FINNS: An Oral History- You Were In Finn Town Here - Fred Meshna

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.

Few and uninteresting as may be the local features of any place to the stranger’s eye, they assume the highest interest when  looked upon as the familiar landmarks of our birth-place or our  home. Around them cluster the most hallowed associations; and no delineations, whether of the pencil or the pen, are  contemplated with more delight, than those which represent the  scenes most familiar to our eyes, with which our own earliest acts  are identified, or where our revered ancestors lived and toiled.  

Frederick Kidder, History of New Ipswich page 64

Fred Meshna

I grew up about 10 miles north of Boston. One of the guys I worked with bought some land in  New Ipswich and said, “There’s another piece right next to me.” I bought it on speculation. I didn’t  know anything about the community. I bought the land because it was cheap. Somebody said one  reason I like it out here is because there’s no competition for me.  

When I started building my house, Ron Somero came over, started kicking rocks, asking  questions and beating around the bush, and finally came out and said, “So I hear you’re an atheist.”  And I said, “Yeah, man, who are you?” “I’m Ron Somero. I live across the street.” And I said, “I  don’t know, yeah, I guess I am.” And he said, “Wow! Are you an anti-Semite, too?”  

We talked awhile and he left and then Matt Traffie came by. I guess he had told Matt Traffie.  Traffie wouldn’t leave; Traffie likes to talk. All the Traffies talk. That’s my role, too. I remember  feeling really bad that I had no skill. My father was a printer and other people are masters at things and  I could do nothing. I’m a teacher but I can’t build cabinets or make a painting or speak a language.  I’ve never been focused enough to develop a skill and that’s always bothered me.  

And as I get older, I’m not so bothered because I’m enjoying this talking thing. I talked to  Matt for a long time and started to get a sense of what’s going on. It’s all that conservative church.  There are these people having 15 and 17 kids and they’re living by their interpretation of the Bible. I  said, “They’re really insane because they’re out of touch with reality.”  

And not long after, local kids used to hang around at Seppala & Aho Construction in town and  cause problems. I was trying to build a recycling center, so I was in the selectmen’s office a lot and  Walter Aho came in to try and relieve the problem. I’d seen him around but I didn’t know who he was.  He came to tell the selectmen that we were all kids at one time and that kids need to experiment:  ‘When I was younger I had my ‘54 Chevy and I used to ride around, too...’  

I said, “Who is this guy?” and someone told me, “That’s Walter Aho. You’ve gotta watch out  for him because he tells people what to do and they do it and they vote as a bloc.” When I went to the  New Ipswich town meeting, almost half of the auditorium was filled with that contingent. And we all  sat on the other side. It was us against them. I’m a teacher and I love education. I love learning. I love literature. And I find out Walter loves the same thing. What he doesn’t like is organized education. But when I talked to Walter over the years, you know what’s happened? As much as I’m being pulled over  to this conservative view, he’s being pulled over to the liberal view and he’s criticized now for being  too liberal.  

And I’ve come so far over to his side of it now. Plus I feel like going to his church. The only  problem I have is that the myths are something I just can’t swallow. I can’t say “Jesus Christ” without  taking His name in vain. I don’t want to say “Only Begotten Son” or “savior” or “salvation.” That  stuff sickens me. It scares me. It gets my hackles up. I get chills up and down my spine when I hear it.  

But the results I think are interesting. And that’s what blows me away about the community.  As I got to know many of these kids, I said, “Wow, something is very right with this.” When I go to  Mike Traffie’s house, I’m envious of what I see. Because there’s no TV and the kids are doing  amazing things. And these kids have this combination of high intelligence and hands-on ability  because of what he’s exposed them to. Instead of watching sitcoms, they’re up putting up huge,  experimental antennas. And they’ve actually built a car and model airplanes from scratch and there’s  14 kids and they’re living on half my salary and they’re doing it well, which is blowing me away. And  I can’t understand it.  

So I go to my liberal friends. This was in the early 80s. We were all together and they were  saying, “Boy what assholes these Finns are!” But now I find myself saying, “Wait, there’s something  to this.”  

And their response was, “Oh, that’s just great! Now you’re going to get converted.” And I  said, “No, no, I’m not going to be converted. But I’m just saying, when we talk about them and don’t  look them in the eyes, we’re just making straw dogs. Start looking at them in the eyeballs and listening  to what they have to say. It’s an amazing view of things.”  

Ron Somero was the first guy I met in the group and for the first two years, every time we met  each other: have you ever seen Seinfeld? Have you ever seen when Newman comes in? “Hell-O,  Newman.” That’s exactly what it was like with me and Ron. “Hell-O, Ron.” And we talked  occasionally and I found it fascinating.  

The big thing was when I built that recycling center in New Ipswich back in the late 80s,  everybody fought me. Many of my Finnish acquaintances had a philosophical problem with it. They believe that if you’re living under the Christian spirit, people will do what they have to do naturally.  With the recycling center, Matt Traffie came up to me and said, “You are making a big mistake. This is  not the right thing to do.” And I said, “What do you think we should do?”  

“We should be Christian, that’s what we should do. If you have a problem with what I am  doing, you tell me. You don’t come in and press this on the community. Anyway, who do you think  you are coming into town doing this?”  

And I said, “You can fight this if you want.” And I just did it. I even had to build it with my  own hands; I took two summers. And when Ron Somero saw me do that, he stood up in a meeting and  said, “He is not just full of talk. He went out and built it all by himself. He deserves praise, not  criticism.” And then we became very close friends.  

There’s a lot of Libertarian in them: you don’t have to take a central, dictatorial stance and  force everyone to do it from the government down. There’s a Libertarian in town, Jeff MacGillivray,  who usually talks to them and they love him because politically they agree with him. He knows things  about them I couldn’t begin to know. He’s also an outsider: a Ph.D. from MIT in physics. He has  gotten very close with them and appreciates them as much as I do; we talk about it, but he’s got a  different perspective. He’s a state representative now. He’s not in their church but they don’t care. I  think he has ambitions to go to Washington.  

He’s found a group of people in town who are in tune with him for very different reasons. But  he knows how to work that and he likes it here. We talk about the fact that these people are so  wholesome and this is a more satisfying lifestyle. He’s not going to leave, either. He’s going to stay  forever.  

It’s no coincidence these Finns come in and build a mall and have it done under budget in  lickety-split time. It’s the combination of intelligence and religion that’s done it. And I think if either  one were missing, you wouldn’t have such a special group of people.  

I started getting to know a bunch in the community when I went down to The 1808 House in  New Ipswich for breakfast and Walter would say something. I’d yell back and he’d move over near my  seat and we’d be talking back and forth, and the construction workers would move in and it was like  this forum. And these construction workers love this stuff. And you know why? Because the church gives them a purpose so that there’s something important to them rather than just TV or whatever than  just material things. They focus on the meaning of life The reason I really started to actually get close  to the Finns is that they viewed me as an anomaly. They thought I was convertible. I told them not to  waste their time. They didn’t scare me and I liked being with them..

[Next - You Were in Finn Country Here -  David Kangas]