Kalevala
In TTL, the 19th century Finnish national movement and the Great Migration of Finns into Northern America converged in an unexpected way into an utopist movement based on the national epic of Finland, the Kalevala. The movement was opposed to industrialization and to the domination of Swedish and Russian interests in the Grand Duchy of Finland, with emigration seen as a solution to both problems. Blessed with a competent and business-savvy leadership, the movement struck a deal with the Colony of British Columbia and established a settlement on Vancouver Island. In 1870-1900 almost 50 000 settlers joined the movement, until Vancouver Island was almost completely Finnish-speaking and entirely self-governed by the movement within the Colony of British Columbia.
In 1900, the russification policy of Finland became even harsher than in OTL. The assassination of the Russian governor-general turned into a popular uprising, which was crushed with terrifying ruthlessness by the Russian army. This more than tripled the emigration via the Kalevala movement, as the Finns sought an escape from imprisonment, torture and murder at the hands of the occupying military. The Russian authorities looked the other way, as from their perspective the movement helped to rid them of the worst troublemakers. In the decade of 1900-1910, over 300 000 Finns escaped to North America, and most of them headed to Vancouver Island.
The Kalevala movement itself was a weird mix of traditionalism and modernism. Based on the Kalevala, the movement declared that there are three honorable fields of work: forestry (
metsämiehet), agriculture (
maamiehet) and fishing (
kalamiehet). However, the anti-industrialization stance of the movement had always been tempered by its business acumen, and soon enough sawmills, meat packing plants and shipyards arose in each of the fields. Still, the movement stuck to its strict egalitarianism and flat hierarchy, which was supported by its common culture and language and thus managed to create a strange but successful "movement-company-state".
Today, the OTL Vancouver Island is the Canadian province of Kalevala with nearly a million inhabitants. With over 80% of population Finnish-speaking, the sole official language of the province is Finnish (and Finnish is also a co-official language with English in the neighboring British Columbia, with over half a million Finnish speakers in the population on five million). The flag of Kalevala features the original symbol of the movement in the top left corner - a red shield with a golden threefold
hannunvaakuna. The symbol was based on the gold and red of Finnish coat of arms, but replacing the royal symbolism with Finnish folk-symbolism, its threefold form symbolizing the three honorable fields of work. The red and white of the flag hold similar meaning, with the three red stripes echoing the threefold symbol on the shield.