Home > Oskari Tokoi

Tokoi was born in 1873 in Kannus in southern Ostrobothnia. In 1891 he moved to America where he worked as a miner and got involved in labour unions. He returned to Finland in 1900 and worked as a farmer and a merchant.

In 1905 Tokoi was elected the chairman of the workers association of Kannus. In 1907 he was elected to the Eduskunta as a representative for the Social Democrats. He was well liked by the other members of his party which resulted in him being elected speaker of the Eduskunta in 1913. In 1917 he was elected to head the Senate of Finland.

During the Finnish Civil WarThe Finnish Civil War was fought from January to May 1918, between the "Reds" punaiset Communists together with Social Democrats, and the "Whites" valkoiset forces of the Conservative Senate intending to maintain status quo (retained independence and cons Tokoi sided with the reds and worked as "comissar in charge of provisions". After the war he fled to RussiaThe Russian Federation ( Russian: , transliteration: Rossiyskaya Federatsiya or Rossijskaja Federacija , or Russia (Russian: , transliteration: Rossiya or Rossija , is a country that stretches over a vast expanse of eastern Europe and northern Asia. With. Between 1919Events January January 1 Edsel Ford succeeds his father as head of the Ford Motor Company January 5 Spartacist uprising Socialist demonstrations in Berlin turn into attempted communist revolution with Spartacist League in the forefront January 9 Spartacus and 19201920 is a leap year starting on Thursday (link will take you to calendar) Events January January 7 Forces of Russian White admiral Kolchak surrender in Krasnoyarsk. January 9 Britain announces it will build 100,000 homes for war veterans. January 10 Leagu, he worked as a political advisor for the Murmansk Legion which was organised by the british to fight the bolshevikA Bolshevik ("", derived from Russian word loosely translated as "majority") was a member of a faction of Bolsheviks of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (RSDLP) led by Vladimir Lenin. The other faction was known as the Mensheviks, derived from "ms. Because of the war, Tokoi couldn't return to Finland and was forced to flee, first to Canada and later in 1921 to the United States. Here he became an editor at the newspaper "Raivaaja".

In 1944Events World War II January January 4 The Battle of Monte Cassino begins. January 5 Murder of Danish playwright Kaj Munck January 17 British forces, in Italy, cross the Garigliano River. January 20 The Royal Air Force drops 2,300 tons of bombs on Berlin; the Finnish Eduskunta made the so called "Lex Tokoi", by which Tokoi was released from all charges of treachery. After World War IIWorld War II was the most extensive and costly armed conflict in the history of the world, involving the great majority of the world's nations, being fought simultaneously in several major theatres, and costing tens of millions of lives. The war was fough he organised help for Finland among the finnish-americans. He visited Finland in 1957 for the 50-year celebration of the Eduskunta. He died in 1963 in the United States.