In the surveys of some houses there are already mentions of people who went to America. Now we hope that the readers of the blog will give us more information, pictures, documents and stories on the inhabitants of Laitasaari who visited America or settled down there. It would also be great to have information on their descendants because of the English part of the blog, which will first concentrate mainly on those villagers of Laitasaari who moved to live in America and their ancestors and posterity.
On the page of Holappa number 51 Solja tells for example of Juho Jaakko Holappa’s (born on the 16th of March, 1894) trip to America. Jaakko was 19 when he left together with 21-year-old Eemeli Parviainen (born on the 13th of December, 1891) from the house of Kangas-Parviainen. Their destination was Houghton Michigan and Baltic Mine. 1
The handsome, young man in the picture is Aappo Holappa (the 17th of May, 1890), Jaakko’s brother, who also visited Michigan, where most people from Laitasaari headed for. The picture has been scanned from Ida Arola’s, née Parviainen’s (born on the 18th of November, 1884) album. She was Eemeli’s sister.
