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Finland - The National
Finnish American Festival |
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Heritage Center
Located in the Wisconsin Northwoods, our cultural center
has facilities for reunions, receptions and gatherings.
The Heritage Center is open Wednesdays and Saturdays
from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m, April through December.
The inspiration for Little Finland was by two women.
Irene Nevala and Gertie Kaari attended a conference
at the University of Wisconsin and came back with a
dream to build a cultural center in Wisconsin's Northwoods.
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Three generations
of Finnish-Americans practice traditional Finnish dance |
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The purpose in
organizing the NFAF was to further the economic development
of the area, to establish a family type of entertainment
for tourists as well as local citizens and to preserve
and promote the rich heritage and culture brought here
by parents and grandparents. Through the efforts of
Professor Robert Gard, Professors Matilda and James
Schwalbach and Michael Warlum, who did his PhD thesis
on the Festival, the dream became a reality. |
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In June, 1964, a Montreal, Wisconsin, mine
building, called a "dry" was leased to hold
a museum, restaurant and theater. Artifacts, tools,
crafts, linens, jewelry and other Finnish items were
collected and catalogued. The Finnish embassy supplied
photographs for display. An early Finnish-American home
display was set up. Dry round bread hung from a pole
on the ceiling by the stove. |
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An authentic sauna was built complete with a mannequin
with a towel over her arm. A carpet loom was set up
and weaving was demonstrated. When the exhibit opened
on July 15, 1964, hundreds of people flocked to attend.
Between July and September, 1964, over 5,000 people
went through the museum.
During this time period, the NFAF purchased three acres
of land from Sulo Kaari and the Les Taipale family donated
eight acres of adjoining land. A Duluth, Minnesota,
architect, Jerry Jyring, drew up the plans for a large
complex, donating his services to the group. The logs
for the Heritage Center came from the iron ore docks
in Ashland, Wisconsin when the ore docks were disassembled
in the middle 1960's. |
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crew of the Heritage Center takes a break. |
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Young
dancers at the
Summer Festival, Juhannus
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A
younger generation has taken over now, and they continue
the effort to let the world know that we are extremely
proud of our Finnish heritage. |
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Museum |
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The
hand-carved spoons and butter ladle on the top left
were donated by Bruno Maki. On the right is a handmade
sleeve presser. These implements were typically used
in the Finnish home.
On the lower shelf are purses made of reed and bark.
A meat cleaver and a key over one hundred years old
were gifts of Irene Nevala. Barely visible on the far
right of the top self are several cow horns.These horns
were used by Finnish immigrant masseurs (kupperi) to
draw blood from a client. A sharp knife stored in a
pig's bladder was used to make a wound. |
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As many as ten
horns were placed on the wound in a client's neck or
back and blood was sucked out of a hole in the tip of
the horn. The horn was discarded after each use. Local
physicians often recommended this procedure for high
blood pressure. The sauna was the setting for the procedure
because it was considered a sterile environment because
of the extreme heat. |
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Many of
these shoes were worn by immigrants when they came to
the USA from Finland. The pair second from the left
originated in Hennerjoki, Korpi, Turunlään
during World War II. Mrs. Hilja Niemi sent the shoes
to her sister, Mrs. Aino Palosaari of Ironwood, Michigan,
to show her the type of shoes worn by Finnish women
during the war. Because of a shortage of leather, they
were made of painted cardboard and cloth. |
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Finnish
immigrant men spent the long, winter months carving
bowls, cream pitchers, and sugar containers. On the
bottom shelf is a pipe over a foot long that was carved
from a burl and a branch.
The hat on the lower shelf was a miner's safety helmet
from the 1920's along with carbide lamps of the period.
In the early days of mining, the men wore floppy, oilcloth
hats that offered very little protection from underground
cave-ins. A candle was attached to the hat by a large
safety pin. |
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The flat iron
was heated on the kitchen stove and used to iron clothes.
An old accordion (hanuri) was donated anonymously. It
came from Finland. Several unidentified photos wait
for a relative to claim them. |
Leather
bound Finnish Bibles. |
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This
loom is typical of one found in some Finnish immigrant
homes. It was a gift to the NFAF by Edith Dobrinski
of Lac du Flambeau. The loom is in use today and is
used to make rag rugs. It was hand-made from birch and
pine. There are no nails, but is built entirely of birch
pegs. The Finnish immigrant woman was proud of her loom
and used it to make rugs and cloth ing alike.
The achieving of pretty and varied colors for both her
house furnishings and her wardrobe opened up a large
and interesting field of activity for the Finnish woman.
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Her dyes were mostly home-made.
Indigo was used for blue, madder for red, butternut
husks or sumac blossoms for brown, onion skins, waxwood
or goldenrod for yellow, and beech tree bark for drab.
Green was made by first steeping in yellow dye and then
in blue. By similar combinations the dyer could obtain
a great variety of shades, even if she found it very
hard to duplicate them. To variegate or cloud her yarn
light and dark, she wound tight bands of cotton about
her skeins at equal distance from each other, before
dipping them into the dye tub. A pair of stockings knit
from such clouded yarn was often the dearest bit of
finery in a little girl's wardrobe.
Their floor rugs, when the time came for such luxuries,
claimed close kinship with the counterpanes. They owed
their origins to the same ragbag, the same dye pot and
the same thrifty fingers. Their rag carpets were woven
sometimes in lively stripes, and sometimes in a pattern,
or rather no pattern, known as 'hit and miss'. At the
same time the bright rag carpet or woolen homespun had
a beauty and distinction of its own amid the primitive
surroundings of the settler's home. It was often the
one touch of color in the room. In the evening, when
the soft firelight played over and blended its various
hues, it gained and in turn shed an almost Eastern splendor
on the otherwise bare, cold-looking abode.
Very often a tanned and dyed sheepskin was used as a
door-mat or warm hearth-rug. But maybe the earliest
attempt of all at something of this kind was the small
mat made of corn sheathing--- the fine husks which enveloped
the Indian corn. The husks were first braided into a
thick rope and sewn into a round or oval mat. Before
twine was plentiful for such sewing, the tough inner
back of the cedar tree was used, or a single blade of
the husk threaded through the large eye of a wooden
needle. |
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