Table Of Content

a WyPa Rnotes P?yo py ; eofe AMbEe bba g “K - BIRECT - GoxH 1! "ED WY 7» Aery y pf H ~ 0 50 ryoa?ee yyy IJMCOOMAFOH ATUNGTR EIT LEAS Y 2 aeiAaeeSe i YY y= yyen CARFr eryT e t9 yp} rbsG A POSTCARD SENT FROM AUNE NIEMI TO HER FRIEND ELSIE HEINO IN 1932 FROM THE SWEDISH AMERICAN LINE'S SS DROTTNINGHOLM. In This Issue... The U.S.S.R. was an ally of the U.S. during World War I and World War II. In the 1930s, between these wars, the Soviet Union invited many Finnish-Americans in the U.S. and Canada to come to the Soviet Republic of Karelia and to bring their advanced forestry skills to build up the timber industry. They were promised jobs, health care, and an education in a classless society where the future was bright. What could go wrong? Larry Seeborg has written the story of his mother and her family and the one mystery they have been haunted by for years. Sylvia Mattson watched as families on Floral Avenue and neighboring streets left to go to Karelia. She wondered why families who had good jobs would leave and head off into a strange new world. To eighteen-year-old letter writer, Aune Niemi, it was the excitement of travel to new places and a chance to devote her labor to an improved social order. Excerpts from her letters tell of the process many others experienced. Also in this issue, Mary Jane Sjoblom writes the story of Henry Sjoblom, AHS graduate of 1957 and Melvin L. Bashore writes about the U.S. Army Spruce Production Division Camps in Clatsop County during 1917-1918. —The Editor CLATSOP COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY JUMTUX CLATsop COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY 714 Exchange St. P.O. Box 88 Astoria, Oregon 97103-0088 (S03) 325-2203 [email protected] CLaTsop County HIsToRICAL SOCIETY www.astoriamuseums.org QUARTERLY Heritage Museum VOL. 42, No. 2—SPRING 2022 16th and Exchange St., Astoria Flavel House Museum Copyright © 2022 Clatsop County Historical Society 8th and Duane St., Astoria (ISSN 1083-9216) Oregon Film Museum 7th and Duane St., Astoria Uppertown Firefighters Museum 30th and Marine Drive, Astoria Contents: BOARD OF DIRECTORS 1 She Lost Her Father Luke Colvin, Astoria, OR President by Lawrence V. Seeborg David Reid, Astoria, OR Vice-President 11 Local Families Move to Karelia Kent Easom, Coeur d'Alene, ID Sylvia Mattson Interview Secretary Kent Ivanoff, Astoria, OR 13 Letters to Elsie Treasurer by the Editor Andrew Bornstein, Bellingham, WA Mike Brosius, Astoria OR 31 Local Finnish-American Brett Estes, Astoria, OR Craig Hoppes, Astoria, OR Immigrants to Soviet Karelia in Julie Kovatch, Astoria, OR Patricia Roberts, Gearhart, OR the 1930s Randy Stemper, Astoria, OR Dulcye Taylor, Astoria, OR By the Editor STAFF 37 Images from Karelia McAndrew Burns from the Kevin Violette Col. Executive Director Sam Rascoe Director of Marketing 40 Coming To America Liisa Penner by Mary Jane Sjoblom Archivist & Cumtux Editor Chelsea Vaughn 43 Clatsop County Spruce Curator Production Camps, 1917-1918 Andrea Weston Business Manager by Melvin L. Bashore Matt Powers Facilities Manager Larry Ziak Custodian Front Cover: IMAGE COURTESY OF LAWRENCE SEEBORG THEODORE SAUSO WITH WIFE WILMA AND Sheila Nolan STEP-DAUGHTER LAURA TERHO. CA. MID Susan Swanby 1920S. Michael Wentworth Cumtux Support CUMTUx: Chinook jargon: “To know...to inform” An Astoria girl's father is deported and disappears in Soviet Karelia. SHE LosT HER FATHER by Lawrence V. Seeborg Y MOTHER, Laura (Terho) and they were married four years Views was a victim of “Karelian later, on July 3; 1913. They settled fever,” the almost fanatical beliefo f in Hoquiam, Washington, where many Finnish-Americans, in the Waino was employed as a tree 1920s and early 1930s, that their topper for a logging company. lives could be greatly improved if On October 17, 1916, disaster they migrated to Karelia, a portion struck when Waino’s tree-climbing of the Soviet Union bordering safety belt broke, and he fell 100 feet Finland. This movement reached to his death. At that time, Wilma a crescendo in 1931-1932, when had been working in a Hoquiam communist agitators in the United boarding house where she met a States, aided by the dissatisfaction bachelor named Theodore Sauso. caused by high unemployment He worked nights as alinotypist and during the depression, were most was “home” at the boarding house successful in convincing Finns during the day. Wilma asked Sauso that opportunities were limitless in if hew ould tend to Laura while she Karelia. A significant effort was be- was working. He agreed to do so and ing made there by Soviet economic was still doing this on a regular basis planners to modernize its lumbering at the time Waino was killed. industry and substantially increase About a year after Waino’s death, the production of forest products. Wilma and her daughter, Laura, Thousands of Finnish-Americans moved to Astoria, where Wilma first resettled in Karelia. This is the story worked as a sales clerk at the Beehive of how Karelian fever affected my department store and then ina similar mother’s life. position at Ahrens, a ready-to-wear Laura, who grew up in Astoria, store. Theodore Sauso also made the Oregon, was born in Hoquiam, move to Astoria, and, on July 12, 1919 Washington, on December 8, 1914. he and Wilma were married. Laura’s Both of her parents were born former babysitter, Sauso, then became in Finland. Her mother, Wilma her stepfather! Johnson, arrived in Boston by After his marriage to Wilma, Sauso ship on June 24, 1909. Her friend, continued to work as a linotypist for Waino Terho, accompanied her, about a year and then purchased a 1 CLATSOP COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY retail business that sold candies, ice in the brewing process and were cream, tobacco, and other confec- harvested by laborers who were paid tions in the front part of the store. A twenty-five cents for each basket poolroom was located at the back of picked. The circular basket was the store. Laura, who was sixyears old about eighteen inches in diameter at at the time, recalls that a view of the the base, widened to thirty inches at poolroom was “hidden” from retail the top, and three feet high. This was customers bya wall that separated the a lot of basket to fill for twenty-five two parts of the store. cents, and Wilma was not happy Needing more capital, Wilma with the prospect. Soon, she had and Sauso took in Mr. & Mrs. arranged to tend the children of the Gustafson as partners, and, in 1925, other hop-pickers while they picked the business was sold to them. the hops! Wilma, who said she did not like Sauso eventually found work the Astoria area, urged Sauso to as a logger in the mountains but look for work elsewhere. The family quit after only a few months when departed on an extended, job-hunt- he became lonesome for Wilma ing trip to Oregon, Washington, and and Laura, who remained in California. They finally settled in Salem. About this time, friends Salem, Oregon. from Astoria came visiting and At first, both Wilma and Sauso convinced Wilma that she should had difficulty finding workin Salem. move back to Astoria, where there One day, Wilma saw an ad in the was a large Finnish community. newspaper announcing a major sale Sauso remained behind for a few at one of Salem’s department stores. weeks to sell their house and then She went to the employment office rejoined Wilma and Laura. Thus, at the store but was not immediately after a stay in the Salem area ofo nly given a job interview as others were eleven months, the family returned ahead of her. Seeing a clerk’s sales to Astoria. book lying on a nearby desk, she Back in Astoria, Wilma and took it and went out on the sales Sauso had no trouble finding work. floor, where she started to write up Sauso began working as alinotypist purchases for customers. When a for Toveri, a Finnish language news- store supervisor asked her what she paper that had become increasingly was doing, Wilma replied, “It looked pro-communist during the 1920s, like you needed some help.” Wilma and Wilma returned to her old job was given the job. asa sales clerk for Ahrens. Wilma and Laura also worked While Laura was growing up in the hop fields outside Salem in Astoria, her family often went during the summer. Hops are used camping or on picnics, usually to D) CumtTux — VOL. 42 No. 2—SPRING 2022 logging camp nearby. “Today is hundreds of picture postcards, the Sunday, but the doctor and I walked images of which could be projected four miles to Camp No.2 and back onto the walls. through the snow,” Dane wrote. “So far we've been pretty busy,” “This camp is four miles down the he wrote. “This is quite likely to be line towards Olney. That is we have all the active service I shall see, for to go four miles to get there. If we we may be here until next fall, at could go straight over the mountain least. But it is plenty active enough it would be only about a mile. There to suit me at present. We've been atit is no medical men here at Camp 2, pretty steadily ever since I arrived.” and they have about seventy men, Care had to be taken when working so you see there is need of one. I’m inalogging camp as the job could be going to move down this week and hazardous. Shortly after his arrival tackle the job. As there are quite a in the camp, they had to attend toa number ofc ivilians here too, and no logger who was hit by a falling tree. doctor, I have an idea that Sergeant “Thad no sooner got here and taken Davis will be a pretty busy man.” offmy coat,” Davis wrote, “before a He liked the two men he was big log rolled onto a man. It crushed assigned to work with in the medical his shoulder, broke three ribs, gave infirmary. “Our Medical detach- him a slight internal hemorrhage ment consists of the lieutenant, and tore his face up pretty badly. myself and one private,” wrote We fixed him up and sent him to the Sergeant Davis. “The private is base hospital at Vancouver.” pretty well trained and a handy In just the few short days he had man, as well as a fine fellow, and the been there, he could see the poten- lieutenant is a prince of am an. He tial risks ofl iving in the logging is from Oklahoma, and he knows a camp. “Did you ever hear a giant number of Kansas people. Besides tree go crashing down?” he asked being all right as a man, he is also a his parents. “When at a distance, it good doctor.” sounds like a long peal of thunder, He hadn't been there long enough but when close by very much like to have visited and written about a loud, ragged volley of musketry. the camp’s recreation halls. There One came down yesterday that were two recreation halls near the played havoc with one of the tents. Olney logging camp. Portland In falling it struck a hemlock, which women donated books, games, came crashing down on the tent, and a phonograph and collection tearing it to pieces and sweeping it of records to help entertain the into the creek. Right close by was 200 men working there. They also another tent with a sick man in it. donated a projecting machine and His was a rather narrow squeak. 47 CLATSOP CouNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY He forgot for the moment that he was sick and came tearing out of the tent yelling like a wild man.” It can be expected that such a report written to his parents would have caused added worry as he was their 9FSO0'V1W00I°St9H0)°')T I# only child. He closed his letter when he saw he was needed to attend to a man with the mumps, but not before adding a postscript: “There are oodles of trout in the streams, and bears, mountain lions, and wildcats in the woods.” Just more fodder to worry his parents. He had been away from home before, attending the Kansas State Agricultural College at Manhattan, but that absence lacked the perils of his Oregon posting. These letters from soldiers posted to several different government-op- erated spruce camps in Clatsop County offer an engaging first-per- son glimpse into an obscure aspect SPRINGBOARDS THEY STOOD UPON of the war effort. Toiling in the WHILE CUTTING THE LARGE SPRUCE forested hills inland from the coast TREE. IN THE BACKGROUND ARE THE TENTS OF THE SPRUCE DIVISION CAMP. under adverse conditions, their work was arduous and, at times, is web-footed and has moss on his dangerous. To men unused to such back,” he wrote to a friend back in a winter season as Clatsop County Kansas. While the work of these afforded, the work could be most soldiers lay far from the battlefields unpleasant. Carl E. Schmitt, a of Europe, their contribution in the twenty-four-year-old soldier from forests of the Pacific Northwest Kansas, posted on railroad con- changed the course of the air war struction to help move the spruce for the Allied forces in World War I. logs from the forests northeast They performed an important part of Seaside, the constant rain was in helping the Allies win the war. 7 tiresome. “This life is great ifa man 48 CUMTUX — VOL. 42 No. 2— SPRING 2022 CCHS 1MaGe #13.002.001,005, KEVIN VIOLETTE COLLECTION