Tsar’s permission for marriage

It is generally thought that the first deaf people to marry in Finland were Carl Oscar Malm’s pupils Fritz Hirn and Maria Klingenberg. After finishing school, Fritz worked as a cartographer at a land survey office in Helsinki and later he founded a successful photography studio in the city. Fritz came to know Maria’s mother in the mid-1850s and the young couple met when Fritz worked as Maria’s tutor. It is likely that Fritz and Maria soon found many things they had in common, such as artistic talent. Maria also became a successful studio photographer later.

In June 1863, their former teacher Carl Oscar Malm died suddenly and the Turku school for the deaf needed a new teacher. The school’s head, Carl Henrik Alopaeus, talked Fritz into becoming a deaf educator, and in October 1863 Fritz accepted the challenging role of teacher. Before the move to Turku, they celebrated their wedding.

Fritz and Maria were married in Helsinki on 27 September 1863. The event aroused interest in Helsinki and the wedding was attended by notables, such as Johan Vilhelm Snellman and Elias Lönnrot. The couple had needed permission from the tsar to marry, and the wedding ceremony was officiated by minister Achilles Sirén, who was a brother of Stén Sirén, Malm’s pupil. Fritz would often talk about the ceremony, which lasted for two hours. This was because the ceremony was performed with the manual alphabet.

Click on the links to read Maria Klingenberg’s and Fritz Hirn’s stories

Of Malm’s students, at least ten married another deaf person after leaving school. Information on the early marriages between deaf people can occasionally be found in old newspapers. In 1879, the Borgå Bladet newspaper listed six marriages between deaf couples. In addition, nine marriages where a deaf man married a hearing woman were mentioned. Most of these couples were married by minister Alopaeus, head of the Turku school. The writer of the announcement also regarded it as important to explain that most of the couples had hearing children.

The best-known of these couples were the Eklunds. Lorentz Eklund (1846–1892) and Elise Wicklund (1849–1915) married on 12 July 1873. Similarly to the Hirns, they needed the tsar’s permission to marry. Lorentz forged a long career as a teacher at Pietarsaari’s school for the deaf. Elise worked as a milliner after finishing school. The Eklunds had six hearing children for whom sign language was their mother tongue. The Eklund’s daughter, Elma, described the status of sign language in the family by saying that for them sign language was the actual language and spoken language was only used with the kitchen help.