From : Paul D. Russell
To : Russell Family:
Subject : Finnish emigration records
Date : Sat, 7 Jul 2001 21:37:10 -0500

Hi All,

I found out recently that the Finnish Migration Institute has digitized the Finnish passport records and passenger records of emigrant ships from the late 1800's and early 1900's. The web page is at:

http://www.migrationinstitute.fi/index_e.html

The site also includes links to other items of interest, such as articles about Finnish emigration and pictures of emigrant ships.

I did a search on our grandparents' names. I did not get any hits in the passport database, but did get several possible matches in the passenger lists. I thought you might be interested in the results.

The following record came up for "Emil Tuomala":

Last name Tuomala
First names Emil
Age or age class 26
Port of departure Hanko
Place of destination Hibbing
State of destination MN
Country of destination USA
Price of ticket FIM 330
Ship from Finland Arcturus
Date of departure from Finland 29.03.1905
Ship from England Columbia
Date of departure from England 08.04.1905
Ocean Line Anchor Line
Port of departure in England *
List and page 40/25
Remarks *

If this is the record for our grandfather, it is interesting to note that the place of destination is Hibbing, MN, rather than Massachusetts. Perhaps he was planning to go to Hibbing, but decided to stay in Quincy after he found work in the granite quarries.

I got the following record for "Hilja Lauren" (accent on e that won't show up in html):

Last name Lauren
First names Hilja
Age or age class 18
Port of departure Hanko
Place of destination Boston
State of destination MA
Country of destination USA
Price of ticket FIM 239
Ship from Finland Arcturus
Date of departure from Finland 09.08.1911
Ship from England Zeeland
Date of departure from England 15.08.1911
Ocean Line White Star Line
Port of departure in England *
List and page 79/101
Remarks Pori!

This seems to be the correct record for Mummu.

I also did a search for "Hilja Tuomala":

Last name Tuomala
First names Hilja
Age or age class 1N
Port of departure Hanko
Place of destination Boston
State of destination MA
Country of destination USA
Price of ticket FIM 2925
Ship from Finland Astraea
Date of departure from Finland 20.06.1923
Ship from England Samaria
Date of departure from England 28.06.1923
Ocean Line Cunard Line
Port of departure in England Liverpool
List and page 116/89
Remarks Mk Norma Tuomala. Helsinki!

This record appears to be for Mummu (after she was married and her name was Tuomala), from a return trip to Finland in 1923.
Note that Mom's name is listed as a companion in the Remarks section. Also, I seem to vaguely remember Mom saying something about having gone to Finland as a young child.

Finally, I did a search on "Norma Tuomala", and got the following:

Last name Tuomala
First names Norma
Age or age class 4
Port of departure Hanko
Place of destination Boston
State of destination MA
Country of destination USA
Price of ticket FIM 2925
Ship from Finland Astraea
Date of departure from Finland 20.06.1923
Ship from England Samaria
Date of departure from England 28.06.1923
Ocean Line Cunard Line
Port of departure in England Liverpool
List and page 116/89
Remarks Mk Hilja Tuomala. Helsinki!

This, then, would be the corresponding record for Mom on the return trip from Finland.

It would be interesting to know if our grandfather was really intending to go to Hibbing or if he just gave that destination since so many others were going there. Also, I'm curious what the purpose was of the trip back to Finland in 1923 by Mummu and Mom.

Love,
Paul

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From : Mom Caldwell
To : Russell, Paul
Subject : Emigration records
Date : Sun, 08 Jul 2001 15:19:46 -0400

Good researching, Paul! It was very interesting to read. Mummu was born September 10, 1892, so the trip that listed her as age 18 in August 1911 would be correct.

Mom talked several times about her trip to Finland as a small child to see Mummu's family. Mummu took her back for an extended time (several months or longer?) to live, but then they came back to Mass. so she could enter school here. Mom told me many times that she didn't learn to speak English until she went to school. She mentioned that she loved the trip by boat, but that Mummu had "crossed the ocean by rail" because she was so sea sick.. Perhaps that's why she never returned for another visit during her lifetime, and never saw her parents, sisters, or young brother again.. That's why she and the other two sisters that had emigrated here were so close. Suoma Alexandra settled in Chicago and was the mother of Ellen Watson and Lillian Roinila. Jennie Amanda lived south of Boston also and was Herbie's mother. By the way, our Amanda Lauren is named after Herbie's mother, if you didn't know.

Thanks!
Gail

See! I did not descend from Martians as you think.

From : Amanda L. Caldwell
To : Paul Russell
Subject : Re: Fwd: Finnish emigration records
Date : Thu, 09 Aug 2001 21:31:52 -0500

Hi, Paul --

It's Mandy if you couldn't tell. My mom forwarded what you sent from the Finnish Migration Institute. That was really interesting. I just found out that at http://ellisislandrecords.org you can search for free for passengers from 1892 to 1924 who went through there. You might already know about it, but I thought I'd tell you in case. I found Emil Tuomala listed with the same information you gave. Cool!

Here are the specifics:

Name: Tuomala, Emil
Ethnicity: Finnish
Place of Residence: Fitli, Finland
Date of Arrival: April 17, 1905
Age on Arrival: 26
Gender: M
Marital Status: S
Ship of Travel: Columbia
Port of Departure: Glasgow, Scotland, UK

from http://ellisislandrecords.org

You can see it matches your information, Paul.

@@@@ Visit http://www.SteveandAmanda.com -- always entertaining -- and http://www.AmandaLCaldwell.com for all your editing needs. @@@@

From : Amanda L. Caldwell
To : Mom Caldwell
Subject : Finnish immigration
Date : Thu, 09 Aug 2001 21:41:30 -0500

Hi!

... You can buy photos of the ships and copies of the manifests at http://ellisislandrecords.org. I tried the other names Paul had for Mummu and her mother, but no luck. Any other or Swedish-side names I should try?

Love,
Mandy

From : Paul D. Russell
To : Amanda Caldwell
Subject : Re: Fwd: Finnish emigration records
Date : Fri, 10 Aug 2001 07:36:26 -0500

Hi,

Thanks for the info. I tried searching at http://ellisislandrecords.org several times just after it opened but was never able to get through due to the huge number of people accessing it. I'm glad to see that its usable now.

I don't know where they got the Place of Residence as "Fliti" in Finland. That's not a typical Finnish word and I could not find it on the Internet or at http://www.mapquest.com.

Thanks,
Paul

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From : "Paul D. Russell"
To : mail@amandalcaldwell.com
Subject : Re: Fwd: Finnish emigration records
Date : Fri, 31 Aug 2001 12:24:38 -0500

Hi,

Original message from Amanda L. Caldwell:
****
Does Fitli sound like any other Finnish city or area? I guess it's to be expected they'd type in something wrong. Do you know where he's from?
****

Mummu told me that he was from the village of Pornainen, which is northwest of Porvoo (which is on the southern coast, east of Helsinki).

Fitli does not sound like any native Finnish location that I know of. In fact, the letter F only occurs in foreign loan words. It could be a Finnish-ized version of a Swedish name, perhaps. Also, many of the old farms had their own names (independent of the owner's name), so Fitli could be the name of a farm rather than a village, which would explain why it does not show up on the standard maps.

Paul

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THE RUSSELL SIDE: A SUMMARY

Norma Russell, born Norma Tuomala, was the daughter of Emil (grandfather in Paul's emails) & Hilja (nee Lauren, Mummu in Paul's emails) Tuomala

Bert & Norma Russell (Mom in Paul's emails) had five children: Lauren, Gail, Eric, Paul, & Karl:

Jim & Lauren Kinkade and Jimmy & Russell

Gail & Jerry Caldwell and Erik, Amanda (that's me!), & Ethan

Eric & Leann Russell and David & Ericka

Paul Russell & Kathy Leahy and Matthew & Anna

Karl & Susan Russell and Mallory, John, & Lauren

         Here's a picture of cousins John, Lauren, Matthew, and Anna Russell at the wedding and at the rehearsal. Find more in the wedding gallery.