The Pehr Jacobsen (Tijberi) Tiberg Family

The Family of Pehr Jacobsen (Tijberi) Tiberg and His Wife (the Birth Family of the Editor's Maternal Grandmother's Father), Palovaara (Korpikylä), Lappi Province, Finland;
Kåfjord, Finnmark County, Norway. Pehr Jacobsen Tiberg was the paternal grandfather of the editor's maternal grandmother. The editor's grandmother (Emma Kristine) told him that Pehr's wife gave birth to seven children. They were named Jacob, Pehr, Eva, Isak, Maria, Magdelina and Adolf, and they were born in that order. Emma said Pehr's wife died when Isak, her father, was nine.

The December 31, 1865, census for Vadsø, Norway, reports: Isak Tiberg (M. No. 14 i indre Kvønby) was age 37, and he was born in Finland; Adolf Tiberg (M. No. 5 i indre Kvønby) was age 28, and he was born in Finland. In other words, the report indicates Isak was born in 1828, Adolf was born in 1837, and that their mother died in 1837 when Isak was nine.

The record of 25-year-old Isak Pehrsen Tiberg's June 24, 1853, wedding in Vadsø, Norway, reports he was born in Karungi [sic].

In searching the HisKi project database on the Internet Webbsite www.genealogia.org, the editor found residing in Karunki parish, Finland, a father named Pehr with a son named Isak, who was born in 1858. A christening record reports that Pehr Palovaara (of Korpikylä village; married to Eva 42) was the father of Isak (born July 2, 1828). The editor believes that this is the christening record of Isak Pehrsen Tiberg (the son of Pehr Jacobsen Tiberg) whose wedding record is referenced above. The editor further believes that the above Pehr Palovaara was the same person as the Pehr Jacobsen Palovaara (of Korpikylä village; married to Ewa Pehrsdatter 36) who was the father of Maria (born June 17, 1825). And, in addition, the editor believes he was the same person as the Pehr Jacobsen Tijberi (of Korpikylä village; married to Ewa 32) who was the father of Eva (born March 9, 1823).

The editor's grandmother's memory apparently was incorrect regarding the order of Isak's and Maria's births: Maria was born about three years before Isak.

It seems that Pehr Jacobsen Tiberg's wife, Ewa Pehrsdatter, was born sometime around the year 1790, and at the time of her death, in 1837, she would have been approximately 47. She probably gave birth to Jacob and Pehr sometime prior to 1821, because their names do not appear in the Karunki parish database. Also, the editor was unable to find in the database the names of Magdelina and Adolf. Perhaps the family changed their residence after the birth of Isak.

The Finns Move into Finnmark County, Norway. "During the first half of the nineteenth century," Wasastjerna says, "the Finns continued to move into... [Norway's Finnmark County, which] had become the promised land, where no one had to live in misery: the people of the Muonio and Kemi river regions had been unable to resist the lure of Norway, and the advice Go, lad, to [Finnmark]! had not fallen on deaf ears. In the years from 1825 to 1865 the number of Finns there grew from 780 to 5,862."

A Norwegian language historical account says, in 1833, Juha Tiberg (PehrJacobsen Tiberg's brother) arrived in Vadsø, Norway, via Kåfjord. He was a merchant, and he reportedly grew wealthy there.

The Pehr Jacobsen Tiberg Family
Emigrates to Kåfjord, Finnmark County, Norway. After the death of Ewa Pehrsdatter in 1937, Pehr Jacobsen emigrated with his children from Finland to Kåfjord, Norway, where Emma Kristine said he went to work in a copper mine. The editor believes the family arrived there in 1840, when Isak Pehrsen was 12-years-old.

Wasastjerna says, "...Kåfjord was... a gloomy place, hemmed in by mountains, to which a copper mine opened by the English had lured hundreds of Finns: 439 of them are said to have been living there in 1855. In this desolate region the work was hard and exhausting..."

"The Finns in East Tromso and western Finnmark seem to have been reasonably satisfied with their lot," says Wasastjerna, "but those in eastern Finnmark were disappointed: [Hammerfest and Vardo-Vadsø was] a bare, mountainous desert where even grass and shrubs did not grow."

Isak Pehrsen Tiberg Goes to Vadsø. Emma Kristine told the editor that Isak Pehrsen Tiberg left his father's home in Kåfjord, at age 15, to work in his Uncle Juha's general store in Vadsø. A history of Norway's Finnmark County indicates Juha Tiberg was a wealthy merchant, and Emma said, Isak lived in Juha's big house until his marriage.

Traveling Along Norway's Arctic Coast. Traveling east via automobile along Norway's Arctic coast from Lakselv on Porsangerfjord

towards Vadsø on Varangerfjord on July 7, 1950, (in her book The Northern Light) Mary Mickelsen observed: "For miles along the strip of bumpy land, between the highroad and the fjords, stretched the drying mended nets with little lead weights and racks upon racks of drying codfish.

"The misty, neurotic clouds, hovering about the mountain peaks kept pace with us all day as we crept along on roads more like dried creek beds.

"The foothills exuded blankets of Arctic cotton grass and the yellow globeflower, a riot of white and yellow." She said, "The car plunged down on hollow wooden bridges spanning crystal-clear flowing brooks...

"Perpetual snow capped the mountains, and the melting snows formed streams, dashing down impetuously through rocky gorges. These cascades were numerous," she observed. "Where flat land is scarce, timbered mountainsides are scattered with vertical pastures and occasional perpendicular patches of garden produce.

"Sod huts thatched with straw or sod, the grass and daisies growing on the roofs, crop up along the slopes of the fjords...

"The long fjords, penetrate great distances inland and send off numerous branching arms with seldom, if ever, a bridge. It takes forever to circumnavigate one of these long fingers." She remarked, "The mountain scenery about Tanafjord is superb.

The Village of Vadsø
"...we drove," Mary said, "into the little coastal fishing village of Vadsø, Andrew's... birthplace, cradled in the arms of Varangerfjord.

"...I should have been proud to call it my birthplace, so serene and peaceful it lay. Against a slight mountain slope, its fishing smacks moored to the pier in the harbor, the quiet town lay, its narrow streets, one below the other, terraced downward to the narrow harbor...

"We ambled to the waterfront, where the tide was low. The old part of Vadsø still stood, its sagging houses hugging the narrow gravel streets..."

In describing his arrival at Vadsø by boat from across Varangerfjord, in March 1914, Frank Hedges Butler says in his book, Through Lapland With Skis & Reindeer, "...it was pleasant to see the steep cliffs running down to the salt water and to hear the seagulls again welcoming us.

"At Vadsø," Butler claims, "I felt at home. I had been there twice before in the winter; in fact, it was here that for the first time I tried reindeer driving. The slopes all round are well suited for the sport, and many of the merchants keep reindeer to make up parties and drive to bungalows outside the town."