Robbery Island

Robbery Island

Rånön is the largest island in the Töre archipelago and an old farming and fishing village dating back to the 16th century.

It was in the middle of the 17th century that Queen Kristina gave Rånön with its huge forests to the "mainland lords".

At the beginning of the 19th century, Rånön became a coal catchment forest for the mills in Töre, Vitåfors and Melderstein, and straight-grown furrows became mast material for government shipbuilding. You can still find remains of tar pits on the island for the production of tar that was used as an impregnation agent. There arose on a couple of occasions at the beginning of the 20th century disputes over logging rights on Rånön.

In that process, the state was the only counterparty, and everything happened completely over the heads of the islanders, despite their ancestry going back several hundred years. Today the island is owned by SCA and it has been completely depopulated since the 1960s. Before there were at most about 300 inhabitants on the island, a school (1867-1939), prayer house and a shop. The telephone came to the island in 1929. All the while they struggled with poor port conditions. At the end of the 1940s, the population had to choose between electricity or a new port. They chose the port, which is still a very well-functioning port today. Just a few years later came the big exodus and today the farms are summer cottages for private individuals. There is also a fishing camp with rental cabins.

Rånön is a very beautiful island. You can walk on the old village road past old buildings, hay barns and hayfields and follow the path from the village up towards the mountain which is 78 meters above sea level. From there you can look out over a wonderful archipelago of bays, straits, bays and islands.