Around the turn of the 1980’s, the idea of establishing rest homes for elderly persons of the Finnish heritage began to gain popularity in Ontario. In 1981 it was announced that the first Finnish rest home in the province was to be built at Sault Ste.
Marie. This announcement attracted the attention of a number of Finns in the Sudbury area. While the matter was discussed informally at some of the meetings of the Sudbury Finnish Historical Society, the first serious step towards the construction of a rest home for Sudbury was made in the heat of a sauna by Oliver Korpela and Leo Raaska. In discussing this matter, Korpela stated to Raaska that if “you folks build the rest home, I will donate the land”. Raaska brought the idea to other Finnish- Canadians at a meeting held in St. Timothy’s Lutheran Church at Copper Cliff in the spring of 1982.
At this meeting it was agreed that a Finnish-Canadian seniors’ centre offering levels of care from self-contained apartments to chronic care facilities should be erected as soon as possible. To formalize this decision, a token dollar was collected from ten contributors in attendance at the time. These included Leo Raaska, Jussi Saari , Jussi Valiaho, Inkeri and Niilo Oinonen, Aino and Voitto Krats, Martli Raivio, Sigrid Kamppi and Aatto Onrnmaa. Little did these people realize that this token dollar would lead by 1992 to the development of a multi- purpose seniors’ facility valued in excess of $10 million dollars and an annual operating budget of approximately $2 million.