FINNISH-RUSSIAN INTERACTIONS in DACHA COUNTRY, 1880S-1920S
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SHARED SPACE, VARIED LIVES: FINNISH-RUSSIAN INTERACTIONS IN DACHA COUNTRY, 1880s-1920s By Kitty Wing On Lam A DISSERTATION Submitted to Michigan State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of History – Doctor of Philosophy 2013 ABSTRACT SHARED SPACE, VARIED LIVES: FINNISH-RUSSIAN INTERACTIONS IN DACHA COUNTRY, 1880s-1920s By Kitty Wing On Lam This dissertation examines the Russian summer house (dacha) communities in southeastern Finland as a site of diverse social interactions from the end of the nineteenth to the beginning of the twentieth century. It covers the period from the 1880s to the mid-1920s because it seeks to address how Finnish-Russian social, economic and cultural contacts were significant in the political context of Finnish nationalists’ resistance to Russian authority and Finland’s transition to independent statehood after the Russian empire’s collapse. This project investigates why the dacha, entrenched in Russian thought as a symbol of Russian middle-class status, also became a physical and mental meeting place for Russians and Finns from various social backgrounds. Dacha communities in Finland were heavily concentrated in the Karelian Isthmus, a region within a few hours reach by train from St. Petersburg, Russia’s imperial capital. This meant that interaction between dacha-goers from Russia and Finnish-speaking inhabitants formed an integral part of the social landscape. These summer house settlements therefore offer a lens through which to examine how social boundaries were created, sustained, and destabilized. This case study is illuminating because Finns and Russians came into contact with each other in a space that was generally seen as part of the personal, private sphere; yet, these contacts also resonated in the public context of community. By examining intercultural exchanges in a specific spatial setting, and asking how imperial imaginings of particular places intersected with everyday social realities, this project prompts us to reconsider issues of nationality, identity, and state-building from an alternate perspective that than of Russian authorities’ efforts to control recalcitrant minorities. Copyright by Kitty Wing On Lam 2013 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS My most sincere gratitude goes to my advisory committee chair, Dr. Lewis Siegelbaum, for his guidance throughout my graduate studies at Michigan State University. I would also like to thank the other members of my committee, Dr. Keely Stauter-Halsted, Dr. Leslie Moch, Dr. Gordon Stewart and Dr. Charles Keith, for their continued support during the dissertation writing process. I am also grateful to Dr. Jason Merrill from the Department of Linguistics and Languages for serving as the Dean’s representative on my committee. I would like to give my thanks to Dr. Timo Vihavainen, Liisa Byckling and Natalia Baschmakoff for taking the time to discuss my project while I was conducting research in Helsinki. I wish to acknowledge the librarians and archivists who assisted with my research: Terri Miller from Michigan State University Libraries, Dmitry Tartakovsky from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Slavic Reference Service, Irina Luukka from the National Library of Finland’s Slavonic Library, Liisa Lehto from the Finnish Literature Society, and Sergei Pogreboff from the Russian Philanthropic Society in Finland. I also owe my gratitude to the staff at the various archives and libraries where I have conducted my research. Finally, I would like to thank the Aleksanteri Institute in Helsinki for providing institutional support during my research trip to Helsinki from January to March 2010. iv PREFACE Parts of this dissertation appear in recently published peer-reviewed articles. Tables 1 and 2 and parts of Chapter Three are included in “For whose Common Good? The Russian Philanthropic Society in Finland and the Challenges of Russian Language Education in Late Imperial Russia,” Region: Regional Studies of Russia, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia, vol. 1, no. 2 (2012), 255-283. A part of Chapter Six is published as “Homes across the Border: Russian Summer Houses in the Karelian Isthmus and the Finnish State, 1917-1927.” Journal of Borderlands Studies, vol. 27, no. 3 (2012), 331-343. Transliteration of Russian names and words in this dissertation, with the exception of widely recognized names, follow the Library of Congress system if the original source is in Russian. Russian names appearing in Finnish language sources are transliterated according to the Finnish standard. Russian words written according to pre-1918 orthography are transliterated as if they follow post-1918 orthographic conventions. Naming conventions for places in Finland follow the modern-day Finnish standard, with a few exceptions. Swedish names for the Finnish cities Viipuri, Turku and Tampere (Vyborg, Åbo, Tammerfors) are used for narrative that refers specifically to the pre-1917 period. Finnish names for these three cities are used for narrative referring to the post-1917 period. Helsinki will remain the name used for the Finnish capital city throughout this dissertation. v TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------vii LIST OF FIGURES ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------viii INTRODUCTION --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1 CHAPTER 1 Dacha Settlements in Finland and Questions of Empire -----------------------------------------------35 CHAPTER 2 Everyday Encounters and Interdependence through Dacha Space -----------------------------------78 CHAPTER 3 Cultural Bridge Building through the Dacha ----------------------------------------------------------113 CHAPTER 4 Crime and Terror in the Dacha Zone: Society and Security in Finland 1905-1917 --------------152 CHAPTER 5 Refuge in the Dacha Land: Ethnicity and Refugee Management -----------------------------------203 CHAPTER 6 The Afterlives of Abandoned Homes: Russian Dachas in the Karelian Isthmus and the Finnish State, 1920-1927--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------237 CONCLUSION --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------265 APPENDICES ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------274 Appendix A – Figure 1: Map of Vyborg Province, 1897 -----------------------------------275 Appendix B – Figure 2: Map of the Frontiers of Finland, 1595-1812 --------------------276 Appendix C – Figure 3: Map of St. Petersburg and environs ------------------------------277 BIBLIOGRAPHY -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------278 vi LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Population of Finland according to mother tongue ------------------------------------------11 Table 2: Population of Finland by number of individuals born in Russia -------------------------- 12 Table 3: Vyborg Province Land Owned by Foreigners ------------------------------------------------51 Table 4: Number of Russian Summer House Registered with Vyborg Province Local Parish District Chiefs, 1892 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------52 vii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Map of Vyborg Province, 1897 --------------------------------------------------------------273 Figure 2: Map of the Frontiers of Finland, 1595-1812 -----------------------------------------------274 Figure 3: Map of St. Petersburg and environs ---------------------------------------------------------275 viii Introduction Antti Leskinen grew up in the 1890s in a Finnish-Russian border town that was a popular place for affluent St. Petersburgers to establish summer houses, known in Russian as the dacha. Fluent in Finnish and Russian, Antti was able to communicate with Russian-speaking guests who frequented his father’s variety store in the town. After the Bolshevik Revolution, he assisted 1 Russian speakers seeking refuge in his village by serving as a translator. Finnish historiography informs us that when Finland was part of the Russian Empire, Finnish and Russian speakers rarely interacted with each other. Migrants from Russia clung to the Orthodox Church as their 2 center of public life. Russian artists, musicians and writers contributed heavily to Finnish 3 culture, but never felt they belonged in Finland. Imperial policies limiting Finnish autonomy in 4 the early 1900s gave Finnish nationalists cause to label Russians as the enemy “other.” Antti Leskinen’s experiences demonstrated nonetheless that Finnish-Russian interaction persisted in spite of political and ethnic tensions. 1 Folklore Archives of the Finnish Literature Society (SKS KRA), Sirkka Karskela, KE 28: 5773-5985. 2 Natalia Baschmakoff and Marja Leinonen, Russian Life in Finland: A Local and Oral History (Helsinki: Studia Slavica Finlandensia, 2001), 22. 3 Temira Pachmuss, A River of Moving Tears: Russia’s Experience in Finland (New York: Peter Lang, 1992), 231. 4 Timo Vihavainen, ed., Dva Lika Rossii (St. Petersburg: Evropeiskii Dom, 2007), 24. Outi Karemaa argues that propaganda to alienate Russians as the enemy “other” took root in Finland between 1917 and 1923. See Vihollisia, vainoojia, syöpäläisiä: venäläisviha Suomessa 1917 – 1923 (Helsinki: Suomen Historiallinen Seura, 1998). 1 The narrative of Finnish political history posits Finland’s incorporation into the Russian Empire in 1809 as a monumental