FARM TO PALACE

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 424, 4 May 1937, Page 3

FARM TO PALACE

Finland’s First Lady Helsingfors (Finland), April 15. Finland’s first lady, Mrs Kaisa Kallio, has made the transition from farmhouse to palace, but she wonders it it can be true. To-day, wearing silk in place of calico, she lives in the president’s palace, with its wide, blue-carpeted stairways, its servants in livery, its gilt, its plush and its dignity. To Kyosti Kallio, the President of Finland, the transition from farm to leadership of the nation was not so abrupt. Son of a peasant and a successful farmer, he had been in politics most of his life. He has held several Cabinet positions, including that of Prime Minister. Mrs Kallio, however, has remained on the farm, managing it profitably while her husband worked at politics in Helsinfors. She confesses that the change frightens her a little. She is a small, pleasant woman, very friendly; but in her At first news of her husband’s election, Mrs Kallio announced that she eyes there is a suggestion of sadness, would not live at the palace; that she would remain on the farm while her husband carried on the duties of his new post. She changed her mind.