We Love Log Cabins. And Frank Eld

2/1/2019

Frank Eld and Finnish Log Construction.
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FRANK ELD: People are interested in log cabins, they love log cabins.

We are fascinated with log cabins. Log cabins give us a sense of peace and being one with nature. They radiate feelings of coziness, warmth, simplicity and charm. Rustic is the trend today. Reclaimed timbers, weather worn logs and patina-ed antiques are the new vogue in interior home design. Just watch any show on HGTV. We want our homes to have that sense of warmth and olden days charm.

Log cabins are a national symbol of humble origins thanks to our 16th president. Abraham Lincoln was born in a one room log cabin in Kentucky. A replica of the cabin stands at the First Lincoln Memorial in Hodgenville, where many believe the original Lincoln cabin once stood. No one knows for certain what happened to the logs from the original home.

Lincoln Logs are rumored to be named after President Lincoln. However, it’s more a possibility they are named after their creator’s father. Lincoln logs were patented in 1920 by John Lloyd Wright, son of famous architect Frank Lloyd Wright, who’s birth name was Frank Lincoln Wright. How many of you played with this simple toy, stacking the logs perfectly together with no gaps in between the logs, imagining your own woodsy retreat to play in. Or maybe you imagined building a “toy house” on top of your pickup truck, like Frank Eld did.

FRANK ELD: It’s a great icebreaker. I meet tons of people.

Throughout the country are log cabins, small and humble, and log homes and lodges, large and luxurious. All equally beautiful and appealing.

Have you ever wondered who built the first log cabins in the United States?

FRANK ELD: We Finns can take credit for the log cabin coming to the new world. The Finns when they came in 1638 to the New Sweden Colony, along with the Swedes, but they brought the Finns along to do the work. The Finns came along and started building log buildings in New Sweden.

FRANK ELD (from presentation): A small vestige of these original log cabins still exist today.

The oldest log cabin still standing in the U.S. is the Finnish-made Nothnagle cabin in Gibbstown, New Jersey.

FRANK ELD: And then it was copied but very very loosely copied in a sense you know, stacking logs and whatever, but the Finns they have a way of doing theirs very unique.

FRANK ELD (from presentation): They used a technique of scribing and hewing so that the logs would fit tightly together, and they eliminated chinking. That’s Finnish log construction. There is no chinking.

I met Frank Eld in 2017 when he was searching my hometown area for Finnish log construction. I saw him again in 2018 at the Finnish-American Folk Fest in Naselle, Washington, and again at FinnFun Weekend in Troy, New Hampshire. Frank has been touring the Finnish-American festival circuit across the U.S. as Finlandia Foundation National’s Lecturer of the Year. His presentations are very visual, chock full of history, laughs and wood chopping.

FRANK ELD: Well I’m Frank Eld and I was born in Idaho, I was born in a Finnish community in central Idaho.

Wait, did he say Idaho?

FRANK ELD: Yeah there are Finns in Idaho! I’ve always been interested in history, ever since I was a young child or young adult and I restored an old pump organ that belonged to my mother’s oldest brother. And that started my passion, for all old things, and in combination with my family history, the Finnish history. And when I graduated college I came home and I bought the old general store in Rosebury. It was just an old abandoned building…And I started the Long Valley Preservation Society. And we started moving buildings before they were torn down. And then I started preserving Finnish buildings and we now have 8 Finnish log buildings there. So that’s when I really started getting into the preservation of Finnish history, Finnish culture, and then that’s when I realized Finnish log construction was different than traditional or American log construction, which there’s lots of log cabins in Idaho. Everybody builds a log cabin. So I had seen hundreds and hundreds of them and I realized these were different. And that’s when I started my research as well as doing the restoration.
But I said, when I retire I’m going to go to Minnesota, because everybody knows there’s Finns in Minnesota, that’s a given. So I’m going to Minnesota and I’m going to see if their Finnish log construction is the same as what I saw in Idaho and what I saw in Finland. And I went, and it was. So then I got real curious and I wondered if they did this everywhere. So I started the serious traveling through upper US and thorugh Canada, 5 years ago.

And since then Frank has been traveling in style.

FRANK ELD: I have traveled thousands and thousands of miles in the Finnebago! A lot of times you don’t know where you’re going to be, you don’t know where you’re going to stay and I knew of course I couldn’t afford the expense of going to hotels every night so I need a camper. And I looked into various different campers and I thought well one you pull isn’t very sensible because you have to drag something all the time. So I startred looking for a camper to fit a small pickup. Which they used to make but they don’t anymore. I had one month left and I hadn’t found a camper yet, and I had already made an appointment in Embarrass, Minnesota. So I’m thinking well, I’m going to have to make one. And when I make something I always go a little over the top!! One of the great features of having this is because I’m a stranger wherever I go, and a lot of times I’ll see a log building somewhere and I’ll pull off, and a lot of times the conversation starts with the Finnebago. And then I tell them who I am and what I’m doing and no one has ever said you cannot photograph and document my building. And they usually say ‘well there’s another one down the road you might want to go look at too’. And having “Finnebago’ on the front and “I’m Finn” on here, whenever there’s a Finn around we get to talking and so I meet a lot of people.

While I stayed in New England last fall I got the chance to ride around in the Finnebago, and it sure does turn heads and start conversations. If you see Frank’s Lincoln log toy house in your own travels, he doesn’t mind giving people the full tour, and letting people know it’s the Finns you can thank for our love of log cabins.

FRANK ELD: It’s quite comfortable, and it’s not as small as it seems, it’s pretty roomy in there…. It’s my little home away from home.

(Blog music credit: "Sakkijarven Polkka" Papu and Towhead)

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