Toivo Pylvänäinen (1894-1979) lived alone on a small island in the middle of the largest open body of water on the second largest lake in Finland for 45 years. Pylvänäinen worked as a foreman at a logging site in the 1930s when, rumor has it, he pulled a disappearing act after learning that he had got some secretary pregnant, going into full stealth mode immediately afterwards. He lived in a very modest cabin making a living by fishing and perfecting his lures. Even his relatives only got wind of his whereabouts after he had given a radio interview at the market square of the provincial capital 90 kms away in the 1970s.

Pylvänäinen and Lauri Rapala, the founder of Rapala corporation, a global market leader in lures, were friends and Rapala used to spend a lot of time at Pylvänäinen’s cabin drinking and perfecting lures with him. When Pylvänäinen got too old to make it at home, having burned himself when falling onto the stove in his sauna, he was taken to a nursing home. He is told have made a failed escape attempt where he first threw his boots out of an open window but failed to follow suit because of his frailty and very old age. Toivo Pylvänäinen’s life is a testament to the creative potential of a man going his own way.

Here’s the man himself in a film shot in 1976 visiting the island for the last time.