Maxmo

The Maxmo parish covered an area of 148.06 Km2, of which one fourth was land.  The area is part of the Kvarken Archipelago.  “The Kvarken Archipelago is continuously rising from the sea at a rate among the highest in the world.  During the last 600 years, over a third of the land areas in Maxmo have risen from the sea.  This means over 20 acres of new land every year.” ³

This map of the Maxmo parish from 1938 displays on the HisKi project website, made available by the Genealogical Society of Finland.

A ‘preaching house’ was built in Maxmo between 1706 and 1708.  A bell tower was built next to the eastern gable of the preaching house in 1729-30.  The bell tower’s ground floor came to serve as an additional space for the longhouse.  With that additional space, in 1731, it was ‘declared a proper church’.  Towards the end of the 1700’s the church became crowded and an extension was considered. ⁴

By the early 1800’s funds had been collected to build a new church.  The old church was demolished in 1824 and the bell tower was rolled away to the current church location. ^{3, 5} Drawings for the Maxmo church were signed by officials, A.W. Arpee and A.F. Granstedt in 1822.  Construction of the new church began in spring of 1824 under the leadership to the church builder Keikki Kuoroski.  The church is a traditional wooden cross church.  It was dedicated in November of 1825.” ^{4, 5}

To see more of the Maxmo church, click here.

Maxmo Church.  This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.  Attribution: Santeri Viinamäki