Made in Finland Spoon
Imported By Albin Partti
Duluth, MN
1920 to 1930s
July 2023
Albin Partti was born in Finland in 1873. By 1940 he was living in Duluth, MN with his wife, Linda (who was also born in Finland) and a 15-year-old daughter named Helvi…who was born in the USA. It is unknown to me if they had any other children.
According to the 1940 Census, he was 67 years old at this time and his occupation was labeled as “Importer”. He was also listed as having a 6th grade education. His wife was 58 years old and their address was listed as 922 East 11th Street in Duluth. As I stated, I don’t know if they had any other children that were no longer home at this time…but they were both over 40 when their last child was born (52 and 43).
That is all I could find on Albin. It appears sometime in the early 1900s he came to Minnesota like so many other Finns from this era. While many Finns created fishing spoons for the great lakes that imitated lures they used in Finland, Albin elected to just import the style that he liked. I sure would like to find out more about him and his family!!
This lure and box are hard to find…especially the box. I have only seen two of these in about 40 years of lure collecting. I acquired one from a fellow collector, the other was found in an antique store in Duluth.
