arrive in Minnesota, in 1861-62.75 A few went north, then turned east, reaching the Kuola Peninsula from where they were finally able to start across the ocean. From Haaparanta, on the border between Finland and Sweden, a group of 230 immigrants set forth in June 1873, the first group from Finland whose destination was Minnesota. The group reached Stockholm on June 19, Hull on June 26. They went by train to Liverpool, where they attended services at the Finnish Seamen's Mission on July 1. Two days later they were on board their Atlantic steamer. 76

For many others Hankoniemi, in southwestern Finland, was the last stopping place on Finnish soil. One traveler who came by this route wrote his impressions of it: "Hundreds of tubs of fresh butter, the export article creating a higher standard of living for the Finns, were carefully packed away in the hold, and the human cargo was crammed, much less carefully, into whatever space was left. The air was so bad it was almost impossible to breathe." 77 Like herrings into a barrel, 264 persons were crowded into the 280-foot long Arcturus in October 1899, and 119 persons into the 1,100 ton Urania. With some sense of responsibility but little show of friendliness, the Hanko steamers carried 1,445 men, women and children in March 1903. In April the figure rose to 2,381, and so it went on from year to year. Overcrowded conditions like this astonished the English who saw the ships arrive, 76 and the immigrants themselves felt that they had not been treated like human beings. 79

On board ship an immigrant who knew no language but his own was able to manage somehow, but once on land the difficulties began in earnest. Anything could happen, even if a husband had advised his wife well, and had instructed her to bring all their savings in cash, to be changed into American money in New York. If she had made the acquaintance of a man on shipboard who became very helpful, and then had entrusted him with looking after the financial transaction, man and money in all likelihood were never seen again. Even with a railroad ticket still left in one's purse, it was difficult to make a long journey by train with not a single penny to spend.

Some, of course, had no money to begin with, like two friends of Johan Piippo. Piippo himself had arrived in the United States

75. Vernon G. Barberg. I'll Take This Land by the Lake. MS. Cokato, Minn. p. 39.

76. Workers Progress Administration (WPA), unpublished study on the Finns in Minnesota. St. Paul.

77. Vilho Reima, Amerikan mailta. Helsinki, 1907. p. 7.

78. Ernest Young, Finland, the Land of a Thousand Lakes. London, 1912. pp 87-88. 79. Amerikan Sanomat, June 18, 1902.

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