While Irish eyes are smiling on St. Patrick's Day, many Finns are already celebrating St. Urho's Day.  The holiday was first celebrated in Minnesota on March 16th, which happens to be just before St. Patrick's Day.

It honors the legendary Urho, the patron saint of vineyard workers.  As the story goes, he saved the grape crop from a grasshopper infestation with his horrible breath as he yelled, "Heinäsirkka, heinäsirkka, mene täältä hiiteen!"  (Grasshopper, grasshopper, go away!)

Social Explorer has data throughout the years on a multitude of ancestries, including the Finnish.

• Soon after the first St. Urho's Day was celebrated, the 1960 census reported that there were 240,827 people in the US born in Finland, representing 0.1 percent of the total population.
• Over 15 percent of them resided in Minnesota, where St. Urho celebrations first originated.
• According to the 2010 American Community Survey, there are now 647,697 residents of Finnish ancestry, making up about 0.2 percent of the total population.

Some St. Urho's Day revelers dress up as grasshoppers and grapes to celebrate.  Social Explorer makes its data festive with purples and greens in the map below.  As you can see, Finns are especially concentrated in northern Minnesota and Wisconsin.  Explore the map to see where you should plan your next St. Urho's Day outing, or if you are a grasshopper, where to avoid.

Map of Finnish Residents in the US (2006-10 Census)

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Happy St. Urho's Day!