Museum Masuuni Brunou is a museum about the industrial history of

Juankoski Juankoski is a former town and municipality of Finland. In March 2014, the Juankoski city council decided that the town would merge with Kuopio in the beginning of 2017. Juankoski is located in the province of Eastern Finland, part of the Northern ...

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

. The museum is situated in the old

blast furnace A blast furnace is a type of metallurgical furnace used for smelting to produce industrial metals, generally pig iron, but also others such as lead or copper. ''Blast'' refers to the combustion air being "forced" or supplied above atmospheric ...

building right beside the rapids (now dammed and diverted to produce

hydro electricity Hydroelectricity, or hydroelectric power, is electricity generated from hydropower (water power). Hydropower supplies one sixth of the world's electricity, almost 4500 TWh in 2020, which is more than all other renewable sources combined and ...

) and is in the centre of the old foundry milieu. The Juankoski Heritage Society was founded in 1990 to safeguard the cultural and historical heritage of the area. The Museum was opened by the society in 1991 and has displays relating to products of the foundry, local history and the lives of local inhabitants. The museum's name 'Blast furnace Brunou' comes from building's original use and from the name of one of the founders of the foundry, Brynolf Brunou. The main entry hall contains displays about the development from peasant to iron worker as well as the development of the factory from an ironworks to a

cardboard Cardboard is a generic term for heavy paper-based products. The construction can range from a thick paper known as paperboard to corrugated fiberboard which is made of multiple plies of material. Natural cardboards can range from grey to light b ...

mill. The second floor contains products from the foundry. In other floors there is changing displays with different themes. The museum contains mainly products of the ironworks from the 1900s. The museum is open in the summer from June to August.

History

In the year 1746 commissioner Brynolf Brunou received permission from the authorities in

Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...

to create a foundry in the shore of Juckaisjoki river near

Kuopio Kuopio (, ) is a Finnish city and municipality located in the region of Northern Savonia. It has a population of , which makes it the most populous municipality in Finland. Along with Joensuu, Kuopio is one of the major urban, economic, and cult ...

. The foundry specialized in using lake and swamp ore. For the first hundred years the pastoral family Argillander and the noble family Tigerstedt tried to get Strömsdalsbruk to operate profitably. However it wasn't until the Russian Ponomarev family took over in the late 1800s that the factory became truly profitable and developed into one of the best maintained industrial centres in Finland. In the early 1900s the foundry was purchased by Baron Anton von Alftan. During this period iron smelting was discontinued with a groundwood plant being built on the opposite side of the river, followed a few years later by the beginning of cardboard production. This production was continued by Kymi concern in 1915. In the 1970s Juantehdas developed as a cardboard factory which was bought by Stromsdal Oy in 1988.2. Pihl, Marja-Sisko: Strömsdalsbruk eli Juantehdas, (Juankosken Kirjapaino, 2010) in Finnish Following the bankruptcy of Stromsdal in 2008 the factory has since been purchased by Premium Board Finland in 2011.

References

External links

* {{coord missing, Finland Museums in Finland Buildings and structures in North Savo Tourist attractions in North Savo Industry museums in Finland Museums established in 1991