Founding mother

An Interview with One of our Founders: Ulla Lipsanen.

On Easter Monday our board received the most extraordinary message on Instagram: The grandchild of one of our founders contacted us and asked if we would be interested in doing an interview. The board of course relayed this message over to our Baccanalia-team, who immediately went on to set the time for an interview. I had the honor of interviewing one of our founders, 90year-old Ulla Lipsanen. I went to meet her and I got to hear all about how our organization came to be. The interview was conducted in Finnish and has been translated by the author

Ulla Lipsanen, née Ahtimo began her studies at the University of Turku in 1957 in the Department of English She had always been interested in languages but got especially interested in English after attending a correspondence course called “English by the Nature Method”

Lipsanen remembers from the department a professor Biese, who read her laudatur seminar thesis, and his assistant Master of Arts Inna Koskenniemi Lipsanen graduated as the Bachelor of Arts in English in 1961 Back then lectures were either in Finnish or English, and were always interpreted to either Finnish or English “One time the interpreter of a lecture got sick and they needed another interpreter I was so excited I immediately raised my hand to do it”, Lipsanen laughs

The organization was originally founded in order to help organize different guest lectures for everyone interested in the English language. The organization worked together with the Finnish-American society to organize the lectures. Lipsanen remembers a specific lecturer from Spain: “There was a dance being organized and he had excitedly prepared one Finnish phrase to tell his dance partner: ‘sinä olet jumalainen’. Unfortunately as a Spanish speaker he had not quite grasped the Finnish ‘j’, and got a smack from his dance partner”, Lipsanen laughs. “He was so confused and wondered what was wrong with these Finnish women.”

Lipsanen revealed that most of the founders were women. There had been one boy she tells, who unfortunately passed away very early on.

“I think there were around 6 to 8 of us students, who decided to form this organization to help us widen our knowledge of the language with these guest lectures. The name Anglica came to us as a latin-sounding name that just felt right for the organization.”

Our signature colors came to us much later on, after Lipsanen had graduated, and in the early days of our organization, the name was all there was. When asked about the boards of her time or events that were organized, she laughs saying:

“We were not that organized back then. We were just a group of people who had the motivation and the spark to organize these guest lectures. I remember being a part of it but it was just for fun.”

Lipsanen in the end was surprised to hear about how large the organization had become.

“When I moved back to Turku, I was surprised to hear that Anglica was still alive and breathing.” She laughs.

I showed Lipsanen several photos from Anglican events and the 65th anniversary party, and told her about the events that we organize these days and what we do. Lipsanen was happy to hear that the organization had reached such magnitude.

“It is truly great to see and I wish you all the best of luck!” she laughs.