Once upon a medieval time, grasshoppers invaded the grape crop of Finland. A catastrophe of epic proportions appeared imminent. The call went out for Urho, he of the mighty mouth.
‘Tis told that as a boy, or poika in Finnish, one Urho became inebriated while indulging
feelia sour, sour milk and
kala mojakka, fish soup. Hardly surprisingly, Urho let out a series of bellows. So loud were these that, so the tale goes, he terrified all the
Rogs (frogs). Later, when grasshoppers threatened to demolish the Vitis vinifera vines, they fled in terror at the sound of Urho’s voice.
This allowed his wife Sinikka to cultivate the precious crop, said to have individual fruit as big as figs, until harvest time. Sinikka’s 12 children were the sent to pick them. After they had been sent to the sauna, stark naked and scrubbed clean, they were thrown into the giant grape barrel to stomp, jump and play all day. Thus, Urho became the patron saint of Finnish Vineyard Workers.
How do we know this? The story spread far and wide, even as faraway as a hamlet in the hinterlands of the north shore of Lake Superior. There stands at the crossroads of the community appropriately named Finland a tall wooden statue of a bearded Urho. His mouth is wide open, emitting a mighty roar in an early example of biocontrol.
Sneering minds challenge these stories. But it is a fact that in the spring of 1956, a scribe employed at Ketola’s Department Store in Virginia, Minnesota, one Richard Mattson was the first to set it down, pen to paper. So was enshrined the legend of St. Urho. Later Mattson aided Gene McCavic in an ‘Ode to St Urho.’
St. Urho’s Day is 16th March. It is then that many Finnish-American communities celebrate their legendary Patron Saint. Parades take place, contests are held and no minor amount of fermented beverage partaken. This, they say, leaves 17th March, St Patrick’s Day, for them to recover.
Why this day, late in winter and not grasshopper time in summer? Such facts of entomology did not interfere with the mythmakers. According to legend, Finland was a lot warmer back on the Dark Ages, warm enough for grapes to grow there – and hoppers to be busy in March. And, so the tale goes, the 16th was chosen so the Finns could drink all the whiskey before the Irish got to it.
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