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1934 - 1985 (Creation)
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Approximately 1.1 m of textual records; 20 audio cassettes; approximately 20 photographs.
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Name of creator
Biographical history
Toivo Pajala was born in 1903 in Vimpeli, Finland and educated at Western Bible College in Winnipeg. At age 19, Pajala migrated to Canada; by 1923, he migrated to Port Arthur, Ontario. Originally Pajala worked as a bushworker. Pajala is known as a preacher: first Laestadian and then Pentecostal. He was ordained in Toronto, in 1946. In 1949, Pajala married his wife, Sylvia.
In Port Arthur, Pajala served as the pastor of Saalem Finnish Pentecostal Church (1949-1963). By 1951, Pajala founded a Finnish-language Pentecostal radio program; it reached the rural areas of the Lakehead, including the camps of bushworkers. In 1936, Pajala migrated to Waukegan, Illinois; he worked as a pastor until retiring in 1967. Upon retirement, Pajala returned to Port Arthur. He remained active in the church until his passing in 1972.
- Lakehead University Archives. Tovio Pajala fonds. https://archives.lakeheadu.ca/index.php/rev-toivo-pajala-fonds
- Kahara, Tellervo, and Finnish Pentecostal Church Saalem. Kansanpappi, Toivo Pajala. Canadan Uutiset, 1985.
Custodial history
Scope and content
Records of Reverend Toivo Johannes Pajala (1903-1972), minister of Saalem Pentecostal Church.
Toivo Pajala was born Dec 31, 1903, in Vimpeli, Finland. His family was Lutheran, with some ties to the Pentecostal Church. Pajala migrated to Canada at age 19, and was in Port Arthur at least by 1923. For many years he made a living as a bushworker.
Religion became an important part of Pajala's life: he became Laestadian, then Pentecostal. He attended the Western Bible College in Winnipeg for two years, and then was ordained in 1946 in Toronto. He married his wife Sylvia in 1949 shortly before returning to Port Arthur.
From 1949 to 1963, Pajala was pastor of Saalem Finnish Pentecostal Church in Port Arthur. In 1951, he established a Finnish-language Pentecostal radio program on CKPR, particularly reaching bushworkers and others in rural areas, and people unable to leave their homes. He was also well known for supporting immigrants to the region, and providing funeral services when others would not.
Pajala spent 1963-1967 as a pastor in Waukegan, Illinois. After 1967, he officially retired, and returned to Port Arthur, where he was still active in the church. His death was in 1972.
Most of the records in this fonds relate to either Pajala's religious education in the 1940s (organized by class or by notebook) or the sermons he gave in Finnish or English, in Port Arthur and by radio (organized loosely by theme.)
The last few files of the fonds relate to a project after Pajala’s death: to interview those who knew him and memorialize him. The book “Kansanpappi Toivo Pajala,” written by Tellervo Kähärä and available in the Library, is a result of that work.
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English
Finnish
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No restrictions on access.
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Some material may be under copyright.
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- Pajala, Toivo (Subject)
- Western Bible College, Winnipeg (Subject)
- Saalem Pentecostal Church (Subject)