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Baldwin Anderson
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Businessman.
Born in Iceland in 1866, he accompanied his parents to Manitoba’s “New Iceland” in 1876. In 1880, the family moved to Winnipeg for about three years. After leaving home, he lived in Selkirk for about 15 years working on steamboats. He eventually became captain of the steamship Aurora. He was also a fisherman on Lake Winnipegosis for two years. At some point in his life his informal name became Baldi or the anglicised version, Baldy.
In 1901, as the Canadian Pacific Railway prepared to lay tracks up to Winnipeg Beach, Anderson bought a farm near Boundary Creek (one half mile north of Winnipeg Beach) and built a large hotel called Boundary Creek House, later renamed the Waldorf. He was also engaged in land-clearing for cottage development and livestock trading.
Once he learned of the CPR’s intention to extend the tracks north to Gimli, he bought property there and constructed a new hotel – the Icelandic (later to become the Gimli Hotel and, later yet, the Como Hotel). In 1910, he moved the family to a large four-bedroom house, on an 80-acre property that he owned nearby. Known as Laufskali (Leaf Hall), he had inherited it from his father. In 1914, the Anderson family, along with three other families, moved to Hecla Island where they fished and raised cattle. In 1917, he was one of three local sled-drivers with dog teams hired to work on an American movie called “A Wild Goose Chase”.
He was married twice, first to Petrina Soffia Gislason (?-1897). She died giving birth to the couple’s first child, a daughter, Petrina Thorunn Soffia. The next year, he married Elin Maria “Lina” Jonnson (?-1939). Only one child, Elis Gladstone, was born to the couple, but they had a full household. Over the years, they adopted five other children.
He died at Laufskali on 21 March 1936.
Death registration [Baldwin Anderson], Manitoba Vital Statistics.
Gimli Saga, pages 437-441.
This page was prepared by Rob McInnes and Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 14 February 2026
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