The story
Archaeological excavations revealed that the vikings used to travel to the archipelago in the 9th century.
Klaus Fleming was born at his family's holdings in Qvidjan, around 1535. He would become one of Swedens then strongest military strongmen and participate in the Cudgel War.
Karin Thomasdotter (1610–1697), who served as vogt in Pargas for over forty years, was one of the longest serving vogts, and also one of only two females to have the position in contemporary Finland.
In 1808 Battle of Rimito Kramp were fought just north of Pargas.
Partek Oyj Abp were founded in Pargas to build up the limestone industry, founded in 1898 with the company being sold to Kone in 2001.
Nagu were a site of battle in 1918 during the Finnish Civil War.
Population history
Population in Pargas from 1749 to 1845 ("Women, Men, Children, & Nobles") as gathered by Sven Gabriel Elmgren.
1749: 2872 persons
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1760: 3069
1772: 3236
1780: 3129
1790: 3211
1800: 3589
1810: 3529
1820: 3420
1830: 3797
1840: 4263
1845: 4340
Recent history
On 1 January 2009, Pargas, Nagu, Korpo, Houtskär and Iniö merged to form the new municipality of Väståboland (Finnish: Länsi-Turunmaa).
Name dispute
Shortly after the merge, people started debating if the Väståboland name was the right name for the merged municipality; those arguing against the Väståboland name proposed Pargas as a 'new' name. The former municipalities could not agree on a new name, and Pargas insisted on a change, so the state had to step in and decided that the name would be Väståboland. The debates became heated and a referendum was arranged to decide what name the municipality should have in May 2011. The result of the referendum showed that 57.7% of the voters supported Pargas and 40.1% of voters supported Väståboland. Though the overall majority supported changing the name, there was an overwhelming support for the name Väståboland in 4 out of 5 of the former municipalities. In Iniö, only 1 voter out of 173 total voted for Pargas, in all four, 62 out of 2,060, while in Pargas proper, 74.5% voted for Pargas.
The municipality council (Swedish: "Fullmäktige") decided on 14 June 2011 in favour of the majority population and decided to rename the municipality Pargas on 1 January 2012. The Council considered taking this issue up again for debate and vote. The council made a re-vote on 6 September 2011 with 25 votes for Pargas, 17 for Väståboland and 1 blank vote.
Merge with Kimitoön
The possibility of merging with Kimitoön to form a single municipality that would include the entire Åboland archipelago has been discussed since 2007, with interest being reignited by the healthcare reforms during the Sipilä Cabinet.
From Wikipedia’s article on Pargas, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.5