Story and photos by Stewart A. McFerran
Editor’s note: A version of this article first appeared in the Grand Traverse Journal, March 2016. Reprinted by permission.
As winter approaches, the traditions of the Finnish founders of Kaleva, Michigan come to mind. A hot sauna is often the best way to get warm on a cold, snowy day. As traditions go, the sauna – a steam-filled room meant to cleanse and relax the body – is practical, enjoyable and shrouded in a rich mythology.
Several years ago, Kaleva’s last Finnish-speaking resident gave me a tour of the saunas Kaleva. Arthur Hulkonen remembered places where saunas had once been, such as one that burned down behind Kaleva Tavern. Homes on Sampo Avenue and Kauko Street had saunas, and there was one at the Bethany Lutheran Church, where Arthur worshipped.
In Kaleva, the saunas were fired up on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Wood heat from the large stoves filled the small, cedar-lined rooms. Rocks on the top of the stoves sputtered and popped when splashed with water. Steam enveloped the Hulkonen family and their friends as they sat on high benches and thrashed their skin with birch whisks to improve blood flow.
Arthur Hulkonen
Arthur was from Nisula in the Upper Peninsula and served in the U.S. Army in World War II. He spent five months as a prisoner of war in Dresden, Germany. He arrived in Kaleva, where his brother was living, on June 29, 1945. He told me he met his wife Mildred at her family’s sauna in Kaleva.
Proud of his Finnish heritage, Arthur served on the Finnish Council at Finlandia University in Hancock, Michigan for many years. He loved Kaleva and spent 70 years actively involved in his community, including as a charter member of the Kaleva Lions Club. In September 2015, the Village of Kaleva and Kaleva Historical Society honored him for his community service and business contributions by placing his name on the Sculpture Tree at the Kaleva Centennial Sculpture Walkway.
An eternal optimist, he had a great appreciation for life and plenty of “sisu,” the Finnish word for perseverance and determination. He loved jokes and reciting poetry. Being surrounded by his family was his greatest joy.
Arthur died on April 25, 2016, at the age of 93. He and Mildred were married for 65 years. At the time of his death, he was the last Finnish-speaking member of the Kaleva community. He is survived by his three children, five grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. The family still uses a sauna in his son Allen’s backyard.
Sleuthing saunas
If you walk down Sampo Avenue in Kaleva, you can see where the saunas once stood. Sauna sites can be found in many backyards there. Once, I stopped at a garage sale on Wuoksi Avenue and noticed a dilapidated stone shed at the back of the yard. It had been painted pink and had a green roof. Sure enough — the sales attendant told me that it had once been a sauna.
After a few inquiries, I found a sauna behind the barbershop and another behind the hardware store. There is a sauna in the yard of the old parsonage of the Lutheran church and a foundation of a sauna behind the Kaleva Tavern. A garden blooms on the site of the Hautamaki family sauna.
Toivo Johnson’s old homestead is just down the road. I could still see the large sign on the sauna outbuilding, which reads: “Toivo’s Sauna.” Toivo, and all Finnish enthusiasts of the sauna, would relate to the following verse. It is one of 22,795 lines of poetry compiled by Elias Lönnrot from oral tradition to create Finland’s national epic, The Kalevala:
I have stoked up the sauna
Heated the misty bath-hut
Softened the bath-whisks ready
Steeped the pleasant whisks.
Brother, bath your fill
Pour all the water you want
Wash your head till it is flax
Your eyes till they are snowflakes!
According to the Kaleva Historical Society, Finnish immigrants often built their saunas first and used them as homes while waiting to build their houses. In 2018, the society received donations to build an authentic Finnish sauna (made of area materials) behind The Bottle House Museum at 14551 Wuoski Ave. The sauna can be toured when the Bottle House is open.
Stewart A. McFerran is a sauna enthusiast who built his own wood-fired sauna near his home on a Northern Michigan stream. He hopes to visit Finland someday.
