In the 1860s, a farmhouse was built in Bränno, Malax. Elias Israelsson Udd lived there with Johanna Jonasdotter Ahlskog and their ten children. Elias and Johanna married in 1873, but according to the property register, the house was completed already in 1862, so who actually built the house is unclear.
Elias died in 1902 and Johanna in 1921, and in the census roll from 1923, their children Johannes, Maria, August, Viktor, Stina, and Anna owned the farm.
In 1920, the Surname Act came into force in Finland, making it mandatory to have a fixed, hereditary surname. Elias Udd's children changed their name from Udd to Uddes. At that time, there were several farms nearby that housed people with the surname Udd.
Image: Elias's father, Israel Israelsson Udd's house mark.
Six (or seven, it's a bit unclear) of the children reached adulthood, and in the 1950s, Anna, Stina, and Johannes Uddes lived on the farm, which was then popularly known as Eljasas. Johannes had been to America once, and his brother August had emigrated to Dollar Bay, Michigan, and lived there until his death.
Image: Fia, Stina (standing) and Anna (sitting). Probably in the 1930s.
Anna cared for her sisters who were sick and "weak", but in 1957, both Johanna Sofia (Fia) and Stina died, so Anna then traveled to America to visit her brother August, whom she had not seen in 58 years. Anna stayed in America for over a year.
Image: Newspaper clipping from Dollar Bay Gazette.
In the 1960s, Anna sold the farm and moved into an apartment in Vaasa. She still owned some of the outbuildings but sold them too in the 1970s. People who knew Anna have told us that she was a very pleasant person, attentive but quiet. She was always "dressed for holidays" and was good at needlework.
Image: Anna's signature in a book at Eljasas.
From the 1960s onwards, the farmhouse served as a summer home for two different families, but from the 1980s, it was no longer actively used.
Anna died on July 2, 1979, a few days before her 87th birthday, and with her, the Uddes lineage also died out, as none of the siblings had their own children to take over the farm.
Image: Anna's grave is at Malax church.
The farm received museum protection in August 2024. According to the given statement, the Ostrobothnian Museum considers the buildings on the site to form a valuable ensemble and to be an important part of the cultural environment, both as individual buildings and as a whole.
At the end of July 2025, the Högväg-Lindholm family buys the farm and begins a renovation journey to give Eljasas new life.
Image: July 30, 2025, the new and happy owners of Eljasas: Jenny, Leia, Lennart, and Jocke.