The Farm is located in the heart of the “sauna belt.” Here is a video tour by my dad of the sauna at the Farm. Originally it was a savusauna (smoke sauna), but was later converted into a steam sauna.
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Finnish American Lives
This morning I found Finnish American Lives. It’s a great documentary from 1982 about three generations of a Finnish American family living in Ironwood, Michigan. It’s amazing that you can stream the entire film (45 minutes) online. The site has additional essays on Finnish Americans in the UP, the Sauna and 2nd and 3rd generation Finnish American culture.
I also found a preview for another film about Finnish Americans, Children of Labor: A Finnish American History
The Finnish Sauna
Like many Finnish farmsteads in the U.P., the Farm had a sauna. Here’s a trailer for a movie about the significance of the sauna for the Finns. I’d like to find a copy somewhere to watch:
on remembering, pt 2
This morning I started reading Agatha Christie’s autobiography. In the forward, she offers some great reflections on writing about one’s own life. She always says this about remembering and the past:
the past, the memories and realities that are the bedrock of one’s present life, brought back suddenly by a scent, the shape of a hill, an old song—some triviality that makes one suddenly say ‘I remember…’ with a peculiar and quite unexplainable pleasure. This is one of the compensations that age brings, and certainly a very enjoyable one—to remember.
Christie
Evijärvi, Finland
My great grandparents, Elias and Johanna Puotinen immigrated to the United States (6 years apart, 1886/1892) from Evijärvi, Finland. While doing a random search online, I found this video. The landscape looks a lot like the UP.