Nelimark Sauna

The sauna was the most characteristic feature of the Finnish homestead, a place where family and friends shared what they considered the wellspring of life and health. For Finnish homesteaders, it was more than a bath house, serving also for washing and drying clothes, baking and cooking, butchering and smoking meat, and even as a spare bedroom for guests. It was typically the first building erected on the farmstead, where the family lived until the big house was built. The log sauna of Erick and Kristina Elizabeth Nelimark, built in the 1930s, was the largest sauna in the Embarrass community. It was a simple structure, easy to build with poplar or pine logs from the surrounding forests, and it had hand-hewn log walls joined at the corners with double-notch joints, known as ristinurkka or sahanurkka.

Minnesota · United States