni became one of the first Icelanders to receive
trading licences after the Danish monopoly trade was abolished. Due to the scale
He has often been called the father of Hafnarfjörður.

From 1787 to 1908, most merchants in
Danes in Hafnarfjörður. There was one Norwegian merchant there, Hans Wingaard Friis from
He was born in Ålasund, Norway, and settled in Hafnarfjörður. At the beginning of the twentieth century
However, the number of Icelandic merchants began to increase, while the number of Danish ones began to decrease.
in the same mood.

Municipal rightschange 

Originally, Hafnarfjörður was part of Álftaneshreppi. Hafnarfjörður then had
a distinctiveness compared to other places in the parish, in that its main industry was
fisheries, but not agriculture. Because of this particularity, there was a will to that
to make Hafnarfjörður a separate municipality, and the idea first came up
officially in 1876.

In 1878, a parish council meeting was held in
Álftaneshreppi, where it was agreed to divide the parish into three:
Álftaneshrepp, Garðahreppur and Hafnarfjörður. If that did not work, it was decided that
the parish would be divided into two: Bessastaðir parish and Garðahrepp. The second proposal
was approved and Hafnarfjörður therefore became part of Garðahreppi.

An attempt was made again to get Municipal rights the year
1890. At a meeting of the Garðahreppur parish council in June of that year, a committee was elected to
to discuss the borough rights of Hafnarfjörður. The committee held a meeting on 27 February 1891,
where a vote was held on the division of the parish, but the majority of those present were
opposed to the division. The matter was therefore dropped and it remained so for the next
years because of difficult times in Hafnarfjörður.

The matter was next raised in 1903. In March of that year
some residents of Hafnarfjörður caused bill was
submitted on Althingi to the Act on the borough rights of Hafnarfjörður. In
The bill, among other things, provided that the bailiff of Hafnarfjörður would be
along with the mayor and his salary being paid from the national treasury. The bill was
defeated in a vote in the Althing. It was reintroduced to the Althing in 1905,
but again defeated in a vote. However, the Althingi passed bills which
granted the burghs greater self-government than before, but they did not go far enough to
The people of Hafnarfjörður would be pleased.

It was therefore brought about that a bill on town privileges
The harbour of Hafnarfjörður was laid before the Althingi, now in the year 1907. Among the changes from the previous year
The bill provided that the mayor would now be paid.
payments from the municipal treasury and not the national treasury. This bill was passed as law No. 75, 22nd.
November 1907 and the law came into force 1st June 1908. Hafnarfjörður became
thus becoming the fifth municipality in Iceland to receive borough status.