Lutheran Ministers

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Johanna Wahtola

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Andrew (Antti) Wahtola

I'm told that being a Lutheran minister is a family tradition on the Rauma side. Apparently, or so the story goes, they were originally Germans who went to Finland to convert the heathens of the truth of Martin Luther's teachings. They would move into a community, start a church, and then be the lay pastor of that church.

Whether that's true or not both of my father's grandfathers were Lutheran ministers. John Victor Rauma was a pastor in Fitchburg, Massachusetts and Andrew Wahtola was a pastor, also in Massachusetts, on Cape Cod, probably Barnstable.

Andrew (Antti) Wahtola came to America in 1909 thru New York City, almost certainly he came through Ellis Island as a 34 year-old tailor. Whether he worked as a tailor in Massachusetts, I cannot tell although his eldest daughter, Martha whom I knew, listed her occupation on her marriage certificate as a weaver. His destination was Fitchburg where there was a growing Finnish community. It was so Finnish that when my father was born 20 years later he didn't learn to speak English until he went to 1st grade, resulting in him taking 3 years to move on to 2nd grade.

When John Victor Rauma was born on October 17, 1866, his father, Karl, was 24 and his mother, Maria, was 22. He married Anna Elizabeth Oikemus on September 19, 1891, in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. They had seven children in 12 years. He died on August 5, 1930, in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, at the age of 63, and was buried there, a couple of blocks from my father's childhood home. My father's version of his death was that he was found dead in a wheelbarrow at the church he pastored. There is some confusion in the records however because his death certificate lists a gastrointestinal disorder as cause of death. My father always said he had a heart attack and fell down into the wheelbarrow while working on church grounds.
John Victor Rauma'







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