The sixth genealogy book – Het sitte Strangista Löijaan
Due to the large amount of descendants, it was decided to limit the book to seven generations. There are 11 500 direct descendants of Matti Strang and Valpuri Löija. Together with spouses and parents of spouses the book contains the information of 18 400 people. The book contains 992 pages.
The starting story of the book is tragic. Matti and Valpuri married in 1707 and settled into the Strang house in Vimpeli. After the disappearance of Valpuri’s 42-year old brother Erkki, the patron of Löija farm, who served as a Carolean soldier in the army of Charles XII of Sweden, in Northern Norway in late 1718 – early 1719, Matti and Valpuri moved to Valpuri’s home farm Löija in Räyrinki village of Veteli. Matti was the patron of Löija in the period 1719-1732. Matti’s father Erkki also moved to Löija with his second wife.
Matti and Valpuri had nine children, out of whom five continued the family numerously. The couple had 84 grandchildren. 33 of them had children of their own.
Of Matti and Valpuri’s children:
- Erkki (1716-1768) married Liisa Pollari (1710-1770) and had 14 children. The couple lived in Löija.
- Maria (1717-1775) married Heikki Alaspää (1717-1804) and had 17 children.
- Brita (1718-1783) married Juho Hannila (1718-1809) and had 16 children.
- Juho (1727-1794) married first Kaisa Alperi (1726-1758) and after Kaisa’s death, Briita Känsälä (1732-1810). Juho had altogether 31 children with his two wives. Juho and his family also lived in Löija.
- Liisa (1732-72) married Erkki Alperi (1724-1794) and had 16 children.
There are descendants of these children with names Löija, Alaspää, Hannila, Alperi, Björknäs, Finnilä, Heikkilä, Kaustinen, Kuorikoski, Lång, Nybacka, Paavola, Patana, Savo and Skytte.
Even though most of the family originally lived in Veteli and Kaustinen, there were second-generation descendants also in Alaveteli, Evijärvi, Halsua, Haukivuori, Himanka, Isokyrö, Ilmajoki, Kannus, Kaarlepyy, Kalajoki, Karstula, Kivijärvi, Kokkola, Kortesjärvi, Kruunupyy, Kälviä, Laukaa, Lestijärvi, Lohtaja, Munsala, Perho, Pietarsaari, Pedersöre, Pyhäjoki, Rautalampi, Raahe, Rautio, Saarijärvi, Saloinen, Sumiainen, Teerijärvi, Toholampi, Ullava, Uusikaarlepyy, Vimpeli and Ähtävä.
There were a lot of emigrants to America in the following generations. Also Viipuri (Wyborg) was a common destination for migrants. As a consequence, some of the family settled in Karelia.
The name list of people included in the genealogy book can be found here. The surnames are those that the people had at the time of their baptism – some people changed their surnames even several times during their lives.
As the family moved a lot, it would have been impossible to make this genealogy book before the current times when most of the older parish records can be found online. While searching for better livelihoods, both farm owners and farm hands moved regularly. Following these people from one parish to another through archival research would have meant driving of at least 100 000 kilometres. Now the information has mainly been collected through internet research of the records of over 200 parishes.
The number of printed books will be smaller than usually. The price of the book is 50 euro (+ postage).