Jill's Genealogy Journey

Stories, Discoveries & Tips

William Laitala

Immigrant Exhibits

by

Recently, I discovered that the Minnesota Digital Library launched several online exhibits about Minnesota immigrants. In the one on immigrant experiences, something jumped out at me: Lars Fjeseth. You might recall that this is not our Lars, but the two have similar names and lived at the same time near each other: https://jillholman.com/genealogy/fjerestad-versus-fjeseth/

The new exhibits are:

  • Minnesota Immigrants: People on the Move
  • Minnesota Immigrants: Immigrant Experiences
  • Minnesota Immigrants: Preserving Culture

There also is an older exhibit called Farm to Table. Find all four exhibits here.

Next, I clicked through and explored some of the Primary Source Sets, which were very interesting. Here are three of my favorites:

  • Civilian Conservation Corps in Minnesota
  • Lumber Industry in Minnesota
  • Mining on the Iron Range

They have added a lot of resources since the last time I checked! Let’s see what they have for Chisholm.

Here we see that we get 151 items when we search for Chisholm in the Minnesota Digital Library.

There are several pictures of the mines and also the ruins after the 1908 fire. While few of the people are labeled, you can get an idea of what it looked like to be there in the early 1900s, which is when William and Katri Laitala arrived in Chisholm. I think these two pictures might be my favorite:

That could be my great-grandfather William standing there!

William & Katri Laitala – A Finnish Family in Northern Minnesota

by

William & Katri Laitala with grandson circa 1944 Chisholm MN

Hooray! The second edition of A Finnish Family in Northern Minnesota is available with lots of new information. Read about William and Katri here!

Please note: a PDF is available for printing on the book home page, but the links don’t come through that way. Use this version to link to the resources that are cited in the book.

The Basic Facts:
William LAITALA
b. 1 Jan 1878, Hapavesi, Finland
d. 21 Apr 1952, Virginia, St. Louis, MN

Katri Elizabeth (Kaisa Liisa) KEMPPAINEN
b. 17 Feb 1879, Paltamo, Finland
d. 29 Jun 1963, Virginia, St. Louis, MN
m. 6 May 1906, Chisholm, St. Louis, MN

You might also be interested in:

William Laitala’s Ancestors

by

As you may have seen from our earlier Laitala post, we had a mystery about William Laitala. Who were his parents? We had a few bits of information, but nothing that tied everything together:

  • Alina, who we thought might be William’s sister, named her parents in a Social Security record: Johan Laitala and Anna M Wiitanen. Are these William’s parents?
  • There is a fragment left from the very damaged parish book dated 1879 from Haapavesi showing Johan Laitala and Anna Marie Wiitanen and their children: Abel, Johan, Herman, Abraim, Anna Maria and Wilhelm. Is this our William? (By the way, we are so lucky the fragment survived! I had been told that no records were available due to a fire. Yippee! It is also an interesting story how this fragment came to our attention. A nice lady in Finland contacted a cousin and shared it with her and then she shared it with us.)

So my clever and persistent mother spent some quality time with the Finnish parish books, searching for a later record of the family. She looked at all the parishes surrounding Haapavesi too in case the family moved around. Nothing. (She had previously found records in the Hiski database showing Juho and Anna Laitala as godparents several times in the parish of Vihanti, between 1885-1895.)

Then she found the cousin had a notation saying that Sakri Juntilla, Alina’s husband, came to Chisholm to meet William Laitala, brother-in-law. Where did this come from?

It took a bit of looking around and then – Aha! The Ellis Island records!

So now we feel confident that this all ties together. William and Alina were siblings. We know their parents names. William was born in Jan 1878 in Haapavesi, Finland. (There are discrepancies on the exact date, but we’re sure of January.) Of his older siblings, we think only Abel and Abraim came to Minnesota, the others remained in Finland. We also think there were two younger brothers, Matti and Antti, who also came to Minnesota. And, of course, Alina Laitala Juntilla, the youngest sister, came to Chisholm with her daughter to join her husband.

So I couldn’t stop there! Then I stitched together these ancestors for William from the Hiski database and the parish pages. This could have errors, but it is a good start for further research.

The Ancestors of William Laitala
The Ancestors of William Laitala

Look at all the interesting things going on with the Finnish names!:

  • Laitala was likely a farm name because it ends with -la
  • Soininen changed to Witanen (Soininen might be an old style family surname)
  • There is some Swedish and some Finnish
  • We are going back far enough that we see the old fashioned “son of Juho”

More info here:

Mesabi Pioneers

by

This is a book about the first men who started the Mountain Iron Mine. (Which was a big deal! It was the beginning of mining the Mesabi Range, which turned out to be the largest iron ore deposit in the world. It is now an historic landmark & as it says in the National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination: Mountain Iron Mine, “Minnesota steel was a significant factor in the decisive role this country played in the two World Wars.”)

I wanted to read this book because I knew the main character was Finnish like my great-grandfather & the story was set near where he settled in northern Minnesota. Arthur, the main character, was an early pioneer to the area & my great-grandfather came a bit later, but there are similar Finnish characteristics such as being a man of few words, being a good moral man & sisu of course! I am not sure if all Finns have an aptitude for building, but my family shares this with Arthur as well. Comparing the main facts on the two:

Arthur Maki aka Arvid Mäkelä William Laitala aka Vitho Laitala
Main character of Mesabi Pioneers My great-grandfather
Born 1864 Born 1878
Came to the iron range 1891 Came to Chisholm in 1903 (about 16 miles west of Mountain Iron)
Escaping the Russian military Escaping something too perhaps?

One part of the book that I especially enjoyed was how well the Finn & the Indian got along. They had a lot in common:

  • Appreciation of nature
  • Listening more than talking
  • Being outcasts
  • Being very moral & hard-working, but being treated badly
  • Sweat lodge & sauna
  • Living with names given to them because their original names were too difficult for people

I was also struck with how hard that had to be for people who loved the wilderness to see the pine forests clear cut & huge pits dug into the earth. Mesabi Pioneers is a must read for you if:

  • You have a Finnish immigrant ancestor
  • You have family in or from the Iron Range
  • You are curious about life in frontier Minnesota
  • You are interested in early open pit iron mining

The author did a great job bringing to life what it was like back then, being a pioneer in northern Minnesota. It was a diverse community of immigrants and these people had a lot of strength & determination. You may think historical fiction has to be boring & dry, but it doesn’t! This book is really quite an enjoyable read. Get the book here.

The author is currently working on the next book & you can get updates with how it is going  here.

While this book is fiction, it is based on true events, so I couldn’t resist seeing what pictures I could find. They made this great video about the book that has many magnificent old pictures!:

And of course there are some great old photographs from the MHS:

And I couldn’t ignore this one of what it would have looked like when my great-grandfather arrived:

Miners - Mesabi Range 1903
Miners – Mesabi Range 1903 (from LOC)

The Laitala Farm through Time – A Photo Essay

by

In 70 years, a lot has happened and then again, not so much has changed. Many of the buildings have stood the test of time. I’m especially proud of the pole barn, standing so straight and true, because my grandpa built it! But alas, the house burned down and some of the buildings are succumbing gracefully to gravity . . .

Pic of The Laitala farm as it was in 1938
The Laitala farm as it was in 1938

 
Pic of The cow barn & pole barn in 1938
The cow barn & pole barn in 1938

 
Pic of The cow barn in 1988
The cow barn in 1988

 
Pic of The garage and machine shop September 1988
The garage and machine shop September 1988

 
Pic for The pole barn & blacksmith shop in 1988
The pole barn & blacksmith shop in 1988

 
Pic of The Laitala farm in 2008
The Laitala farm in 2008

 
Pic of The pole barn, cow barn & blacksmith shop in 2008
The pole barn, cow barn & blacksmith shop in 2008

 
Pic of The blacksmith shop with the chicken coop in the background in 2008
The blacksmith shop with the chicken coop in the background in 2008

 
Pic of The machine shop succumbing to gravity in 2008
The machine shop succumbing to gravity in 2008

 
Pic of the Inside view of the machine shop succumbing to gravity in 2008
Inside view of the machine shop succumbing to gravity in 2008

 
You might also be interested in: