FINNS: An Oral History- Keeping Services - Dorothy L. (Patat) Somero

New Ipswich Historical Society

FINNS: An Oral History of Finnish-Americans in New Hampshire’s Monadnock Region

Excerpted from FINNS: An Oral History... by Patricia Kangas Ktistes, 1997, all rights reserved.

Dorothy L. (Patat) Somero  

There were a lot of Finns in New Ipswich who never went to church. But to me, the reason I  went to the Congregational Church was my kids could go to Sunday school. My husband Martin’s  church, the Independent Apostolic Lutherans [Independents], only met a couple of weeks each year. I  tried to get other mothers in the Independent church to start a Sunday school, but everybody was too  busy and didn’t know where to get literature.  

I know Martin’s mother [a member of the Independents, who split from the main Apostolic  Church] did not like it when I got active in the Congregational Church. One year, the Congregational  Church was conducting a survey so they could get more members. One of Martin’s sisters used to send  a quarter with her child for Sunday school offering. That was a lot of money in those days and we  didn’t question that. But some wording on the survey upset my mother-in-law and as a result, Martin’s  sister pulled her child out of there.  

I was kind of surprised the first time I went to an Independent Apostolic service because it was  held in somebody’s house. The biggest thing that surprised me was the children just kind of ran around  and paid no attention to the service. I remember later on making my son sit on my lap or beside me.  All the other kids were in another room playing. He was the only kid made to sit with the adults. I  could not see the sense in going when the kids weren’t being churched. So then finally I caved and let  him go play for half an hour when it was close to refreshment time.  

It seemed like everything centered around food at these services. I remember they used to  have an hour-and-a-half of Finnish services. There usually were a couple of people who didn’t speak  Finn. So for us, they would have maybe 10 minutes in English, sort of a re-cap. When they preached,  they talked off the top of their heads. To me, their sermons weren’t a structured sermon like I was used  to. My father was Catholic. My mother was baptized Baptist, I think. I was baptized Methodist Episcopal, and my brother was baptized in the Congregational Church. And eventually we all went to  the Community (Methodist) Church. Very ecumenical.  

One time, the visiting Independent preacher was Matt Reed. He came when I was visiting  from college with my roommate Bertha Somero, my future sister-in-law. Matt Reed came over to me.  He was a big man. I was pretty small then; barely 18 and sitting on a couch. He said, “Are you a Christian?” I said, “Yes.” He said, “Well, where did you go to church?” I said, “I went to a community  church.” And he said, “Well what denomination are you?” I said I was a Methodist. He said,  “Methodist, schmethodist!” and walked away. I thought, ‘What kind of a minister is this, who would  say that to a kid?’  

I found that attitude among other people. They tried to be polite but it was clear that they felt I  didn’t believe right: was I ‘saved?’ But they didn’t really teach much so you knew what was going on  or expected. I never understood how when you married into the family, you just ‘belonged’ to their  church. Usually you have your religion before you get married. And why would you change unless it’s  been agreed upon between the two of you? But with the Independents, whether it was the man or  woman, the person who married into the family automatically joined, or so it seemed to me. I asked  my husband’s sister, “How do you get members?” She said they don’t do missionary work; they just  have their own little group. One of the things taught was that they shouldn’t associate with non Christians [outsiders]. I said to one of them, “Well, how do you get converts if you don’t go out and  preach what you believe?” But they didn’t. I couldn’t believe it.  

In those days, the more orthodox Apostolics were called ‘Hardwoods’ and Independents were  ‘Softwoods.’ The big difference I saw was the Hardwoods believed in public confession. You stood up  in church and admitted you had sinned against someone and had to ask personal forgiveness. The  Softwoods did not do public confession. It appeared Hardwoods believed in faith and works as the  means to salvation and Softwoods believed in just faith.  

Then there was this feeling between the two churches. If you were in either, you didn’t quite  feel you belonged to the larger relationship if you attended the other; even if you were a cousin. To  members of either group it appeared that whoever belonged to their particular church, even if they  weren’t related, they were better than you, even if you were of their own family.  

One person who never acted that way was Olga, Matti Somero’s wife. I never knew her very  well but when my son was born, she sent down a pair of red, a pair of white, and a pair of blue ribbed  wool socks. On the Sunday before Memorial Day when we had the big parade in town, it was the one  time Olga came down from the farm. She would go to the cemetery for the memorial service and  always stop by my car and try to say a few words of English to me. I thought it was nice of her. Also, the Eino Somero family, especially the girls, were great. One thing that kind of scared  me at first when the Independents held their services was that some of the women used to kind of  jump for joy during the worship service. They’d be shouting in Finn. I wasn’t prepared for it. They had  been nicknamed the ‘Holy Rollers’ or ‘Holy Jumpers’ or something by other people in the town. I  found that out afterwards at the library when somebody mentioned it.  

Years ago, when I was working at Tricnit Hosiery Mill in New Ipswich, a young Apostolic  woman worked next to me at what they called a ‘looping’ machine. And for a treat, I bought myself a  little Hoodsie cup: ice cream. If you pulled back the lids of these cups, there was a little piece of tissue  paper. And underneath the tissue paper, there was a picture of a movie star. And this one time, I got  Bing Crosby. I said, “Oh, he’s such a good singer!”  

The young woman said to me that movies were wrong and sinful. I was kind of ornery back  then. So I started telling her how his voice was soothing and helped the wounded servicemen in the  hospitals to heal. She didn’t say anything. She just turned and looked at her machine and went on with  her looping.

[Next - Keeping Services - Ralph Kangas]