September 2011
Ferocious Finn Bait
Arrowhead Mfg Co
Ely, MN
1930s?
This month I decided to tell the story on why so many "Finns" migrated to Minnesota in the early 1900s and share a little personal history about my family.
When Europe was industrializing in the late 1800s and early 1900s, Finland, which was run by a monarch of Imperial Russia, was to a great extent excluded from the revolutionary process. The population of Finland was growing and there was little new land left to cultivate for farmers and unemployment was very high.
In the 1870s, about 3,000 migrants from Finland came to the United States. They wrote to family and friends back home and encouraged people to come and try their luck in America. Stories began to spread of acres of land that could be cleared for farms and there were also jobs in mines, factories, logging, and railroads.
In the 1880s, the Finland migration to America saw a 12-fold increase as 36,000 more Finns came to the new country. Then, in 1899, the Russian government started an aggressive campaign for the “Russification” of Finland. Many more Finns chose to escape the repression by migrating to the New World, thus beginning the “Great Migration” of Finns into North America. During the 1900s, 150,000 more migrants left Finland in search of a new life.
One of these Finnish migrants was a young lady who got a ship ticket from a friend who backed out of the trip at the last minute. While alone in New York, she met a man from Finland who told her that many people from their native country were settling in the state of Minnesota such as himself, his brother and his mother. She agreed to join him and the two got married and started a small farm complete with a new home, a dairy barn, a chicken house and, of course, a sauna. These people were my grandparents, Fred and Anna Nissila.
They weren’t alone. Many Finns headed to Minnesota to start a new life in logging, farming, mining, or whatever appealed to them. Many towns popped up in Minnesota that were primarily Finnish communities such as Kensington, New York Mills, Menahga, Duluth, Virginia and the town of Finland…to name a few. Minnesota and neighboring states were chosen for settlement due to the region’s climate that was similar to Finland. The heaviest settlements, which included northeast Minnesota, became known as the “Finn Hook”. Today, this region is known as having the highest population of Americans of Finnish Ancestry of any region in the United States (a map is on wikepedia here: Finns In The USA).
Around this timeframe in the Finnish town of Ely, MN, a small lure company started. While this lure company had nothing to do with my family and it is quite a distance from when my grandparents lived, I believe it was started by one of the Finnish settlers in that area of Minnesota. I have only found two lures made by this company, and both are metal spoon-type lures. This month’s “Lure of the Month” is the Ferocious Finn Bait by the Arrowhead Mfg Co. I know little history about this company, and if anyone has any information on this lure or company they wish to share…I would love to hear from you!
By 1929, due to new quota of immigrants allowed in from Finland set-up by US authorities and the conditions in Finland improving, the Great Migration was over.
My grandparents were proud Americans. While they still spoke a lot of Finnish at home, they required English to be the #1 language of their three children (Vilho (Slim), Anna (Irene, my mother), and Jenny) and they had to attend and graduate from High School. They were one of the first farms in the area to have electricity, a television, and a telephone. In fact, neighbors from miles around came to use the phone and the sauna.
My grandfather, Fred, never went back to Finland. The closest he ever got was the few times he was back in New York at a young age as he loved the big city, including the Yankee baseball team. My grandmother, Anna, did go back to Finland once after her husband passed. This was about 60 years since she left, and the relatives that were in Finland were worried about her visit as they thought she would be a “snooty” and “better than you” American. We she arrived, they were happy to see that she was “just like us!”. What a trip that must have been!
Even though my grandparents and their three children are now gone, each year we try to hold a Nissila Family Reunion. It just so happens that this year it will be held in September over the Labor Day weekend. The day involves stories, pontoon rides, games, and a fish fry. Is there a better lure to feature this month than the Ferocious Finn Bait? And, this lure box was only obtained in the last days of August 2011 thanks to a visitor to my website. Paljon kiitoksia!!
A picture of the Nissila family and friends taken in 1938
(Note: My mother is the small blonde girl in the front row)
What is a Walled Eyed Pike? LOOK HERE....
