Place names are reminiscent of the era of the forest Sámi
Hunting, fishing and gathering have been prevalent in the Pyhä-Luosto area since the prehistoric era. For the forest Sámi people of the area, Pyhätunturi has been a sacred place, as its name suggests (literally: sacred fell). According to oral tradition, they have, e.g., visited the Uhriharju seita (holy place) to ask for good luck for hunting by bringing offerings, for example parts of a deer carcass. Pyhätunturi has been an important wild reindeer hunting ground and later a reindeer husbandry area.
Pagan sacrificial rituals were abandoned when the forest Sámi in the region were converted to Christianity between 1620 and 1680. The baptism sites of that period can still be identified by their names: Pyhänkasteenlampi (literally: pond of holy baptism) and Pyhänkasteenputous (literally: waterfall of holy baptism). The border between Lapland and Lanna, the Sámi area and the land settled by farmers, respectively, also passed by the Pyhätunturi fell.
Traces of logging culture
You can still see long tree stumps and winter roads in the Pyhätunturi area, signs of the logging culture and timber harvesting of the past. The forests south of Pyhätunturi were felled at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries by picking the forests’ largest trees in the winter. Horses were used to transport the timber along winter roads to the nearest timber floating route, and the timber was floated to River Kemijoki in the summer and then to the sawmills and factories in Kemi. Forestry was practised in the area until Pyhätunturi National Park was established in 1938.
There were large logging operations to the northeast of Luosto and Lampivaara especially in the 1920s and 1930s. Felled trees were transported to the banks of the River Kitinen to await summer, when they were floated down the river. The foundations of many loggers' cabins are still visible.
From tourism to national park
The recognisable profile of the Pyhätunturi fell became one of the symbols of Lapland in early 20th century. Despite the difficulty of travel, tourists arrived by boat or drawn by horses or reindeer and traversed the last section on foot or on skis. The construction of a road from Kemijärvi to Pelkosenniemi in the mid-1930s accelerated the growth of tourism, and in the 1960s, the first slopes and hotels were built in the Pyhätunturi ski resort. Tourists discovered the Luosto landscapes after the wars; the Yli-Luosto open wilderness hut built for them in 1949 is still used by hikers. The systematic development of tourism in the Luosto area began at the end of the 1960s.
Establishing a national park in the Pyhätunturi and Luosto areas was first proposed already in 1910. Initially, the plan was only partially implemented: a national park was established in the Pyhätunturi area in 1938. It was Finland’s first national park along with the Pallas-Ounastunturi National Park. The unified Pyhä-Luosto National Park was finally established in 2005 when sites included in the Luosto mire and old-growth forest conservation programme were incorporated in the Pyhätunturi National Park.