Burfjord

Burfjord's growth as a town is relatively recent. Prior to 1500, the Kvænangen region was almost entirely inhabited by indigenous Sami peoples, who at some point left the traditional nomadic life of reindeer herding atop the mountain plateau and settled to fish and farm as sjøsame (sea-Sami). The first scouts northward from Trondheim found no southern Norwegians living in or around the area. During the early 18th century, Burfjord and the larger Kvænangen region became inhabited by Norwegians from the south who plied their trade fishing and farming, as well by the Kven people and Finns who emigrated from the east. Despite the Kvæns remaining a minority, population-wise, they nevertheless gave Kvænangen its namesake. Kvænangen was originally part of the Skjærvøy parish in northern Troms county. Kvænangen became a separate sub-parish in 1861. It was in the 19th century that Burfjord grew in size and became a more urban village area. Due to its geographically central location, it was chosen as the administrative centre of Kvæanangen Municipality.^[4]

• Gunnar Kaasen, a Norwegian-born musher who delivered a cylinder containing 300,000 units of diphtheria antitoxin to Nome, Alaska, in 1925