Black and white photo of Hilda Käkikoski, a white woman with light hair pulled back, round glasses, and a grey dress with big puffy sleeves.
“My hikes were many and long. I gave at least 100 presentations. My spiritual people celebrated me and my opponents hated me. As I live, I will not forget this wonderful winter.”
– Hilda Käkikoski
One of the nineteen first women to be elected into the Finnish parliament, and a lesbian with multiple relationships with women, Hilda Käkikoski was a groundbreaker in many ways. Working for equal pay for women, improving education, and free food for children at school she can easily be mistaken for a progressive politician, but that was not the case. Anti-sex worker, very religious, and a part conservative party of Finland, Käkikoski was not what one might automatically think of when they hear of a lesbian, feminist, activist.
Born on the 31st, of January 1864 Käkikoski’s father died when she was quite young, and when her mother remarried she married a man who didn’t support girls receiving an education. Growing up Käkikoski did not fit into this worldview, singled out as a smart ambitious child she received a scholarship and moved to Helinski at age 14. Going to a private all-girls school, Käkikoski was able to flourish, dressing the way she wanted, cutting her hair short, and exploring her sexuality.
She went on to study Finnish and Nordic history in university and earn a Ph.D., tutoring her way through school and becoming a teacher. Along with being a teacher, she was also a vegetarian, gymnast, cyclist, and writer.
Her interest in writing would develop beside her interest in women’s suffrage, with Finland just on the cusp of not only allowing women to vote but to be voted for, she would write about feminism in the Finnish Women’s Association’s magazine something she was also a member and vice president of.
Along with nineteen other women, in 1907 she was elected into parliament, with her representing the Finnish Party, changing the shape of Finnish politics.
““Personally, I for one, am happy that I got to be involved in the first election campaign”
She took her political career deadly seriously, both before being elected and after. She was known as an especially diligent worker, studying the minutes of meetings. Working on women’s rights, improving the Finnish educational system, and speaking out as a moralistic and anti-sex worker politician who believed in chastity above all else.
It is clear that, that her politics were a mixed bag. The feminist movement at the time was largely based on the idea that women were more naturally morally pure than men, a popular idea in Europe at the time. She seemed to believe this, and because of this was particularly harsh and judgemental of other women, specifically women that were not following her own internal rules on sexual expression.
This applied to her own sexual expression, which she seemed to have firm and hard rules on. This is not in and of itself is a problem, far from it, but becomes a problem because she believed these rules to be universally applicable.
She was in a relationship with activist Fanny Pajula, and the two lived together for six years when Pajula died. Later she would have relationships with Hildi Ennola, Frances Weiss, Hanna Masalin, and Helmi Kivalo, all at the same time, though it is hard to find if this situation was an agreed upon by all participants.
In her political life, though she was incredibly popular in her constituency, she was unable to run for reelection after her first term because of her declining health, she described the situation saying:
"Personally, I for one, am happy that I got to be involved in the first election campaign, to be included in a large spring of the nation's awakening, to be involved where the most decisive, the most dangerous battles were fought, self-ignite, the other to light, to get to forget physical infirmity and feel, the spirit’s worth and control.”
Through her whole life, she deeply valued caring for children, and would write children's poems, songs, and short stories, and would write up until her death on 14 November 1912.
[Disclaimer: some of the sources may contain triggering material]
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