Famous people on Finland's street names

Kyösti Kallio

29 Kyösti Kallio was a Finnish politician who served as the fourth president of Finland from 1937 to 1940. His presidency included leading the country through the Winter War; while he relinquished the post of commander-in-chief to Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim, he played a role as a spiritual leader. After the war, he became both the first President of Finland to resign and the only one to die in office, dying of a heart attack while returning home after submitting his resignation.

Aleksis Kivi

12 Aleksis Kivi was a Finnish writer who wrote the first significant novel in the Finnish language, Seitsemän veljestä, published in 1870. He is also known for his 1864 play, Nummisuutarit. Although Kivi was among the very earliest writers of prose and lyrics in Finnish, he is still considered one of the greatest.

Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim

10 Baron Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim was a Finnish military commander, aristocrat, and statesman. He served as the military leader of the Whites in the Finnish Civil War (1918), as Regent of Finland (1918–1919), as commander-in-chief of the Finnish Defence Forces during the period of World War II (1939–1945), and as the sixth president of Finland (1944–1946). He became Finland's only field marshal in 1933 and was appointed honorary Marshal of Finland in 1942.

Ilmari Juutilainen

9 Eino Ilmari "Illu" Juutilainen was a fighter pilot of the Ilmavoimat, and the top scoring non-German fighter pilot of all time. The top flying ace of the Finnish Air Force, he led all Finnish pilots in score against Soviet aircraft in World War II, with 94 confirmed aerial combat victories in 437 sorties. He achieved 34 of his victories while flying the Brewster Buffalo fighter.

Armi Kuusela

9 Armi Helena Kuusela is a Finnish-American charity worker, model and beauty queen. In 1952, she won the Finnish national beauty contest Suomen Neito and was presented with a trip to the United States to participate in the first-ever Miss Universe pageant, becoming its first title-holder.

Jean Sibelius

8 Jean Sibelius was a Finnish composer of the late Romantic and early-modern periods. He is widely regarded as his country's greatest composer, and his music is often credited with having helped Finland develop a stronger national identity when his country was struggling from several attempts at Russification in the late 19th century.

Johan Ludvig Runeberg

6 Johan Ludvig Runeberg was a Finnish priest, lyric and epic poet. He wrote exclusively in Swedish. He is considered a national poet of Finland. He is the author of the lyrics to Vårt land which became an unofficial Finnish national anthem. Runeberg was also involved in the modernization of the Finnish Lutheran hymnal and produced many texts for the new edition.

Juho Kusti Paasikivi

5 Juho Kusti Paasikivi was a Finnish politician who served as the seventh president of Finland from 1946 to 1956. Representing the Finnish Party until its dissolution in 1918 and then the National Coalition Party, he previously served as senator, member of parliament, envoy to Stockholm (1936–1939) and Moscow (1940–1941), and Prime Minister of Finland. He also held several other positions of trust, and was an influential figure in Finnish economics and politics for over fifty years.

Alvar Aalto

3 Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto was a Finnish architect and designer. His work includes architecture, furniture, textiles and glassware, as well as sculptures and paintings. He never regarded himself as an artist, seeing painting and sculpture as "branches of the tree whose trunk is architecture." Aalto's early career ran in parallel with the rapid economic growth and industrialization of Finland during the first half of the 20th century. Many of his clients were industrialists, among them the Ahlström-Gullichsen family, who became his patrons. The span of his career, from the 1920s to the 1970s, is reflected in the styles of his work, ranging from Nordic Classicism of the early work, to a rational International Style Modernism during the 1930s to a more organic modernist style from the 1940s onwards.

Minna Canth

3 Minna Canth was a Finnish writer and social activist. Canth began to write while managing her family draper's shop and living as a widow raising seven children. Her work addresses issues of women's rights, particularly in the context of a prevailing culture she considered antithetical to permitting expression and realization of women's aspirations. The Worker's Wife and The Pastor's Family are her best known plays, but the play Anna Liisa is the most adapted to the films and operas. In her time, she became a controversial figure, due to the asynchrony between her ideas and those of her time, and in part due to her strong advocacy for her point of view.

10 unique persons spotted on 94 streets