Sea Captain Janne’s Cabin

Janne Byström lived at sea for 38 years – for more than half of his life. He worked as a seaman for 15, a mate for 6 and a sea captain for 17 years.
Janne was interested in birds, and it is not an exaggeration to that he was both a sea captain and an ornithologist in one. The captain had bought bird cages and even some birds during his trips, but his favourite hobby was to catch birds that had flown onto the ship and add them to his “collection”. In his cabin, he had ceilings full of birds in cages: canaries, goldfinches, and other singing birds. He didn’t have a parrot, even though many had brought one home.

Seamen had a deep respect for Janne Byström both as a captain and as a human being. This was seen in the way that his ships were always very popular amongst the new recruits. He was seen as a good, reliable and careful sailor. Ship building and seafaring as an industry went down in Raahe at the end of the 1890s, and the biggest factor was the so-called composite ships’ new era, and the merchants in Raahe didn’t want to start investing in the new technology.
So, the 57-year-old sea captain became unemployed in the spring of 1895.

The Sea Captain’s Cabin is decorated as it was back in 1896 when Janne was already ashore and had left his stunning career as a sea captain behind him, with the captain’s portrait on the wall and many beautiful birds in the room as memories of his seafaring times. In this “cabin”, Janne spent his retirement years, looking back to the birds flying free in the sky and the stormy nights at sea.