JUKOLA’S BOARDING HOUSE (Biographical)

                                                 (Dedicated to Diana Davis)

In 1952 or 3, I was to take a month-long field geology course in Minnesota.  Our center was to be in the town of Virginia, MN.  In looking about, I learned of a place called Jukola’s Boarding House, a large frame building originally constructed for immigrant Finnish miners in 1912.*  Growing up in St. Paul MN, I knew quite a few people of Norwegian or Swedish extraction, but don't recall ever knowing anyone of Finnish extraction until my stay in Virginia.**  At any rate, I checked with Jukol's, and they had a room for $1.50/night and $2.00/day for meals.  That sounded good to me so I took it.

I was assigned to a large bedroom with a bathroom.  It had a urinal with a sign over it, “Bucks With short Horns Stand Close.”  Cute!  The next day was a Sunday and I woke up to people singing hymns.  I had missed the eating hours for breakfast so I went out in search of a place to get something to eat.  It tuned out the next-door church was a Finish Lutheran church and there were a lot of people standing in the small plot of lawn in front of the church so I thought the church was letting out, but when I came back after eating, a church service was going on.  I went to sleep at night to the gentle sounds of hymns.  They really made a day of it.

Miners were on strike which may be why my room was available, but there were a lot of people of Finnish extraction milling about waiting for lunch which on Sundays was the major meal, of the week it turned out.  Lunch consisted of good pot roast, potatoes, and gravy.  I don’t recall vegetables, but there were probably some with some pie for dessert.  They were known for their pies.

A victim of the strike was rather monotonous meals for the rest of the week.  Dinner consisted of leftover pot roast, mashed potatoes and gravy, and pie.  And so it went for the rest of the week that I began to call the pot roast beef chips.  Then on Sunday, there would be fresh pot roast to start the week.

I met a young man there who came from Finland a couple years before, and we took up a friendship.  His interest really was in practicing his English.  I wasn’t to help him talk unless it was hopeless.  Sometimes when he couldn’t think of a word, he would try so hard that sweat would appear on his forehead.

Every time I saw him, I had an overpowering urge to ask him how he liked the United States, but I didn’t want to ask him such a banal thing.  One day after work, we were in a bar having a beer and I opened my mouth to say something when out came, “How do you like the United States?”  Ooh!  He replied, “ If you are rich, almost anyplace is good, but, if you are a working man, the United States is the best.”  Pretty good, I thought.

Another time we were visiting at Julola’s and a couple of old-timers were talking across the room.  I asked my Finish friend what they were saying, and he replied, “You don’t understand them?  They are speaking English.”  I replied that it didn’t sound like English to me. And he said that they were putting Finnish ending on the words.

Two of my classmates lived in the nearby town of Eveleth, a town of maybe 7,000, and I hitchhiked the seven or nine miles to the home of Jerry Anderson (The Curly-Headed Swede).  Also present was Art Columbo (The Red-Headed Italian).  After the visit and dinner, I was going to hitchhike back to Virginia, but Jerry said, “We better take you as it is dark, where are you staying?”  I told them,” Jukola’s Boarding house.” They hadn’t heard about it, so I tried to explain where Jukola was.  Jerry said, “ It sounds like you are living in Fintown,” I said that you might call it that as there certainly are a lot of Finnish people there.  “You don’t go out walking at night do you?”  “Well I do, but since you mention it I don’t see anyone else walking around at night.”  I guess that when the Swedes and Norwegians came into Fintown looking for trouble, they found it.  Actually, the people I ran across were just hard-working people and nothing to be afraid of.

One time I had a swimming date with a nice looking Finnish girl.  I have no idea how we met.  Anyway afterward, I was told by my Swedish and Norwegian friends that I shouldn’t do that.  That it was not right.  There are parts of the country where you don’t have to be of colored skin to be discriminated against.

* https://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WMFVXD_Jukola_Boardinghouse_Virginia_MN
** I had heard a story about Finnish troops luring Soviet forces onto a frozen lake where the Finns had planted Christmas trees during the Finno-Soviet Wat of late 1939 and early 1940.  When the Soviet force got onto the frozen lake, the Finnish forces blew up the ice on the lake for a great victory. (I have been unable to confirm this story, though Soviet forces did advance over frozen lakes.)