The front page of the Wednesday, March 13, 1940 edition of the Obituary was dominated by the Moscow Peace Treaty which ended the war between Finland and Russia. This was also known as the Winter War. Finland would go on to declare war on the Soviet Union again on June 25, 1941.
Also being reported was the death of William Olson. Olson was the pioneer of Niagara (ND) township.
PUBLISHED ON MARCH 13, 1940
William Olson, Pioneer, Dies
McCANNA, N. D.—William Olson, 81, pioneer of Niagara township, died Saturday night (March 9, 1940) at the Andrew Nusviken farm near McCanna where he had made his home for the last 25 years.
Funeral services will be held Wednesday at 2 P. M. in the Niagara Congregational church with Rev. Mr. Davis of Michigan officiating. Burial will be in the Niagara cemetery.
Mr. Olson was born in Sweden and came to the United States in 1881, homesteading in Niagara township in 1882. He farmed there for many years, lived 10 years in Minneapolis and then returned to McCanna where he resided since.
He was never married. Survivors are his brother, O. Albin Olson, and Mrs. Andrew Nusviken of McCanna and Mrs. Christine Smith of Crary.
Vital Territory Ceded to Soviet In Peace Treaty
MOSCOW — (AP story as published by the Obituary on Wednesday, March 13, 1940) — Soviet Russia early today announced officially the signing of a peace treaty with Finland which wrests as the spoils of three and a half months of invasion Finland’s defense bastions on Baltic and Arctic seas and makes part of the vast territory of the U.S.S.R. the whole fortified Karelian isthmus, where uncounted Russian and Finnish dead lie beneath the trampled snows.
The treaty must be ratified within three days.
Finland gets peace—a yearly rental of 8,000,000 Finnish marks ($120,000) in return for a 30-year lease on her Hanko “Gibraltar” at the mouth of the Gulf of Finland and evacuation of the Petsamo Arctic district by Soviet troops.
HOSTILITIES CEASE EARLY TODAY
The treaty was announced in the form of an official communique.
Hostilities will cease at noon (3 A. M. CST) today (Wednesday).
The peace treaty was signed by Premier-Foreign Commissar Vyacheslaff Molotoff, A. A. Zhvanoff, secretary of the central executive committee of the Communist party; Brigade Commander Vasileffsky for the Russians; and Premier Risto Ryti, Juho Paasikivi, General Karl Rudolf Walden, and Vaino Voinmaa for Finland.
RUSS RAIL LINE TO SPLIT FINLAND
She gives up:
- The entire Karelian isthmus and its Soviet-penetrated Mannerheim line.
- The shell-wrecked city of Viipuri, once Finland’s third metropolis, and the islands in its bay.
- All the shores of Lake Ladoga, largest in Europe, and three towns. Both on the lake’s western isthmus shore and on its northern coasts thousands of Russian troops have been slain.
- Hanko, naval base on the southwest, and the surrounding peninsula, on a 30-year lease. This area will form Soviet naval-military bases.
- Part of the Sredni and Rybachi peninsulas in the far north, on the Arctic ocean.
- Certain islands in the gulf of Finland.
- A great slice of northeastern Finland, including Kuolajarvi.
- A railroad, to be built during 1940, which will link the White Sea within northern Russia to the gulf of Bothnia, west of Finland, the railway bisecting Finland above her narrow waistline.
- Free transit for Russian goods across the Petsamo Arctic area from Russia to Norway, duty free.
- The right to maintain any Finnish warships, submarines or warplanes in its Arctic waters, with the exception of small coast guard vessels.
WEATHER FORECAST FOR MARCH 13, 1940
https://www.tkqlhce.com/click-101319427-11570746?url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/
1132828913
/?xid=6948
Obituary front page from March 13, 1940.
Our newsroom occasionally reports stories under a byline of “staff.” Often, the “staff” byline is used when rewriting basic news briefs that originate from official sources, such as a city press release about a road closure, and which require little or no reporting. At times, this byline is used when a news story includes numerous authors or when the story is formed by aggregating previously reported news from various sources. If outside sources are used, it is noted within the story.