Määttälä ironworks

Lestintie Toholampi

Iron was manufactured on the Määttälä farm already in the late 1500s, and iron-manufacturing skills have been passed from one generation to the next in the family. In the 1600s, iron products were delivered from Määttälä to other parishes as well. At some point, an uncommonly large bloomery was built at Määttälä: its height was about a metre and the area of its hearth 50 cm x 60 cm. The bellows and sledgehammer were used with waterpower received from the adjacent heavily flowing brook. The centre stake, rotated by a waterwheel, extended from the rapids to the smithy. The sledgehammer weighed almost 50 kilos. Tools, mill axes, anchors, and nails were forged from relatively high-quality and durable iron.

The last owner of the Määttälä ironworks was Mikko Juhonpoika Määttälä, also known as Rauta-Mikko (1751–1822). As a recognised expert, he also worked in Southern Ostrobothnia, building bloomeries and teaching iron-manufacturing methods. In addition to iron, he sold boards and timber, as well as tar burned in his tar-burning pits, from his mill. Towards the end of the 1700s, Määttälä was one of the wealthiest houses in the parish. When Rauta-Mikko died, the operation of the ironworks had already slowed down. Near the Määttälä ironworks, a blacksmith memorial by Lasse Minkkinen was erected in summer 1993. This memorial gives an idea of what old bloomeries looked like.