YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

Bought with the income
of the
WILLIAM C. EGLESTON FUND

THE CECHS
(BOHEMIANS)
IN AMERICA

AUGUSTINE HERRMAN
The first known Cech immigrant in America

THE CECHS
(BOHEMIANS)
IN AMERICA
A Study of their National, Cultural
Political, Social, Economic
and Religious Life
By THOMAS CAPEK
AUTHOR OF BOHEMIAN (cech) BIBLIOGRAPHY, ETC.
Illustrated

BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
(Cfre ftibeontu: jBttjtf Cambribge
1920

COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY THOMAS CAFBK
ALL KIGHTS RESERVED

INTRODUCTORY
THE subject of Germanic immigration has been
treated in all its aspects, in German and in
English alike. Literature relating to the settling of
the Scandinavians, notably Swedes, is considera
ble. The achievements of the Irish, the English, and
the Dutch have been recorded in detail by numer
ous writers. That the story of Spanish colonization
is adequately described goes without saying, for the
Spaniards, like the Dutch, the English, and in a
lesser degree the French, were history-makers on a
large scale. The large influx of Jews to the United
States within the last three decades has stimulated
scholars of the Hebrew race to study more inten
sively than ever before their past here.
What has been written on the theme of Cech im
migration? In English very little. Emily Greene
Balch's volume, Our Slavic Fellow Citizens, dis
cusses not Cechs alone, but all the Slavs; besides,
Miss Balch devotes the greater portion of her book
to the consideration of her favorite subject, econ
omy. My volume aims to throw light, not only on
the economic condition of the Cech immigrant, but
on his national, historic, religious, cultural, and
social state as well.
Considerable has, of course, been written, here
and abroad, on the various phases of what the

INTRODUCTORY
Cechs loosely call their "national life" in America,
although a full, connected story of the transatlantic
branch of the race is still unwritten even in the
national tongue.
In 1908 the St. Louis Hlas published the Dejiny
Cechuv Americkych (History of the Cechs in Amer
ica), by Dr. John Habenicht of Chicago. The vol
ume is not sufficiently dispassionate to fall within
the more rigid definition of historical writing. It
is frankly propagandist literature and ardently
partisan. In compiling this work I have made generous use
of the memoirs of pioneers in the Almanac Ameri
can. Useful data are stored in the Pamdtniky (Me
morials) which various lodges publish from time to
time to commemorate some noted event in their
existence. Old newspaper files have yielded abun
dant, if not always authoritative, information. I
have had access to the files of the Slavie, Dennice
Novoveku, Pokrok Zdpadu, Delnik Americky, New
Yorske Listy, and other papers. Of the greatest help
to me were notes which I had collected for my
work, Padesdt Let Ceskeho Tisku v Americe (Fifty
Years of Bohemian Letters in America, published
in 191 1). This volume contains a complete list of
books, brochures, and newspapers beginning with
January 1, i860, the day and year the first Cech
language paper made its appearance on this con
tinent. To Mr. Milo§ Lier, of the University of
Prague, I am indebted for valuable material which
vi

INTRODUCTORY
he extracted from the files of Prague papers bearing
on emigration between the years 1848-60.
Statistics are not always dependable. In five or
ten years the figures here quoted will be out of date.
America, which still feels the growing pains of
national adolescence, has a way of confounding
the statistician. When I finger the pages of Dr.
John Palacky's book, Spojene Stdty SeveroamerickS
(United States of North America), I can hardly
realize that the mass of figures contained in that
volume relate to the land in which I live — so un
like is the America of 1919 and Palacky's America
of 1876.
I do not describe Cech America as a tourist who
passes hurriedly through a foreign country and
records the impressions of the moment ; I write as a
close relative, a member of the family, who for
thirty-nine years has lived uninterruptedly in Cech
America or very close to its border. I know it in its
holiday attire and in its working clothes. I know its
faults, which are many, and its virtues, which, I
like to think, outweigh them. A residence of seven
years in Omaha, spent partly in a newspaper office,
partly in a law office, gave me a rare opportunity to
observe at close range the evolution of the virile
settler of the Middle West, while life in large cities
(in New York since 1894) has brought me in direct
and daily contact with the men and women who
live in those queer but cozy corners of America
called, somewhat patronizingly, "foreign quarters."
vii

INTRODUCTORY
The Cechs sent to America not adventurers, but
bona-fide settlers almost synchronously with the
Dutch and earlier than the Swedes. Driven from
their native land in the first half of the seventeenth
century, Cech Protestant exiles are known to have
settled in New Amsterdam, the present New York,
and among the English in Virginia.' The real Cech.
immigration, however, dates from 1848, the year of
revolutionary changes in Austria, and it is of that
immigration that the volume, The Cechs (Bohemi
ans) in America, chiefly treats.
Most of the men and women who have taken a
leading part in the affairs of American Cechs I have
known personally, many of them intimately. My
list of friends and acquaintances has included
Charles Jonas', F. B. Zdrubek, L. J. Palda, John
Rosicky, Bartos" Bittner, Josephine Humpal-
Zeman, Frances Gregor, Vojta Masek, John Bo-
recky, John Karel, Paul Albieri, Edward Rosewater,
Frank Skarda, John A. Oliverius, Vaclav Snajdr.
Of these Vaclav Snajdr is the only one now living.
I exchanged letters with Joseph Pastor and corre
sponded with the widow of Frank Mracek, latterly
a resident of Odessa, Russia, and with the widow
of Vojta Naprstek. I never had the good fortune to
meet Ladimir Klacel, but heard sufficient concern
ing that unhappy philosopher from my brother to
enable me to form a fairly accurate picture of the
purely human side of the man. The younger men
and women who now stand at the helm of affairs
viii

INTRODUCTORY
are known to me personally or through their work.
Thirty-odd years ago Cech America was so Lilli
putian that it was possible, without consulting
Who 's Who, for every one to know every one else.
If a meeting of nationals was held, all the men of
consequence could be crowded under a common
roof, if not conveniently seated around one table.
Those were the days when the newspaper editors
were the sole intellectuals of the nation. The poli
ticians, big and little, lawyers, teachers, physicians,
merchants, and others who presently clamor for
their share of sunshine and popularity, were yet
unborn or were striplings, attending school, when
the veteran journalists like Jonas' ruled Cech
America. As appears from the context, the volume dis
cusses the Cech branch of the Cechoslovak nation
only; the Slovaks are not included, for although
the two race groups live side by side in several ur
ban centers, each attends its own churches, patron
izes its own club-houses, joins its own fraternal and
other societies, lives its separate life. The Cech im
migration was fully thirty years old when the Slo
vaks began coming in. Their habitats are not the
same. The Slovaks, as is shown by statistics, are
massed in Pennsylvania, where the Cech population
is small by comparison.
Is the Cech an asset or a liability to his adopted
country? "Our nation," comments Charles Veleminsky, a
ix

INTRODUCTORY
pedagogue who traveled in the United States, "has
ever been idealistic, sacrificing all for its ideals.
Idealism is the most precious offering of the Cech
immigrant to America. Without ideals even prac
tical America is unthinkable." The Declaration of
Independence of the Cechoslovak Nation pledges
itself to uphold the ideals of modern democracy " as
they have been the ideals of the Cechs for cen
turies." From Hus to Havlicek the Cech has waged
a ceaseless, though at times a losing war against
the sinister powers of reaction. In the course of the
struggle and directly due to it, his native lahd lost
political independence, but the conqueror could not
stifle in him the lofty ideals he inherited from his
Hussite forebears. /
The Cech is self-reliant. Note the names of the
deputies in the former Austrian Parliament, or
those now guiding the affairs of the Republic: Dr.
Rieger, Dr. Pacak, Dr. Kramaf, Dr. Soukup, Mr.
Klofac — all commoners. On the other hand, ob
serve, for the sake of comparison, who had been
the spokesmen of the Magyars in the Hungarian
Parliament: Count Karolyi, Count Andrassy,
Count Batthyany, Count Tisza, Count Apponyi.
The native Cech nobility practically disappeared
in the seventeenth century. The aristocracy owning
estates in Bohemia was, up to the time of the war,
almost without exception Austrian in sentiment,
ultramontane in politics, feudal in traditions. Stern
necessity has taught the Cech commoner to rely on
x

INTRODUCTORY
none save himself, to think and act for himself. It
is astounding what progress in art, literature, com
merce, and industry he has made within the last few
decades of national revival unaided by aristocracy
and hampered, if anything, by the Vienna Govern
ment. He is intelligent. At Ellis Island he has estab
lished two records. Of all the races from the old
Dual Empire, Germans and Magyars not excepted,
the Cech was the lowest in the percentage of illit
erates — one and one half per cent — and the
highest in the percentage of skilled labor. If it is
true, as their enemies contend, that the Slavs are
as yet barbarians, the Cech, who in culture is fore
most among the Slavs, can boast of being the first
barbarian in Europe. Thomas Capek
Bedford Park, New York City
October, 1919

CONTENTS
I. Seventeenth-Century Immigration i
II. Eighteenth-Century Immigration 19
III. Nineteenth-Century Immigration
and after 25
IV. The Distribution of the Stock 59
V. Trades, Business, Professions 69
VI. The Immigrant as a Liability 94
VII. Through Intermarriage into the
Melting-Pot 96
VIII. All Born in America Belong to
America 100
IX. New Bohemia in America 105
X. Gamin Etymology — Pantata — Cor
ruption of the Language — Ameri
canization of Names 114
XI. Rationalism: A Transition from the
Old to the New 119
XII. Socialism and Radicalism 137
XIII. The Cech as a Soldier 155
XIV. Journalism and Literature 164
XV. Musicians, Artists, Visitors from
Abroad xiii

CONTENTS
XVI. The Language Schools: Teaching of
Cech 241
XVII. The Churches 246
XVIII. Fraternal and Other Societies 254
XIX. The Part the American Cechs took in
the War of Liberation 265
Appendix 279
Index 285

ILLUSTRATIONS
Augustine Herrman Frontispiece
Map of Virginia and Maryland, 1670, by Aug
ustine Herrman, with Portrait by Himself 12
Two American Cechophiles: Robert H. Vickers
and Will S. Monroe 26
The Cechoslovak Legation in Washington:
Commissioner Charles Pergler and Part of
his Staff 34
Racine (Cech Bethlehem) in 1850 38
Invitation to a Beseda and Amateur Theatri
cals held at Racine, October, 1861 38
Cech Residential Section, Chicago 44
Cech Business Quarter, Chicago 44
The Pathfinders: Vaclav Pohl, John Herman,
Francis Korbel, John Borecky 48
The Pathfinders: A. L. Slesinger, Joseph Kri-
kava, Joseph L. Lesikar, the Hubacek
Brothers 52
Sokol Slovanska. Lipa Hall, Chicago 56
C.S.P.S. Hall, Chicago 56
Cech-American Hall, Milwaukee 56
xv

ILLUSTRATIONS
Plzensky Sokol Gymnastic Association Hall,
Chicago 56
Map showing the Distribution of the Stock in
the United States 60
Two Towns with Cech Names and Cech In
habitants: Pisek, North Dakota, and Proti-
vin, Iowa 66
The First Lawyers: Joseph Sosel, Cedar Rap
ids, Iowa; J. W. Sykora, Cleveland; John
Karel, Kewaunee, Wisconsin, former U.S.
Consul-General to Petrograd; August Hai-
dusek, La Grange, Texas 84
Pioneer Physicians: A. M. Dignowity, San
Antonio; Adolph Chladek, Chicago; John
Habenicht, Chicago; Edward J. Schevcik,
New York 86
Congressmen of Cech Nationality: Thomas F.
Konop, Anthony Michalek, John J. Babka,
Adolph J. Sabath 88
Types of American Scholars of Cech Parent-
, age: Dr. Paul J. Hanzlik, Dr. John Zeleny,
" Dr. F. G. Novy, Dr. Alois F. Kovarik 90
Dr. Robert J. Kerner 92
Dr. Bohumil Simek 96
A Cech Alley in Chicago 106
Vojta Naprstek and "Mrs. Josephine," his wife 126
From a portrait by M. Svabinsky. xvi

ILLUSTRATIONS
Ladimir Klacel 132
L. J. Palda 138
Joseph Paces 152
From a photograph taken in Prague after his final release
from prison. The face bears the marks of his physical
sufferings.
The First Number of the Slowan Amerikansky 164
Pioneer Journalists: J. B. Erben, Frank Kori
zek, JosephiPastor, Frank Mr&oek 166
Charles Jonas' at Thirty 168
From a photograph taken in Prague, where he had gone
to report for the Slavie on the Franco- Prussian War.
Kristina Korizek, Jonas's Bride, at Twenty 168
From a photograph taken in 1864.
Jonas's Birthplace at Malesov, Bohemia 168
Newspaper Homes: The Svornost, Chicago;
The Hlasatel, Chicago; The Hospodaf,
Omaha 172
Vaclav Snajdr 178
Jan Barta Letovsky 182
Anton Malinowski 182
Malinowski, an agent of the Russian Government, who
had come to Racine for the purpose, accompanied Letov
sky and Mracek on their futile expedition to Amur, Si
beria, to select a location for a New Bohemia there.
Charles Jonas' 184
From a photograph taken in 1890, when he was Lieuten
ant-Governor of Wisconsin.
Vaclav Snajdr and his brother-in-law Charles
Jonas' 188
xvii

ILLUSTRATIONS
Vaclav Snajdr and Joseph V. Sladek 188
Early Newspapers 192
Francis B. Zdrubek 196
John Rosicky 198
John V. Capek 200
Professional Women: Catherine M. Capek,
teacher in Cleveland, 1878-1918; Josephine
Humpal-Zeman, social reformer; Frances
Gregor, author; Dr. Anna F. Novak, of
Chicago, the first woman physician of
Cech nationality 202
Barto§ Bittner 204
Dr. Ales* Hrdlicka 206
Thomas Capek 208
Charles Pergler 212
Dr. J. F. Smetanka, Dr. J. E. S. Vojan, Joseph
Tvrzicky 216
Clara Vostrovsky Winlow 220
Early Musicians: Vaclav Kopta, violinist; J.
J. Kovafik, viola; J. H. Capek, violinist;
V. A. Raboch, organist 226
Anna Drazdil 230
Frances R. Janauschek 230
Charles J. Vopicka of Chicago, United States ¦
Minister to Rumania 236
xviii

ILLUSTRATIONS
St. Prokop College, Lisle, Illinois 242
Sarka B. Hrbkova 244
St. Prokop Church, Chicago 246
Monsignor Joseph Hessoun 248
Vincent Pisek, D.D. 250
Jan Hus Church and Neighborhood House,
New York 252
Jan Hus Monument, Bohemia, Long Island 258
Bethlehem Chapel, Loomis Street, Chicago 258
Birthplace of the C.S.P.S, 262
Jacob Mottl's boarding-house and saloon on Ninth Street •
between Soulard and Lafayette Streets, St. Louis, where
the Cech Slavic Benevolent Society was organized in
1854.
By-Laws and Traveling Pass of the C.S.P.S.
Brotherhood, issued in 1865 262
Rev. Oldrich Zlamal 268
Cechoslovak War Posters, designed by Vojta
Preissig 274
Vladimir A. Geringer, United States Trade
Commissioner to the Cechoslovak Republic 276

note on Cech pronunciation
The diacritic mark occurs on the following letters: a, e, 8, 2, d"
f, n, ?, §, I, u, fl, y, 2. D and 6 are seldom used. The mark tends
alike to soften and shade the sound of the letter.
a is pronounced long as in darling.
6 as a in care.
£ as ye in yellow.
c as ch in cherry.
i and y as ee in tree.
n as n in canon.
f as rsh in Pershing.
§ as sh in shall.
u and fl long as in rule.
2 as j in the French word jour.
ch as in the Scottish loch.

THE CECHS
(BOHEMIANS)
IN AMERICA
CHAPTER I
seventeenth-century immigration
THE opening act of the drama of the Thirty
Years' War, which was essentially a struggle
for supremacy between Protestantism and Cathol
icism, was staged in Bohemia. The Bohemian Pro
testant Estates in 1619 deposed their ruler and
elected Frederick of the Palatinate, son-in-law of
James I of England, as King of Bohemia. One year
after the coronation ceremony, or to be exact,
November 8, 1620, the armies of the imperialists
engaged the Bohemian army in battle near Prague,
on what is called White Mountain, signally defeat
ing it.
The Battle of White Mountain was destined to
become the most momentous event in the history of
Bohemia. It marked the downfall of the nation's
independence; it was directly responsible for the
collapse of Protestantism in Bohemia and in coun
tries confederated therewith.
A number of the rebel chiefs fled from the coun
try with Frederick; others soon followed the Winter
King, so that Liechtenstein, Lieutenant-Governor

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
of Bohemia, was able to report to his imperial mas
ter, on January 17, 1621, that the principal con
spirators, to the number of sixty, were already be
yond the border. Scores of suspects who could not
get away in time or who, for some reason or other,
scorned to save themselves by flight, were appre
hended and tried for treason. On June 21, 1621,
unforgettable as the "Bloody Day of Prague,"
twenty-seven of the rebels perished on the block.
Still others were punished by the confiscation of
their property, or by prison sentence.
Those condemned to suffer death were Count
Joachym Andrew Slik, Director under Frederick
and Governor of Upper Lusatia ; Vaclav Budovec
of Budova, orator, traveler, and author; Christo
pher Harant of Pol2ic, a soldier and writer whose
description of a journey to Egypt and Palestine
is one of the ornaments of Cech literature of the
seventeenth century; Count Caspar KapliF of
Sulevic, an old man of eighty-six; Dr. John Jes-
senius of Jessen, a distinguished physician, rector
of the University in Prague, writer and speaker.
Jessenius was condemned to have his tongue cut
out, to be beheaded, and to have his body quar
tered. The other victims who on that day gave
their lives for their faith and country were: Prokop
DvoFecky of Olbramovic, Frederick of Bile, Henry
Otto of Los, William Konec-Chlumsky, Bohuslav
of Michalovic, Divi§ Cernin of Chudenic, Valentin
Kochan of Prachov, Tobias Steffek of Kolodej,
2

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
Chfistopher Kobr, John Sultys, the mayor of
Kutna Hora, Maximilian Hos'talek, the mayor of
Zatec, Vaclav Jizbicky, Henry Kozel, Andrew Ko-
cour, Henry Recicky, Michael Vitman, Simon
Vok&c, Leander Riippel, and George Haunschild.
The last two were Germans. TheodorSixtof Otters-
dorf was pardoned at the last moment on the scaf
fold. John Kutna ur, councilman of the Old Town
of Prague, and his father-in-law, Simon Susicky,
were hanged from a beam in the window of the Old
Town Council Hall. Nathanael Vodiiansky was
hanged from a gibbet set up in the center of the
Old Town Square. "On this day of grief and sor
row 1 it seemed that the victors were determined
to put to the sword the whole of Bohemia and
their pitiless revenge smote down all those who,
by reason of their birth, their intellectual or moral
attainments, their political services, their names,
or their wealth, had raised themselves to the posi
tion of leaders among their people, guardians of the
nation's traditions and defenders of its rights."
Count Slavata, a nobleman who himself played jj
no inconsiderable part in the terrible drama of anti-!-;
reformation, and who, on account of his religious jf
convictions, cannot be accused of bias, is authority;!
for the statement that 36,000 Protestant families, 1
including 185 houses of the nobility (some of these
1 Ernest Denis: Fin de l' Independence Boheme. Paris, 1890.
Translated into Cech by Henry Vancura. Prague, 1904; also,Antonin
Gindely : History of the Bohemian Rebellion in the Year 16 18. Prague,
1878. 3

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
houses numbered as many as fifty members each),
spurning the Emperor's terms, went into exile.
Historians recognize three stages in the exodus
of Protestants. The first emigration began in 1621
when the conqueror ordered the banishment of
teachers and ministers of the gospel. By. reason of
this edict about a thousand members of these two
professions were forced to leave the country.
Next, the wrath of the ruler turned against lay
men. He caused their property to be confiscated.
By the end of 1623 more than six hundred of the
largest estates had been confiscated. On such a
stupendous scale was the seizure of property carried
out that but one fourth of the entire land in Bo
hemia remained undisturbed in the hands of the
original owners. This brought about the second
emigration. Toward the close of 1626 Count Harrach, the
Archbishop of Prague, submitted to the govern
ment a plan for the re-Catholization of Bohemia,
As amended by the crown, the plan contemplated
not conversion, but extirpation of the Protestants.
The imperial patent of July, 1627, provided that
non-Catholics should not be permitted henceforth
to live in the country. Now ensued the third emi
gration, the most far-reaching of all.
The exiles at first sought refuge in the neighbor
ing states of Saxony, Silesia, Hungary, and Poland.
As their hopes of an early return to the native
country waned, they migrated to more distant
4

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
lands: Transylvania, Russia, Sweden, Denmark,
Hamburg, Holland, England, Brandenburg, Swit
zerland. Not a few of the bolder spirits sailed on
Dutch and English ships to America.
In Saxony the refugees were numerous enough
to people whole villages: Johanngeorgenstadt, Alt-
georgfeld, Neugeorgfeld, Neusalz. Strong city colo
nies were formed in Schandau, Freiberg, Annaberg
(at Annaberg and Freiberg were the centers of
titled emigrants), Schneeberg, Zwickau, Chemnitz,
and Dresden. Those professing the Lutheran faith
favored Pirna and Zittau. In 1691 the Zittau com
munity built a church, in which Cech services con
tinued to be held till 1846. At Neusalz worship in
the native language was maintained far into the
second half of the eighteenth century. At Pirna the
number of exiles reached 2710 by the end of 1628;
in 1631 the colony counted 2256 members. By 1639
only 1700 persons remained. About fifty aristo
cratic families settled in Pirna. Dresden received
the first contingent in 1622. Services in Cech were
first permitted to be held in Dresden in 1650, and
the congregation held together until 1845, when a
German-speaking pastor took charge of the parish.
Bishop Komensky could truly say that his was a
scattered flock. Statesmen, scholars, teachers, di
vines, soldiers, artisans, the flower of the nation,
were forced "to eat the bitter bread of banish
ment." Doctor Mathias Borbonius (Biirda) of Borben-

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
hayn, Latin poet, and Paul Strinsky of Zapska
Stranka, author of the Respublica Bohemia
(printed by the Elzevir Press in Leyden), sought
asylum in the city of Thorn. George Holik, writer,
resided in Germany, publishing at Wittenberg, in
German, the Blutige Thrdnen des hochbedrdngten
Bohmerlandes. Jacob Jacobeus of Kutnd Hora, author of a short
Church History of Bohemia (published in Amster
dam), retired to Holland.
Daniel Skreta, a Director of the Revolution,
earned his living as City Clerk in Danzig.
John Raik became professor of medicine at Up-
sala, Sweden; Philemon taught, history at Bremen.
F. Natus, Orientalist, died in Braunschweig. Va
clav Clemens, humanist (from his birthplace also
called 2ebracky, Zebracenus), dwelled from time
to time in Holland, Danzig, and Sweden. He died
in the last-named country, a pensioner of Chancel
lor Oxenstierna.
Bishop John Amos Komensky established him
self in Holland. Other refugees of note who made
Holland their home were Doctor Habervesl of Hab-
ernfeld, author of numerous works, one of which,
Bellum Bohemicum ab Anno 1617 was issued at
Leyden; Daniel Kohout, Director of the Revolu
tion; Paul Skala of Zhor, author of The Church His
tory, Church Chronology, and other learned books;
Paul Jesin of BezdSdice, jurist and writer; Paul
Kaplir of Sulevic, one of the commanders of the
6

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
Bohemian Army; Vaclav William Roupovsky of
Roupov, jurist.
Ferdinand Charles Svihovsky of Risenberg died
in Amiens, Adam Loksan of Loksan, in Sedan.
The most famous exile who made his home in
England was Vaclav Hollar of Prachen, etcher.
Some twenty-four hundred plates bear the name
of Wenceslaus Hollar Bohemus, or Wenceslaus Hol
lar of Prague. Hollar died in 1677 in London. An
other distinguished wanderer to England was Simon
Partlic (Partlicius) of Spicberk, mathematician and
author. Samuel Martinius of Drazov, traveler, writer,
theologian, leader of the Lutheran party among his
countrymen, took up an abode in Germany.
Henik of Valdstein, a Director of the Revolution,
died in Thorn.
Charles of Zerotin, author and statesman, served
the King of Denmark in a high capacity at court.
Tobias Steffek of Kolodej accepted service with
the Prince of Anhalt.
Radslav Vchynsky of Vchynic and Tetov (or
Kinsky, as the family name is now written), Direc
tor of the Revolution, died at Leyden. A poet of
acknowledged ability, Vchynsky is said to have
been a master of eight languages.
The Saxon family, von Ronau, traces its ancestry
to John Albrecht Krinecky of Ronov, a man of
letters. Von Treitschke, the German historian and pub-

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Heist, also claims to be descended from a family of
Cech exiles. So does General Woyrsch, who com
manded a German army on the Polish front.
Woyrsch's forebears were the Vojirs, an ancient
and honorable family.
; Thomas V. Bilek x enumerates fifty lords and
knights who accepted commissions in the Swedish
army alone. .
Count Hendrich Mates of Thurn attained the
rank of field marshal; four rose to the rank of gen
eral, Zdenko, Count of Hodic, Vaclav Ferdinand
Sadovsky of Sloupno, Wolf Colon of Fels, Frederick
Sobeticky of Sobetic. Colonels and lieutenant-
colonels were: Jaroslav Count Kinsky, Vaclav
Cabelicky of Soutic, Adam Berka of Dube, Henry
Frederick of Stampach, Mathias Jizbicky, Vaclav
Zaborsky of Brloh, Henry Petipesky of Chys, and
Nicholas of Techenic. Two were brevetted majors,
eleven captains, mostly of cavalry, two quarter
master-generals, thirteen officers belonging to vari
ous lines of the service.
Exiles belonging to the military class joined as
volunteers the armies of the state in which they
happened to be living. Many enlisted in the Danish
army; the greater part, however, made common
cause with the Swedes, "shedding their blood," to
quote the language of a historian, "for allies who
afterward betrayed them."
1 Thomas V. Bilek: Reformace Katolickd, p. 176. Exile of non-
Catholic nobility from the country. Prague, 1892.
8

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
The first known emigrant to America by way of
a Dutch port was Augustine Herrman.1 "Herrman
came to New York in 1633, in the employment of
the West India Company," says Charles Payson
Mallery.2 "Three years later he was appointed by
the Director and Council of New Netherlands, one
of the Nine Men, a body of citizens selected to as
sist the government by their counsel and advice."
Mallery states that he was "a man of good educa
tion, a surveyor by profession, skilled in sketching
and drawing, an adventurous and enterprising
merchant, . . . the first beginner of the Virginia
tobacco trade." Some time in 1660 he moved from
New York, where he owned land along the present
Pearl Street, to Bohemia Manor in Maryland.
This manor consisted of some twenty thousand
acres in Cecil and New Castle Counties and it was
granted by Lord Baltimore in recognition of serv
ices rendered by Herrman in drawing the map of
"Virginia and Maryland. As it is Planted and In
habited this present Year 1670 Surveyed and Ex
actly Drawne by the Only Labour and Endeavour
of Augustin Herrman, Bohemiensis."
Of Herrman's early life prior to his appearance in
New Netherland, reports are conflicting. An Ameri
can genealogist thinks he was born in Prague in
1 Dutch chroniclers spell the name indifferently: Herman, Herr
man, Harman, Heerman, Hermans.
2 Charles Payson Mallery: Ancient Families of Bohemia Manor;
their Homes and their Graves. 74 pp. The Historical Society of Dela
ware. Wilmington, 1888.

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
1605 and that his father's name was Augustine
Ephraim. A Cech writer (Korensky) has expressed
the belief that Herrman might have been a scion of
a noble family.
In the Memorial Book of the Town of Mseno
(Bohemia) LittD., p. 39, the following entry is
recorded: "a.d. 1 621, the Sunday before Christ's
birth, on a cold day, our beloved pastor, Abraham
Herzman, went into exile, with his family to the
City of Zitava (Zittau). His noble-minded and
pious wife did not live to see this humiliation, hav
ing died of grief one month before his departure.
. . . Before the parish house waited a vehicle, iq
which sat the entire family, that is, son Augustine
and three daughters. The pastor blessed his flock
and followed the conveyance on foot, the people
meanwhile chanting, 'From the depths of my sor
rows, I appeal to Thee, Oh Lord,' and accompany
ing their minister to the village of Bezdedice." 1
If the Augustine Herzman of Mseno, disregard
ing the slight variation in the spelling of the sur
name, is not the Augustine Herrman of Bohemia
Manor, it is, admittedly, a remarkable coincidence
in date and name.
1 Misled by Herrman's German-sounding name, German-Ameri
can writers, notably Kapp, Faust, and Cronau, have appropriated
Herrman as their own. This is an error which refutes itself. Tens of -l
thousands of Cechs bear German names, just as there are tens of
thousands of kern deutsch Germans, whose patronymics are unmis
takably Slavic. Why should Herrman have signed himself on docu
ments, as he did on his map of Virginia and Maryland, Bohemian,
had he been a German? The inconsistency of this claim is obvious.
10

MAP OF VIRGINIA AND MAR*

NP BY AUGUSTINE HERRMAN

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
Herrman's fondness for the land of his nativity.
amounted to an obsession. In addition to his nam-'
ing the first tract of land which he received from -
Lord Baltimore, Bohemia Manor, he named other \
land grants, Three Bohemia Sisters and Little Bo- )
hernia. The supposition is not unreasonable that
Herrman contemplated founding in America a col
ony of compatriots. The Swedes in Delaware had
established a New Sweden, the Dutch New Nether-
land, the Puritans New England, why not a New
Bohemia? Herrman's Bohemia Manor contained
sufficient elbow-room for a good-sized settlement.
In a New York deed 1 he describes himself as
Augustine Herrman of Nova Bohemia, in the Prov
ince of Maryland. To Herrman the misery of his
co-religionists in Europe was well known, for he
had been one of them. How successful he was with
his colonization plan and how many, if any, Cech
families found a home on his estate, local historians
do not inform us. ,
By his will, executed in 1684 he directed that in
the event of his family becoming extinct, a portion
of Bohemia Manor should go to the State of Mary
land for the purpose of founding a Protestant school,
college and hospital, to be known by the name Au
gustine Bohemia.2
1 Liber A, p. 145, July 9, 1672, New York City Register's Office.
2 "Augustine Herrman, Bohemian, 1605-1686." A paper prepared
by General James Grant Wilson, of New York, an honorary member
of the New Jersey Hist. Soe. Read at a meeting of the Society, May
15, 1890. New Jersey Hist. Soe. Proceedings, v. 21, no. 2, pp. 21-34.
II

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Genealogists agree that Frederick Philipse, as the
name was spelled at that period, or Vrederyck
Felypsen, founder of the noted American family of
that name, was a native of Bohemia. Hon. John
Jay, diplomatist and jurist, has this to say of the
Philipses: "The first ancestor of this family who
settled in this country was Frederick Flypsen, a
native of Bohemia, where his family, being Pro
testants, were persecuted. His mother, becoming a
widow, was constrained to quit Bohemia with him
and her other children. She fled to Holland with
what little she could save from the wreck of their '
estate. The amount of that little not admitting her
to provide better for Frederick, she bound him to
a carpenter, and he became an excellent workman.
He emigrated to New York, which was then under
the Dutch Government, but in what year I am not
informed." According to another source 1 Philipse's
father "was the honorable Viscount Felyps of Bo
hemia, who sprang from the ancient viscounts of
that name and country." Again: "Besides their
high rank as nobles, they appear to have held the
office of grand veneurs or keepers of the deer forests
in Bohemia, as there is still preserved in the family
the color and badge of office, consisting of a gold
chain set with amethysts, diamonds, rubies and
emeralds to which was suspended a deer beautifully
chased in gold."
1 Robert Bolton: History of the County of Westchester, from its First
Settlement, p. 508. New York, 1848. 12

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
Singularly enough, the register of Bohemian no
bility of the seventeenth century does not contain
the name Philipse or Felypsen. Neither does a ny one
bearing that name appear to have suffered through
confiscation of property. Thomas V. Bilek's His
tory of Bohemian Confiscation after the year 1618,
sets forth the name of every landowner whose
property had been confiscated, but Philipses are not
among them. Then, too, the rank of viscount was
all but unknown in Bohemia. A more likely explan
ation is — providing, of course, that Philipses be
longed to the nobility — that they had discarded
their Cech name, difficult to pronounce by foreign
ers, assuming instead their given name, Philip.
"The surname Felypsen," remarks Bolton, "is a
patronymic from Philip, hence the English substi
tute Frederick Philipse, which at an early period
became the adopted name of the family" (page
319)- Chroniclers refer to Philipse as "Bohemian mer
chant prince." He was one of the wealthiest men of
his day in the American colonies. The Manor Hall
in Yonkers, still standing, was one of the residences
of the family; another seat, at Philipsburg, bore the
name "Castle PhiUps." The story is told that
George Washington fell in love with pretty Mary
Philipse, a descendant of this illustrious family.
According to one version, Philipse traveled to
America in 1647, on the same ship with Stuyvesant.
It is certain that in 1653 the family was already in
13

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
New Amsterdam, for in that year Philipse is men
tioned as one of the appraisers of the property of
Augustine Herrman. This, by the way, would indi
cate that Herrman and Philipse knew each other.
Records prove that other natives of Bohemia lived
in New Amsterdam besides Herrman and Philipse.1
In the Reformed Church was married, December
10, 165 1, Herrman to Johanna Varlet. Another rec
ord of marriage of a Bohemian or rather a Mora
vian, which is one and the same, reads: "1645. 26
Febr. Jeurian Fradell, j. m. Uyt Moravian en Tryn
Herkser." Who would suspect a Bohemian under
the name of Fradell?
A few years later, another Fradell, Jeuraen Simon
Fradell, weduwanaer (widower), was married in the
same church. From the records it is not clear
whether the entry refers to Jeurian Fradell, who
had become a widower, or to another Fradell, Jeu
rian Simon.
y* An entry in the Dutch Church notes the mar
riage of a girl by the name of Hollar. This might
have been a relative of Wenceslaus Hollar, the
etcher. Adam Unkelba, who was married in the
church on September 12, 1660, was, without doubt,
a Cech. Styntje Hermans, who contracted wedlock
in the Dutch Church, May 14, 1655, with Cornelis
Hendrickszen, may have been Herrman's sister, for
1 Berthold Fernow, editor: Marriages from 1630 to 1801 in the Re
formed Dutch Church; records of New Amsterdam from 1653 to 1674.
Published by the City of New York. 14

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
the Memorial Book of Mseno mentions him as hav
ing sisters. What about John Kostlo, a resident of
New Amsterdam? This name is neither Dutch nor
English. l
The Dutch Government commissioned one Lo-
ketka to go overseas and report on the condition
of New Netherland. Loketka, presumably a Cech,
sent an exhaustive report to his home government.
Whether Loketka subsequently settled here or re
turned to Holland is not known.
It is more than probable that William Paca, one
of the signers of the Declaration of Independence
for Maryland, was of Cech extraction. Genealogists
are inclined to believe that Paca is of Italian or
Portuguese origin; yet if they have no other proof
for their belief save the supposedly Latin structure
of the name, they will be surprised to learn that the
cognomen Paca, root and termination, is Cech.
Pacov is the name of a town in Bohemia; Paca,
Pacd'k, Pacovsky, Pacalt, are family names com
mon in Bohemia. Might not William Paca have
been a descendant of a family which settled on
Herrman's Bohemian Manor in Maryland? 2
That Cechs settled in Virginia is attested by ship
manifests. These immigrants sailing for Virginia
were beyond doubt Cech : Christopher Donak, who
1 New Eng. Hist, and Gen. Reg., v. n, p. 123.
2 In the Pamdtky Ceskych Emigrantu vAmerice, the present author
expressed the belief that Paca might be of Cech origin. J. V. Nigrin,
writing to the Chicago daily Svornost, under date July 4, 1914, shares
the belief. 15

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
purchased land in 1655 in Northampton County;
John Doza, a fellow passenger of the Donaks, who
settled in the same county; Anna Dubes, who had
taken land in 1652 in Lancaster County. Other
immigrants were John Duch, settling in 1650
in Northumberland County, and Anna Simco, in
1653, in the same county.1 It is a gross exaggera
tion, however, to say that "between 1650-80 sev
eral thousand Cechs came to America, settling in
the penal colonies of Georgia and Virginia. . . ." 2
The Cechs could not have settled in Georgia be
tween 1650-80 for the very good reason that Geor
gia was first settled by a colony of one hundred and
twenty whites in 1733.
That stragglers might have made their way with
the Puritans to Massachusetts is more than likely;
the Bohemian Church observed many of the stern
concepts of religious duties which distinguished the
Puritans. Matthew Cenig (Cenek) died in Massa
chusetts in 1654.3
If the names of Elizabeth Baysa, Mary Bunc,
and Loues (Louis) Standla are Cech, as they seem
to be, it would go to prove that Cech exiles settled
in Connecticut.4
1 George Cabell Greer (clerk, Virginia State Land Office) : 1623-
66. Early Virginia Immigrants. Richmond, 1912.
2 Pamdtnik Slovanskych Baptistu v Americe, p. 8. Chicago, 1909.
3 Early Records of Boston; also, New. Eng. Hist, and Gen. Reg.,
v. 10, p. 219.
4 Births, Marriage and Deaths. Original Distribution of the Town
of Hartford, Connecticut, among the Settlers; _, also, New. Eng. Hist.
and Gen. Reg., v. 12, p. 173. 16

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
Samuel Barta,1 bearer of a typically Cech name,
signed a petition dated April 22, 1755, in which
settlers living along the Kennebec River in Massa
chusetts appealed for protection to Governor Shir
ley. On the obverse of the petition, the name is
spelled correctly Barta; on the reverse, however,
the petitioner is already transformed by the chron
icler into Barter. Alexander Barta, evidently a rel
ative of Samuel, is on the roster of prisoners who
were captured by the British in 1777. Alexander,
too, is spelled carelessly Barta and Barter. John
Spital, in some documents assumes the anglicized
name John Spittle.2
It is possible that individual exiles had joined the
Swedes who, under Governor Prins, founded a set
tlement on the Delaware River (1638), naming the
country New Sweden. Soldiers of Cech nationality
served in the army of Gustavus Adolphus. Always
friendly, the relations between the Swedes and
Protestant Cechs were notably close about this
time.3 Unerring traces of Cech exiles lead to one of the
Barbados, the group of West India Islands which
the British occupied in 1625. Augustine Herrman,
it is known, had extensive business interests on the
1 New York Hist, and Gen. Reg., v. 44, pp. 203-04. .
2 Ibid., v. 19, p. 136.
3 "When the Thirty Years' War was brought to a close, Sweden,
anxious to gain the friendship of all nations, sent Mathias Palbitsky
to congratulate the King of Spain on the conclusion of peace."
(Amandus Johnson: The Swedes in America, 1638-1900, v. 1, p. 164.)
17

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
island; so did his fellow countryman Frederick
Philipse. The ship Expedition, bound in Septem
ber, 1635, for the Barbados, had aboard one Ed
ward Benes, a name peculiarly Cech. In the "True
and Perfect List of all ye Names of ye Inhabitants
in ye Parrish of Christ Church, with an Exact
accompt of all ye Land, white Servants; and Neg's
[negroes] within ye Said Parrish Taken this 22th
Decemb 1679," we find three other Cech names:
John Hudlice, tailor, who shipped from South
ampton on the Virginia, Captain John Weare,
bound for the Barbadoes; Edward Marsan "has
10 acres and 6 negroes," and Anthony Slany "has
2 negroes."

CHAPTER II
EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
THE resolve of the Moravian Church to found
colonies overseas marks a distinct epoch in the
history of Cech emigration in the eighteenth cen
tury. These emigrants came with the Germans at
the time or times when religious ferment had made
people restless in Central Europe. While the seven
teenth-century arrivals had been assimilated by the
English or the Dutch, according to where they hap
pened to settle, the eighteenth-century immigrants
to Pennsylvania merged into the larger Teutonic
immigration. As told in detail in the preceding chapter, Prot
estantism in Bohemia and Moravia had been
crushed in the first quarter of the seventeenth cen
tury; yet what theological writers describe as "the
hidden seed" was never wholly destroyed. Here
and there survived individuals and groups of indi
viduals (in Bohemia, particularly in the Litomysl
district) who, notwithstanding stern repression,
clung in secret to the proscribed faith. To be sure,
open adherence thereto was out of the question;
there were no houses of worship in the land and
none were allowed to be built. Yet what the follow
ers of Hus were forbidden to do publicly they could
not be stopped from practicing clandestinely. De-
19

the Cechs in America
votional literature, which partisans contrived to
smuggle into the country from across the Saxon
border, was found to be the most efficacious means
of keeping together the faithful. The city of Zittau,
in Saxony, became the recognized book mart of the
Cech Protestants. There Wenzel Kleych (1678-
1737) set up a printing shop, and manuals and
prayer books printed in Kleych's establishment
were distributed in Bohemia despite the watchful
ness of the Austrian authorities. Kleych's most in
defatigable assistant in this missionary activity
was Adolph Christian Pescheck, himself a descend
ant of a family of exiles who had settled in Ger
many. Another name inseparably associated with
Kleych's publishing house was that of John Liberda
(1701-42), a schoolmaster and a pamphleteer, later
a pastor of a Cech congregation in the suburb of
Berlin. The Moravians never quite forgot that Bishop
Komensky had been at one time a minister of a
church in Fulnek, Moravia. In 1724 a number of
families, tiring of endless molestation, decided to
emigrate from Moravia to Saxony. Herrnhut was
the name these emigrants gave to a settlement they
founded on the estate of Count Zinzendorf.
The families and individuals more or less promi
nent among these emigrants from Moravia were:
Melchior Kunz, Andrew Beyer, Matthew Stach,
John and David Zeisberger, all of Zauchtenthal;
the Jaeschke and Neisser families of Sehlen; the
20

EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
Grasman family of Senftleben and the Nitschmann
family of Kunwald.1
Though they had come from German-speaking
towns and villages of Moravia and bore German
names, it should not be believed that all were Ger
man. There were among them co-religionists of
Cech birth or ancestry as is proved by a list of
them prepared by George Neisser.2
In border lands where the Slavs and the Teutons
live side by side mixing more or less freely, the
patronymic is not an unerring index to the ances
try. All are not Slavs who bear Slavic names; con
versely, all are not Germans who have German
names. For what they are worth, we extract from
Neisser's list those patronymics which by sound or
structure appear to be Cech-Slavic:
Anna Neisser, maiden name Anna Holaschek
(p. 41), Catherine Riedel, maiden name Zudolska
(p. 43), Thomas Procop, married Anna Neisser (p.
51), Friedrich Boenisch, married Anna Stach (p.
54), Matthew Stach (p. 55), Rosina Stach, his wife
(P- 55). Melchior Kunz, married Judith Holaschek
(p. 56), George Schmidt, married Maria Wachofsky
(p. 55), Matthew Miksch and Martha Miksch (p.
1 Edmund de Schweinitz : The History of the Church known as the
Unitas Fratrum. 641 pp.
2 George Neisser: A List of the Bohemian and Moravian Emigrants
to Saxony. Collected from various sources in print and manuscript;
begun and compiled at New York from June 2 to July 20, 1772.
Translated and edited by Albert G. Rau. Transactions of the Mora
vian Historical Society, v. ix, parts 1 and 2. Printed for the Society.
Bethlehem, Pa., 1911. Times Publishing Company.
21

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
57), Thomas Stach (p. 58), Michael Schukal and
—  Schukal, his wife (p. 60), Paul Jersabeck (p.
61), Christian Stach, brother or cousin of Matthew
Stach (p. 61),  Hukuff, wife of Zacharias Hu-
kuff (p. 64), Anna Maria Lawatsch (p. 71), Andrias
Anton Lawatsch (p. 71), Joseph Bullitschek (p. 75),
Wenzel Procop (p. 76), Wenzel Till (p. 76), Anna
Watscheck (p. 77), Zacharias Hirschel, Cech name
Gecinek, pastor in Berlin (p. 77), Balthasar Dwor-
zinsky (p. 78), Lucas Paresch (p. 78), John Kopat-
schek (p. 78),  Neskunda (p. 78), Susanna
Peiter, daughter of Christopher Fakesch (p. 78),
George Wenzel Golkowsky (p. 79), Susannah Hel
ena Golkowsky (p. 80), Rosina Kisselova (p. 80),
Johann Czerny (p. 80), Rosina Stuschike (p. 81),
Franz Herodicz (p. 81), Anna Kreitsche, maiden
name Boschena (p. 81), Dorothea Pospischill (p.
81), Carl Urban (p. 81), Matthew Pochobratsky
(p. 82), John Kaplan (p. 82), Catherine Weiprach-
titzke (p. 82), Eva Brachatshin (p. 82), Wenzel
Slatnik (p. 83), Anna Kissela (p. 83), Wenzel Bonar
(p. 83), Matthew Prokopek (p. 83), John Prokopek
(p. 83), Elisabeth Keetschar, married Kowarsch
(p. 83), Magdalena Fihol (p. 83), Marie Kubasek
(p. 83), Andreas Broksch (p. 83), Martin Powalka
(p. 83), Judith Shukal (p. 84), Jacob Swihola (p. 84),
Joh. Jacob Swihola, Jr. (p. 84), Andreas Budeman-
sky (p. 84), John Gilek (p. 84), John Matema (p.
84), Wenzel Oudrzik (p. 84), George Pakosta (p.
84), Anna Swoboda (p. 84), Carl Matschek (p. 84),
22

EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
Thomas Juren (p. 85), Augustin Witthofsky (p. 85),
John Holeschofsky (p. 85).
Some of the emigrants we find later among set
tlers in Pennsylvania. In Egle's catalogue we meet
with Michael Miksch (p. 167), Catherine Butman-
sky (p. 168), Andrew Broksch (p. 170), Thomas
Stach (p. 209), Andrew Anton Lawatsch (p. 210),
George Wenceslaus Golkowsky (p. 302), Joseph
Bullitschek (p. 303), Ulrick Pitcha, Anna Maria
Masin, etc.1 In another register we note these Cech
surnames: Martin Blisky, John Ludwig Buda,
Mathias Hora, Gabriel Gascha, Johann Seirut-
schek. Without doubt a descendant of a Cech family
which settled in Pennsylvania in the eighteenth
century was John W. Kittera, a member of Con
gress from 1791 to 1801. At the completion of his
congressional terms he was appointed United States
District Attorney for the Eastern District of Penn
sylvania and removed to Philadelphia, where he
died. He was the son of Thomas Kittera of East
Earl Township, Lancaster County.
The first attempt at missions by Moravians un
der British auspices was undertaken in Georgia.
Toeltschig was one of nine missionaries sent to
Georgia in 1734. Toeltschig died in Dublin in April,
1 William Henry Egle, editor: Notes and Queries: Historical, Bio
graphical and Genealogical. Relating chiefly to interior Pennyslvania.
Fourth series, v. i. Also, Names of Foreigners who took the Oath of Al
legiance to the Province and State of Pennsylvania 1727-75. With
the foreign arrivals, 1786-1808. Harrisburg, Pa., 1892.
23

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
1764.1 The second colony was founded in Pennsyl
vania, where the Moravians purchased a tract of
five hundred acres in Bucks County in the spring of
1 741, and a second tract of five thousand acres at
Nazareth. To Pennsylvania now set in a steady in
flow of Moravians and it is reckoned that between
1 74 1 and 1762 upwards of seven hundred men and
women, most of them members of congregations on
the Continent and in Great Britain, crossed the
seas and settled in Pennsylvania.2
1 Abraham Reincke: A Register of Members of the Moravian
Church between 1727 and 1754.
2 W. C. Reichel: A Register of the Members of the Moravian Church.
With historical annotations; also, I. Daniel Rupp: A Collection of
upwards of 30,000 Names of German, Swiss, Dutch, French and other
Immigrants in Pennsylvania, from 1727-76.

CHAPTER III
NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION AND AFTER
PRIOR to 1840 no one in Bohemia thought of
emigrating, says a contemporary. In the first
place, Bohemia experienced a wave of prosperity
after the Napoleonic wars. Everything was cheap
and there was plenty of work. In 1840, however,
blighting droughts visited the country x and there
was a failure of the potato crop. Suffering actual
want, the Cech people at that time began to think
of migrating to America. The first to leave Kutna
Hora, as the gubernatorial passport of 1845 proves,
was innkeeper Pospisil, the second, cabinet-maker
Fiirst. The passport cost fifty florins in silver. With
out it not even a mouse could slip across the border
which was carefully patrolled by the grenzjagers.
One incurred the risk of being shot if one attempted
to cross without a passport.
In 1847, thirty-nine men of the Thirty-fifth Pil-
sen Regiment (Khevenhuller) escaped to America
from the Mainz fortress, Tuma, the orderly of
General Uhlmann, of the artillery,2 among them.
Following Tuma, these soldiers deserted: Stropek,
Skala, Zajicek, Lexa, Cukr, Osoba. In 1849 the
1 The Pokrok Zdpadu. 1888. Reminiscences of Anton Kocian
(Kotzian) of Bfeclava.
2 In New York Tiima bore the by-name of Cech Columbus, a
jocular allusion to his early landing.
25

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
military accountant Touzimsky ran away to
America, having embezzled the regimental funds.
The latter's successful flight gave courage to other
soldiers. "I planned with twenty-one other men
to get away, too," relates Anton Kocian, "inas
much as Tuma had written us that he owned in
New York a Cech Casino and that the Cechs in
that city had organized a club. At times as many as
700 emigrants, chiefly from the Slane, Beroun and
Kourim district (Cech — Kraj, German — Kreis)
concentrated at Mainz.1 There they waited for the
ship to sail and if not accommodated in taverns, they
were given shelter in the military barracks. I am
certain some of the oldest deserters will recall the
circumstances well. Stropek, Zajicek, Touzimsky,
my school mates, were from Kutn& Hora. Tuma,
Lexa, Skala and Cukr belonged by domicil to
Kourim and Tabor. Where these men settled I do
not know. I lost sight of the nineteen save one who,
under the assumed name of Senna (JSenner) worked
in a brickyard in Brooklyn. Tuma was the first cor
respondent from America to newspapers in Bo
hemia. He contributed to Charles Havlicek's paper.
My brother-in-law wrote me when I served in the
army, that an ex-soldier, Tuma by name, from time
to time wrote for the papers." 2
1 Emigrants traveled from Bohemia via Bavaria to Mainz through
the traveling agency of Karl Rabe who had an emigration bureau in
Rheinstrasse. 2 If it is true, as Kocian says, that Tuma contributed to Prague
papers, his letters were not published under his signature, for an
26

Robert H. Vickers
Author of" History of Bohemia '

WillS. Monroe
Author of "Bohemia and the Cechs '

TWO AMERICAN CECHOPHILES

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
Until 1884 the authorities kept a record of emi
gration in the Emigration Tabellen. These tables
registered annually persons who left the empire and
"emigrated to foreign lands with the intention of
not returning." They noted the age, sex, and prop
erty interests of the emigrant. After 1867 the au
thorities began to lose control of the movement, and
in 1884 the central bureau of statistics in Vienna
abandoned this tabulation as unsatisfactory. In
stead it began to publish in the Statistische Monat-
schrift data bearing on the transoceanic emigration
only, based on figures collected by Austrian consuls
at the principal seaports of the world.1
In the sixties of the last century the Frenchman
Alfred Legoyt 2 could say truthfully that the people
of Austria showed no inclination to emigrate. With
apparent satisfaction he noted that there were
several factors which militated against emigration
on a larger scale. Among other considerations there
were the great distances to seaports, strict, almost
prohibitive regulations by the state, prosperity
among the small farmers, large areas of undevel
oped land awaiting skilled cultivators, and so forth.
Yet, before long, economists were amazed to wit-
examination of the files of Havlicek's journals has failed to bring
out Tuma's name.
1 Dr. J. Buzek: Das Auswanderungs-problem und die Regelung
des Auswanderimgswesens in Oesterreich, v. x, pp. 441, 553. Zeit-
schrift fur Volkswirtschaft, Socialpolitik und Verwaltung. Wien und
Leipzig, 1 90 1.
2 Alfred Legoyt (1815-85): L'Emigration Europeenne. Paris,
1861. 27

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
ness an almost revolutionary change in this re
spect. From Bohemia there were two distinct kinds of
emigration: the political one which had its origin
in the revolutionary disturbances of 1848; the
jother emigration, due to economic causes.
1 The wonderful stories of the discovery of gold
in California excited the Cechs no less than they
I jagitated other Europeans. Newspapers published
ijhighly colored articles about the rich California
gold fields, while emigration agents, plying their
trade surreptitiously, magnified what was already
exaggerated by the press. Warning by the authori
ties against emigration had little or no effect; in
a like manner admonitions by the church proved
futile. It is probably true that the gold craze af
fected Bohemia more generally than it agitated
other Austrian states. In 1853, 1311 people emi
grated from Plzen district, 1009 from Budejovice
district. The year following witnessed the depar
ture from the first-named district of 1946, from
the second 1386, and from Pardubice district 1068.
In 1855, Tabor district lost by emigration 649,
Chrudim 499, Eger (Cheb) and Plzen 426 each.
A falling-off occurred in 1859, when only 842 left
Bohemia. Non-official statisticians estimate, how
ever, that the figures here given are by far too
low and that we should strike the mark by doub
ling them. All told, the number of emigrants from
the empire to the United States during the Cali-
28

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
fornia gold fever excitement amounted to about
25,000. It will be noticed in the following table that from
the outset Bohemia and Moravia sent out an al
most even ratio of males and females. Tabulated
according to age, a majority of the emigrants were
between seventeen and forty, which years, experi
ence has demonstrated, represent a period of the
highest physical productivity. In the adult male
wage-earner it is a time when ambition impels him
to most intensive effort and action.

Emigration according to Sex and Age between 1850-60 *
1850

Land

Sex

Vp to
7 years

7-17
years

17-40 years'.

40-50 years

Past 50

Total

Males

Females

BohemiaMoravia
Silesia

87 9
42

79 4
66

15 I
2

22 5
16

103 5
77

23 2
12

3 I

166 13
108

1851

Bohemia MoraviaSilesia

187 3
21

154 8
28

58 37

43 1
3

193 5
3i

23 I
7

24 II

341 II
49

1852

BohemiaMoravia Silesia

229 18
47

198 19
38

. 89 5
14

79 12 10

188 14
53

43 67

28 I

427 37
85

» Mittkeilungen aus dent Gebiete der Statisttk, v. jcvii, part 3, p. 89. Herausgegeben
von der K, K. Central = Commission. Wien, 1870.
29

THE CECHS IN AMERICA

Bohemia
MoraviaSilesia

Bohemia
MoraviaSilesia

1853

Bohemia

1730

1689

300

1235

1284

480

120

3419,,.

Moravia

140

132

69

80

93

23

5

272"'"

Silesia

124

100

55

49

99

16

5

224

1854

Bohemia

3H9

2979

1495

1315

2309

708

301

6128

Moravia

150

148

82

55

"5

36

10

298^

Silesia

73

74

32

31

63

H

7

147

1855

Bohemia

1507

I5H

714

706

1109

324

168

3021

Moravia

252

250

123

108

200

57

H

502

Silesia

18

H

4

6

19

3

32

1856

Bohemia

1054

1034

480

483

790

219

116

2088

Moravia

96

89

49

49

63

19

5

185

Silesia

1857
1 102
IO65
527
460
858
219
103
29
22
8
12
22
5
4
42
31
9
13
42
9
1858
1859
i860
685 138 31
617 120 19
269 60 5
294 66 11
556 100 29
126 26 4
2167 5i
73
Bohemia
678
663
284
300
346
141
70
IMI
Moravia
49
26
6
16
39
9
5
75
Silesia
30
23
4
7
30
10
2
53
Bohemia
432
410
171
176
335
112
48
842 y,
Moravia
32
33
II
12
33
7
2
65^
Silesia
23
20
3
7
32
1
-
43
>7
1302
6
258
I
50
30
NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
During the eight years between i860 and 1868
the emigration from Bohemia, Moravia, and Sile
sia was, respectively:

Year

Bohemia

Moravia

Silesia

1861 

1927
12461 124
1950
2417 308974303220

88
55 52 8
38
158
371 71

64

1862 

25

1863 

29

1864 

57

1865 

59

1866 

66

1867 

126

1868 

64

The total number of emigrants from Austria be
tween 1850-68 was 57,726; of this no less than
43,645 is Bohemia's share. The backward districts
of the southern part of the country furnished by far
the heaviest quota. ;
Emigration to Russia from Bohemia began to
assume at this time marked proportions. Thousands
were lured thither by the prospect of high wages —
high, compared to wages paid in Austria — and by
land grants offered to settlers by the Russian Gov
ernment. After the Austro- Prussian War in 1866,
the flow of surplus population toward America
again increased; in fact, the Austro-Prussian War,
synchronous as it was with the end of the Civil
War, marked an epoch in emigration which from
that year on mounted steadily and rapidly.
After 1880 the character of the emigration is seen
to change noticeably. The Cechs and Germans who
3i

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
had been supplying the bulk of the arrivals from
Austria, gradually begin to give room to a new
ethnic element, the Hungarians.
Later the Jugo-Slavs follow the Hungarians and
in the overshadowing figures that result, the Cech
portion becomes, by comparison, negligible.
Notwithstanding strict police regulations, adver
tisements, though veiled, appear here and there
telling of the great opportunities in America, giv
ing instructions how to travel and other advice. Die
Constitutionelle Allgemeine Zeitung von Bbhmen (Sep
tember 22, 1848) contains the advertisement of the
firm of Knorr & Janssen, of Hamburg. The repre
sentative of the firm in Bohemia is Ed. Zenk of
Liebenau. Another advertisement is that of Postschiff Ver-
bindung London-New York. Passagiere und Aus-
wanderer aus oest. Staate. The agent is G. H.
Paulsen. The same newspaper recommends to readers in
its issue of April 15, 1849, to purchase a book on
America, bearing the title, Auf, nach Amerika, by
Fr. Jager.
An announcement, printed May 31, 1849, as
sures the public that despite the Danish War, emi
gration to America via Bremen proceeds uninter
ruptedly. The Prazsky Vecerni List lends space (in 1 849)
to the following advertisements:
"May 22. Travelers to America are conveyed by
32

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
vessels on the 15th of every month by S. H. P.
Schroder in Bremen. Agent C. Poppe, Prague,
Konsky Trh, No. 833."
"June 30. Announcement to Travelers to Amer
ica. The firm of Liidering & Co., in Bremen, ships
emigrants on the 1st and 15th of every month by
fast going vessels. Agent, F. A. Dattelzweig, Kla-
tovy (Klattau)."
The Prazske Noviny of September 16, 1847,
edited by Karel Havlicek, admonishes the readers
not to emigrate. The article is obviously a reprint
from the German. If the Cechs, the writer argues,
who contemplate going to America, work as hard
at home as Americans are known to toil, they will
be surprised to find America at their own threshold.
The Politicke wesnicke nowiny z Cech of September
11, 1849, pleads with the readers that love of the
fatherland, if nothing else, should deter Cechs
from emigrating. Who but adventurers dare the
trip to America, anyway? Yet it is futile to try to
divert the thoughts of the poor and the resolute
from America.
" Reports continue to arrive from California con
cerning the large quantities of gold unearthed
there," says the Noviny Lipy Slovanske of February
14, 1849. "Nuggets of gold ore weighing as much
as a pound, in some cases two, have been found.
There are instances on record of emigrants making
in gold digging and in trading with the Indians as
much as $30,000. The average earnings of a person
33

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
per day amount to $100. Fever is prevalent among
the inhabitants but it is not fatal. Clothing, food
and domestic labor are very high; shirts sell at $10
each, beef from $i to $2 a pound, laundering a
dozen shirts costs $6. A merchant's clerk commands
$3,000 a year."
Writing from New York to the Prague Ndrodni
Noviny, April 3, 1849, J. C.1 harps on the same
favorite theme, California and its fabulous riches.
Emigrants traveled to the United States by the
four ports of Hamburg, Havre, Antwerp and Bre
men. As late as 1849 not a mile of railroad existed
in Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee,
or Texas.2 Up to 1850-55 but a small percentage of
emigrants went west by railroad. They chose their
homes in lake or river cities which had been bene
fited by canal and railroad construction. Buffalo, on
Lake Erie, was of small importance until 1825
when by the opening of the Erie Canal, it became
the gateway from the great valley to the Atlantic
States. Cleveland in the same way benefited by the
opening of the Erie Canal, as did Detroit, the oldest
of the Western cities. Steamboats plied regularly
between Milwaukee and Buffalo in the season of
lake navigation. As a general rule the French and
English clung to the seacoast, while the German,
Scandinavian, and Cech pushed into agricultural
1 "J. £." is conceivably Joseph Cilinsky, a jeweler from Prague,
and an early resident of New York.
* McMaster's History of the United States, v. viii, p. 88.
34

Copyright by Harris If Ewing, Washington, D.C.
THE CECHOSLOVAK LEGATION IN WASHINGTON
Charles Pergler (second from left) and part of his Staff

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
States. Before an all-rail connection had been es
tablished between New York and Chicago, Buffalo
was a kind of Mecca, where immigrants, journeying
westward, assembled. The city presented a sight
not to be seen elsewhere on this continent. Endless
caravans of coaches, of lumbering moving vans, of
country wagons, the latter loaded with household
furniture, agricultural implements, boxes, trunks,
moved through the principal thoroughfares. Immi
grants, with packs and baskets strapped to their
backs, lounged on the sidewalks or crowded in
front of lodging-houses. In 1845, says a chronicler,
96,000 Europeans passed through the city. Boats
which maintained communication with points west
of Buffalo seemed to do no other business, except
the transport of immigrants and their luggage.
The decks of these boats were provided with stalls
for domestic animals. In appearance, they sug
gested nothing so much as Noah's Ark. Their decks
were loaded with passengers, horses, horned cattle,
vehicles, and household belongings. Ordinarily,
travelers journeyed from New York to Albany by
water, from Albany to Buffalo by rail, from Buffalo
to Detroit by a lake boat. From the latter-named
city to Chicago, again by boat, the journey lasted
from five to six days. The Missouri Republican of
July 20, 1849, advertises the trip from St. Louis to
LaSalle, a distance of 281 miles for $5. From La-
Salle to Chicago, 100 miles, $4. From Chicago to
Buffalo via Buffalo and Detroit, from $5 to $8.
35

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
From Buffalo to Albany by rail, $9.75. From Al
bany to New York by boat, 50 cents. Owing to
the popular clamor that transportation compan
ies overcharged immigrants, a committee was ap
pointed in New York to investigate the alleged
charges of extortion. It was claimed that immi
grants were treated brutally by agents and run
ners, particularly those who were unable to speak
English. Buffalo never appealed to Cechs. Boreck^
mentions by name about ten families who lived
there in the mid-fifties. Even these few moved to
other parts, eventually, save the Myskas or Misch-
kas, as the name came to be spelled later.1
In the following seacoast, river, and lake cities the
nuclei of settlements began forming in or after the
fifties: New York, Baltimore, New Orleans, Buf
falo, St. Louis, Dubuque, Cincinnati, Milwaukee,
Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago, Racine, Manitowoc,
and Kewaunee. Always small, the settlements in
New Orleans, Buffalo, and Dubuque soon disap
peared, owing partly to removal, partly to assimi
lation. The first farming communities sprang up in Wis
consin. This State possessed advantages over others
which strongly appealed to the Central European.
The climate, though severe with long winters, was
salubrious and singularly free from those frequent
and unhealthy changes which prevail farther south.
1 John Boreck^: Chapters on the History of Cech-Moravians in
America, p. 9.
36

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
The soil was adaptable to the raising of maize, rye,
wheat, oats, and vegetables, all products with
which the Cech husbandman was familiar. More
over, there was no fear of the humiliating competi
tion with negro labor. Wisconsin's attractions were
widely advertised in German and Austrian news
papers. In the aggregate, it had the largest propor
tion of foreign citizens. Out of a population of
305,391 in 1850, there were 106,691, or more than
one out of three, born abroad. Of that number
nearly 40,000 were Germans. "The state [Wiscon
sin] commended itself to settlers in other ways.
Taxes were low; one could become a citizen within
one year. Good land could be bought at $1.25 an
acre and the ground of poorer quality for less price
than that. The state maintained in New York City
a salaried official, so called Immigration Commis
sioner, whose duty it was to seek to divert the
flow of newcomers thither. This commissioner ad
vertised extensively in the foreign language press,
mainly German, sending besides, generous quanti
ties of printed matter to points in Germany, Aus
tria, Switzerland." 1
One of the pamphlets read : " Come ! In Wisconsin
all men are free and equal before the law. . . . Reli
gious freedom is absolute and there is not the slight
est connection between church and state. ... In
Wisconsin no religious qualification is necessary for
1 Albert B. Faust: The German Element in the United States, v. 1,
P- 477-
37

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
office or to constitute a voter; all that is required is
for the man to be 21 years old and to have lived in
the state one year." l
Wisconsin, for a long time, stood at the front of
Cech effort in the United States. The weekly Slavie
made familiar in every household the names of
Milwaukee, Racine, Caledonia, Manitowoc, and
Kewaunee. The Germans called Milwaukee the
German Athens, the Cechs baptized Racine, where
stood the cradle of the Slowan Amerikdnsky and
later Slavie, the Cech Bethlehem.
At one time or another, Wisconsin was the home
of Vojta Naprstek, John Herman, Frank Kofizek,
J. B. Letovsky, Vaclav Simonek, Vojta Masek,
Charles Jonas, Ladimir Klaeel, Franta Mraeek,
John Borecky, John Karel. Here were projected
and came into existence, at the promptings of the
Slavie the first Cech language schools; here, too,
were organized the Slovanska Lipa chain of socie
ties. When the newer States, Nebraska and Kansas,
had been thrown open to settlers, it was the hardy
Wisconsin pioneer who was ready to advise his less
experienced countrymen in those States.
"The Cech community of Milwaukee is one of
the oldest in America ; it is older than either the one
in Chicago or Cleveland, for the Cechs were per
manently settled in Milwaukee the first half of the
1 John G. Gregory: Foreign Immigration to Wisconsin. Address
delivered before the Wisconsin State Historical Convention at Mil
waukee, October 11, 191 1.
38

RACINE ("CECH BETHLEHEM") IN 1830

Slovanske Besede

mVAHMiLXIM J'ttfiliSTA%'ISArJM

TANECNI ZABAVOU
v Racine ilut* fijuo UiOt

INVITATION TO A BESEDA, RACINE, OCTOBER, 1861

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
nineteenth century. ... In 1848 Vojta Naprstek
came. It was he, who here had sown the seed of na
tional life; he was the founder of the local Cech li
brary; from him came the incentive to publish a
Cech newspaper. . . . Synchronously with him ar
rived in Milwaukee Hans Balatka of Moravia. . . ."
" In no other state of northern America are so many
Cechs settled as in Wisconsin. Admittedly, the first
stopping point of our countrymen was Milwaukee,
where now live between two and three hundred
families; by far the largest numbers are found in
the city and county of Manitowoc. . . ." "Many
large Cech settlements may be found especially in
the counties of Manitowoc, Kewaunee, Oconto, La
Crosse, Adams, and Marathon."1
Vojta Masek (Mashek, 1 839-1903), a well-to-do
merchant, tells in his reminiscences 2 that when he
1 F. K.: "The Cradle of Bohemian National Life in Milwaukee,"
The Kvety Americke, December 22, 1886. — "The Bohemian Opera
House in Manitowoc," The Kv&ty Americke, April 13, 1887. —
Vaclav Cizek: "Reminiscences of the Old Settlers." The Almanac
Atnerikdn, 1897. — J. J. Vlach: (e) "Our Bohemian Population."
Proceedings of the State Hist. Soe. of Wisconsin. Madison, 1902. —
Nan Mashek. (e) "Bohemian Farmers in Wisconsin," Charities,
New York, December 3, 1904. — Anton Novak: "Brief Account of
the Bohemian Community in Milwaukee, in Memorial published
on the occasion of the fourteenth convention of the C.S.P.S., held
in Milwaukee, 1909.
2 The Kvety AmerickS, January 5, 1887, biography and portrait;
the Almanac Amerikdn, 1891; the Almanac Amerikdn, 1901, me
moirs and portrait. A lifelong friend of Jonas' and his schoolmate
from Prague, Masek, gave up journalism (Jonas took over the
Slavie from him) because "it did not offer enough opportunity to an
ambitious man."
39

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
came to Racine in 1861 the farmers, unable to make
a living out of the few acres of soil which they had
under cultivation, sought employment in the lum
ber industry, laboring in the saw mills in towns,
cutting and rolling logs in camps. Many of them
worked as shingle cutters. Often the only domestic
animal owned by the farmer was a cow or a calf. All
around the country was thickly wooded; beautiful
maples, cherry trees and birches were cut arid
stumps burned to clear the land for cultivation.
Unfortunately, beauty was the only asset of these
trees. Market value they had none. Stumps were
left in the ground until they rotted or were burned;
in the patches, which by the way, widened year by
year, the farmer planted his potatoes and his corn.
Of the sea coast cities New York was the only one
to attract Cechs in greater numbers. For a good
many years New York served merely as a jumping-
off place, a point of distribution, from which immi
grants scattered to inland places. Although tens of
thousands had passed through its gates on their
journey westward, Joseph Pastor, in a communica
tion to the Slavie, estimated in 1867 their strength
there at 1500. The New Yorkers hired rooms in the
poorest quarter of the city. The furniture consisted
of only the necessary pieces; chairs, tables and
beds. Cases were by no means' uncommon where
two related families shared the same diminutive
apartment. On the lower east side, in Essex, Divi
sion, Houston, Delancy, and Rivington Streets,
40

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
which is the habitat of the poor from southeastern
Europe, still may be seen many of the old-time ram
shackle structures in which they lived. Worse yet
was the back-yard tenement; shut off from light
and air, the tenant and his children enjoyed within
them about as much comfort as an inmate of a
jail.1 No rural community in New York State of any
consequence took root except one. That is situ-j'|
ated at Bohemia, on Long Island, about fifty miles j
from New York City. John Vavra, John Koula J
and John Kratochvil are the reputed founders of
it in 1855. A local historian says that eleven fam
ilies settled in Bohemia Village in 1859.2
St. Louis bid fair at one time to become a Cech
metropolis. There the first Catholic church was
erected in 1854; there the C.S.P.S. benevolent
brotherhood was organized in 1854. And had not
Racine deprived it of the honor by a close margin of
1 Jacob Riis: (e) How the Other Half Lives (studies among the
tenements of New York), pp. 136-47. New York, 1891. — Jane E.
Robbins : (e) "The Bohemian Women in New York and their Work as
Cigarmakers," Charities, New York, December 3, 1904. — Memorial
issued on the occasion of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the exist
ence of the New York Supreme Lodge, C.S.P.S., and of lodges subor
dinated thereto. 148 pp. January 16, 1904. — John V. Capek: The
History of the Cech Community in New York and the Ndrodni Jednota
(Society of National Union) of American Cechs. 48 pp. New York,
1904. — The Almanac of the Cech-Slavic People in New York, v. 1.
164 pp. New York, 1904. — J. E. S. Vojan: "The Cech Quarter of
New York," pp. 176-84, in Greater New York, 1908.
2 Joseph F. Thuma: "History of Bohemia Village," The Almanac
Amerikdn, 1896. "Reminiscences of John Koula," The Almanac
Amerikdn, 1903. 41

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
twenty days, St. Louis might have been the birth
place of the Cech press in America.
St. Louis attracted European settlers because it
was the terminus of boats sailing up the Mississippi
from New Orleans. Passenger and freight carrying
lines navigating the Mississippi, Missouri, Illinois,
and Ohio Rivers made regular stops there. Settlers
bound for points west of the Mississippi River pre
ferred St. Louis to Chicago. It had four times as
many inhabitants as Chicago; in 1845 two German
dailies were published there. When in 1853 Chicago
was connected with the east by rail and travelers
found it more convenient and cheaper to reach the
northwest by way of New York and Chicago rather
than enter it via New Orleans and the Missis
sippi River, the claim of St. Louis to the title of
Cech metropolis was irretrievably lost. Chicago
ultimately wrested the scepter from its old rival.1
! In Cleveland the Cechs began concentrating in
'larger numbers about the same time, that is, after
1852. 2 The story is told that sixteen families who
1 The Almanac Amerikdn, 1901. Vaclav Jirouch believes that no
more than thirty Cech families lived in St. Louis in 1852. The growth
of the St. Louis center suffered a setback during the Civil War; the
tide of immigration turned, Jirouch thinks, to Cleveland, Chicago
and to eastern cities generally. — The Memorial of the Fiftieth Jubi
lee of C.S.P.S. 1854-1904, published on the occasion of the Thir
teenth Convention of the C.S.P.S. Brotherhood, August i, 1904, at
St. Louis.
2 The Cech Community of Cleveland and the Social Life thereof.
192 pp. Published the year of the Ethnographic Exhibition in
Prague, 1895. Substantially the same story by Hugo Chotek, though
concise, is reprinted in the Almanac Amerikdn, 1895, pp. 201-11.
42

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
arrived that year found temporary shelter in the
home of a kind-hearted Bohemian Jew by the name
of Levy. The fact should be noted that the Israelites
in many instances preceded others from Bohemia.
"When we reached Cleveland in 1853," says
Mrs. Novak, "Indian tents were pitched beyond
Newburgh. We settled in Brooklyn (suburb of
Cleveland), where we found many of our country
men. I recall the following names of old settlers:
F. Zika, V. Benda, J. Kaiser, old man Kocian, Bl&ha,
Zeman, Hladik, Stein, Bauer, Ptacek, Marek, etc." x
Land prices in Cleveland, according to Novak,
who came in 1853, were ridiculously low. All the pio
neers could have become rich had they been fore-
sighted. Any kind of work was welcome in the
start, as long as it assured existence to the immi
grant. A private census taken of the Cleveland com
munity in 1869 2 lists 696 families, numbering a
total of 3252 persons. Of these 1749 were men, 1503
women. The occupations of the men, the census
gives as follows: 346 laborers, 76 masons, 72 joiners,
56 tailors, 44 shoemakers, 39 coopers, 25 lock
smiths and machinists, 13 musicians, 11 smelters,
More trustworthy data on the Cleveland community than Chotek's
story are contained in the narratives of Francis Sykora (arrived in
1853), Joseph K?i2 (1853), Martin KrejEi (1854), Francis Sprosty
(1866), Francis Payer (1868), Joseph V. Sykora (1863), in the Al
manac A merikdn, 1895. — Magdalena Kucera: (e) "The Slavic Races
in Cleveland," Charities, January, 1905.
1 The Cech Community of Cleveland, etc., p. 17.
2 The Slavie, February 17, 1869.
43

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
12 butchers, 9 saddlers, 9 weavers, 8 stone cutters,
7 wheelwrights, 6 furriers, 6 tinsmiths, 5 bakers, 5
tanners, 5 dyers, 4 cutlers, 2 builders, 2 bookbind
ers, 1 printer, 1 watchmaker, 1 sanitary inspector,
1 policeman, I brewer, 1 lithographer, 1 priest, 22
saloonkeepers. The census gatherer (Payer? Er-
hart?) records 396 owners of cottages.
Into Chicago, the first groups began filtering in
1852-53, The Chicago pioneers squatted on the
outskirts of the city, on land that is now a part of
Lincoln Park. There they lived until 1855 in shacks
when the owner of the land drove the squatters off.
The men earned their living by loading and un
loading lumber on the river front. The women and
children did the customary chores around the
house. On market days, the women went to market
to buy groceries and to the abattoirs for cheap
meats (haslet, tripe, kidneys, brains, etc.). Often
the purchases were made on the cooperative plan.1
1 F. B. Zdrfibek: "History of Chicago and of its Cech Residents,
pp. 139-71 — in the Almanac, Amerikdn, 1884. — Charles Jonas': (e)
"The Bohemians in Chicago" Chicago Sunday Times, January 24,
1892. — St. J. Halik and J. R.: "Hall of the T. J. Sokol in Chicago,"
the Kv&ty Americke', March 16, 1887. — The Directory of American
Cechs, published to commemorate the Cech Slavic Ethnographic Ex
hibition in Prague, in 1895. 320 pp. — Josephine H. Zeman: (e) The
Bohemian People in Chicago. The Hull House Papers, pp. 115-28.
1895. — Dr. John Habenicht: Reminiscences of a Cech Physician, A
contribution to the history of Cech Americans. 89 pp. Chicago, 1 897.
— Dr. John Habenicht and Anton Pregler: Memorial of old Cech
Settlers of Chicago, published in commemoration of the second anni
versary of the society, held August 20, 1899. 51 pp. — Paul Albieri:
"The Cech Element in Chicago," pp. 5-40, in The Directory of Bo
hemian Merchants, Tradesmen andSocieties. Chicago, 1900. — Frank
44

CECH RESIDENTIAL SECTION, CHICAGO
Millard Avenue, looking north from Ogden Avenue

CECH BUSINESS QUARTER, CHICAGO
Blue Island Avenue, looking south from Eighteenth Street

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
Minnesota boasted, in 1850, of 6077 white in
habitants. Settlers, chiefly of Scandinavian an
cestry, poured in so fast that ten years later
the population had already mounted to 172,023.
Though the Germans constituted a goodly per
centage, yet their numbers in Minnesota never
even approximated the grand total of Germandom
in Wisconsin and it was far behind the figure made
up by the combined populations of Swedes and
Norwegians. In 1900 the census reported 211,769
settlers of Swedish and 224,892 of Norwegian an
cestry. Of the Germanic race the census enumerator
found in the State that year 289,822 people. New
Prague greeted the first Cechs in 1856. "The fine
stretch of land comprising LeSueur, Rice and Scott
counties, peopled chiefly by our Cech countrymen
and which we may truly call Little Bohemia was,
fifty years ago, the stamping ground of droves of
deer, roebuck and other beasts of the field." x
B. Zdrfibek: The History of the Cech National Cemetery in Chicago,
from 1877, the year of its foundation, to the twenty-fifth year of its
existence in 1902. 144 pp. Chicago, 1902. — Memorial of Ludvik's
Theatrical Troupe. Published to commemorate the tenth anniversary
of a permanent Cech playhouse in Chicago. 52 pp. Chicago, 1893-
1903. — Alice G. Masaryk: (e) "The Bohemians in Chicago," Chari
ties, December 3, 1904. — The F'*tory of Ten Years Duration of the
Society of Old Cech Settlers of ¦>. 86 pp. Chicago, 1908. —J.
E. S. Vojan: "Cech Chicago innings and Present Develop
ment," pp. 29-68, in Direc> .^ Almanac of the Cech Population
of Chicago.
1 Rev. John Rynda: Guide to the Cech Catholic Congregations in
the" Archdiocese of St. Paul. 233 pp. Published by the League of
Cech priests of that diocese. 1910.
45

the Cechs in America
John Kas"par, who emigrated as a lad of fourteen,
tells how the Kaspar, Maly, and Navratil fami
lies journeyed from Racine (Wisconsin) to McLeod
County in Minnesota. Each family provided itself
for the long trek with an ox-team and a prairie
schooner, in which were piled featherbeds, kitchen
utensils, clothing, provisions. The caravan started
from Racine on April I, reaching its objective
in McLeod County after untold hardships, on
July 6. x
Iowa received the Cechs somewhat later than
Wisconsin. A local annalist counted 139 Cechs in
Cedar Rapids in 1856.2 Vaclav Drbohlav is known
to have lived in Cedar Rapids in 1850; Vit Fibikar
and Vaclav Rigl settled there either in 1851 or 1852.
The arrivals of 1854 were John Barta Letovsk^,
Anton Sulek, F. Kubias, Joseph Vanous (Wallace),
John Witousek, Joseph Woytisek, John Cernin,
Joseph and F. Rencin, Jacob Polak.3
"The first permanent settlement was made in the
northern part of Johnson County, in Jefferson
township and College township in Linn County.
The majority of the older settlers in this section
1 The Almanac Amerikdn, 1891.
1 Joseph E. Marcombe: (e) The History of Linn County.
* Memorial of the Cech American Day during the Golden Jubilee of
Cedar Rapids, June 14, 1906, p. 42. — L. J. P. (alda): "Hall of the
Reading Club in Cedar Rapids," the Kvety AmericM, February 16,
1887. — Sarka B. Hrbkova: (e) "Bohemians have done much for
Cedar Rapids," The Cedar Rapids Republican, June 10, 1906. — J.
R. Jicinsk^: (e) Bohemians in Linn County. Linn County Atlas.
Davenport, 1907.
46

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
came in the years 1854 to 1856, but stragglers fol
lowed for many years later." 1
Members of the Pecinovsky family were pioneers
in Dubuque and Davenport.2 The settling of Spill-
ville and vicinity took place later when railroads
made traveling more convenient. M. B. Vosoba,
Vaclav Jilek and Anton Simerda bought land in
Jones County in 1855.3
Home-builders began arriving in Nebraska in
noticeable numbers after 1863, following the pas
sage of the Homestead Law. Saline County, and
especially the stretch of land lying between the
towns of Crete and Wilber, welcomed the vanguard
of the strangers, all or nearly all of whom had come
from Wisconsin. Some, it is said, were discontented
with the climate, others with the soil of Wisconsin.4
A. L. Schlesinger 6 (1806-93), who died in Denver at
a ripe old age, was the first-known settler there.
Schlesinger had been a deputy to the Bohemian
Diet. Dissatisfied with political conditions he emi
grated in 1856. After various unsuccessful attempts
to gain a footing elsewhere, he landed in Washington
County, Nebraska, in 1857. For a number of years
1 B. Simek: (e) The Bohemians in Johnson County. (Ia.) p. i.
5 The Almanac Amerikdn, 1891. * Ibid., 1896.
« Rev. John Stephen Broz: History of the St. Vdclav Bohemian
Catholic Congregation in Dodge. 73 pp. — Jubilee edition of Osvita
Americkd, June 15, 1904. — (e) History of the Bohemians in Ne
braska. Published by the Nebraska State Historical Society, 1914. —
Otto KotouC: (e) "The Bohemian Settlement at Humboldt," in His
tory of Richardson County.
« The Kvety Americke, January 6, 1886. Biography and portrait.
47

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Schlesinger made his living as a teamster, hauling
food-stuffs and goods over the trackless plains
between Omaha and Denver.
Another old settler was Edward Rosewater
(originally Rosenwasser), the founder of the Omaha
Bee and of the Pokrok Zdpadu. Indisputably, Rose-
water was the most distinguished Bohemian Jew in
the State.
John Herman who, like most Nebraskans, had
first tried Wisconsin, is said to have brought with
him more cash money to America than any other
pioneer; according to John Rosicky, a Nebraska
newspaper editor, some 80,000 florins. Like Schlesin
ger, Herman had taken an active part in the national
movement in Bohemia ; like Schlesinger, he too was
elected to the Diet. Emanuel Arnold and Charles
Havlicek, patriots and revivalists, were his per
sonal friends. Both, when danger threatened, found
succor under Herman's hospitable roof. Police ter
rorism forced him to sell his property and emigrate
in 1856. Due to unfortunate investments first in
St. Francis, then in Manitowoc in Wisconsin, Her
man lost his fortune and settled as a poor man in
Saline County.1
Why the Cechs from Moravia have shown pref-
1 The Kvety Americki, March 30, 1887. — Biography and por
trait, Jubilee edition of the Osveta Americkd, June 15, 1904. Herman
was one of the striking figures among the pathfinders. Not without
reason co-nationals looked up to him as a leader. The author served
a term in the Nebraska Legislature with Herman's oldest son,
Stephen.
48

VACLAV BOHL

JOHN HERMAN

FRANCIS KORBEL

JOHN BORECKY

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
erence for Texas x to the exclusion of other Southern
States, is explained in another chapter. Dr. Habe
nicht, who practiced his profession there, is author
ity for the statement that the men who were instru
mental in diverting the initial migration to that
State were Pastors Bergman of Zapudov (Mora
via) and Joseph J. Zvol&nek of Liptal and Vsetin
(Moravia). Letters written by them to members of
their former congregations induced many Protest
ants from Moravia and Bohemia to migrate there.
Catspring in Austin County, all accounts agree,
formed the base and concentration point of the
newcomers. Here they rested, took counsel, and
bought supplies for the fatiguing journey inland.
Cech Texas still recalls the old families of Joseph
Lesikar, Joseph Siller, John Reymershoffer, Joseph
Masik. Lesikar, his biographer records, reached
Catspring in 1853. An admirer of Havlicek, he did
his bit in preparing the ground for Cech journal
ism in the United States. As agent in Texas of the
St. Louis Ndrodni Noviny, an outspoken Unionist
paper, Lesikar was threatened with death by Con
federate neighbors unless he gave up the agency of
this mischief-making publication. One of the Siller
family studied law and was either the first or one
of the first Cechs in the United States to devote
himself to the practice of that profession. The Rey-
mershoffers passed through Catspring in 1855.
1 Kenneth D. Miller: (e) "Bohemians in Texas," The Bohemian
Review, May, 1917.
49

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Drifting to Galveston, they became prominent in
business and politics there. John Reymershoffer, a
son of the pioneer, acted as Austrian Consul. By
Joseph Ma§ik is claimed the distinction of having
been the first teacher of his nationality in Texas.
In company with fifteen other families, Masik
landed in Galveston in 1855; thence the travelers
proceeded by boat to Houston and from Houston
in prairie schooners to Catspring.1 Substantially the
same story is reported by Antonfn Strupl, a photog
rapher, having a studio in Industry.2
A prominent figure in Texas is August Haidusek
of La Grange, proprietor of the journal Svoboda,
jurist and banker. Haidusek migrated to Texas as
a lad before the Civil War. He served in the Con
federate army. He thinks he was the first lawyer of
Cech birth in this country, having been admitted
to the Texas bar in 1870.3
In Kansas, the oldest settlement took root ten
years after the Civil War. "Meandering southwest,
we entered Kansas at the corner of Washington and
Republic Counties going through Republic, Jewell,
Mitchell, and Lincoln Counties into Wilson town
ship, Ellsworth County. . . . The founding of the
settlement in Palacky Township occurred in June,
1876. . . . The largest party of Bohemian home-
seekers came September 1, 1876, from Chicago. It
was one of the organized clubs or colonization socie-
1 The Almanac Amerikdn, 1887.
2 Ibid., 1892. > Ibid., 1901.
50

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
ties (p. 477)." The newcomers spread over the
counties of Osborne, Mitchell, Lincoln, Russell,
Ellsworth, Barton. The locust pest, which ruined
crops in Saline County, was the direct cause of
many Nebraskans emigrating to Kansas.1
Settlements in North and South Dakota were
founded, not by professional farmers arriving direct
from Bohemia, as was the case with the farming j
settlements in Wisconsin, Nebraska, and Iowa, but 1
by proletarians from large cities, such as Chicago.
The longing to get away from the grinding misery i
in the shop and factory impelled New Yorkers, {
within the last fifteen or twenty years, to buy'
farms in Connecticut.
A few wayfarers went to Pennsylvania (Alle
gheny) before the Civil War, but the main influx
did not set in there until the seventies. The charac
ter of the Pennsylvania immigration is essentially
different; not farmers, but millworkers and miners
migrated there.
An attempt at farming on the cooperative plan
was made by a number of families from Chicago at
Vontay, in Virginia. The community, however, dis
solved in 1900, after an existence of less than three
years. Another settlement centering about Peters
burg, near Richmond, has been, on the other hand,
highly successful.
The agricultural contingents in Oregon and
1 Francis J. Swehla: (e) "The Bohemians in Central Kansas."
Collections of the Kansas State Historical Society. Topeka, 1915.
51

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Washington are not only small, but necessarily
recent. This is also true of Oklahoma.
The farmer constructed his dwelling as necessity
dictated. If he chose his future home in prairie
States such as Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, where tim
ber was scarce, he built a sod house; if his prefer
ence was for a woodland country, like Wisconsin,
he constructed a log cabin. F. J. Sadilek, Register of
Saline County in Nebraska, narrates how on a dark
night he once rode with his horse and wagon right
over a dugout, realizing his blunder only when he
heard the terrified shrieks of the inmates. The sod
houses were mere burrows in the ground. Where a
stream ran through the land, the settler usually dug
himself into the slope of it.1
Farmer Joseph Klima, who settled in 1854 near
Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, describes how mem
bers of his family, harnessing themselves, pulled
logs to the site chosen for the cabin. Corn bread and
"coffee," the latter ground from roasted corn, was
the daily if not the sole food of the family. At times
even that gave out. By dint of hard labor and self-
denial, Klima saved enough to buy a team of oxen,
a wagon, and a plow. After that, the progress of
breaking up the ground went on more quickly than
when the sole farming implement was a pick and
a shovel. "I dragged on my back feather beds tied in a
bundle and some kitchen utensils. My wife carried
1 F. J. Sadilek: My Reminiscences. 60 pp. Omaha, 1914.
52

Joseph L. Lesikar The Hubacek Brothers
THE PATHFINDERS

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
cooking-pots and our nine-year daughter had in her
arms a kitten. Thus equipped we started house
keeping in Wisconsin. Upon a closer examination
of the land we had picked out, we espied on it some
deserted log cabins, or rather the odds and ends of
cabins, for everything but the walls was gone. With
another family we put up in one of the cabins; our
pallets consisted of a few logs on which we strewed
brushwood to make them softer." *
"With hoes we raked a patch of ground to plant
potatoes. Our house was a very simple affair. We
dug a hole in the ground, lining it with sod. Then
we threw a top over it, overlaid that with brush
wood and thatch and our dwelling was complete." 2
To get a true perspective on the old immigrations
something should be known of the social and politi
cal conditions as they existed in Bohemia about
1848. First of all let it be borne in mind that it was
the agricultural and domestic labor from the prov-l I
inces which supplied the major part of the new-'
comers. Secondly, the peasantry had just emerged
from a condition resembling semi-slavery, the law
which abolished forced labor having been passed in
1849. The elementary school taught little more
than reading, spelling, and arithmetic. The sover
eign desired not educated citizens, but loyal and
obedient subjects. For centuries the ruling class
drummed into the head of the peasant its specious
1 The Almanac Amerikdn, 1903. Narrative of Frank Hrbek.
2 Ibid., 1891. Narrative of Joseph Pecinovsk£«
53

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
theories: obey the Church, obey the Government,
obey the lords. The archbishop claimed a prior lien
on the peasant's soul; the emperor held a chattel
mortgage on his body; the lord usurped the fruits
of his labor. To the peasant little was left that was
i free and unencumbered.
Regimented from childhood up to obey and never
i to command; knowing little or nothing of constitu
tional liberty, was it any wonder that, if compared
: to an Englishman, a Swede, or a German, the old-
time Cech immigrant appeared backward and ser
vile and sheepish? The fault, of course, was not his;
the blame rested on the shoulders of those who for
centuries held captive his intellect, who sought to
retain their hold on him by the pernicious teaching
that dumb obedience and unreasoning faith were
his only hope of salvation.
"When I came to St. Louis in May, 1857," says
John Borecky,1 " I found in that city a strong Cech
community. They had a Catholic Church, and a
C.S.P.S. fraternal lodge. Yet the genuine Cech
spirit somehow or other was lacking. Among so
many of my countrymen I found no books except
prayer books."
When the author last visited his native land he
was importuned with all sorts of questions con
cerning the Americans. "Tell us how our country-
1 Lecture delivered by John Borecky on the occasion of the fiftieth
anniversary of the Slovanska Lfpa Society. St. Louiske Listy, Jan
uary, 1909.
54

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
men are doing in America. — Do you know my
cousin, a manufacturer in Chicago? — Have you
heard of my uncle, Mr. X? He is said to be doing
excellently. — What do you hear about Mr. N., a
wealthy notary in Chicago?" Everywhere the
author met people who had or claimed to have
uncles, cousins, brothers-in-law, grandfathers, who
were manufacturers, wholesale merchants, superin
tendents, and foremen. In every instance the rela
tive held some commanding position; that all were
wealthy was self -understood, for can one imagine an
American uncle who is poor?
A Prussian captain of industry has said that
America was a land of unlimited possibilities. Yet
despite all these possibilities we know that the
process of transforming a peasant into a great mer
chant and a mechanic into a manufacturer is not
as rapid as some would wish and others want to
believe. Every Cech community, of course, has
its superintendents, foremen, and merchants, but
these men, without an exception, have worked
themselves up only after a hard and long-drawn-
out struggle. Dollars and gray hair invariably come
to the successful man together.
A young Prague machinist remarked to the
author: "I shall go to America next spring. I shall
remain there three or five years, no longer, until I
have saved some money, then I shall return to
Prague.'^ That in America one gets rich quickly or
easily is another illusion. Cech immigration is more
55

the Cechs in America
than seventy years old, and yet how many wealthy
men are there of that nationality? They can be
counted on the fingers of two hands. But what immi
grant has amassed a fortune overnight? Not one.
Five years are spent in preparatory work; another
five or ten years elapse before our Central European
disappears in the melting-pot. Then there is the
English language, the knowledge of which is useful
to the mechanic and small business man and indis
pensable to the professional. Without it the new
comer is much in the same predicament as the
handsome prince in the fable whom the sorceress
had lured into the bewitched circle: he was power
less to extricate himself from his position and none
could reach him from without. To master English
is in itself a problem. In three, five years, few suc
ceed in accomplishing the task; those who shut
themselves within the narrow confines of their own
communities seldom learn it except in a perfunc
tory fashion.
In the beginning they held their social functions
in halls owned by Germans. The reason was obvi
ous. Next to the mother tongue, they were profi
cient in German. English sounded unfamiliar to
them. The community grew socially and economi
cally, and churches and lodge-halls were built.
These structures were modest, and judged by pres
ent-day standards, unsightly. They answered the
purpose, however, and satisfied the taste of the
time. The material used in every instance was
56

SOKOL SLOVANSKA LIPA HALL
CHICAGO

C.S.P.S. HALL, CHICAGO

5N

"S\ &

Pflfr

CECH-AMERICAN HALL, MILWAUKEE

PLZENSKY SOKOL GYMNASTIC ASSO
CIATION HALL, CHICAGO

NINETEENTH-CENTURY IMMIGRATION
wood. The Catholics in St. Louis built in 1854 a
frame chapel (St. John Nepomuk) ; their Chicago
co-religionists built in 1864 a frame chapel (St.
Vaclav). The Sokol Slovansk& Lipa erected a frame
hall on Taylor Street in Chicago in 1869. The Perun
Hall, the social center of the Cleveland commu
nity, originating in 1 87 1, is, however, constructed
of brick. The C.S.P.S. Hall on Eighteenth Street,
Chicago, which for many years housed a language
school, is of the same material, brick. It dates to
1871. From wood to brick — a step forward. Years
pass by, the old country sends annually a contin
gent of from 5000 to 10,000 future citizens; the
fresh arrivals augment the strength of those already
here. Gradually the more enterprising shop- workers
branch out as master mechanics; others leave fac
tories to go into small business as bakers, grocers,
butchers. The more Americanized settlers begin to
buy real estate, at first for home purposes, later for
speculation. Real estate rises in price, property in
terests multiply, the well-to-do middle class, ap
preciating the value of higher school education,
gives the children the benefit of high school or col
lege training. In time the sons and daughters of
butchers, grocers, saloon-keepers, and farmers grad
uate as school-teachers, lawyers, doctors, pharma
cists, dentists. These American-born and American-
bred children, if they decide to live for professional
or other reasons in or near the settlement, make its
inner life not only more complex, but also more
57

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
refined. They refuse to live in the dark flats and
ugly tenements which had housed their parents
for years. As individuals prosper, their social and
economic requirements correspondingly increase.
A prompt decentralization of races, composing
the old Dual Monarchy, a separation from bed and
board, an alignment according to language and race
ensues : a Pole to Pole, no matter whether in the old
country your John Lubomirski owed allegiance to
Austria, Prussia, or Russia; a Cech to Cech; the
Magyar to his own; the Austro-German to the Ger
mans from the Fatherland. The State idea to which
Austro-Hungarian statesmen have clung as ten
aciously as the dervish holds fast to his fetich, is
that moment proved an illusion, or rather a delu
sion: political boundaries that had separated people
of the same race are seen to disappear as a rainbow
fades. Only two binding ties survive: race and
language.

CHAPTER IV
THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE STOCK
THE Thirteenth (1910) Census found 539,392
foreign-born persons of Bohemian (and Mora
vian) stock. Of this number 237,283 were of the
same mother tongue, 8199 of mixed mother tongue;
41 ,724 were of foreign-born father, 23,448 of foreign-
born mother.1
Distribution according to Countries of Origin in Detail *
Foreign-born Total foreign
1010 1010
Bohemia (and Moravia)  228,738 539,392
Austria  219,214 515.183
Germany  6,263 17.382
Hungary  1,755 2,868
Russia  1,898 1,694
Europe, not specified  148 405
Canada  118 236
At sea  102 173
England  30 67
Roumania  27 38
Belgium  26 59
France  22 33
Turkey in Europe  18 20
Switzerland  16 34
Greece  II 18
Turkey in Asia  8 13
Denmark  7 I3
South America.  7 8
Australia  5 43
Serbia  5 7
1 Thirteenth Census of the U.S. 1010 : Mother Tongue of the For
eign White Stock. Table 2, p. 963.
* Ibid., Table 22, pp. 995"-9°-
59

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Norway  4 16
Montenegro  4 4
India  4 4
Netherlands  3 17
Africa  3 10
Ireland  3 7
Luxemburg  3 3
Sweden  2 13
Bulgaria  2 3
Scotland  I 9
Italy  1 7
Asia, not specified  1 6
Finland  1 5
Central America  1 1
China  1 1
Spain  2
Country not specified  24 41
Mixed foreign  949
Distribution of Stock according to States 1
Illinois  124,225 California  3,707
Nebraska  50,680 Massachusetts  3,010
Ohio  50,004 Washington  2,984
New York  47,4oo Colorado  2,903
Wisconsin  45.336 Connecticut  2,693
1 Texas  41,080 Indiana  2,126
Minnesota  33,247 Oregon  1,709
Iowa  32,050 Montana  1,653
Pennsylvania  13,945 Virginia  1,059
Missouri  13,928 Arkansas  778
Kansas  1 1,603 Wyoming  671
Michigan  10,130 Idaho  663
So. Dakota  9,943 West Virginia  535
Maryland  9.199 Rhode Island  346
No. Dakota  7,287 Kentucky  305
New Jersey  6,656 Utah  268
Oklahoma  5,633 Alabama  184
Tennessee  176 Florida  92
1 Thirteenth Census of the U.S. igio : Mother Tongue of the For
eign White Stock. Table 17, pp. 985-86.
60

THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE STOCK

New Mexico  175 Nevada  84
Louisiana  173 So. Carolina  71
District of Columbia  135 Mississippi  61
Georgia  127 New Hampshire  44
Delaware  121 Maine  41
Arizona  97 No. Carolina  16
It will be seen that the stock is bulked in the
Middle West. South of the Mason and Dixon line,
Texas comes first with considerable Cech popula
tion, and Oklahoma next.
Distribution in Cities havi

Albany, N.Y 
Atlanta, Ga 
Baltimore, Md 
Birmingham, Ala . . .
Boston, Mass 
Bridgeport, Conn . . .
Buffalo, N.Y 
Cambridge, Mass
Chicago, 111. 
Cincinnati, O 
Cleveland, O 
Columbus, O 
Dayton, O 
Denver, Colo 
Detroit, Mich 
Fall River, Mass 
Grand Rapids, Mich.
Indianapolis, Ind 
Jersey City, N.J 
Kansas City, Mo 
Los Angeles, Cal 
Louisville, Ky 

NG 100,000 OR MORE INH,

\BITANTS *

Total

Native

foreign

Foreign-

of foreign

white stock

bom

or mixed

1910

parentage

91

56

35

25

9

16

7.750

3,354

4,396

17

7

10

551

233

3i8

559

295

264

271

152

119

24

13

11

110,736

50,063

60,673

368

170

198

. 39,296

17.134

22,162

172

106

66

H7

78

69

607

248

359

2,641

1,133

1,508

5

5

177

7i

106

104

38

66

222

120

102

171

72

99

564

272

292

56

24

32

1 Thirteenth Census of the U.S. 1910: Mother Tongue of the For
eign White Stock. Table 24, p. 1012. 61

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Lowell, Mass  6 3 3
Memphis, Tenn  30 16 14
Milwaukee, Wis  6,370 2,785 3,585
Minneapolis, Minn  1,649 684 965
Nashville, Tenn  37 15 22
New Haven, Conn  109 43 66
New Orleans, La  98 43 55
(New York, N.Y  40,988 21,078 19,910)
" " Manhattan Boro . 31,167 16,506 14,661
" Bronx " . 3,206 1,498 1,708
" Brooklyn " . 1,615 857 758
" " Queens " . 4,851 2,129 2>722
" Richmond " . 149 88 61
Newark, N.J  1,150 582 568
Oakland, Cal  229 99 130
Omaha, Neb  5,414 2,622 2,792
Paterson, N.J  87 43 44
Philadelphia, Pa  1,652 778 874
Pittsburgh, Pa  3453 ^9°7 *>546
Portland, Oreg  354 178 176
Providence, R.I  95 63 32
Richmond, Va  47 24 23
Rochester, N.Y  86 33 53
St. Louis, Mo  10,282 4,118 6,164
St. Paul, Minn  4,140 1,621 2,519
San Francisco, Cal  960 489 471
Scranton, Pa  134 69 65
Seattle, Wash  402 239 163
Spokane, Wash  174 77 97
Syracuse, N.Y  83 38 45
Toledo, 0  393 262 131
Washington, D.C  135 59 76
Worcester, Mass  42 19 23
Distribution in Ten Selected Cities *
Chicago  110,736 Milwaukee  6,370
New York  40,988 Omaha  5,414
Cleveland  39,296 St. Paul  4,140
St. Louis  10,282 Pittsburgh  3,453
Baltimore  7,750 Detroit  2,641
1 The Slavie of November 3, 1864, estimates the Cech urban popu-
62

THE DISTRIBUTION OP THE STOCK
Immigration of Bohemian and Moravian stock
from 1882 (in which year Bohemia first appeared
independently in the census) to date, the figures
since 1910 being those of the Commissioner-Gen
eral of Immigration: *
1882  6,602 1900  3,060
1883  5,462 1901  3,766
1884  8,239 1902  5,590
l885  6,352 1903  9,577
1886  4,314 1904  11,838
l887  4,579 I9°5  ",757
1888  4,127 1906  12,958^
J889  3,085 1907....  13.554'
1890  4,505 1908  10,164
1891  11,758 1909  6,850
1892  8,535 J9io  8,462
1893  5,548 1911  9,223
1894  2,536 1912  8,439
1895  1,607 1913  11,091
1896  2,709 1914  9,928
1897  1.954 1915  1.651
1898  2,478 1916  642
1899  2,526 1917  327
lation as follows: St. Louis, 7000; Chicago, 2500; New York, 1500;
Milwaukee, 1200; Cleveland, 800; Detroit, 300. The same paper,
dated August 15, 1865, overstates when it asserts that there were (in
1865) 120,000 people of Cech stock in America. The tendency
among immigrants is to overestimate their number, so that if offi
cial figures are inaccurate, private estimates are in most instances
worthless. According to the census of 1870 there were little over 36,000 Cechs
in the country. The Slavie of May 3, 1872, thinks that if to this num
ber were added those who, through ignorance, had been tabulated
as Austrians, we should get a total of 42,000 born in Bohemia. The
city population was: Chicago, 6277; St. Louis, 2652; New York,
1487 ; Milwaukee, 1435 ; Detroit, 537 ; Allegheny, 324 ; Pittsburgh) 49.
1 Annual Report of the Commissioner-General of Immigration to
the Secretary of Labor, pp. 74-75. Washington, 1917.
63

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Communities having more than ioo People of Cech Stock '
Alabama: Silverhill.
Arkansas: Hazen, Dardanelle, Pine Bluff.
California: Los Angeles, Oakland, San Francisco.
Colorado: Denver.
Connecticut: Bridgeport, East Haddam, New Haven, Chester, Stam
ford, West Willington.
District of Columbia: Washington.
Illinois: Antioch, Algonquin, Belleville, Berwyn, Braidwood, Cary
Station, Chicago, Cicero, Coal City, Collinsville, East St. Louis,
Edwardsville, Granite City, Lockport, Lyons, Madison, Oak
Park, Pullman, Pullman Junction, Streator, Wilmington.
1 The list of communities is based on the United States official census
and on private estimates, furnished by persons who, by reason of their
social or business standing or length of residence, are qualified to speak
with authority for their respective States. The following collaborated on
the list:
Alabama, Anton Svoboda, farmer, Silverhill. Arkansas, John Kocou-
rek, merchant, Hazen. California, Dr. Clara V. Winlow, social worker,
writer, Los Angeles. Connecticut, L. C. Frank, former manager of the
New Yorski Listy, New York. Illinois and Indiana, the late L. J. Tupf ,
publisher of the Slavie; J. V. Nigrin, secretary of the Bohemian Literary
Society, and Vladimfr A. Geringer, publisher of the Svornost, all of Chi
cago. Iowa, Professor Bohumil Shimek, Iowa City. Kansas, Dr. Joseph
F. Pecival, Chicago (former practitioner in Kansas), and W. F. Sekavec,
County Clerk, Ellsworth. Maryland, V. Miniberger, editor of the Cecho-
American, Baltimore. Massachusetts, Joseph Kovar, South Boston.
Michigan, John Bedrych, C.S.P.S. official, Detroit. Minnesota, F. B.
Matlach, real-estate broker, St. Paul, and Rev. Joseph Bren, Hopkins.
Missouri, Hynek Dostal, editor of the Hlas, and A. J. Cejka, fc.S.P.S.
official, both of St. Louis. Montana, V. Simacek, farmer, Kolin. Ne-
braska, Rose Rosicky, Secretary of the National Printing Company,
Omaha. New Jersey, Rev. Norbert F. Capek, Newark. New York, the
author. North Dakota, Rev. V. F. Mikolasek, Lankin. Ohio, F. J. Svo
boda, publisher of the AmeriSan, Cleveland. Oklahoma, J. HruSka,
Prague. Oregon, Adolph Groulik, farmer, Crabtree. Pennsylvania, Fred.
Kalina, merchant, Pittsburgh, and Rev. Vaclav Losa, editor of the
KrestanskS Listy, Coraopolis. South Dakota, Monsignor E. A. Bouska,
Tabor. Texas, Rev. J. W. Dobias, Houston. Washington, James Tyra,
Spokane, and John Nedelka, Seattle. Wisconsin, Caroline Jonas-Salak
(daughter of Charles Jonas), Racine, and the late Anton Novak, pub
lisher of the Domdcnost, Milwaukee.
64

THE DISTRD3UTI0N OF THE STOCK
Indiana: Crown Point, Gary, Hammond, Indiana Harbor, Indian
apolis, Lockport, North Judson, Whiting.
Iowa: Belle Plaine, Britt (or Duncan), Calmar (with surrounding
country), Cedar Rapids, Center Point (with surrounding country),
Chelsea, Clutier, Cou Falls, Cresco (with surrounding country),
Davenport, Elberon, Ely, Fairfax (with surrounding country),
Fort Atkinson, Fort Dodge (with surrounding country), Iowa
City, Irving, Lone Tree (with surrounding country), Manly,
Marion, Marshalltown (or Marshall Quarry, with surrounding
country), Mason City, Morse, Mount Vernon, North Liberty,
Oxford, Oxford Junction, Plymouth, Pocahontas, Prairieburg,
Protivin, Richmond, Riverside, St. Ansgar, Shueyville, Sioux City
(with surrounding country), Solon, Spillville, Swisher, Tama,
Toledo, Turkey River, Vail, Vining, Walker, Walford, Wakish.
Kansas: Ada, Atwood, Belleville, Black Wolf, Caldwell, Clebourne,
Cuba, Ellsworth, Esbon, Everest, Glasco, Hanover, Hollyrood,
Irving, Jennings, Kanopolis, Lucas, Marysville, Munden, Narka,
New Tabor, Ogallah, Olmitz, Palacky, Pilsen, Plainville, Rosse-
ville, Timken, Washington, Wilson, Zurich.
Louisiana: New Orleans, Libuse, Kolin.
Maryland: Baltimore, Curtis Bay.
Massachusetts: Boston, New Bedford, Springfield, Three Rivers,
Turners Falls, Westfield.
Michigan: Detroit, East Saginaw, Grand Rapids, Iron Mountain,
Ludington, Owosso, Traverse City.
Minnesota: Alexandria, Austin, Badger, Bass Lake, Bear Creek,
Bechyn, Beroun, Biscay, Blooming Prairie, Breckenridge, Brook-
park, Browerville, Canby, Cromwell, Denham, Eden Prairie,
Foley, Glencoe, Glenville, Greenbush, Heidelberg, Hill City
(doubtful), Homolka, Hopkins, Hutchinson, Jackson, Jordan,
LeSueur Center, Lonsdale, Lucan, Mahnomen, Maple Lake,
Meadowlands (doubtful), Melrose (doubtful), Minneapolis, Min-
netonka, Montgomery, Myrtle, New Prague, Olivia, Owatonna,
Pine City, St. Louis Park, St. Paul, Sauk Center, Seaforth, Silver
Lake, Stewart, Tabor, Taunton, Thief River Falls, Ulen, Veseli,
Virginia, Vlasaty, Willow River, Winona.
Missouri: Bolivar (and Karlin), Cainesville, Fen ton, High Ridge,
Kansas City, Mashek, Rock Creek, St. Charles, St. Joseph, St.
Louis.
Montana: Coffee Creek, Denton, Great Falls, Kolin.
Nebraska: Abie, Atkinson, Barnston, Bee, Beemer, Brainard, Bris-
65

the Cechs in America
tow, Bruno, Burwell, Clarkson, Colon, Comstock, Crete, David
City, Deweese, De Witt, Diller, Dodge, Dorchester, Du Bois,
Dwight, Elyria, Exeter, Farwell, Friend, Galena, Garrison, Ge
neva, Geranium, Hallam, Hay Springs, Hemingford, Heun, How
ell, Humboldt, Kramer, Lawrence, Leigh, Lewiston, Linwood,
Lindsay, Lincoln, Lodgepole, Loma, Lynch, Madison, Milligan,
Morse Bluff, Niobrara, North Bend, Odell, Ohiowa, Omaha, Ord,
Osmond, Pierce, Pishelville, Plainview, Plasi, Plattsmouth, Pleas
ant Hill, Prague, Praha, Ravenna, Richland, Rogers, Rushville,
St. Paul, Sargent, Schuyler, South Omaha, Spencer, Spring Ranch,
Swanton, Stuart, Table Rock, Tate, Thurston, Tobias, Touhy,
Ulysses, Valparaiso, Verdigre, Virginia, Wahoo, Western, Weston,
West Point, Wilber, Wilson, Wymore.
New Jersey: Bayonne, Boundbrook, Elizabeth, Garfield, Hoboken,
Jersey City, Little Ferry, Newark, Passaic, Paterson, Trenton,
Union Hill, West Hoboken, West New York.
New York: Albany, Bay Shore, Bay Side, Binghamton, Bohemia,
Buffalo, East Islip, Gloversville, Haverstraw, Herkimer, Newfield,
New York, Poughkeepsie, Riverhead, Rochester, Rockland Lake,
Sayville, Schenectady, Yonkers.
North Dakota:. Bechyn, Conway, Dickinson, Lankin, Lawton, Lid-
gerwood, Mandan, New Hradec, Pisek, Praha, Ross, Veseleyville,
Wahpeton.
Ohio: Akron, Bellaire, Bridgeport, Canton, Cincinnati, Claysville,
Cleveland, Columbus, Dayton, Defiance, Dillonvale, Drill, Lorain,
Maynard, Mingo Junction, Mt. Carmel, Toledo.
Oklahoma: Canute, Garber, Hennessey, Kingfisher, Medford, Okla
homa City, Perry, Prague, Yukon.
Oregon: Crabtree (and Scio), Malin, Portland, Scappoose.
Pennsylvania: Allegheny (and Millvale), Bowerton, Coraopolis,
Dauphin, East Pittsburg (and Turtle Creek), Irwin (and Jean-
nette Manor), Loyalhanna (and Latrobe), McKees Rocks, Monaca,
Mt. Pleasant, North Braddock, Philadelphia, Russellton, Scran-
ton, Steelton (and Harrisburg), Uniontown, Verona, Wilkes-Barre.
South Dakota: Academy, Armour, Bendon, Bijou Hills, Chamber
lain, Crow Lake, Dante, Dixon, Eagle, Butte, Fairfax, Gann-
valley, Geddes, Gettysburg, Gregory, Herrick, Houghton, Ips
wich, Kadoka, Lake Andes, Lakeport, Lesterville, Letcher, Oka-
ton, Platte, Ree Heights, Redfield, Red Lake, Roscoe, Scotland,
Sisseton, Tabor, Tripp, Tyndall, Utica, Veblen, Vienna, Vodnany,
Wagner, Winner, Yankton.
66

Pisek, North Dakota

A street in Protivin, Iowa
TWO TOWNS WITH CECH NAMES AND CECH INHABITANTS

THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE STOCK
Texas: Abbot, Alma, Ammansville, Ballinger, Barclay, Bartlett,
Beasley, Beeville, Bleiberville, Bluff, Bomarton, Brenham, Bres-
lau, Bryan, Buckholts, Burlington, Caldwell, Cameron, Cats-
spring, Chriesman, Cistern, Corpus Christi, Coupland, Crisp,
Crosby, Cyclone, Dacosta, Dallas, Deanville, Dillworth, Dime
Box, Dubina, East Bernard, El Campo, Elgin, Ellinger, Engle, -*
Ennis, Eola, Fairchilds, Falls City, Fayetteville, Flatonia, Flores-
ville, Fort Worth, Frelsburg, Frenstat, Frydek, Gainesville, Gal
veston, Glenflora, Gonzales, Granger, Guadelupe, Gus, Guy,
Hackberry, Hallettsville, Harrold, Haskell, Henkhaus, Hillje,
Hobson, Holik, Holland, Holliday, Holman, Houston, Houston
Heights, Hubbard, Hungerford, Industry, Inez, Jarrell, Karnes
City, Kaufman, Kendleton, Koerth, La Grange, Laneport, Louise,
Lovelady, Lyra, Marak, Megargel, Merle, Miles, Moravia, Moul-
ton, Mt. Calm, Nada, Needville, Nelsonville, Ocker, Oldenburg,
Olmus, Penelope, Pierce, Pisek, Placedo, Plum, Port Lavaca,
Poth, Praha, Primm, Rabb, Rices Crossing, Robstown, Rockdale,
Rogers, Rosebud, Rosenberg, Rosprimm, Rowena, Roznov,
Runge, St. John, Schulenburg, Sealy, Seymour, Shimek, Shiner,
Skidmore, Smetana, Smithville, Snook, Strawn, Sublime, Sugar-
land, Sunnyside, Sweet Home, Taiton, Taylor, Telico, Temple,
Terrell, Thrall, Thurber, Tours, Tunis, Vernon, Victoria, Waco,
Waller, Wallis, Waterloo, Weimar, Wesley, West, Wheelock,
Wichita Falls, Wied, Yoakum, Yorktown.
Virginia: Churchland, Disputanta, New Bohemia, Petersburg,
Vontay.
Washington: Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma.
West Virginia: Wheeling.
Wisconsin: Adams, Alaska, Algoma, Alma, Antigo, Appleton, Ash
land, Baraboo, Barron, Bayfield, Beaver, Belle Plaine, Belleville,
Birchlake, Birchwood, Black River Falls, Blue River, Boscobel,
Branch, Bridgeport, Brill, Brodhead, Bryant, Butternut, Cadott,
Caledonia, Campbellsport, Carlton, Carolville, Casco, Cato,
Cazenovia, Chelsea, Chetek, Chilton, Chippewa Falls, Clay, Cobb,
Coleman, Cornell, Cudahy, Dane, Denmark, Deerbrook, Dilly,
Dodge, Eastman, Eau Claire, Fairchild, Fennimore, Fifield,
Flambeau, Fond du Lac, Fort Atkinson, Forestville, Francis
Creek, Friendship, Grand Rapids, Green Bay, Grimms, Haugen,
Hazelhurst, Hillsboro, Holy Cross, Hudson, Hurley, Janesville,
Jefferson, Kaukauna, Kellnersville, Kenosha, Kewaunee, Kewas-
kum, Krok, Krakow, La Crosse, Ladysmith, Langlade, Lancaster,
67

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Lena, Lodi, Luxembourg, Manitowoc, Marathon, Marek, Mari-
bel, Marion, Marinette, Marshall, Mauston, Medford, Mellen,
Menasha, Menomonie, Merrill, Middleridge, Milladore, Mil
waukee, Mishicot, Montfort, Mosinee, Muscoda, Necedah, Neva,
New Auburn, North Milwaukee, Oconto, Odanah, Ogema, Osh-
kosh, Park Falls, Phillips, Pilot Knob, Pilsen, Plover, Prairie du
Chien, Prescott, Prentice, Racine, Reedsville, Rib Lake, River
Falls, Rochester, Shawano, Sheboygan, Sister Bay, Slovan, South
Milwaukee, Spencer, Stangelville, Sturgeon Bay, Tisch Mills,
Two Rivers, Union Center, Viola, Waterloo, Waukesha, Wausau-
kee, Wauseka, West Allis, Westboro, West Bend, Woodlawn,
Yuba.

CHAPTER V
TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
THE Twelfth Census figures on occupations
showed 71,389 Bohemian male breadwinners
of the first generation and 32,707 of the second
engaged in gainful occupations. Of this number,
32 per cent of the first and 43 per cent of the second
generation were engaged in agriculture. These per
centages are large and bear witness to the dis
tinctively agricultural character of the Bohemian
population; taken together, more than 35 per cent
of all breadwinners of Bohemian origin were agri
culturists in 1900. The concentration of Bohemian
farmers in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska,
and Texas is very evident, not far from four fifths
of the 18,094 farmers of the first generation in the
United States being found in those States. Nebraska
leads with one fifth of all Bohemian farmers of the
first generation, Texas follows with one sixth.1
All in all few rural colonies were visited (by
the Immigration Commission) where members ap
peared more intelligent or more prosperous than
some of the Bohemian communities in Texas. In
the Middle West — Wisconsin, for instance — Bo
hemians are reputed to be on a par with the average
1 Reports of the Immigration Commission, v. 11, part 24, pp. 375-
481.
69

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
farmers of any race of the same generation farming
under similar conditions. The old settlements in
Wisconsin have attained a high state of prosperity.
The Commission investigated farming conditions
in Texas, where it examined thirty colonies or settle
ments; one small group in Missouri was studied; in
Connecticut about 60 farming families consisting
of 320 persons were visited. No attempt was made
to investigate the very prosperous communities in
Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota, Kansas,
etc.1 To sum up, 32 per cent of the first and 43 per
cent of the second generation are engaged in farm
ing; the balance are massed in towns, working at
various trades. Retail merchants thrive every
where and their number is steadily on the increase.
Seldom one finds Cechs doing unskilled outdoor
labor, blasting, tunneling, road- building; they pre
fer indoor jobs in the factory and the shop. Mining,
likewise, does not seem to attract them; at least
they are less in evidence than other Slavs in the
Pennsylvania coal mines, coke regions, and steel
mills. Musicians, professional and amateur, are
numerous. A rather large proportion are employed as tailors
— 6.9 per cent of the male breadwinners in the first
generation and 3.7 per cent of those in the second.
The corresponding percentage for the Russians are,
respectively, 18 per cent and 5.5 per cent and for
1 Reports of the Immigration Commission, v. I, part 24, p. 9.
70

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
the Austrians 7.9 per cent and 1.9 per cent. No
other nationalities have as high percentages in this
occupation.1 In general intelligence the tailors rank
high; many of them have learned the trade in
large European cities, Prague, Vienna, Paris.
A distinctive feature of the occupational distri-j
bution of immigrants is the comparatively large!
percentage (3.2) employed as tobacco operatives.jl
This exceeds the corresponding percentage re
ported for any other of the seventeen classes of
immigrants for which the occupation statistics
have been computed, the next highest percentage
being that for the Russians (2.1). Of the 2266
Bohemian male immigrants reported in this occu
pation, 1738, or more than three fourths, were in
the State of New York, constituting more than one
fourth (26.1 per cent) of the total number of Bo
hemian immigrant breadwinners in that State. In
the second generation the percentage of tobacco
and cigar factory operatives declines to 7.7 per
cent in the State of New York and to 1.3 per cent
in the United States.2
Why the old immigration went into cigarmaking (
is not an uninteresting story. In the town of Sed-j
lee, in Bohemia, the former Austrian Government!
operated a large cigar factory employing over two
1 Reports of the Immigration Commission. Occupations of the first
and second generations of immigrants in the United States, Senate
Doc. 282, p. 117.
* Ibid., p. 117. 71

1 i !

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
thousand men and women. The tobacco industry
in Austria was a government monopoly. In the
sixties a few of the Sedlec cigarmakers emigrated
to New York. The newcomers earned good wages,
they wrote to their friends, and presently more
cigarmakers arrived. Eventually workmen from
other trades, unable to find employment in their
own particular lines, mainly owing to their igno
rance of English, drifted into the tobacco shops,
and soon butchers, blacksmiths, students, tailors,
musicians, men, women, and children toiled at to
bacco — some in the shops, others, usually fam
ilies, at "housework." Editor Palda estimated that
when he visited New York in 1873, fully 95 per
cent of his countrymen were earning their living
at this sort of work.
The system remembered in New York with
horror as "housework" was abolished by act of
the legislature in 1888. Theodore Roosevelt, by
the way, was very active in the passage at Albany
of this law. No greater menace to the public health
ever existed than housework cigarmaking. The.
ban put on it liberated from the tobacco bondage
thousands of women and children. Even the male
workman profited thereby; for unable to find a
job in the shops, which became congested in con
sequence, he was forced to look around for other
work. In time he managed to get back to the trade
to which he had been apprenticed in the old coun
try. In the end the saying, "Every Cech a dgar-
72

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
maker," ceased to be true. It is estimated that less
than 15 per cent of Cechs are now attached to this
industry directly or indirectly in New York City.
A New Yorker, well qualified to speak on the
subject by reason of his long residence and his close
intimacy with the home life of his nationals adduces
these reasons why the second generation has given
up cigarmaking and is going into other employ
ments : "The young folks will not learn it and follow
it as a trade. While it may have been good enough
for their parents, they reason, it is not good enough
for them. A girl who has graduated from a pub
lic school will not think of going to the tobacco
factory, there to work side by side with Italian,
Russian, and Greek girls freshly landed. The de
partment store, the office, win them because they
offer greater opportunities than work in cigar
shops." Fifty years of cigarmaking are back of the New
York community, yet how many manufacturers
of Cech nationality are there? Wertheimer, Bondy,
Lederer, Krebs — not one Cech among them.
The percentage of clerks, copyists, and salesmen
among Bohemian male breadwinners advances
from 1.6 per cent in the first generation to 5.6 per
cent in the second. These figures are for the United
States. In the State of New York the percentage is
1.2 in the first generation and advances to 5.8 in
the second.1
1 Reports of the Immigration Commission, Senate Doc. 282, p. 118.
73

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
In the first generation the leading occupation is
that of farmer; in the second generation that of
agricultural laborer. In each generation the four
leading occupations are the same — farmers, gen
eral laborers, tailors, and agricultural laborers.1
Four occupations — tobacco and cigar factory
operatives, carpenters, miners, and butchers —
appear in the list of the first ten for the first gener
ation, but not in that for the second. In the second
! generation these places are taken by the clerks and
copyists, the salesmen, the machinists, and the
draymen, hackmen, and teamsters.2
Some thirty years ago a number of skilled pearl
button makers came to the United States from 2i-
rovnice, a provincial Bohemian town, known far
and wide for its highly specialized pearl button
industry. The 2irovnice workers introduced the
craft here, and to-day there are some fifty pearl
button shops owned by Cechs, employing in
normal times from 1250 to 1300 operatives. This
represents a total of 75 per cent of the industry
in the East. The shops are in Manhattan, Astoria,
and Winfield, in New York; Staffordville, West
Willington, Higganum, Connecticut; Carlstadt,
New Durham, Hoboken, Little Ferry, Cliffside,
Newark, and Union Hill, New Jersey. The Mother
1 By the caption "agricultural laborers" is not meant seasonal
labor on the farm only; it includes the sons of farmers, who live on
the place with their parents.
1 Reports of the Immigration Commission, Senate Doc. 282, p.
118.
74

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
of Pearl Industry Association uses none other save
ocean pearl.1 A 2irovnice man is said to own in
Chicago the largest shop of its kind in the United
States. A machinist in New York who is interested
in one of the local shops has invented a labor-saving
machine which, by way of compliment, he exports
to Zirovnice.
Land-ownership, more than any other agencyJJ
has contributed to the wealth of Cechs in America.'/
All prospered who invested in land, the farmer in a
higher degree than the city man. One can easily
figure out how much the farmer has added to his
competence when one remembers that fifty or sixty
years ago he bought his land for a trifle of $5 or $10
an acre and now he values the same land at from
$75 to $300 and even more an acre. If the buyer of
city lots had the good fortune of getting in the path
way of the building wave, he was able to dispose of
his property quickly and advantageously; a less as
tute or lucky buyer had to bide his time. Building lots
were contracted for on the installment plan — one
or two hundred dollars sufficed to bind the purchase.
Early recognizing the value of self-help, they joined
savings, loan, and building associations. With the
aid of these associations thousands were enabled to
build and own cottages in cities. In 1916 a Cleve
land building association, the Mravenec (Ant),
applied to the State authorities for permission to
1 Figures furnished by William Lomnicky, Secretary of the
Mother of Pearl Industry Association, New York.
75

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
increase its shares from $3,500,000 to $5,000,000.
Commenting on the application, newspapers stated
that this made the Mravenec the second strongest
savings and loan association in Ohio. According to
the report of the Auditor pf Public Accounts sub
mitted to the Governor of Illinois showing the
condition in that State of building, loan, and home
stead associations as of December 1, 19 10, 94 out
of a total of 197 associations located in Chicago
were Cech; of a total of $17,000,000 assets, the
share of these Cech associations was $8,785,917,
or more than 50 per cent of the whole.1
If one strolls along Broadway, New York's
main business artery, one notices scores of business
signs bearing Slavic names: Zemanski, Pulaski,
Chuknin, Malowicz, Verbelovsky, are some of the
patronymics that beam at one in gold letters. If
one peeks over the window shutter, however, one
finds no Slavs there. The truth is that the Slav,
inclining by temperament to husbandry, is a nov
ice, a newcomer in business; he began late and
with the small capital which he commands he
must court luck in less aristocratic business thor
oughfares than Broadway. The Jews are almost
the sole carriers of Slavic names in big business.
To this state of things the Cechs are no exception,
though some of them have demonstrated their
ability to grapple with the more intricate commer-
1 J. E. Salaba Vojan: Cech American Epistles, pp. 126-29. Chi
cago, 191 1.
76

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
cial and industrial problems. The saloon-keeper no
doubt preceded all others as a business man. To
open a saloon required less preliminary training
than almost any other business undertaking; the
little capital that he needed for the start the brewer
furnished, and if the beginner established himself
in a foreign quarter, among the people of his own
race, he could get on tolerably well with only the
rudiments of English.
To deny the great influence of the saloon and the
saloon-keeper on the immigrant would be disputing
the obvious. Most, if not all, the lodges and clubs
which honeycomb the so-called foreign quarters
have had their birth under the saloon roof. When
in 1873 the New York cigarmakers undertook to
organize against the rapacity of the bosses, eight
relief societies sprang into existence in eight dif
ferent saloons. What old settler does not recall
the saloons kept by Mottl in St. Louis, Slavik in
Chicago, Hubacek in New York? To have traveled
through New York and not to have stopped at
August Hubacek's tavern on the East Side would
have been tantamount to a gross betrayal of the
national cause. The fame of Hubacek's name rang
from one corner of Cech America to another. John
Slavik's place on Clark Street before the sixties
was a recognized rendezvous of Chicagoans. In
Jacob Mottl's saloon and boarding-house in St.
Louis, the C.S.P.S. benevolent brotherhood ex
perienced some of its initial triumphs. A liberal
77

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
spender and a good fellow, the saloon-keeper, let
it be admitted, was not always a liability. If he
chose, or if he was the right sort of man, he could
be a valuable asset. Of late years, however, the
saloon-keeper's power has rapidly declined. His
former prestige is now but a tradition and a tra
dition, by the way, which is utterly incompre
hensible to the latter-day immigrant. The National
Halls, which are now found in every community
of any consequence, have de«1t him the severest
blow. Then there are the public reading-rooms and
libraries, with their foreign departments; these
take away from the saloon-keeper many a pro
spective patron. A formidable foe of the saloon
are the Settlement and Neighborhood Houses with
their manifold attractions for young people: gym
nastic clubs and summer camps for the boys and
girls. Last, but not least, is the influence of the
school, which teaches the young to abhor the
liquor traffic as something disreputable.
An examination of the advertising columns of
the Slavie l at the time of the Civil War gives us
a pretty good idea of the kind and magnitude of
business. Of a total of eight pages, which the Slavie
then printed, the advertisements take up less than
two pages, and judging by their names, but five of
the advertisers are of Cech nationality. Dr. Joseph
Castka, physician and surgeon, occupying offices
at 113 West Madison Street, Chicago, offers his
1 The Slavie, June 25, 1862.
78

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
skilled services to his countrymen; F. A- Klimt
informs the public that he has opened a saloon near
the corner of Van Buren and Market Streets,
Chicago; Joseph Novak operates a hardware store
at 143 Milwaukee Avenue, and John Raisler, a
carpenter shop in the same city. Frank Pribyl
keeps a grocery in Racine, Charles Roth a saloon
and boarding-house in St. Louis. Dr. J. R. Veeter
admonishes the St. Louisians to patronize him,
because "he has studied in Prague and his ex
tensive practice embraces every known disease."
Hynek & Kriz manufacture cigars on the corner
of Chestnut Street, in Milwaukee, while J. Beck,
near Union Hall, in Racine, "expects that all
Cechs will purchase unstintingly of his large stock
of boots and shoes." If, beside these, we take into
account a few small advertisements, such as
Wanted, and Take Notice, the sum is complete.
By 1865 the roster of advertisers has grown per
ceptibly, but the saloon-keeper leads. From Chi
cago Franta Bern sends gladsome news to his
friends that he takes orders for crayon portraits,
and sells pictures and books at reasonable prjces.1
John Borecky wishes all Chicago Slavonians to
take notice that he has opened a New Cech Tavern
at 239 Canal Street; Anna Brabenec, a midwife
graduated with honors from the Prague Clinic of
Midwifery, offers to women, at 153 East Sixth
Street, New York, the benefit of her ten years'
1 The Slavie, March 14, 1865.
79

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
experience. August Hubacek is owner of a Cech
Saloon at 235 East Fifth Street, New York.
Joseph Vozab heralds to the Cech-Slavs the joyful
tiding that he has fitted up the White Inn at 133
Essex Street, New York, "where Cech musicians
give a concert every Sunday; dancing every Mon
day!" B. Chladek, dealer in household furniture,
mirrors, and curtains, recommends his goods to
the esteemed public, at 36 West Randolph Street,
Chicago; Joseph Bures & A. Matuska are pro
prietors of a Cech carpenter-shop in Chicago. "It
is situated in Canal Street, No. 237, fifth house
from the corner of Van Buren, next to the New
Cech Tavern of J. Borecky." Fiser & Rubes' are
the owners of a saloon at 160 Van Buren Street,
next to the Rock Island Railroad Depot. Franta
Seyk, tailor of Kewaunee, Wisconsin, has in stock
hats, caps, shawls, gloves, shirts, clothing, and
woolen goods for men. Frank Pivrnec, also of
Kewaunee, manufactures all kinds of wagons,
sleighs, plows, and cutters. Masek & Stransky, of
Kewaunee, sell patent medicines, oils, paints, and
supplies for painters, dry goods, spices, coffee,
sugar, hardware, farmers' implements, the best
quality of boots and slippers made to order, farm'
and garden seeds, school supplies and clocks,
jewelry, hats and caps, lamps and oil, wall-pa
per, glaziers' supplies, writing-paper, penholders,
perfumery, shoemakers' supplies. J. Vancl & J.
Kralicek, in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, deal in sugar,
80

Male Breadwinners of Bohemian Parentage (Parents born
in Bohemia), First and Second Generations, Classified by
Occupations, with per cent Distribution, 1900 1

Occupation

All occupations 
Agents 
Agricultural pursuits 
Agricultural laborers 
Farmers, planters 
All others in this class 
Blacksmiths 
Boot and shoe makers 
Bookkeeper and accountants
Building trades 
Carpenters and joiners 
Masons 
Painters 
Plumbers 
Other building trades 
Clerks and copyists 
Draymen, teamsters 
Iron and steel workers 
Hucksters and peddlers 
Laborers not specified 
Machinists 
Manufacturers and officials 
Messengers and errand boys 
Merchants and dealers 
Miners and quarrymen 
Printers, lithographers 
Professional service 
Salesmen 
Saloon-keepers and bartenders . . .
Saw and planing mills employees.
Servants and waiters 
Steam railroad employees 
Tailors 
Textile mill operatives 
Cotton mill operatives 
Hosiery 
Silk mill 
Woolen mill 
Other textile mills 
Tobacco and cigar factory 
All other 

First generation
(born abroad)

Number

71,389 395
22,857 4,428
18,094 335864
1,041 144
3,749 1.947 703792 159 82
5°9
863
1,672 194
9,996 926
498 86
2,130 1,567 417979649
1,064 720230847
4,931 375 48 5
3861
223
2,266
11,420

Per cent
distribu tion

100. 0
.6
320 6.2
25-3 ¦5
1.2i-5 .2
5-3
2.7 1.0
1. 1
.2
. 1
•7
1.2
2-3 •3 o3
¦7
.1
3-02.2 .6
i-4 ¦9
i-51.0 •3
1.2
6.9 ¦5
. 1
. 1
. 1
•3
3-2
16.0

1

Second generation
(.born in United Slates)

Number

32,707 151
13,997 8,928
4,961 108
325
214249
1,321 521 92
434 196 64
929591605 60
2,659 643 140
393759
254438653
930305 169
114
300
1,198 57 55
99
29
420
4,788

Per cent
distribu tion

100. 0
•5
42.827-3 15-2 •3
1.0 ¦7 9
4.0 1.6 •3
1-3 .6 .2

1.8 .2
8.1
2.0 •4
1.2
23 .8
i-3
2.0
2.8 ¦9-5
¦3¦9
3-7 .2

Reports of the Immigration Commission, Senate Doc. 282, p. 120.

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
coffee, tea, chicory, spices, chocolate, almonds,
raisins, dates, nuts, dry prunes, pears, and dried
apples, rice, pearl barley, millet; buy and sell pro
duce and pay to farmers the highest cash prices;
keep in stock patent medicines of all the firms of
repute, lamps, oils and purest kerosene; excellent
Limburger and Swiss cheeses, cigars of every
brand, and particularly a large stock of old wines
and best beers. J. Gerhardy & Frank Novak,
of ioo Milwaukee Avenue, Chicago, "hereby an
nounce that, as heretofore, they have on hand a
varied assortment of iron and tinware and other
goods, stoves included; they also deal in Austrian
scythes, the latter being the make of the most
renowned Bohemian and Styrian factories." Frank
Mary gives notice to all Cech-Slavs that he has
opened the first tavern, "U Sokola," between
Fifth and Sixth Streets, New York. Incidentally
he expresses the hope "that all patriots will
patronize him."
The New York City Directory for 1850-51 regis
ters the name of John Kubin, jeweler, 357 Hous
ton Street; Christopher J. Kucha r, bookkeeper,
2"] Bowery; the Directory for 1852-53, Joseph
Hubatchek, capmaker, 19 Avenue A.; Andrew Hu-
baczek, engraver, 86 East Broadway; the Direc
tory for 1851-52, Wenzel Twrdy (spelled by de
scendants Twidey), tailor, 91 Willet Street. The
Directory for 1859, Anthony Pokorny, capmaker,
213 Avenue A.; Francis Pokorny, saloon-keeper,
82

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
294! Grand Street; Gabriel Pokorny, turner, 70
Willet Street; Louis Pokorny, tailor, 213 Clinton
Street.1 Francis Vlasak or Francis W. Lasak (alias
Lassak, as the name looked after it had been be
comingly trimmed by the owner), who started as
furrier at 376 Broome Street, was one of the
first merchants of Cech nationality in the United
States.2 From that street Lassak removed to 19
John Street, where he remained for years. The
story is that Lasak owed his start in the fur busi
ness to John Jacob Astor. The Lassaks inter
married with well-to-do New York families and
acquired considerable wealth. Another pioneer
merchant was John Konvalinka, likewise a furrier.
Konvalinka began cutting furs at his home, 11
Division Street, moving later to 36 Maiden Lane.3
The name Konvalinka is still seen above a fur
shop in Maiden Lane. He died in June, 1896, at
the age of seventy-five years, leaving four children.
The Mathushek Piano (now a corporation)
derives its name from Fred Mathuscheck,4 who
began after the fifties as a piano-maker on a small
scale at 34 Third Avenue. Another Cech piano-
maker was J. Laukota, who, in partnership with
1 Trows' New York City Directory. 1859.
2 Thomas Longworthy: New York Register and City Directory for
the Sixty-fourth Year of American Independence. New York, 1839.
3 Henry Wilson: The Directory of the City of New York for 1852-53.
4 According to Cech orthography, MatouSek. In the 1852 New
York City Directory Mathuscheck is put down as a wood-carver.
83

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
one Marschall, conducted a business at 5 Mercer
Street.1 The following table, extracted from the Directory
of Bohemian Merchants* throws an illuminative
sidelight on the business life of the community in
Chicago. The table, of course, does not include
all the merchants and traders of that nationality,
rather only those in business there whose card
is inserted in the Directory. Twenty-six different
occupations are classified.
Contracting tailors  322 Barbers  43
Saloon-keepers  321 Lawyers  43
Grocers.  266 Custom tailors  40
Butchers  147 Bakers  39
Boots and shoes  107 Builders  38
Milkmen  97 Druggists  27
Confectioners and stationers 84 House-painters  26
Insurance and real estate Masons  25
brokers  60 Undertakers  22
Midwives  60 Music conservatories  22
Dressmakers  58 Bandmasters  19
Wood and coal  51 Plumbers  19
Cigar manufacturers  51 Blacksmiths  19
Physicians  45
Lawyers, physicians, and dentists are multiply
ing so fast of late that warnings have been sounded
of "overproduction of the learned proletariat."
Chicago alone supported, in 1917, 46 male and 22
female medical practitioners and 78 lawyers.3 The
1 Henry Wilson: The Directory of the City of New York for 1851-52.
2 Directory of Bohemian Merchants, Traders, and Societies. Chi
cago, 1900.
8 For the information on medical practitioners the author is
indebted to Dr. L. J. Fisher; for the figures on lawyers, to Joseph A.
Holpuch.
84

Joseph. Sosel

J. W. Sykora

John Karel August Haidusek
THE FIRST LAWYERS

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
Directory and Almanac of 191 5 1 prints (p. 241) the
cards of 36 male and (p. 245) 19 female physicians.
In the number of their inteligence the Cechs far
surpass all other American Slavs. The great ma
jority of the professionals are, of course, Ameri
cans by birth or education. Physicians graduated
from Prague or Vienna are comparatively few, the
glamour of their foreign diplomas being no longer
as overpowering as it was in the past.
Who came first, the physician or the lawyer?
Obviously the physician, since a diploma from a
European medical school entitled him to practice
medicine without an admission examination. Not
so with the lawyer, in whose case the knowledge of
English and also of American law was indispens
able. And who but a native or a long-time resident
possessed that knowledge in a sufficient degree to
enable him to plead cases in court? Joseph W.
Sykora2 of Cleveland believed he was entitled to
wear the toga of the first Cech Blackstone. Fred
erick Jonas, however, disputes Sykora 's contention.
According to him, Joseph Sosel of Cedar Rapids
was undoubtedly the first. F. Kolacnik is reported
to have been a practitioner in Chicago in 1862.
F. Parti, who did a law business in Chicago at the
1 Directory and Almanac of the Bohemian Population of Chicago.
1915- 2 J. W. Sykora came to Cleveland in 1863 as a student of the
Latin School at Pisek. In the early years he took a conspicuous part
in the social life of his countrymen of that city. At Pisek, Sykora
was a classmate of John V. Capek.
85

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
close of the sixties, was an old settler.1 Very likely
Parti was a type one encounters in the doorways
leading to piepoudre courts — a go-between and,
on occasion, interpreter. Joseph Siller of Texas is
said to have had a law office at Eagle Lake, Col
orado, at the close of the Civil War. In New York
there was Konvalinka, son of the furrier of that
name, and John E. Brodsky; on the paternal side
both were of Cech origin. "From this it would
appear," comments Frederick Jonas', "that Sykora
was not the first but probably the third among
pioneer lawyers."
August Haidusek, a newspaperman, jurist, and
banker at La Grange, was admitted to the bar in
Texas in 1870. He also advances his claim to priority
as a valid one.2 Dr. Francis A. Valenta, a Cech by
name, if not by affiliation, commenced practic
ing in Chicago in 1851. Valenta is said to have
early reemigrated to Europe. Dr. de Lewandowski,
a "Bohemian" physician, enjoyed an extensive
practice in New York City in the seventies. Doc
tors of the stamp of de Lewandowski, who were
ready to pose — on the office door-plate or in
newspaper puffs — as a Bohemian for Bohemi
ans, as a Pole for Poles, as a German for Germans,
were by no means uncommon. Older readers of the
1 Dr. John Habenicht and Antonfn Pregler: Memorial of Old
Cech Settlers in Chicago, p. 15. 1899. Reference to Kolacnik and
Parti. 2 The Almanac Amerikdn, 1901. 86

A. M. Dignowity, San Antonio

Adolph Chladek, Chicago

John Habenicht, Chicago Edward J. Schevcik, New York
PIONEER PHYSICIANS

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
foreign-language press recall with a shudder the
glaring advertisements of the "Eminent European
Specialists." Whether any of the practitioners of
long ago became rich from the proceeds of their
practice is extremely doubtful. From what Dr.
John Habenicht has to tell us of conditions in
Chicago, it may be believed they did not. In the
first place, people were too ignorant or faint
hearted to go to the doctor save in desperate
cases, when, as the Cech saying goes, "the patient's
soul is on the tip of his tongue." Obstetrical cases
were then wholly monopolized by the ubiquitous
and complaisant midwife, "graduated with honors
from the Prague clinic of midwifery." Then there
was the proprietary medicine man to contend
with — the greatest foe of the legitimate practi
tioner of foreign nationality. Forty or fifty years
ago competition against him must have been dis
couraging, indeed. Nowhere was the humbug of
his miracle-working liniments, pain-expellers, pul
monary teas (brust thee), cough syrups, blood-puri
fiers, more obstrusive and offending than in the
foreign-language press.
Dr. Habenicht asserts that "at that time [1866]
there were only two Cech physicians in Chicago,
Dr. Adolph Chladek and myself."1 Dr. Habenicht
should not be understood as claiming that before
his time there were no doctors outside of Chicago.
There was, to mention one instance, Dr. Anthony
» Dr. John Habenicht : Memoirs of a Cech Physician, p.44. Chicago, 1 897.
87

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
M. Dignowity in Texas. Having landed in New
York in 1832, Dignowity, after a somewhat ad
venturous career — he had been a manufacturer,
real-estate speculator, inventor, saloon-keeper, abo
litionist agitator, mine-owner, author, and phys
ician — moved to San Antonio, Texas, where he
died in 1875. 1
Aldermen and councilmen, school trustees, as
sessors, justices of the peace, legislators, county
and town treasurers, registers and town clerks of
Cech nationality have increased so prodigiously
of late that the chronicler cannot count them all.
Twenty, thirty years ago the newspaper editor
introduced a column with the caption "Cechs in
America," and in this column he noted the eleva
tion to public office of every co-national. In those
strenuous days even constables and justices of the
peace came in for a generous share of newspaper
applause. The editor recorded triumphantly the
name of every village statesman rising to fame,
every school-teacher, every pupil graduating with
honors or without them, from a high or normal
school. No one was too small to be overlooked.
"The Cleveland people have no reason to com
plain that Cechs are unrepresented in the police
and fire departments of that city. According to the
latest official bulletin, A. B. Sprosty is chief of
police; A Cadek, F. Sprosty and F. Hoenig are
1 Anthony M. Dignowity: Autobiography. Bohemia under Aus
trian Despotism. New York, 1859.
88

Thomas F. Konop

Anthony Michalek

John J. Babka Adolph J. Sabath
CONGRESSMEN OF CECH. NATIONALITY

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
captains; there are two lieutenants and 98 police
men. In the fire department O. Cermak is captain;
J. Pecka lieutenant and there are 43 firemen of our
nationality." x
If not the first, Edward Rosewater, who was
sent from Omaha to the Nebraska State Legisla
ture in 1870-71, was one of the pioneer lawmakers
of Cech nationality.2 In Iowa, M. B. Letovsky of
Iowa City, son of John Barta Letovsky, paved the
way for other legislators. Charles Jonas' served in
the lower house of Wisconsin, while John Karel,
merchant, lawyer, and country banker, was elected
from Kewaunee, in the same State. Among the
other early Solons was John E. Brodsky of New
York and Leo Meilbek of Illinois. Meilbek attained
the further fame of having been a pioneer among
socialist legislators.
Lawmakers of Cech nationality in Nebraska,
Iowa, Minnesota, Kansas, Dakota, Wisconsin are
no longer rare. More than half a dozen of them
help to make and unmake laws in Nebraska alone.
The old-timers thought that Jonas' was the only
man fit to represent his countrymen in Congress.
Imagine, therefore, the surprise of all when in
1904 a young man, Anton Michalek, unknown
even by name outside of the city where he lived,
was elected to Congress by the Republicans of a
Chicago district. Soon thereafter came Adolph J.
1 The Kvety Americke, August, 1918.
2 The Pokrok Zdpadu, September 25, 1889.
89

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Sabath, likewise from Chicago. A third repre
sentative got in from Wisconsin — Thomas Konop.
Yet a fourth Congressman of Cech ancestry, John
J. Babka of Cleveland, was elected in the fall of
19 1 8. Priority, however, belongs to Michalek. No
Cech has yet succeeded in being elected to the
Senate, though the late Edward Rosewater was
prominently mentioned as a candidate.
More numerous than either the doctors or
lawyers are the school-teachers. A recent estimate
put the number of teachers of Cech descent in
Nebraska alone at 290. Frederick Jonas believes
that the daughters of J. B. Seykora of Iowa pre
ceded all others as teachers. The two Landa sis
ters of Cleveland taught public school in the mid-
seventies. The elder of the sisters, Anna, married
Frank Skarda, publisher of the New York DelnicM
Listy. After her marriage Anna Skarda assisted
her husband in newspaper work. Later she was
associate editor of a Texas weekly. The younger
sister, Catherine M. Capek, taught in Cleveland
from 1874 to 1918.
Anna Nedobyty of St. Paul, Minnesota, Clara
Vostrovsky Winlow of San Jose, California, and
Frances Gregor lead their sex as college graduates.
In recent years young men are forging ahead to
more responsible positions — as members of fac
ulty staffs of colleges and universities. Several of
them are scholars of national reputation.
All students of chemistry know the name of
90

Dr. F. G. Novy^ Dr. Alois F. Kovarik
TYPES OF AMERICAN SCHOLARS OF CECH PARENTAGE

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
F. G. Novy, of the University of Michigan. Born
in 1864 in Chicago, Novy graduated from the school
in which he has been for many years a professor.
Then he took post-graduate courses in Europe;
among others he attended the University of Prague.
Dr. Novy discovered a compound claimed to be a
preventive for intestinal diseases such as Asiatic
cholera and typhoid fever. In 1901 he was ap
pointed member of the United States Commission
to investigate the bubonic plague in the Orient.
Dr. Robert Joseph Kerner, born in Chicago, is
the author of Slavic Europe (a selected bibliog
raphy in the western European languages), pub
lished by the Harvard University Press in 191 8.
For this volume the author gathered material both
here and in Europe for a number of years — prac
tically since he graduated from Harvard University.
To the Anglo-Saxon scholar Slavic Europe is an
indispensable aid. When the war broke out, Kerner
severed temporarily his connection with the Uni
versity of Missouri and accepted employment with
the Government. Because of his profound knowl
edge of the history, ethnology, and politics of the
Slavic nations inhabiting central and southeastern
Europe, Kerner's advice was sought by war experts
both here and abroad whenever questions affecting
the Slavs came up for discussion. Kerner's father
is one of the publishers of the Chicago Denni
Hlasatel. On the staff of Yale University are two profes-
91

the Cechs in America
sors with excellent records: Dr. John Zeleny, born
(1872) in Wisconsin, one-time acting dean of the
graduate school of the University of Minnesota.
Dr. Zeleny is Professor of Physics at Yale. He re
ceived degrees from the University of Minnesota,
from Cambridge in England, and from Yale. His
older brother, Dr. Anthony Zeleny, is Professor of
Physics at the University of Minnesota, and still
another brother, Dr. Charles Zeleny, is Professor
of Zoology at the University of Illinois.
Dr. Alois F. Kovafik, an Iowan by birth, was
formerly connected with the University of Minne
sota; now he is attached to the Sloane Laboratory
at Yale. The Victoria University of Manchester,
in England, conferred upon Kovafik the degree of
Sc.D., in recognition of researches in physics.
Professors and students of the Prague University
were genuinely surprised when Bohumil Simek,
Professor of Botany in the State University of
Iowa, delivered in 1914 lectures in impeccable
Cech on the plant life of the United States. They
were amazed upon being told that the learned
botanist had never attended any but English lan
guage schools; that up to that time he had not been
in Europe; that all the Cech he knew he had learned
in Iowa City, his native town, by self-tuition.
Simek occupies a unique position among univer
sity professors of Cech descent. He was never con
tent to act the r&le of a mere onlooker or a critic.
He felt he was a blood relative and that he must
92

DR. ROBERT J. KERNER

TRADES, BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS
collaborate, not criticize. Therefore he joined the
societies of his racial kinsmen ; read Cech books and
newspapers — for a time he edited the organ of the
C.S.P.S. Society; he interested himself in most of
their cultural problems. Many a youth is indebted
for his college education to the Matice Society,
of which the professor is a co-founder.
Of his father, "a heretic and rebel" (as Austrian
reactionaries used to call the Cech nationalists of
1848), Simek is justly proud. The elder Simek was
a pioneer settler in that part of Iowa where the son
was born in 1861. For his work as a scientist the
Prague University recently made Simek Sc.D.
Dri Paul J. Hanzlik, Assistant Professor of
Pharmacology, Western Reserve University, was
born in Iowa (1885), studied in the Universities of
Iowa and Illinois, and in 1914 was a research stu
dent in the Pharmacological Institute of the Uni
versity of Vienna. He has published important
papers dealing with subjects in biological chemistry,
pharmacology, and therapeutics.
The first professor of Cech nationality was M.
Charles Hruby, who came in 1834. He taught
German language and literature in an Ohio Col
lege.

CHAPTER VI
THE IMMIGRANT AS A LIABILITY
OF the police reports obtained from the prin
cipal cities of the United States, only those of
Chicago contained records of arrests admitting of
statistical analysis of the relations of immigrants
to crime. The reports of the Chicago Police Depart
ment for the four years from 1905 to 1908 con
tained tabular statements of arrests by crime and
nationality. The records for these four years were
therefore combined and retabulated. These figures
form the material on which this chapter is based.1
Figures show that offenses of personal violence
are relatively most frequent among the crimes of
the immigrants coming from eastern and southern
Europe — the Lithuanians, Slavs, Italians, Poles,
Greeks, Cechs, and Austrians. The largest pro
portion is found in the Lithuanian group, of whose
total crimes those of personal violence form 12. 1
per cent.2
The relatively large proportion of burglaries
among the crimes of Cechs (1.7 per cent) is notice
able, though ten other nationalities have larger
percentages of the total gainful offenses. The Bo
hemian percentage of burglary is the same as the
1 Police Arrests in the City of Chicago, chap, ix, p. 133, Senate Doc,
v. 18. Washington, 1911.
2 Ibid., p. 136.
94

THE IMMIGRANT AS A LIABILITY
Canadian and the German, but both of these latter
nationalities have higher percentages of the total
gainful offenses and of the specific crimes of for
gery and fraud and of larceny and receiving stolen
property.1 Among eight nationalities — Bohemian, Chinese,
Danish, French, Irish, Norwegian, Slavonian, and
Scotch — no arrests for abduction and kidnaping
were made.2
The nationalities having the six highest per
centages for simple assault are the Lithuanians,
Slavs, Bohemians, Greeks, Poles, and Russians.3
Of the nationalities from the south and east of
Europe only the Bohemians and the Russians have
smaller percentages of homicide than any nation
ality from northern and western Europe.4
The Polish, Bohemian, Slavonian, Canadian,
Danish, German, Lithuanian, and Austrian all ex
ceed the American white group in percentage for
arrests for disorderly conduct.5
The record of the immigrant as a charity-seeker
and pauper,6 as a dynamic force in industry,7 as a
social problem in large cities,8 is adequately con
sidered in the Senate Documents herein referred to.
1 Police Arrests in the City of Chicago, chap, ix, p. 140, Senate
Doc, v. 18. Washington, 191 1.
2 Ibid., p. 143. 3 Ibid., p. 143.
4 Ibid., p. 144. 6 Ibid., p. 147.
s Immigrants as Charity Seekers, Senate Doc, v. 10.
7 Immigrants in Industries, Senate Doc, vs. 68, 69, 70.
8 Immigrants in Cities. Senate Doc, vs. 66, 67.

CHAPTER VII
THROUGH INTERMARRIAGE INTO THE MELTING-POT
WHILE, as a rule, the young folks choose life
partners from among their own race, it will
be noted from the figures given below that mixed
marriages are increasingly popular. As a matter
of fact there are not many Cech families unre
lated, through one branch or another, to non-Cechs.
Unions with mid-European races, particularly the
Teutonic, have been most popular in the past. With
Latin nations, Italians or French, or with the
far Northern races (Scandinavians), Cechs rarely
concluded marital relations. Comparatively few
are the cases of Cechs mating with other Slavs:
Poles, Russians, South Slavs (Jugo-Slavs). That
the Teutons have supplied more marrying partners
than all the other nationalities put together, may
dismay the idealist and the Slavophil, but it does
not surprise one who is familiar with pre-war con
ditions in Central Europe. Love not only laughs at
locksmiths, but it scorns to be made a party to a
race feud. A vital link is the ability to speak the
language of the other race; and much as the Slavo
phil may deplore it, there still are more Cechs
who know German than there are Cechs who speak
Russian, Polish, or Serbo-Croatian.
The 1 910 census made no investigation concern-
96

DR. BOHUMIL SIMEK

THE MELTING-POT
ing mixed marriages and hence it is impossible to
give later official statistics than those of 1900.1

Father born in

Mother born in

¦ Bohemia

Austria

1676

Bohemia

Canada (English)

154

Bohemia

Canada (French)

33

Bohemia

Denmark

22

Bohemia

England

89

Bohemia

France

68

Bohemia

Germany

4024

Bohemia

Hungary

455

Bohemia

Ireland

132

Bohemia

Italy

11

Bohemia

Norway

22

Bohemia

Poland

294

Bohemia

Russia

166

Bohemia

Sweden

35

Bohemia

Switzerland

103

Bohemia

Other countries

223

Mother born in

Father born in

Bohemia

Austria

1741

Bohemia

Canada (English)

357

Bohemia

Canada (French)

92

Bohemia

Denmark

9i

Bohemia

England

241

Bohemia

France

171

Bohemia

Germany

7H3

Bohemia

Hungary

728

Bohemia

Ireland

203

Bohemia

Italy

85

Bohemia

Norway

72

Bohemia

Poland

771

Bohemia

Russia

191

Bohemia

Scotland

61

Bohemia

Sweden

98

Bohemia

Switzerland

240

Bohemia

Wales

20

Bohemia

Other countries

274

1 Twelfth Census (1900) of the United States Population, Part 1,
p. 850, Table 56. Total persons of mixed foreign parentage.

97

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Is there any particular factor that enters into
these mixed marriages? Sometimes it is the occu
pational contact — employment in the same shop
or factory — which brings two young people to
gether. Common faith, if not a determining, is yet
an influencing, factor. Years ago when New York
Cechs were largely employed at cigarmaking, sev
eral Cubans, specializing at what cigarmakers call
"Spanish work," married Cech girls working in
the tobacco industry. The author has been told
that in and near Humboldt, Nebraska, Swiss and
Cech farmers, being neighbors, have intermarried
freely. The Chicago paper Svornost has recorded
the case of the Mayor of Traverse City, Michigan,
who boasted of German-Cech-French blood.
Cases of curious marital snarls and tangles in
evitably occur in mixed marriages. The divorce
calendar of the District Court of Douglas County,
Nebraska, contains the case of Gaydou vs. Gaydou.
The plaintiff was a Cech woman who knew her
mother tongue and no other language; the de
fendant was a French-Canadian who could stam
mer, besides his native French, only a few words
in English. And yet these two, blissfully ignorant
of each other's language, managed to live together
happily for three whole months. An Italian cobbler
in New York, curly-haired and swarthy of skin,
swore to love and cherish a flaxen-haired Cech lass
from near Kutni Hora. When these two started
out on their marital life journey, their lingual at-
98

THE MELTING-POT
tainments were so rudimentary that they had to
resort to the expedient of the sign language. It
makes one realize the truth of the saying that,
after all, the whole world is kin, when one reads
among lodge notices in the New Yorske Listy a call
for a meeting of the "Union of Cech Women,"
signed by Ludmila Cassidy, secretary, and Jose-
fina O'Connell, treasurer. In this instance the Hiber
nian and the Cech hearts and hands have joined.
Are mixed marriages happy? Mrs. de C, having
as a widow married a Belgian, does not advise Cech
girls to enter into wedlock with partners not of
their own blood. "Usually such marriages end
unhappily," is her warning. Mr. — sky of Brook
lyn, however, holds an opposite view. His two
daughters have made ideal alliances with German-
Americans, while his son married a Yankee girl.
"What difference does it make," argues Mr.
— sky, "whom my girls marry? They are born
here, and are therefore Americans, like their hus
bands, who are also of the same (American)
nation."

CHAPTER VIII
ALL BORN IN AMERICA BELONG TO AMERICA
A NOTED violinist came to New York. The
local Cech community, proud of its renowned
countryman, gave an evening in his honor. If not
contrary to the terms of his contract with the
manager, the violinist consented to play.
On the great day the Bohemian Hall was crowded
with people eager to do homage to the artist who
contributed to the fame of his country's music.
Every one was pleasurably expectant when the
artist arrived in company with his manager, carry
ing the magic violin under his arm. The violinist
played a bar or two of the national anthem Kde
domov muj, putting into the simple air all the
feeling of which a Cech musician away from home
is capable. At that mOment, tense with emotion,
women were seen to press handkerchiefs to their
eyes. But it was interesting to note the unequal
effect of the anthem on the hearers. While the old
folks were visibly moved by the appealing tones
that reminded them of the Fatherland, the young
people listened coldly, critically.
In the orchestra sat an elderly man, a staid
citizen, father of several children, all of whom had
been born in the metropolis. As the violinist struck
the first bar of the Kde domov muj, the old gentle-
ioo

BORN IN AMERICA, AMERICANS
man's powerful frame was seen to shake and his
eyes grow moist. His son of about sixteen, who sat
next to him, was also aroused by the music, but in
a different way. He turned to his father and re
monstrated: "Father, why do you weep? Why do
you make such a show of yourself?"
Are Cech children not interested in the birthland
of their parents? Or, to state the case more point
edly, are they indifferent about their ancestry?
The answer is simple: the American Cech youth —
American not only by cold statistics, but by sym
pathy as well, for all that is born in America be
longs to America — are neither better nor worse
than the children of Swedish, French, or Irish
parentage. Their schooling is American, their
mother tongue English. The spirit of the Anglo-
Saxon race, happily blended with distinctive Slavic
traits, is their spirit.
When Frances Gregor's English version of
Bozena Nemcov&'s masterpiece BabiZka (Grand
mother) came off the press, the Cech papers in
the United States were deeply chagrined that the
book, notwithstanding flattering newspaper no
tices, did not appeal more strongly to the younger
generation. "We are keenly disappointed that our
American-born children feel so little interested in
the work of our authoress," commented one news
paper. "If Babicka had been published here in
Cech we should have condoned the apathy of our
young folk, but Miss Gregor's Babicka they should
IOI

I

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
all be able to understand." Yet is it reasonable
to expect from our American children and grand
children, reasoned the same journal, whose heads
are full of fractions and algebra, to love our ador
able Babicka, to listen patiently to her artless
tales of rustic life, to evince curiosity about the
contents of that wondrous, decorated dowry chest
of hers?
j The process of Americanization of children be-
i gins in the primary grades of the public school
and is made complete in practical life. Often for
eign-born parents are heard complaining of the
rapid denationalization of their offspring. It is
by no means unusual for such parents, in order
to give to children a working foundation in their
vernacular, to make it a practice to converse with
them at home in the native tongue, to the ex
clusion of English. School-teachers are often in
credulous that this or that child has been born in
America, so elementary is the knowledge of Eng
lish it brings to the schoolroom. The author has in
mind the case of a boy, who, though born in New
York, knew but a few words of English, and those
he pronounced like a foreigner. At home, for his
sake, English conversation was eschewed. Having
been taken on a visit to his grandparents in San
Jose, California, where there were no Cechs, the
boy one day came running in to tell his grandfather
how stupid his playmates were: they could not
speak Cech! Yet all these expedients and precau-
102

BORN IN AMERICA, AMERICANS
tions avail nothing. The moment the child crosses
the threshold of the schoolhouse, the question of
his future fealty is settled. With his grandmother,
or other members of the family, he will talk Cech,
because he has found out that grandmother knows
no other language. Let the child, however, sense a J
speaking knowledge of English in any one, relative
or neighbor, that person will ever afterward be
addressed by him in English only. The oddity has
been noticed among the children of foreign-born
parents, that while the first born speaks the mother
tongue of the parents passably well, the youngest
offspring speaks it poorly or not at all. The ex
planation is simple enough. When the first child
came, the parents in all probability were still
monolingual, knowing no other except their own
tongue. Meantime, as the other children began ar
riving, the parents already had acquired a speak
ing knowledge of English; that is to say, they had
become bilingual. In consequence, the later-born
children, no longer needing the "other language"
in their intercourse with parents or older kin,
never learned it.
You may persist in telling your child of the glory
of Bohemia's past; that the land of your birth had
an old and honorable record long before the Pilgrim
Fathers landed on the Massachusetts coast. The
child will answer: But how small your country is
compared to our si You realize how futile it is to
argue with a youthful head to which nothing ap-
103

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
peals more convincingly than physical greatness.
The tallest mountain — Mount Whitney; the
longest river — Missouri; two oceans; New York
now estimated to be the largest city in the world;
a republic of more than one hundred million in
habitants — is it possible to play a bigger trump-
card in order to convince youthful minds? Prague,
too, is a city of respectable size? Why, we have a
dozen towns larger than Prague. Two of our smaller
States, New Jersey and Maryland, will counter
pane the whole of Bohemia with a few hundred
miles to spare! The area of a single American State
is larger than the whole of the Cechoslovak Re
public.

CHAPTER DI
NEW BOHEMIA IN AMERICA
TWO and a half centuries ago, Augustine
Herrman, lord of Bohemia Manor, visualized
a New Bohemia which should shelter exiles of his
faith and race, as New England, New Sweden, New
Holland, and New France had been planned to
serve as a haven of refuge to men from England,
Sweden, Holland, and France. Pathfinders like
Naprstek and Oliverius fancied that a Cech com
munity was realizable; the perplexing question
was how and where to establish it. Klacel, to the
end of his days, was obsessed with a like notion.
He dreamt of Svojanovs, compact groups con
ducted somewhat on the pattern of Brook Farm.
In the seventies Joseph W. Sykora, a member of
the Cleveland bar, drew an alluring picture in the
Slavie of a New Bohemia. Unfortunately, Sykora's
Cech fairy tale was just what its name said — a
fairy tale and nothing more. On December 31,
1865, and January 1 and 2, 1866, the so-called
Slavic Congress met in Chicago to discuss the
ways and means for the organization of a Cech-
Slavic community. Charles Jonas was elected
chairman, Adolph B. Chladek, secretary. It was
planned to send a delegation (Charles Jonas and
J. B. Erben) to Washington to petition the Govern-
105

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
ment for a grant of land. But a public subscription
which had been ordered to that end did not bring
funds enough to defray the traveling expenses of
the delegates to the capital, much less to lay a
foundation for the proposed community.
John A. Oliverius urged his countrymen to mi
grate en masse to Oregon, and seek in that State,
protected as it is on one side by the sea, the
consummation of the long-cherished dream. The
scheme was promptly voted down by Charles
Jonas, who always looked upon Oliverius as a
harmless fanatic. The projected migration of
American Cechs to Russia that had been advo
cated by J. B. Letovsky, F. Mracek, and others at
the beginning of the Civil War, was another man
ifestation of their yearning to live apart in settle
ments made up of their own people.
Experience has shown that the settlements
thrived best in which the home-seekers were free
to select their acres and choose their neighbors.
Where land agents or leaders of colonizing expedi
tions did the choosing for the farmers, there was
discontent, resulting in failure.
One of the earliest fruitful attempts at coloniza
tion originated in Chicago. Under the leadership
of Franta Bern and Franta Janousek, a company
of agriculturists started in the seventies from Chi
cago for Knox County, Nebraska. On the way, so
the story goes, the two leaders disagreed as to the
merits of the land, with the result that the expedi-
106

en
8 g
as
s •§

w ¦§
a I
w t:
>o g
<: o

NEW BOHEMIA IN AMERICA
tion split into two parties : a number of the settlers
took land in Knox County,1 near the present towns
of Verdigre and Niobrara, while the other faction,
led by Bern, crossed the Missouri River into the
neighboring State of South Dakota and located in
Bon Homme County. In 1874 a Chicago organiza
tion, styling itself Slovanskd Osada (Slavic Colony)
proposed to take workmen from congested centers
and settle them in Nebraska or Kansas. About the
same time some Omaha people organized the
Slavonia club with the object of forming settle
ments in Nebraska.
The Ceska Osada (Cech Colony) in Chicago, an
other organization, issued this appeal in 1876 to
prospective land-tillers! "The idea of freeing one's
self from the yoke of capital and building one's
own existence in the country is excellent. We recog
nize it to be the only feasible and practicable solu
tion of the so-called workingmen's problems. The
fertile soil of the West is capable of giving sus
tenance and independence to millions of home-
builders and we cannot do otherwise than approve
of the plans of the society." The Ceskd Osada also
favored settlements in a warmer climate. Onward
to Texas, Arizona, and California, read their ad
dress; let the Cechs feel the joy of resting in the
shade of orange trees after their daily toil! A com-
1 The Pokrok Zdpadu of August 3, 1900, contains an account of the
thirtieth anniversary of the Knox County settlement. — The Al
manac Pionyr for 1919: "What the first settlers in Nebraska en
dured." By one of them (Sedivy).
107

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
mittee of this organization was sent to Shasta
County, California, to report on conditions there;
a minority opposed the coast State because, in its
opinion, the price of the land was too high. To
some, Oklahoma seemed to offer greater oppor
tunities than California. One of the most ardent
partisans of California, Frank Petrovec, a young
man of the type characterized by Germans as a
Latin farmer, because he had been educated in a
Latin school, was accidentally killed by a railroad
train as the investigation committee neared the
border-line of the land of promise. This tragic in
cident discouraged the members of the Ceskd Osada,
who were never to taste the joy of resting beneath
the orange tree after their daily toil.
A. F. Dignowity of Del Rio, Texas, invited the
j Cechs to settle on a ranch of some thirty thousand
j acres which he claimed he owned jointly with his
j brothers in Kinney County, seven miles from Fort
Clark and Brackett.1 Dignowity contended his
land was as fertile as any in California. He wished
the countrymen of his father, the late Dr. Anthony
M. Dignowity, to avail themselves of the opportun
ity and establish a settlement on his land. Dig-
nowity's appeal remained apparently unheeded,
for no Cechs are known to live in that part of
Texas. The Cechs are not the only Europeans who have
aspired to build up separate communities. The
1 The Pokrok Zdpadu, January 18, 1888.
108

NEW BOHEMIA IN AMERICA
Germans have made systematic and repeated
efforts in that direction. Witness the Teutonic
concentration in Pennsylvania. The Giesner Aus-
wanderungs Gesellschaft schemed to make Mis
souri a German State. Read what vision Paul
Follenius and Friedrich Munch, two Germans of
culture, conjured to themselves: "We must not go
from here [Germany] without realizing a national
idea or at least making the beginning toward its
realization; the foundation of a new and free Ger
many in the great North American Republic shall
be laid by us. . . . Thus, we may be able at least in
one of the American territories to establish an essen^
tially German State, in which refuge may be found
for all those to whom conditions at home have
become unbearable — a territory which shall be
able to make a model State in the great Republic."1
Follenius and Munch and some followers secured
land in 1834 m Warren County, but in a larger
sense the plan ended in a failure.
In 1835, a society was organized in New York
by the name of Germania. The main object of
Germania was to introduce and foster here German
customs and language. The promoters petitioned
Congress to set aside a suitable area for exclusive
colonization by Germans. Congress disallowed the
petition; but the petitioners, undismayed, deter-
1 Albert B. Faust: The German Element in the United States, with
special reference to its political, moral, social, and educational in
fluence, v. 1, p. 433. 1909.
109

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
mined to pursue another course to attain their
object. Immigrants from the Fatherland were to
be advised to settle in enclaves picked out for them
in advance; these enclaves were to be proclaimed
German-language territories the moment German
settlers had obtained the upper hand in them. The
promoters, however, disagreed as to the choice of
the State wherein the experiment was to be tried.
While certain members favored Texas or Oregon,
others thought the Middle West, somewhere be
tween the Mississippi and the Lakes, the more
suitable place. Franz Lohner, who had evinced
considerable solicitude about the future of his
countrymen beyond the seas, believed no country
offered greater opportunities than the area between
the basins of the Ohio and Missouri Rivers. The
Irish, reasoned Lohner, made their homes in the
large cities of the East; the Americans were scat
tered over the length and breadth of the continent.
This distribution of races left to the Germans the
Middle West in which were the choicest prizes —
Wisconsin and Iowa. Upon Milwaukee was con
ferred the proud title, Deutsche Athen, German
Athens. German settlers gained ascendancy in these
Wisconsin counties: Milwaukee, Ozaukee, Wash
ington, Grant, Sheboygan, Manitowoc, Jefferson,
Outgamie, Fond du Lac, Sauk, Waupaca, Dane,
Marathon, Waushara, Green Lake, Langlade, and
Clark. What reader of older Cech newspapers will
not readily recognize in several of these names old
no

NEW BOHEMIA IN AMERICA
acquaintances? St. Killian is the home of a large
settlement of Germans from northwestern Bo
hemia.1 Count von Castell, an aide to the Duke of
Nassau, became convinced that prospects were ex
cellent for the introduction of German kultur in
Texas. Castell enlisted not only the sympathy, but
what was more important, the financial aid, of a
number of aristocratic families in Germany and
Austria. In 1842 two delegates, Count Boos Waldek
and Victor von Leininger, traveled to Texas in
order to study the situation on the spot. And so
enthusiastic was the report which these two nobles
sent home that the Mainzer Adelverein agreed to
sponsor the plan publicly. A systematic pro-Texas
campaign was undertaken in Central Europe. Two
years later (1844) Prince Carl Solms-Braunfels
started for the new land with one hundred and
fifty families by way of Bremen. The place which
these pioneers chose as their headquarters was
named New Braunfels, in honor of the leader of
the expedition.
The agitation carried on by Solms-Braunfels
had a direct bearing upon the immigration from
Moravia a few years later. The principal seat of
activity of the Mainzer Adelverein was at Mainz.
Now, the Mainz fortress was until the Austro-
Prussian War in 1866 garrisoned jointly by Austrian
1 Annual Report of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, pp. 58-
59- 1890. Ill

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
and Prussian soldiers. Cech soldiers served there
among others, and the inference is a reasonable one
that the projects of the Mainzer Adelverein were
fairly well known to them. Besides, aristocrats who
were interested in it as members or patrons, owned
estates in Germany and Austria, as well as in
Bohemia and Moravia.
It was not mere coincidence that the Cechs
.uniformly massed in those cities and country areas
in which the Germans had been settled. Persons
familiar with Cech psychology know that the march
lof the Cech pathfinders in the footsteps of the
Germans had not been fortuitous, but a matter of
qareful premeditation. As explained on another
page the Cechs were drawn to the Germans by a
similarity, if not identity, in customs and mode, of
life; besides, educated as many of them had been
in German-language schools, the pioneers felt
pretty much at home among the Germans — not
withstanding old-country racial antagonisms. Wis
consin, we know, was intended to be a German
State; we find Cech farmers settling there. The
Cechs began massing in St. Louis in the middle of
the last century; and St. Louis was one of the Ger
man strongholds in the Middle West. Other promi
nently German cities were Milwaukee, Cincinnati,
and Detroit; strong groups of Cechs located in all
these. Could the Cechs with their incomparably small
numbers and slender means hope to succeed where
112

NEW BOHEMIA rN AMERICA
the Germans, having the advantage in numerical
strength, superior organization, and powerful sup
port, had failed?
Judging by the lessons of the past it is certain
that communities which aim to perpetuate a lan
guage other than English will not thrive in the
United States. The Slovaks at one time started
a noisy campaign in their newspapers to divert
miners and mill workers to a Slovak enclave in
Arkansas. And the result? One village in Hazen
County called Slovaktown attests the failure of the
undertaking. Polonia in Wisconsin could tell its
story of the shattered hopes of the Poles. A few
decades ago the Scandinavians set out to dominate
Minnesota. Now Minnesota dominates the Scan
dinavians. No parish school, no church congregation, no
foreign-language community can long withstand
the force majeure of Americanization. In a measur
able time the Bohemias, Germanias, New Braun-
fels, Polonias, and Slovaktowns, will be but a
name and a memory.

CHAPTER X
GAMIN ETYMOLOGY — PANTATA — CORRUPTION OP THE
LANGUAGE — AMERICANIZATION OF NAMES
GAMIN America has bestowed on certain of its
immigrants race-names, jestful or tantalizing,
over which the learned etymologist may well de
spair. The Teuton is called "Dutchman," clearly
from " Deutsch," " Deutscher." In the olden times,
before the Yankee learned to differentiate between
the new-comers from Central Europe, every immi
grant resembling the German in dress or looks was
unceremoniously dubbed by him a Dutchman.
For the son of Italy the gamin etymologist has
coined the somewhat cryptic appellations of "Dago"
and "Wop." Even one ignorant of the mysteries
of roots and terminations will readily understand
why he refers to the Mexican as " Greaser." The
Irishman is " Mick" and the Hungarian in Penn
sylvania, " Hunk" or " Hunky." In some localities
Bohemians are called "Bohoes," in other "Bo-
hunks"; less familiar are the terms " Cheskey " and
"Bootchkey." A non-Bohemian finding himself in
a city quarter peopled by Bohemians cannot but
notice the word Cesky (pronounced Cheskey) leer
ing at him from every store sign : Cesky pekar (Cech
baker), Cesky hostinec (Cech tavern), Cesky gro-
cerista (Cech grocer). Promptly he must see a
114

GAMIN ETYMOLOGY
connection between Cesky and Bohemian. The word
"Bootchkey," however, offers no such clue to the
etymologist as "Cheskey"; to get at its hidden
meaning one must know something of the moods
of the New York street. The explanation is made
that in a street warfare the Cech boys of the
Upper East Side signaled to each other with the
call pockej, meaning, in Cech, wait, hold on. To
the ears of the non-Cech playmates this sounded
very much like bootchkey. Hence, a Bohemian is
"Bootchkey." Thus far but one Cech word has made itself at
home in the English language: pantata. The Stand
ard Dictionary of the English Language,1 page 1273,
gives this derivation of it: "Pan-tata. (Slang. U.S.)
One having authority ; a boss. Czech — pan, mas
ter, mister — toto, father. Pantata, pan — mister, and
tata — endearing term for father (the true equiva
lent in Bohemian for father being otec), is ordinarily
used in addressing one's father-in-law, though in
a broad sense any elderly countryman may be
spoken to as pantata. As understood in New York,
where the word was first used in 1894, at the time
of the Lexow Committee trial, it signifies a corrupt
police captain." 2
Has any one taken the pains to count the English
words which have been injected into the Cech
1 Funk & Wagnalls Co. New York and London, 1903.
2 Report and Proceedings of the Senate Committee, appointed to
investigate the Police Department of New York City, v. II, p.
1722.
H5

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
language? Glance through the advertisement col
umns of a newspaper and you will begin to under
stand what inroad English is making into the Cech.
The following words are taken from a short real
estate advertisement in the New Y or she Listy: acre,
improvement, block, lot, mortgage, assessment,
canalization. It is superfluous to say that the
Cech language has an equivalent for every one of
the foregoing expressions, yet English is given
preference. Note how English looks when a foreign language
¦ — in this instance Slovak — tries to assimilate it.
A Slovak weekly, Ndrodne Noviny of Pittsburgh,
complained in a recent article entitled, "Preserve
the Purity of our Tongue," of the wanton corrup
tion of the Slovak. As transliterated into the
Slovak tongue, English looks queer to an Amer
ican: jesser — yes sir; noser — no sir; sej — say;
jes — yes ; stir — sure ; olrajt — all right ; kvoder —
quarter; dajm — dime; skuner — schooner; viska
— whiskey; pejda — pay day; boket — bucket;
dinerka — dinner; strita — street; revra — river;
a psters — upsta irs ; da nsters — downsta irs. " The
use of these and other corruptions," expostulates
the editor of the NdrodnS Noviny, "has gained such
a hold on our people, that most of them are no
longer aware they are using them." As an instance
of the subduing force of English, the same editor
tells of a social at which the guests present agreed
to pay a fine of five cents for each English word
116

CORRUPTION OF THE LANGUAGE
uttered. In an hour's time $7.55 had been collected
in fines.
In the homeland the purists try to keep the
tongue free from the dross of the so-called German
isms. Who will keep watch over the purity of the
language here and shield it from Anglicisms, from
erosion and corruption?
No name has caused its bearers greater discom
fiture than Vaclav. Vaclav, be it remembered, is
one of the patron saints of Bohemia. An ancient
hymn which is still sung in the Catholic churches
invokes "Holy Vaclav, Duke of Bohemian Land,"
to save his countrymen from extermination. Some
how or other the American Vaclavs — St. Vaclav
has a host of namesakes on both sides of the
ocean — are not content with the name. A number
of the milder malcontents have given it a German
or a Latin form: Wenzel, VenCeslas, Venceslaus;
the majority, though, figuratively speaking, have
thrown Vaclav overboard, assuming in lieu of it
William, Wesley, Wendel, James, according to the
fancy of the bearer. Vaclav is, of course, as un
translatable as Roland, Kenneth, or Leslie.
The Americanization of names is a practice by
no means infrequent, although it is not as wide
spread as popularly believed. Caprice or expe
diency prompt one to change his name. Sometimes
a name is coined as a result of a fair exchange of
values, Cech for English, provided it is translatable.
Thus Jablecnik is made Appleton, Studnicka is
117

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
transformed into Wells, Krejci becomes Taylor,
Zastera hides himself behind Apron. In the ma
jority of cases the man moulds his patronymic
along the lines of Cech pronunciation: Korista —
Corrister; Anderlik — Underleak; Kucera — Good-
sheller; Koci — Cutshaw; Mrkvicka — Murray;
Krenka — Krank; Mosnicka — Mason; Mar§alek
— Marshall ; Nozir — Norris; Cihak — Jayshaw;
Hudec — Hudson; Tesar — Teaser; Preucil —
Prucil; Simacek — Smack. A Nebraska politician
trimmed his name from Lapacek to La Pache;
Vancura, a plain Vancura, by a genial tug at his
surname emerged from out of the purging process
as Van Cura. Who would sense in Van Cura a Cech
and not a descendant of a Knickerbocker family?

CHAPTER XI
RATIONALISM: A TRANSITION FROM THE OLD TO THE NEW
ACCORDING to Austrian official statistics,
960.48 of every 1000 persons in Bohemia
profess the Catholic faith, 21.77 are Protestants,
16.19 Jews, 1. 12 Old Catholics, 0.20 without con
fession, 0.24 mixed. These figures, however, do not
obtain in America. If we were to take the Cech
residents of New York as an illustration, we should
get approximately this result: Catholics, 254; Prot
estants, no; Jews, 16; persons without any church
affiliation, 620. Conditions, of course, vary in dif
ferent States and places, due to various local
causes. In some the strength of the Catholics and
of the non-Catholics is about evenly balanced.
Chicago is such a place. In others the Catholics
predominate; the latter is believed to be the case
in Texas, Wisconsin, Minnesota. It is within the
truth to say that 50 per cent of the Cechs inj
America have seceded from their old-country
faith. One author is convinced that the strength of
the secessionists is nearer 60 or 70 per cent than
50.1 Of the non-church faction, two distinct shades '|
are recognizable; first, the negativists, and secondly
1 J. E. Salaba Vojan: "Why should we American Cechs be Lib-
eral-Minded? " pp. 425-28, in Cech Reader, edited by Vojta BeneS.
Prague, 1912. 119

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
the dyed-in-the-wool anti-clericals who have sub
scribed to Havlicek's harsh formula as applied
to the priests: give them nothing, credit them
nothing. From what class do the dissenters come? The
immigrant from the rural districts of the domes
tic and agricultural labor class has, on the whole,
remained loyal to the faith in which he was born
and reared. Not so with the worker from urban or
j industrial centers. In his ranks, cases of dissent
are common. Among the inteligence, the educated
class, religious secession has been the rule, not the
exception. Indeed, so general was the secession by
the intellectuals that, before the mid-nineties, the
churchmen had no lay inteligence worth mention.
As between the Cechs from Bohemia and those
from Moravia, the first-named have manifested a
readier inclination to break away than their more
conservative kinsmen from Moravia.
Certain people professed to think that the schism
was but a whim and a fad and that when the nov
elty of it wore off the malcontents would return.
Well-informed commentators did not share this op
timistic view. The whim, if it were a whim, has
lasted altogether too long. Newspapers have been
made and unmade by reason of the controversy
between the churchmen and the secessionists. De
termined to outdo the opposition, one faction has
built houses of worship, while the other with equal
perseverance has erected club-houses where men
120

RATIONALISM
and women could meet "free from the intrusion of
clericalism." What is the cause of this decatholization?
One writer1 asserted that the rupture would
never have taken place had not Joseph Pastor, i
editor of the weekly Pokrok, thrown a firebrand !
of discord among his countrymen. Before Pastor's ,
time, he argued, the Cechs were of one mind, one \
faith. )
Another was inclined to blame the clergy. The j
veteran priests, he charged, were wont to be (J
domineering, and to show their resentment many 1
parishioners ceased going to church.
Still another condemned Klacel and his subversive
propaganda. Zdrubek and Snajdr and their liberal
publications also came in for a share of censure.
A fourth writer thought that it was the scarcity
of houses of worship in the pioneer years which led
to the parting of the ways. Yet he failed to explain
why the Poles did not falter in their faith under
precisely the same untoward conditions. A Pole
migrates from Catholic Poland to non-Catholic
United States and he remains steadfast, notwith- Jj
standing the change of residence. The Cech, also a' <
Catholic at home, becomes decatholicized overseas.! j
Why? An extremist in all things, Dr. Habenicht 2 held
1 John Borecky: Chapters on the History of Cech- Moravians in
America, p. 13.
2 John Habenicht: The History of the Cechs in America, p. x.
121

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
l|to the view that "vulgar materialism" was at the
I bottom of the defection. According to him the
1 liberals kept aloof from the churches for the reason
/ that they were averse to supporting them finan
cially. An American student,1 whose books on immi
grants have elicited wide newspaper comment, has
no argument to offer; however, he is scandalized
that there are so many non-churchmen among
the Cechs. "They are thoroughly eaten through and
through by infidelity." If this writer had said that
the Cechs were "thoroughly eaten through and
through," not by infidelity, but by Hussitism, so
far as Hussitism implies a challenge to unquestion
ing faith, he would have hit the nail on the head.
The primary cause, the causa causans, of the
alienation lies deep in the nation's past. To con
tend that Pastor, or Klacel, or any one individual
is responsible therefor is as reasonable as that John
Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry was the cause of
the Civil War.
First, there is Bohemia's Hussite past. Though
he may not be conscious of it, the truth of the
matter is that the Cech's inclination to dissent, to
\ question, to challenge, to dispute, is largely in-
j ;herited from his Hussite forefathers. In the Amer-
| ican Cech these tendencies burst forth with ele
mental strength the moment he landed in America,
where he could speak, act, and think free from the
1 Edward A. Steiner: On the Trail of the Immigrant, p. 230.
122

RATIONALISM
oppression to which he was subject in his native
land. Von Ranke, the historian, avers that Emperor
Charles IV (1316-78), was the greatest man born
on Bohemian soil. Admittedly Charles was a wise,
progressive sovereign. Under his rule many inno
vations were introduced, the foundation of the
Prague University in 1348 being doubtless his
most enduring achievement. Contrary to what von
Ranke asserts, the Cechs believe that not Emperor
Charles but John Hus was the greatest man born
in Bohemia.
Non-Bohemian historians are apt to view and
study Hussitism from one angle only, the religious.
To the natives Hussitism has a deeper meaning.
More than any other force it has kindled in
them, keeping it alive for centuries, the feeling of
national consciousness. The Austrian conqueror
in the seventeenth century almost destroyed the
nation, yet he was powerless to blot out the living
memory of its glorious past, and it was under the
light of this great past that nationalism revived in
the middle of the nineteenth century.
The Hussites started out to correct certain
abuses in the Church ; but before long their lead
ers, broadening the programme, raised the banner
of nationalism and struck at the Teutons, whom
eventually they pushed everywhere to the very
edge of the frontier. The defense of faith and the
defense of language were not the only issues in-
123

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
, volved. In the course of time the dispute resolved
i itself into its elemental factors: a struggle between
democracy, which the Hussites championed, the
right of men to determine for themselves their sys
tem of government, their form of religion, and their
scheme of social relationship; and aristocracy and
Teutonism, represented by the anti-Hussites, which
sought to impose upon the individual a privileged
religion, government, and caste system. In the Cech
of to-day Hussitism evokes emotions akin to those
which move a Frenchman at the contemplation of
the Great Revolution. The things the French did
toward the close of the eighteenth century, the
Hussites set out to achieve in the fifteenth century.
That the Hussites failed, while the French three
and a half centuries later triumphed, was due to
causes wholly beyond the power of the Cechs to
control. Secondly, there are the country's Protestant tra
ditions. That, too, is a weighty factor the influence
of which should not be minimized. Up to the Thirty
Years' War the Cechs had been a Protestant nation.
When the victor had begun to recatholicize Bo
hemia following the disastrous Battle of White Hill
in 1620, thousands, tens of thousands, preferred
banishment to the renunciation of their faith. Sev
eral of the chief rebels lost their heads on the scaf
fold for a cause they believed to be a righteous one.
Far from condemning the Protestants for having
rebelled against the Hapsburgs, even though the
124

RATIONALISM
ill-planned rebellion had almost cost the nation its
life, every liberal-minded Cech of to-day admires
as heroes and venerates as martyrs the men who
on the Bloody Day at Prague, June 21, 1621, gave
their lives for the Fatherland.
Thirdly, the fact should not be lost sight of that
between the American protagonists of rationalism
and the revivalists in the mother country the con
nection was not only close, but in many instances
personal. The men who had worked for the regen
eration of Bohemia since 1848, clergymen included,
were thorough-going liberals, even radicals. One of
the greatest leaders of this period, the man whom
the American rationalists quote oftener than any
other, was Charles Havlicek (1821-53), journalist
and politician.
Not Ladimir Klacel, as is popularly believed, but
Vojta Naprstek, was the first to disseminate ra
tionalism among American Cechs. Naprstek, who
was an admirer and personal friend of Havlicek's,
published in Milwaukee, in the early fifties, a lib
eral weekly, the Flug Blatter. Though a German-
language paper the Flug Blatter was read largely
by Naprstek's fellow countrymen. Many of the
patrons of the Flug Blatter became, in later years,
stockholders, readers, publishers, editors, and sup
porters of the Cech press. As interpreted in the
columns of the Flug Blatter, Naprstek's liberalism
was strikingly like that espoused by Havlicek in
the Prague Ndrodni Noviny; that is to say, it was
125

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
anti-clerical and anti-Austrian. "In 1854 the Flug
Blatter was the subject of some heated debates in
both houses of the Wisconsin legislature, where
Assemblyman Worthington of Waukesha and Sen
ator McGarry of Milwaukee offered resolutions
prohibiting the legislative postmasters from dis
tributing this publication to the members. These
resolutions, however, were not adopted."1
Vojta Naprstek was born in Prague in 1828 and
died in that city in 1894, mourned by the entire
nation. He came to New York in 1849 as a political
refugee. It is a mistake to think that Naprstek fled
to America for political reasons only. In his mind's
eye he pictured to himself an ideal Cech community
in America. He weighed the matter carefully and
noted in 1847 in his diary: "As soon as I am entirely
ready, I shall start my agitation. In a year and half
there shall be a Cech settlement in America."2
After wandering here and there he finally settled
in Milwaukee, starting his publication in 1852. Al
though his stay in America was of a comparatively
short duration, eight years in all, it sufficed to make
an enthusiastic American of him. Upon returning
to his native land in 1857, he missed no opportunity
to familiarize his country with American ideas,
1 Parkman: Club Papers, p. 236. 1896.
2 Julius Zeyer: Vojta Ndprstek. A lecture delivered on his seven
tieth birthday, p. 11. Prague, 1896. Vojta Naprstek: Memorial Leaf.
Prague, 1894. Reprint of illustrated articles from the Svetozor,
Prague, xxviii: 1420-21-22. J. R. Jicinsky: Osveta Americkd, Feb
ruary-March, 1907.
126

VOJTA NAPRSTEK AND "MRS. JOSEPHINE." HIS WIFE

RATIONALISM
American institutions, American methods. Amer
icanism, it may truthfully be said, was Naprstek's
life passion. When he came into possession of the
family patrimony, which was considerable, he be
gan to lay plans for what in time developed into
the Naprstek American Museum, otherwise known
as Naprstek Industrial Museum, in Prague. Woman
suffrage had in him a warm advocate; the Club of
American Women was organized and met in his
salons. Naprstek's hospitable home was a rendez
vous of emigrants and none were more heartily
welcome than American Cechs. "That which the
heart unites the sea shall not divide," was a motto
prominently displayed in Naprstek's reading-
rooms. He never sought the favor of the governing
class, his democracy being too real and his religious
views too radical. A New Yorker having once asked
him what Americans he admired the most, the
former editor of the Flug Blatter replied, unhesitat
ingly, Paine and Jefferson.
Now as to the part the press played in the se
cession movement.
The Slowan Amerikdnsky', Ndrodni Noviny,
Slavie, and the St. Louis Pozor, followed the old-
fashioned programme of Cech nationalism. The
Pokrok, which appeared in Chicago in 1867 under
the direction of Joseph Pastor, struck out boldly
and openly against clericalism. The Pokrok's chal
lenge was taken up the same year by the Katolicke
Noviny, of which Father Joseph Molitor of Chicago
127

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
was editor. Beginning with 1867 every newcomer
in the journalistic field who had set out to serve the
" interests of Cecho-Slavs in America " was obliged
to choose between the one or the other camp.
Neutrality was a word abhorred equally by both
contentious factions. Matters progressed from bad
to worse when Pastor resigned and Zdrubek as
sumed his place as editor-in-chief of the Pokrok.
During Zdrubek's editorship, and due to his igno
rance of the law, occurred the sensational libel
suit which Father William Repis of the St. Vaclav
parish in Cleveland brought against the editor.
Trivial in itself, the libel caused a tremendous up
roar everywhere; the "infidels" and the churchmen
alike regarded it as a sort of test of their respective
strength. One of the fruits of Repis's libel suit was
the organization by the liberal party of the Liberal
Union. The Katolicke Noviny having passed out
of existence for lack of support, Father Hessoun
of St. Louis provided the Catholics in 1872 with
another defender of their faith, the Hlas. The
Hlas had retained almost unopposed the leadership
among co-religionists until 1893-94. That year the
order of the Benedictines established in Chicago
two journals, since become influential, the Katolik
and the Ndrod.
The Catholic adherents rallied around Hessoun's
Hlas, while the Pokrok continued to fight the battles
of the liberals. Even in Klaeel's time the Pokrok
was considered their organ, because the journal-
128

RATIONALISM
istic ventures of the aged thinker never enjoyed
a wide circulation. After a stormy existence of
eleven-odd years the Pokrok finally suspended
publication in Cleveland.
The defunct Pokrok was replaced in the mid-
seventies by two new pugnacious journals. One
was the Chicago daily Svornost, which Zdrubek
founded in 1875 in partnership with August
Geringer; the other was the weekly Dennice No
voveku started by Vaclav Snajdr in Cleveland.
These two papers pledged themselves to uphold'
the cause of free religious discussion. Snajdr sat in 1
the editorial chair of the Dennice Novoveku for'
thirty- three years. Zdrubek held the reins of the"
Svornost for thirty-five years. Friend and foe alike
will agree that Snajdr and Zdrubek kept the pact
faithfully. Excellently edited, the Dennice No
voveku boasted by far the most intelligent, though
not the largest, community of readers.
Prior to 1891, the Dennice Novoveku was the
official organ of the C.S.P.S. brotherhood. One can
imagine what it meant to the cause of liberalism to
get a fearless journal of the stamp of the Dennice
into thousands of C.S.P.S. households. In plain
language it signified the winning over to the side
of the liberals of as many partisans as there were
members in the organization. The J.C.D. sister
hood also adopted the Dennice Novoveku as its
organ; here again new territory had been con
quered, new friends won. 129

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
The progressives scored a triumph when Klacel
arrived in the United States, in 1869. Here was an
author of distinction, a much-talked-of philospher
and intimate friend of some of the greatest men
and women of Bohemia. A report which preceded
him from abroad that he was coming to America
to found a commune of followers, added, if any
thing, to the magic of his name.
Even men who had studied theology or were duly
ordained as priests, turned against their Church.
Few of these endured more for a principle than
Father Thomas Juranek. Coming to America in
1848 or 1849, a backwash of revolutionary Bohe
mia, Juranek tried hard to get a start at some
thing that was more to his liking than the pulpit.
He drudged for a time at cigarmaking in New York.
Seeing no prospects in this occupation, he made
his way to Milwaukee; there he became a fruit
peddler. Saving a few dollars he bought a hand-
organ and with this instrument strapped to his
back, he tramped along the Mississippi River to
New Orleans and back to Wisconsin. He settled in
Cooperstown, in Manitowoc County; there he
established himself as a schoolmaster, cigarmaker,
justice of the peace, and newspaper correspondent.1
He died March 5, 1890.
Juranek was not the only priest to lay aside the
v 1 Thomas Juranek: The Contemplations and Reflections of an Old
Cech Organ-Grinder toward the Close of the Nineteenth Century, To all
liberal-minded Cechs for careful perusal and investigation, dedi
cated by an apostate priest. Greenstreet, Wis., 1889.
130

RATIONALISM
cassock. Old settlers will readily recall the case of
William Repis (or Revis, as he later anglicized his
name), who in the seventies ministered to a thriving
parish in Cleveland. Due, it is claimed, to bitter
attacks by the radical press, Repis left the priest
hood, married, and settled on a farm in Iowa.
Celebrated is the case of Ladimir Klacel. Edu
cated for the priesthood, Klacel had taken the
monastic vows of the Augustinian Friars and for
a time taught philosophy at a school of that order
at Brno, Moravia. But applying the philosophi
cal deductions of Hegel, whose teachings he had
embraced, to politics and religion, to Church and
State, the brilliant pedagogue found himself, in
consequence, in sharp opposition to his superiors.
Expulsion from the school followed.1 In order to
"emancipate his mind from the shackles of slavery,"
as the ex-friar described his mental state, he decided
to emigrate overseas at the risk of losing friends
and imperiling a splendid literary reputation. At
that time Klacel was in his sixty-first year, which
would seem to indicate that his resolve to leave the
Church was the outcome of seasoned judgment.
The circumstance that he had quarreled with the
1 Augustine Smetana (1814-51), a Cruciferian monk, was publicly
excommunicated under circumstances recalling the dramatic and
sensational expulsion from the Israelite Community, of which he
was a member, of Baruch Spinoza, the Dutch philosopher. In this
connection one is reminded of the case of another Cruciferian monk,
Karl Anton Postl, known to American literature as Charles Seals-
field, born in Moravia. Postl was a fellow inmate with Smetana in
the monastery of that order in Prague. 131

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
hierarchy and that the hierarchy had disciplined
him added, if anything, to the luster of his name
in the opinion of the American rationalists.
Toward the close of his life, due, no doubt, to
worries and cruel disappointments of all kinds,
Klacel turned mystic and visionary. As a social
reformer he shared Fourier's communistic ideas.
Fourier, as we know, proposed what he termed
phalansteries, consisting of a fixed number of per
sons who should live together, combining the result
of their labor. Klacel 's pet scheme was the organ
ization in the Middle West (he had his eye on the
Black Hills country in South Dakota) of Svoja-
nov communities composed of his followers who
should work the land on the cooperative basis —
precisely Fourier's project. Fortunately for Klacel
none of his communities of which he dreamed were
realized; had they become actualities it is certain
they would have collapsed as did most of the under
takings of this kind, as for example the most noted
one, Brook Farm in Massachusetts. When Klacel
finds a competent biographer who will edit an |
informing synopsis of his philosophy, the historian
will be better prepared to assign a place to this 1
remarkable man in the evolution of thought in
America. F. B. Zdrubek (1842-1911), "the arch-propa
gandist of atheism," was the son of poor, struggling
parents who sent him to a Catholic seminary to be
educated for the priesthood. Having, as he tells us,
132

/ / /
/ / /
1 1 1

LADIMIR KLACEL

RATIONALISM
experienced a change in religious faith, Zdrubek
left the Catholic for a Protestant seminary, from
which latter he duly graduated. Settling in Chicago
and taking up journalism as a profession, he began
as lecturer, writer, and journalist, "to combat the
menace of bigotry and superstition among his
countrymen." Few journalists waged a more relentless warfare
against the clergy than Joseph Pastor, editor of the
Pokrok, who served a novitiate with the friars of
Zeliv Abbey.
John V. Capek, author of the humorous life of
St. Anthony of Padua, in verse, spent a school
semester or two with the Franciscans in Prague.
Capek asserted that it was in the monastic cell
that his theological ideals underwent a change.
Bartos Bittner and Alois Janda both took a
course in Catholic theological seminaries, both re
belling in the end.
Dr. Frank Iska started his career as a priest.
Unable to believe what he preached, he went over
to the Old Catholic Church. In 1902 he arrived in
the United States with the idea, it is said, of organ
izing in Chicago a congregation of Old Catholics.
Failing in this, he returned to his native country,
but the following year came back, establishing a
permanent residence in Chicago. Casting aside Old
Catholicism, he avowed his adhesion to the prin
ciples for which Klacel and Zdrubek fought all
their lives — freedom of religious expression.
133

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
J. B. Erben of St. Louis, the oldest living Cech
journalist in the country, is said to have run away,
as a student, from a Benedictine monastery in Bohe
mia where he was being educated. Embracing the
evangelical faith, Erben, who knew German as
well as his mother tongue, gave himself to religious
work among the Germans in the United States.
Tragic was the end of John C. Hojda, spiritual
head of the St. Vaclav parish in Baltimore. Re
signing his charge and at the same time renouncing
his faith, Hojda eked out a scanty existence on the
Baltimore Telegraf, a struggling Cech weekly. Sub
sequently he took up horticulture for a living. In a
fit of insanity, due, it is said, to brooding over
family matters, he killed two of his children. He
was placed in an asylum, where he died in 1898.
Rationalistic tenets, so far as known, claimed
two converts from among the Protestants. One was
a minister by the name of Joseph Kalda, a restless,
discontented spirit. For a Chicago publishing house
Kalda edited a book of Funeral Speeches for the
use of those who wished non-church burial. Kalda
died in want in Chicago under particularly dis
tressing circumstances. A recent convert to ration
alism is V. Mineberger, editor of the Baltimore
Cecho-Slovan. Mineberger announced that it was
his resolve to leave the Church in whose teachings
he no longer believed. Like Zdrubek, Mineberger,
too, was originally a Catholic.
A strange case came to the notice of the public
134

RATIONALISM
about eight years ago. The secretary of a New
York liberal association, Anton Vlcek, died follow
ing a short illness. Vlcek's occupation was that of
a bookkeeper in a downtown business house. After
^iis death the members of the society were as
tounded to learn that their radical-minded official
had been none other than Father Anton Vlcek,
formerly pastor of the St. Prokop Catholic parish
in Cleveland. The surprising part of it was that
Vlcek contrived to guard the secret of his former
life even from intimates.
Rev. Vaclav Vanek, a well-known Protestant
divine, formerly attached to a parish in Baltimore,
but now located in Chicago, originally studied
theology in a Catholic seminary; finding himself
in dissent from Catholic teachings he joined the
Chicago coterie of journalists, of whom the late
B. Bittner, liberal thinker, was one.
Cech rationalism x in the United States is the
1 T. G. Masaryk: "Cech Liberals in America," Nase Doha
(Prague), October, 1902, pp. 1-7; Rev. F. Tich£: Thoughts on New
Religion. An answer to L. J. Palda. Probed into and submitted to an
impartial examination. 88 pp.; Cech American Liberalism, 1907-11,
or, Discussions, Deliberations and Resolutions passed at the Conven
tion of Liberals, 135 pp. New York, 1911; Discussions, Deliberations
and Resolutions passed at the Convention of Liberals, held June 13, 14,
and 15, 1907. Chicago. 182 pp.; Lectures by T. G. Masaryk: Pub
lished by the Executive Committee of the Liberal Union. 61 pp.
Chicago, 1907. Contents of the lectures: "Havlicek and the Liberal
Movement; "Liberalism and Religion"; "Religion and Human
Society"; "The Principles adopted at the Convention of Cech
Liberals in America "j "The Evolution of Liberalism" ; "The Politi
cal Situation of the Cech Nation and Austria"; "The Woman and
her Position in the Family and Public Life."
135

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
after-growth of political repression and narrow-
minded paternalism. Naprstek's Flug Blatter fought
not creeds, but the Church as a political institution,
as a partner of the Hapsburg State. Euphemisti
cally Havlicek defined this one-time fellowship of
the Hapsburg State and the Church as a "union
of the saber and the aspergill." Now, when the
fetters of bondage are shattered and in his home
land the Cech js as free as he is here, whence will
the militant rationalist derive his inspiration and
his slogans?

CHAPTER XII
SOCIALISM AND RADICALISM
LJ. PALDA is entitled to be called the father
• of Cech socialism in the United States. In
his autobiography Palda states that his admiration)
for Lassalle and Marx dates from the time he J
worked as a factory hand, a weaver, in Switzerland!
and Saxony. This statement is open to doubt, for
at the time of his arrival in New York, in 1867,
Palda was a youth barely twenty years old. The
more reasonable supposition is that the socialist
cult obtained a firm hold on him not in Switzerland
or Saxony, but in the United States, during his
development into maturer manhood, when the
laboring class, yielding to his forceful personality,
acclaimed him as one of its chiefs. Just how deeply
Palda was read in the party's literature, we glean
from the following sentence: "At the house of
friend Borovicka (New York) I came across
Havlicek's Duch Ndrodnich Novin and a treatise
on socialism and communism by Klacel."1 To
gether with Frank Skarda he founded in Cleveland
in 1875, DUnicke Listy (the Workingmen's News).
1 L. J. Palda: From Times Past. These reminiscences, in Cech,
were published serially in the Osveta Americkd in 1903. Borovicka,
here referred to, was an intelligent New York workman, reader of
good books, and, at the time of Palda's first stay in New York, a
caretaker of the library belonging to the Slovanska Lipa Society.
137

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
The motto of the paper was "Equal duties, equal
rights." The title-page bore the significant legend
that the Workingmen's News was being published
as the "Organ of the Socialist Workingmen's Party
in the United States." Precisely what socialist
party the paper claimed to be the official spokes
man of, and who the members of the party were,
has not been made clear. Joseph Bunata,1 a con
temporary and a party man, admits there were
Cech socialists in the country at that time (1875),
yet he recalls nothing of an organized socialist
party. For instance, Leo Meilbek, a member of the
Illinois legislature, classified himself as a social
democrat. Palda's business partner, Frank Skarda,
was nominated, though not elected, on the socialist
ticket for Lieutenant-Governor of Ohio.
Two years later (1877) the DelnickS Listy was
removed to New York City, the' publishers cor
rectly surmising that the metropolis offered to a
socialist paper a wider field than an inland city of
the size and location of Cleveland.
In Palda's reminiscences we are told that soon
after the removal of the paper to New York, its'
editor started organizing socialist clubs. The war-
cry, "Proletarians of the world, unite," demanded
not words, but action, he informs us. "The group
I helped to organize bore the name, Cech-Slavic
International Workingmen's Association of New
1 Joseph Bunata, a journalist living at Ennis, Texas, has long ago
renounced his adherence to socialism.
138

L. J. PALDA

SOCIALISM AND RADICALISM
York." The principal members (besides Palda)
were V. Jandus,1 George Sretr, Joseph Bunata, and
Bily. The last-named was an arrival from Paris.
In justice to Palda, it should be said that in his
advocacy of socialism he was conciliatory. He was
well aware of the fact that the doctrine was foreign
to the mass of his countrymen, most of whom had
emigrated from rural districts, and he was a patient
teacher. Like all socialists, he believed, of course,
that our social and economic order was unjust; yet
he held consistently to the viewpoint that society
had it in its power to purge itself, not by revolution,
but by evolution. Moreover, he was not convinced
that in obedience to the party's behests he must re
nounce his Cech nationalism. In this last regard he
was what we might call. a Nationalist Socialist. As
his mind ripened, his views ran more along the lines
of scientific socialism; that is, he predicted the
coming of socialism as the result of gradual eco
nomic evolution. Younger comrades.who were eager
for action, tried more than once to discredit Palda
in the esteem of the party. Pettifogger, capitalist in
disguise, were some of the epithets hurled at him in
their press. Palda's missionary work in America
would have, in all likelihood, come to naught, had
not events occurred at home which gave socialism
here a firmer footing. In 1879 social democrats
1 V. (William) Jandus, since 1876 a resident of Cleveland, pub
lished in the English language a forceful study, Social Wrongs and
State Responsibilities. Cleveland. Horace Carr. 1913.
139

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
held in Prague a secret meeting which has become
known in the annals of the party as the St. Mar-.
garet's Congress. (St. Margaret was the name of
a hall in Prague.) Convoked without a permit, the
Congress was dispersed by the police and a number
of the leaders arrested and thrown into prison.
Once on the police black-list, the more prominent
of the socialists found existence in Bohemia unen
durable. So they removed to other parts of the em
pire, not a few leaving it altogether. Some went
to Budapest; others escaped to Switzerland; still
others chose as their future homes great industrial
centers in Europe and America: Paris, London,
New York, Chicago. On January 30, 1884, martial
law was proclaimed in Vienna. A direct result of
this measure was the suspension of the constitu
tional rights of trial by jury (non-political cases
excepted), freedom of association of citizens, and
freedom of the press. With a stern hand the police
dissolved political clubs, suppressed newspapers,
arrested or expelled the leading agitators. So rigor
ous was the clean-up that by 1885 social democracy
in Austria was laid prostrate.1 Comrade Josef Hy-
bes2 reckoned that in the period between 1878-87
1 Dr. Edward Benes: The Labor Movement in Austria and Bo
hemia. 47 pp. Brandys n. L. 191 1.
2 Josef Hybe§: The Initial Days of the Propaganda among Cech
Comrades. 64 pp. Brno, 1900. Hybe§ gives account in his pamphlet
of their connection with the propaganda in Prague and Vienna of
comrades Mikolanda, Mily, Zoula, Choura, all of whom had emi
grated to America.
140

SOCIALISM AND RADICALISM
the police, employing all those devices favored by
the secret police of autocracy, had ruined the exist
ence of some 2000 socialists. According to Josef
Steiner x the political police had to its credit 4086
arrests and convictions between 1880-89. A look at
Steiner's revelatory statistics will enable one to
understand why Emperor Franz Josef nursed a
personal grudge against social democrats.
Steiner's Table

Sentenced for

1880

1881

1882

1883

1884

1885

1886

1887

1888

1889

Unlawful association

41
364 8
10

41 1
367 23 24

91 1
332 17 10

92 3
335 39 17 5

9327
306 30 1711

93 11
302 16 3 1

145 9
250 22 4 5

11 2
283 19 5 5

2 1
246 25 3 1

14 5
240 73 2 1

Lese majeste (person
of Emperor) 
Lese majeste (mem
bers of reigning

Disturbing peace . . .
Unlawful collection

Total  4086

423

438

451

491

484

426

435

325

278

335

All accounts agree that one of the first fugitive
socialists to arrive in America was Leo Kochmann
(1844-19 1 9), who escaped on the eve of going to
jail to serve a sentence for active participation in
the St. Margaret's Congress. Frank Skarda, who
at that time (1882) was looking about for an editor,
promptly gave Kochmann employment on the
Delnicke Listy. From this time on until he retired
1 Josef Steiner: The Martyrdom of Cech-Slavic Social Democracy
and the Progress of the Party in Austria. 178 pp. Prague, 1902.
141

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
from journalism (1913), Kochmann resided in New
York uninterruptedly, and the colony of social
democrats in that city came to regard him as one
of its strong men. Far below Palda in intelligence,
possessing but an elementary-school education, dif
fident as a speaker, upright, but in his earlier
years inclined to be fanatical, Kochmann was toler
ably well posted on the aims and literature of social
democracy. However, his party was his world, and
beyond the sky-line of that world he had neither the
ambition nor the courage to look. The revolutionary
verses appearing under his pen name, Vive la Lib-
erte, were sincere and on occasions spirited. In col
laboration with Frank J. Hlavacek and Bernard
Here, Kochmann rendered into Cech (1890) Blos's
French Revolution. For a quarter of a century he was
editor-in-chief of the New York daily, Hlas Lidu.
In 1882 Johann Most came to the United States.
He had just finished a jail term of sixteen months
in England for having glorified, in his journal, the
assassination of Alexander II, Czar of Russia. Be
fore that time Most had served terms in Austrian,
Saxon, and Prussian prisons. Soon after his arrival,
he undertook a speaking tour through the country.
Social democrats were surprised at the large num
ber of followers who flocked everywhere to Most's
standard. In several cities in the United States,
where Most delivered his harangues, anarchist clubs
were established. A convention of radicals was held
in Pittsburgh in 1883; and the New York police
142

SOCIALISM AND RADICALISM
having in the meantime taken measures to check
the local Most agitation, the headquarters of the
party were transferred from New York to Chicago.
Then followed, in 1886, the Haymarket tragedy
which aroused and angered American public opin
ion as no other similar event has ever done. A num
ber of the organizers of the riot suffered the death
penalty. At the same time the authorities launched
a crusade against the anarchists from which they
have never recovered.1
The fact cannot be denied that Johann Most
found ardent sympathizers among those Cech social
democrats who were dissatisfied with the orthodox,
scholarly socialism of Marx and Lassalle, and who
clamored for deeds. Literature and party news
papers prove this irrefutably.
The protagonists of revolutionary socialism were,
with a few exceptions, workmen, but workme of
the more intelligent and well-paid class — furriers,
tailors, machinists, typesetters, — who had learned
their trade or worked at it in large cities. The earn
ing power of these craftsmen was comparatively
1 Hillquit thus differentiates between the socialist and the an
archist: "The anarchist sees the highest state of development in
the absolute sovereignty of the- individual, and considers all social
restraints upon the personal and untrammeled personal liberty as
injurious and reactionary elements in human civilization [p. 231].
The socialist regards society as an organic body, of which the in
dividuals are but separate organs performing different functions for
the organism as a whole and in turn deriving their strength from the
well-being of the entire organism" (p. 230). Morris Hillquit: History
of Socialism in the United States. 234 pp. New York, 1903.
H3

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
high ; in intelligence they towered far above the un
skilled agricultural and domestic labor from the
non-industrial districts of KutnS. Hora, Tabor,
Pisek. Association with men and women of other
races lent these men that air of cosmopolitanism
which is the envy of the provincial. Not a few were
glib talkers, if not effective, persuasive impromptu
debaters; when oratory failed to convince the
doubter through presentation of reasons, they were
ready to try to sway the wavering ones by appeal to
passion and prejudice. Most idealists, as we know,
possess the gift of eloquence to an unusual degree.
In addition to the vernacular, almost all, if not all,
were versed in German. This enabled them to read
German-language newspapers, and associate freely
with German comrades. Those who had been em
ployed in Paris brought with them to America a
smattering of French. The members of the small
London colony learned English. Comrades with a
literary turn of mind, on coming to the United
States translated almost exclusively from German
sources; seldom from English or French, never from
Russian. This made apparent the dominating influ
ence of the several Volkszeitungs, Arbeiterzeitungs,
and Volksrechts on the American Cech socialist
editors. But few of the journalists knew English
enough freely to translate from it. This meant that
they judged America in the light of a foreign dogma
and sought to reform it through the medium of a
foreign language. 144

SOCIALISM AND RADICALISM
Proselytism by means of the press reached its
high- water mark between 1885 and 1890. New York
City was the center of the movement; less active
was the field of the radicals in Cleveland and Chi
cago. By far the busiest publishers were:
The Cech groups of the International Working-
men's Union of Chicago (Ceske skupiny Mez'mk-
rodni Delnicke Jednoty v Chicagu). Series, Epistles
of Revolution.
The American Workingman (Delnik Americky).
Series, Workingmen's Library.
The Group Anarchy (Bezvladi) of New York.
Series, The International Library.
The Group Self- Rule (Samospr&va) of New York.
Series, The Epistles of Freedom.
The Literary and Debating Club Progress (Pok
rok) of New York.
The Cech Workingmen's Educational Society
No. 2 of New York (Ceskodelnicky vzdelavaci
Spolek cis. 2 v New Yorku).
The Cech Social Democratic Section in New
York (Ceskd socialni demokraticka sekce v New
Yorku). The Group Bezvladi attained a considerable posi
tion as a publisher. While not strong numerically,
its membership was made up of self-conscious
young men who knew that to carry on a propa
ganda with results Costs money, but they were will
ing to pay for it. Members taxed themselves from
$1 to $5 monthly according to the wages they
H5

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
earned. Now and then London and Paris sent in
small gifts of money; even comrades in Bohemia
contributed their mite. The main burden of financ
ing the propaganda was borne and ungrudgingly
paid by the New York units.
Save a few revolutionary songs by Norbert
Zoula, Joseph B. Pecka, Leo Kochmann, and F. J.
Hlavaeek, the Cech book literature of social re
formers, which, by the way, is surprisingly copious,
consists of translations. Not one creative thinker,
not one self-directing reasoner appears among
them. The catalogue shows translations — un
skilled translations at that — from Michael Baku-
nine, Adolf Douai, Peter Kropotkin, Paul Lafargue,
Enrico Malatesta, Karl Marx, Johann Most, J. A.
Popengiesel, Elisee Reclus, A. Rette, A. Schaffle,
Pierre Ramus, Ferdinand Lassalle.
. In due time the consequences of the propaganda
/began to be manifest. The New York community
split into two antagonistic factions : the nationalists
and the radical socialists. The first-named party
stood for Americanism ; as a subordinate issue, it de
fended Cech nationalism as interpreted by Jonas'
and by the other editors. Agreeably to the tenets
of their creed, the socialists inclined toward inter
nationalism, which, as the name implies, spurned
national separatism. From radical socialism to
anarchism was only a small leap and there were
many reformers who embraced the creed of anar
chy openly. 146

SOCIALISM AND RADICALISM
Thoughtful and observant men, Palda among
them, warned the radicals, clustered around the
Proletdr and the Delnicke Listy x in New York and
around the Budoucnost, in Chicago, to be moderate.
The agitation, they pointed out, was doomed to end
in a fiasco if not supported by the American press.
Who was it that sympathized with the radicals,
they argued? Not the American workman, nor yet
the farmer; these two classes remained deaf to their
seductive catchwords. The farmer and the mechanic
read none save the English-language papers, which
discussed the timely topics of trade-unionism, tariff,
pension, currency. Radical socialism found favor
and support in large industrial places only, and then
in the foreign quarters thereof. "Anarchy is hope
lessly discounted," argued Palda, "so long as the
carriers of the doctrine are confined to Volkszeit-
ungs and to other foreign-language newspapers."
But a writer in the Proletdr reproved the father
of socialism for interfering in a quarrel the merits of
which he, a capitalist ( !) and a westerner, had ceased
to understand.
The advent in New York of Norbert Zoula,2 a
silversmith from Prague, is chronicled in 1883.
Zoula spent a year and a half in an Austrian prison
1 This Delnicki Listy must not be confounded with Skarda's paper
of that name. The Delnicke Listy here mentioned was the property
of the International Workingmen's Union of New York, edited by
F. J. Hlavaeek.
_ 2 According to one account Zoula was by birth a Slovene, not a
Cech. 147

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
awaiting trial; after finishing a sentence of ten
months, he repaired to Switzerland, from which
country he emigrated here. After a comparatively
short stay in New York, he proceeded to Chicago to
edit in that city the Budoucnost (Future), "organ
of anarchists of the Cech-Slavic language." His
associates in the management of the paper were
Joseph Pondelicek, Jacob Mikolanda, Joseph B.
Pecka. The vigorous police censorship which fol
lowed the Chicago Haymarket outbreak forced
this journal, like many other anarchist papers, to
suspend. The year the Budoucnost sang its swan
song, Zoula died in California of tuberculosis, "the
common malady of the proletariat," a newspaper
commented at the time : and he died in utter want,
deserted by his comrades.
Joseph Boleslav Pecka, moulder by trade, made
his appearance in Chicago in 1884. As the recording
secretary of St. Margaret's Congress, he brought
upon himself in the motherland the anger of the
police. For this with thirty other comrades he was
put into prison. His "portion " was eighteen months
and he served his term in full. Having been active
in Vienna as collaborator of the Delnicke Listy, he
needed no urging to do his share in the press prop
aganda of the party in America. He died in Chicago
in 1897, in his forty-eighth year. Two years after his
death, comrades published his SebranS Bdsne (Col
lected Songs). Pecka's style as a journalist was
vigorous and clear. The Collected Songs (92 pages)
148

RADICALISM AND SOCIALISM
are the revolutionary rhapsodies of the downtrod
den proletarian.
Jacob Mikolanda, a baker, migrated in 1882
or 1883. He became connected with the Chicago
Budoucnost, and when this radical paper was forced
to the wall, he wrote for the Prdvo Lidu (People's
Rights), a weekly of more moderate tone than the
Budoucnost. For alleged complicity in the Hay-
market affair Mikolanda was sent to the work
house for six months. His death occurred in Cleve
land. Frank J. Hlavaeek, now on the editorial staff of
the Chicago daily Spravedlnost (Justice), began life
as a miner. Having had a certain degree of newspa
per training at home, Hlavaeek from the outset (he
came to New York about 1887) gave himself wholly
to journalism. With several friends he set up in New
York in 1893 the Delnicke Listy, the publisher of
which was nominally the International Working-
men's Union. By common consent the Delnicke Listy
was regarded as the organ of revolutionary social
ists. For want of support the paper was forced to
give up its existence in New York. It was removed
to Cleveland, where, under the editorship of V.
Kudlata, it finally went under. Disillusioned,
Hlavaeek quit New York and went to Chicago.
There he returned to his old allegiance — social
democracy. With the downfall of the Delnicke Listy
the radical wing of social democrats, the party of
action in New York, lost its greatest support.
149

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Thereafter the decline of this faction in New York
was rapid and its ultimate break-up inevitable.
Among other small things, Hlavaeek published a
collection of workingmen's songs in Cech, The Torch
(214 pages) and a rhymed narrative of the Crea
tion, "accurately according to the version of the
Bible." Though Hlavaeek is not above the average
rhymester in skill, one cannot but concede, reading
his humorous tale of the Creation, that he possessed
a certain store of robust humor. Zdrubek tried to
tell much the same story in verse, but his Bible to
Laugh is incomparably inferior to Hlavacek's.
Edward Mily, a typesetter, was expelled from
Bohemia and later from Vienna as a political unde
sirable. He went to Budapest, removing in 1884 to
London. Later he came to New York. Mily did
effective work on the Volne Listy (Free News),1 and
translated, besides, several pamphlets.
The youngest refugee was William Krouzilka, a
student from Prague. A ready debater and a clever
newspaper reporter, Krouzilka, despite his youth,
rose quickly to prominence in the party. In Chicago,
whither he went from New York, he published cred
itable pamphlets, one of which was a Life of Dar
win. He died in Chicago a few years ago.
Vaclav Kudlata, said to have been a student of
theology in Bohemia, delivered in 1897 a lecture
"on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the
1 The Volni Listy originated in 1890 in Brooklyn. Suspended in
the first months of the war.
150

SOCIALISM AND RADICALISM
death of the Chicago Martyrs," which was that year
printed in pamphlet form under the heading After
Ten Years. Another brochure by Kudlata is en
titled, Half-hearted and Whole Liberalism (1897).
Kudlata died in 191 7, at Elizabeth, New Jersey.
None of the reformers had a more enthusiastic
following in the debating clubs than Gustav Haber-
man. During his second stay in the United States, in
the early nineties, Haberman helped to father the
radical VolnS Listy in New York. "Later I dis
sented from the extreme policy of this paper," we
read in his memoirs.1 Returning to Bohemia, Haber
man rose to a commanding position in the working-
men's councils and he was elected on the socialistic
ticket to the old Austrian Parliament.
Of Frank Choura (a miner living in a small town
in Pennsylvania) Dr. Soukup has this to say: "He
was a witness and a participant in the Paces drama.
After the arrest of Paces, Rampas and Christopher
Cerny, he (Choura) fled to America. On this man
rested the terrible suspicion of having informed on
his comrades. The events of the last few years have,
however, fully exonerated Choura."
Because he had a guilty knowledge of the exist
ence of Paces's unlicensed printing shop and had
omitted to inform the police, Frank Janota, a tailor,
became, in the eyes of the law, Paces's accomplice
after the fact. Janota saved himself from arrest by
1 Gustav Haberman: Z miho Zivota (From my Life). 253 pp.
Prague, 1914. 151

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
a hurried flight to Switzerland. From the Swiss Re
public he went to London, and there published
sheets which he called Pomsta (Revenge) and Revo-
luce (Revolution) . Reaching New York some time in
1894, he became associated with the Volne Listy,
remaining at the head of this paper for about five
years. Janota signed his articles with the pseudo
nym "Rebel."
In the little cemetery at Neligh, Nebraska, lies
buried a martyr-workman whose tragic life-story,
because true, is more gripping than that of Jean
Valjean, in Les Miserables. Whereas in Hugo's mas
terpiece the villain was the sergeant Th6nardier, in
the case of Joseph Paces, the Cech Jean Valjean, it
was the State, as typified by secret police, which
played the villain's role.
Joseph Paces was a simple workman, whom social
and national wrongs had made a rebel — rebel
against society and state. Jean Valjean stole a loaf
of bread and for this was sent to the galleys; Paces
did not steal, cheat, or rob. He was a political crim
inal, though a desperate one, according to the view
point of the Austrian police. What crimes did Paces
commit? First, he set up a secret printing press in
northern Bohemia to further the propaganda of
social democracy. Because he did this without a
license from the authorities (who, of course, would
not have granted it) , he violated certain strict police
regulations. Then he was guilty of lese majeste. The
Government prosecutor charged him with treason,
152

JOSEPH PACES

SOCIALISM AND RADICALISM
besides. When in prison, Paces in a moment of
desperation attacked a brutal jail-keeper with a
knife; this constituted a new crime: assault with
intent to kill.
On the occasion of his discharge from prison
(altogether Paces had given eighteen years of his
life to the cause of social democracy) , his comrades
in Prague arranged a reception in his honor. "Here
we saw him for the first time," writes Dr. Francis
Soukup.1 "A bent, pale-faced man, looking as if he
had just arisen from the grave. With face seamed,
a haunted look, proud flesh around one eye. Hands
trembling as if palsied, knees wabbly. Eighteen
years spent in an Austrian prison at hard labor had
left its marks on this living skeleton. ..." Dr.
Soukup visited Paces's grave at Neligh. "Here Paces
came to find his resting-place. ... On these vast
plains, in the heart of America, far from the people
who had taken away from him all he had, wife, chil
dren, youth, health, life. . . . Such had been his life,
such is his grave; great as a man, greater still as the
martyr of the Cech proletariat. ..."
Anarchism among the American Cechs is dead.
The Haymarket event dealt it a knock-out blow
from which it never recovered. The older generation
of immigrants, who had the opportunity to note at
close range its corrosive tendencies and the vicious
methods employed by its votaries, recall it as a
1 Dr. Francis Soukup : America; a Series of Pictures from American
Life. Prague, 1912.
153

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
hideous vision. Both the leaders and the followers
are anxious to forget the past.
The socialists have four newspapers to further
their cause, namely, the Spravedlnost (Justice) and
the Zdjmy Lidu (Interests of the People) in Chi
cago, the Americke Delnicke Listy (American Work
ingmen's News) in Cleveland, and the Obrana
(Defense) in New York.

CHAPTER XIII
THE CECH AS A SOLDIER
IN the Civil War the Cechs provided the United
States Army with more musicians than generals.
At any rate, the historian is certain of the existence
of the former, whereas a most thorough search of
the register of officers from 1789, the year of the or
ganization of the Army, to 1903,1 failed to unearth
a single general. The Poles presented to the strug
gling Republic two fighters of note, Kosciuszko and
Pulaski. A number of Polish officers are known
to have served in the Civil War. The name of
V. Krzyzanowski, who held an independent com
mand, comes to mind. No Austro-Hungarian na
tion, however, has paid such generous tribute to
Mars, the god of war, as the Magyars.2 This is of
course explained by the circumstance that many
Magyar officers were living here in involuntary
exile, following the suppression of the Hungarian
Rebellion in 1849. Among the list of officers serving
in the Union Army and claimed to be Magyar one
notices such suspiciously un-Magyar names as
John T. Fiala and Anton Pokorny. The last-named
1 Francis B. Heitmann: Historical Register and Dictionary of the
U.S. Army, from its Organization, September 29, 1789, to March 2,
1003. Published under Act of Congress, March 2, 1903. Washington.
Government Printing Office.
2 Eugene Pivany: Hungarians in the American Civil War. Cleve
land, 1913. 155

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
was major of the Eighth and lieutenant-colonel of
the Seventh New York Infantry.
Pridefully the Chicago Cechoslovaks point to
the fact that their first club (i860) was a military
organization styling itself the Slavonian Lincoln
Rifle Company. Several of the Cech members hav
ing dropped out before the volunteers had been
called into service, the club corrected its name to
Lincoln Rifle Company. Geza Mihaloczy, according
to one version a Slovak, but according to another
(Pivarry), a Magyar, is remembered as its organi
zer. Whether Magyar or Slovak, Mihaloczy died
a brave soldier's death on the battle-field. He lies
buried at Chattanooga. Before the war he was quite
a conspicuous figure in the Chicago circles.
But two officers, in the Register and Dictionary
have given Bohemia as their birthland : John Pilsen
(seemingly an assumed name from the town of
Pilsen), captain of a New York regiment of volun
teers, and John Rziha. Elsewhere, Rziha is referred
to as John Laub de Laubenfels. The Slavie prints
a communication dated March 19, 1862, from pri
vate J. Zajicek, stationed at Hunter's Chapel, Vir
ginia, in which occurs this passage: "In our regi
ment of volunteers, that is the 8th of New York, we
have only a handful of Cechs, eight all told. The
first in command of Company B. is F. Werther,1 by
1 Frederick Werther owned a liquor saloon in New York, much
patronized by Cechs. He took active interest in the social activities
of his blood brothers.
156

THE CECH AS A SOLDIER
birth a Slovak, who is attached heart and soul to his
ancient race." In another letter, also published in
the Slavie, bearing the date December 5, 1862, the
same soldier (Zajicek) writes: "When the 28 th Wis
consin Regiment passed through (Hunter's Chapel)
we lined up by the roadside. We were surprised to
hear that so many Cechs were enrolled in that
regiment. Presently a comrade rushed to tell us
the joyful news that he had recognized several
friends in the 28th Regiment, with whom he had
spent enjoyable days in Chicago and Milwaukee;
Lieutenant Landa was there and with him no less
than sixty Cechs." The Slavie that year was sending
out about twenty copies to soldiers in the field.
From this it would seem that there were not many
soldiers in the camps; or that Cech fighters had
been braver soldiers than newspaper subscribers.
Just how many had shouldered the musket in de
fense of the Union, one cannot say, for the muster
rolls did not tabulate the nationality of the private.
The subjective and often more confusing than illu
minating reminiscences of Cech soldiers, which we
find reprinted in Joseph Cermak's book,1 offer no
basis even for an estimate, much less for accurate
computation. A monument has been erected in the
Bohemian National Cemetery in Chicago to com
memorate their participation in the great struggle.
We have said that the Cechs had contributed
1 Joseph Cermak: The History of America. From various sources.
Chicago, 1889.
157

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
more musicians to the Army than generals. In cor
roboration of this we find in the local history of the
Poles x this bit of interesting information: "A depu
tation of Poles headed by Officer Ludwig Zychlinski
wished to pay the compliments of their people to
President Lincoln, who was staying in camp not far
from St. Louis. General Hooker undertook to intro
duce the delegation to Lincoln. The President asked
how many Poles were serving in the army; and re
calling some of the Polish officers by name, Krzy-
zanowski first of all, he praised their valor." On
this occasion, relates Zychlinski, "a toast was
drunk to the health and good luck of the Poles, and
the musicians, among whom were Cechs and two
Poles from Warsaw, played the anthem, 'Jeszcze
Polska nie Zginela' (Poland has not yet perished)
which moved all to tears."
"So far as I could make out from the scanty ma
terial at my disposal no Cech in the Union Army
wore a higher brevet than Adolph B. Chladek (born
1838 in Vamberk, Bohemia, died 1887 in Chicago).
He served with the Ninth Wisconsin Infantry,
early receiving the commission of second lieuten
ant. At first he was attached to the staff of Gen
eral Schofield; later he served on that of General
Weir.2 Cermak believes that American Cechs sent a con-
1 History of the Polish National Union, p. 23. Chicago, 1905.
2 Joseph Cermak : The History of America. Part m, The History
of the Civil War. Chicago, 1889.
158

THE CECH AS A SOLDIER
siderable number of their sons to the ranks. Pre
cisely how many, he fails to state; his narrative
accounts for these numbers serving in the Union
Army: Iowa, 29 men x (p. 198); Wisconsin, 26 (p.
181); Maryland, 19 (p. 182); Illinois, 13 (p. 78);
Michigan, 10; and so forth. Cermak leaves it to be
inferred that, except a handful of conscripts in the
Confederate Army from Texas and Louisiana (the
only Southern States having Cech population),
they were all fighting for the Union.
John Wagner, a not over- veracious writer,2 as
sumes that Captain Lesdegar Kinsky (conceivably
a member of the aristocratic family of that name)
was a Bohemian. Kinsky served in the war until
1864 when wounds and sickness incapacitated him.
He died in Boston in 1891. Another soldier of for
tune from Bohemia with a Civil War record was
Count Edward C. Wratislaw, Lieutenant-colonel
of the Forty-fifth New York Infantry.3
Cenek Paclt, a rolling stone and a globe-trotter,
whose inextinguishable desire for adventure had
led him to explore the ends of the earth, is the only
soldier of Cech nationality serving in the Mexican
War of whom we have any record. Having enlisted
1 B. Shimek: (e) The Bohemians in Johnson County, on pp. 6-7,
gives the names of 57 Cechs serving in the 6th, 12th, 14th, 15th,
22d, 46th, 47th Iowa Infantry and 1st, 2d, 6th, 8th, and 9th Iowa
Cavalry, in addition to 6 regulars.
2 John Wagner: Transatlantic Gossip. 41 pp. Prague, 1898.
3 F. B. Heitmann: Field Officers of Volunteers and Militia in the
Service of the United States during the War of the Rebellion; 1861-65;
p. 827. 159

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
in the United States Army in 1846^ Paclt claimed
to have taken part in several of the battles that
ended in the seizure, by General Winfield Scott, of
Mexico City in 1847. Discharged/from the Army in
1853, this restless wanderer resumed his globe
trotting. He died in 1887 in Zululand.1
Hundreds of Cech volunteers and enlisted men
shouldered the musket in the Spanish-American
War, doing their duty honorably in Cuba, Porto
Rico, and the Philippines. A comrade in arms, a
United States regular, told their collective story.2
In the war just ended Cechoslovak volunteers
(at home they call them legionaries), fought the
Central Powers under Russian, French, Italian,
Serbian, Canadian, English and United States
colors. How many legionaries served in the armies of the
Allies? Soon after his arrival from Russia President
Masaryk in a speech delivered in Carnegie Hall, in
the summer of 1918, asserted that 50,000 Cechoslo-
vaks in Siberia were under arms and that another
60,000 were awaiting to be armed.
The Cechoslovak unit in France numbered
15,000 men. This was made up of volunteers from
the United States and deserters and released pris
oners of war from the Russian and Serbian fronts.
The contingent in Italy, composed wholly of de-
1 Cenek Paclt' s World Travels. By Dr. Jaroslav Svoboda. Mlada
Boleslav, 1888.
2 Matthew Masek : The Spanish-American War of 1898. Illustrated.
48 pp. August Geringer. Chicago, 1899.
160

THE CECH AS A SOLDIER
serters from the Austro-Hungarian Armies, was
mentioned in the dispatches as having over 20,000
men. Some 1000 took part in the operations on the
Balkan fronts.
A writer who has made a close study of published
reports computes the strength of volunteers and
enlisted men in the United States at 100,000. In the
opinion of the same writer the loss in man power
on the Allied side was 34,000. By far the heaviest
losses were sustained in the Russian campaigns and
in the terrible march with the Serbian Army across
Albania. Putting the estimate of the losses in the Austro-
Hungarian Armies at 220,000, we obtain a total of
254,000 men killed.1
A popular legend in Bohemia says that the
knights slumbering in the cave of the Blanik Moun
tain would awaken and with St. Vaclav leading
them would fall upon the enemy at the hour of the
Fatherland's direst peril and would confound and
destroy him.
The knights of the legend did awaken and they
did come out of the Blanik Mountain at the time
the Fatherland was in supreme peril. That was in
July, 1 914. The knights were the legionaries who
gave their lives to the end that democracy might
triumph and that their native land might be freed
from the yoke of the Hapsburg oppressor.
1 Otakar Charvat: The Pokrok, July 16, 1919.
I6l

THE CECH AS A SOLDIER
On July 18, 1919, President Woodrow Wilson
reviewed in Washington a detachment of invalided
veterans returning home from Siberia. On this occa
sion the President addressed the following eulogy
to "Major Vladimir Jirsa, officers, and men of the
detachment of the Cechoslovak Army," which will
always be read and treasured by Cechoslovak le
gionaries. "It gives me great pleasure to have this oppor
tunity to review this detachment of your valiant
army and to extend to you, its officers, and the
brave men associated with you, a most cordial
welcome. Though we have been far away, we have
watched your actions, and have been moved by
admiration of the services you have rendered under
the most adverse circumstances. Having been sub
jected to an alien control, you were fired by a love
of your former independence and for the institu
tions of your native land, and gallantly aligned
yourselves with those who fought in opposition to
all despotism and military autocracy. At the mo
ment when adversity came to the armies with
which you were fighting, and when darkness and
discouragement cast a shadow upon your cause,
you declined to be daunted by circumstance and
retained your gallant hope. Your steadfastness in
purpose, your unshaking belief in high ideals, your
valor of mind, of body and of heart evoked the
admiration of the world. In the midst of a disorgan
ized people and subject to influence which worked
162

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
for ruin, you constantly maintained order within
your ranks, and by your example helped those with
whom you came in contact to reestablish their lives.
I cannot say too much in praise of the demeanor of
your brave army in these trying circumstances.
Future generations will happily record the influence
for good which you were privileged to exercise upon
a large part of the population of the world, and will
accord you the place which you have so courageously
won. There is perhaps nowhere recorded a more
brilliant record than the withdrawal of your forces
in opposition to the armies of Germany and Austria,
through a population at first hostile, or the march
of your armies for thousands of miles across the
great stretches of Siberia, all the while keeping in
mind the necessity for order and organization.
" You are returning now to your native land,
which is to-day, we all rejoice to say, again a free and
independent country. May you contribute to her
life that stamina which you so conspicuously mani
fested through all your trying experiences in Russia
and Siberia, and may you keep in mind after your
return, as you had kept in mind heretofore, that
the laws of God, the laws of man, and the laws of
nature require systematic order and cool counsel
for their proper application and development, and
for the welfare and happiness of the human race."

CHAPTER XD7
JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
AN American writer who examined the bibliog
raphy of Cech books, pamphlets, year-books,
memorials, and newspapers published here since
i860, expressed genuine astonishment at its bulk.
Not knowing the language, however, he was unable
to differentiate between original productions and
publications which are mere reprints, translations,
or adaptations. The truth is that original works
catalogued are but few. The 'book output of the
socialists, for instance, is made up of translations.
Several of the most productive authors — to men
tion one, Zdrubek — were translators, not original
writers. Is it possible to create in America a distinctive
German, or Swedish, or Cech literature? More in
tensively than any other race the Germans culti
vated letters in their national tongue in America;
yet what really great writers have they produced
since Peter Zenker's time? "The hopes of a German-
American literature, entertained by some of the
enthusiasts of 1832 and 1848, have never been real
ized," so answers this query Gustavus Ohlinger.
"It would be difficult to find a German book," he
continues, "which the Germans themselves would
claim was entitled to even an humble place in liter-
164

Iltlt

Racine, W 1 ifronshi, 1 ledna,

Jjfc.<W(wtH»*i«rf ctitov. "
.An! Worn cffiint fcrii iW=P

lit? nt» rM;
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ft*J}«ti!.'tr,,i.Orr*-fc. IB.

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l^t irnrtfd b ft( fcW' ' lih I* l'j!V i'jri' Hi11 •"**. "^
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#*a )f ftrfil fijMi MrMnr. I t** >-*4jt *fly.' ,- pd,!( fcrf,
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liirfijl tut THjfl. (un oullu fulK
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^rai f.iprrrf h+jti, rirfM |h«\ (1>.
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ri'irw 2 irrriin IjfrjH rfrtfln* ifflrl
f« I "sin, jfflr (fofi n« Bmtn (m,
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ft i rwui m *itu i<Ml»fn. Wi' jt.Hta**
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tinunt.ii
s mi vfc r.-
THE FIRST NUMBER OF THE SLOWAN AMERIKANSKY
The first Cech Newspaper in the United States
JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
ature. Very few native-born German-Americans
have become German writers of even average abil-
ity-" Perhaps Swedish, Italian, or Cech authors may
yet create a work of striking and enduring value,
but in view of the absorbing force of Americanism
one is certain that other than English-language lit
erature will not thrive here.
Journalism preceded book literature.1 The first
newspaper, Slowan Amerikdnsky, came out Janu
ary I, i860; the first publication in book form, of
which we have authentic record, was issued in
1865.2 From the first the newspapers had the upper
hand. To improve them the publishers spared
neither time nor expense; book literature, unfor
tunately, remained an afterthought. Like Cinder
ella it was forced to mope in the corner, while the
publisher spent all his spare cash to dress up the
pampered daughter, the newspaper, in most at
tractive finery. Of course, one must reckon with the
high-pressure life of the average American, who
finds just time enough to read the daily paper. That
book- publishing continued to be neglected was due,
1  th (F. K. Ringsmuth): "Cech Literature in America,"
Kvety Americke, September 29, 1886.
2 Pravda, etc., The Truth, or an open discussion of events and
of progress in the nineteenth century, as viewed in the light of his
tory and from other sources, by Charles Prochazka. Racine, 1865. A
year before, that is in 1864, Charles Jonas' brought out a Spelling
Book and First Reader for Cech Slavic Youth in America, and Anton
Eisner, in St. Louis, a Reminder of the Fatherland. The two last-
named publications, however, were reprints.
165

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
largely, to a lack of a purchasing public. August
Geringer in Chicago, John Rosicky in Omaha,
Anton Novak in Milwaukee, and Charles Jonas
in Racine published quite a number of books and
might have published more if the public had shown
more appreciation — in buying them.
A New York bookseller, on being asked what
class of people purchased Cech books, replied:
"My best customers are clergymen and socialists.
Old settlers seldom buy a book; their children
never." Useful handbooks antedated belles-lettres. Dic
tionaries and interpreters were as indispensable to
the immigrant as a plough is needful to the farmer or
tools to the mechanic. Five years after the Ameri
can type foundries had cast type with Cech dia
critic marks, Charles Jonas compiled for the use
of his countrymen a Bohemian-English Interpreter.
By 1870 F. B. Zdrubek had gotten out an English
Grammar. Both publications were woefully deficient
textually and crude typographically. For that mat
ter, everything that came off the press in those
days, whether a pamphlet or a newspaper, bore
tell-tale marks of apprenticeship.
In the winter of 1852-53 arrived in Boston, on
the ship Amor, a small company of home-seekers,
several of whom were destined to play a noted part
in the history of Cech immigration. One of them
was Frank Korizek (1 820-99), 1 stonemason and
1 Kvety Americke, August 18, 1886. Biography and portrait.
166

J. B. ERBEN

FRANK KORIZEK

JOSEPH PASTOR

FRANK MRACEK

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
odd-job man from Letovice, a provincial town in
Moravia. At one time Korizek had been a turnkey
in the chateau of Count Kalnoky. It hardly need be
added that he was, in addition to all his varied
accomplishments, a self-taught musician, who was
glad to earn a florin or two at country dances and
weddings. Korizek settled in Racine — Watertown was his
objective — and earned the distinction of being the
Nestor of Cech journalism. His daughter, Christina,
married Charles Jonas; the other daughter, Cecilia,
was given in marriage to Vaclav Snajdr, a name in
separably linked with the evolution of the rational
ist movement.
Another of the Amor's passengers was John
Barta (also called Letovsky, from Letovice, his
birthplace), Korizek's fellow townsman and school
mate. Barta (1821-98, Iowa City), who had ren
dered invaluable help to Korizek, in his initial strug
gles with the Slowan Amerikdnsky, established in
1869 at Iowa City a weekly bearing almost the same
name as Korizek's journal. The paper founded by
Barta still continues to be issued in Cedar Rapids,
whither it was removed from Iowa City. Its name
is Slovan Americky (American Slav).
Charles Jonas, in the biography * of Korizek,
asserts that his father-in-law made up his mind to
become a publisher after reading the life-story of
Benjamin Franklin. The famous American philoso-
1 Jubilee issue of Slavie, November 4, 1885.
I67

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
pher started his career as a printer's apprentice;
why could not Korizek begin the same way, even
though he was a married man and father of a grow
ing family? In this resolve, Jonas tells us, Korizek
was strengthened by the study of Charles Hav-
licek's x editorials loaned to him by a friend.
While it is conceivable that Korizek found an
inspiration in the life-stories of Franklin and Havli
cek, and was eager to emulate, in his own humble
way, the example of these great men, yet there is
one essential fact which Jonas omitted in telling of
Korizek's achievement, namely, that years before
another fellow countryman in the United States
had striven hard to establish here a newspaper in
the Cech language. That man was Vojta Naprstek.
In 1857 Naprstek addressed a meeting of interested
parties in St. Louis on the subject. He urged New
Yorkers to help, and he is known to have corre
sponded with Chicagoans toward the same end.
Naprstek even outlined the future policy of such a
paper. It should be liberal and fearless, somewhat
like Havlicek's Ndrodni Noviny. Naprstek's return
to Europe in 1857 alone prevented him from realiz
ing this pet project. Notwithstanding this clear and
convincing evidence, we are asked by Jonas to be-
1 Charles Havlicek, or Charles Havlicek Borovsk^ (from Bo-
rovany, his birthplace), was a noted publicist, whose journal,
Ndrodni Noviny (National Gazette) the Austrian Government sup
pressed as revolutionary. A volume of selected editorials was pub
lished under the caption, The Spirit (the essence) of the Ndrodni
Noviny. 168

KRISTINA KORIZEK, JONAS'S BRIDE

CHARLES JONAS AT 30

JONAS'S BIRTHPLACE AT MALESOV, BOHEMIA

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
lieve that his father-in-law derived all his resolve
and drew all his inspiration from Franklin and Hav
licek and none from Vojta Naprstek, his near neigh
bor and contemporary (Naprstek lived in Milwau
kee, Korizek in Racine). Posterity will do justice to
Vojta Naprstek as the originator, the mental spon
sor, of the idea; Korizek will be remembered as the
mechanic who consummated it.
Korizek learned to set type in the shop of the
National Demokrat, a German weekly in his home
town, Racine. Hearing that stored behind the sa
cristy of a Milwaukee church was a hand printing
press, the property of a priest, Korizek decided to
buy it. The price of the press was $140. He had a
few dollars laid aside, which he had earned as a
musician, and, with loans and gifts from friends, he
succeeded in raising $40. For the balance of the
purchase price, that is $100, Korizek gave the priest
a mortgage on his cottage.
The first number of Korizek's weekly was dated
January I, i860. It bore the name Slowan Ameri-
kdnsky. The type was German, or "kurent" (cur
rent), as the old folks used to call German script.
Twenty-four numbers of the paper Korizek edited
and set up alone, with only such small outside help
as Joseph Satran (tailor) and Vaclav Simonek
(school-teacher) were able to render. In the day
time he worked in the printing shop; evenings
he was kept busy reading and writing by candle
light, except when he was engaged to play, for
169

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
music still assured the sole dependable means
of a livelihood and he felt he must not neglect
it.1 Korizek's Slowan Amerikdnsky was three or four
weeks old, when the St. Louis Cechs launched forth
another weekly, the Ndrodni Noviny (National
Gazette). This paper was meant to be the first jour
nal published in America, but owing to the dilatori-
ness of its promoters, it really was the second. The
St. Louis paper was a joint-stock enterprise which
had been in the making for upward of three or four
years. In a way the Ndrodni Noviny was Naprstek's
paper, inasmuch as its stockholders were following
the plan previously laid out by him. By acting
quickly, Korizek forestalled the St. Louisians by
less than a month, reaping as publisher whatever
advantage accrued from priority.
Before long the Slowan Amerikdnsky and the
Ndrodni Noviny felt keenly the adverse economic
conditions incident to the Civil War, and friends
having advised merger as the only means of saving
both properties from bankruptcy, a meeting of
representative men was arranged in Caledonia,
Wisconsin, with the result that the rival concerns
joined forces. The Slowan Amerikdnsky and the
Ndrodni Noviny, title names and all, were thrown
into the melting-pot out of which emerged on Octo
ber 30, 1 86 1, a weekly, that was christened the
1 Slavie, November 4, 1885. Kvety Americke, September 18, 1886.
Biography written by Charles Jonas'.
170

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
Slavie. Racine prevailed over St. Louis as the home
office of the new journal.
Between January, i860, and the spring of 191 1,
326 Cech journals had come into being, represent
ing every shade of public opinion.1 Socialists, anar
chists, Protestants, Catholics, agnostics, Republi
cans, Democrats have had their say in them. Of
these 326 journals some 85 survive and to-day
clamor to be heard. The Hlasatel (Herald) of
Chicago claims a circulation of 25,000, if one
is to take the advertising agent at his word.
The Hospoddf (Husbandman), an agricultural bi
monthly, with a home in Omaha, is said to be a reg
ular guest in 30,000 households. The year 1875
witnessed the issuance in Chicago of the first daily,
the Svornost; now four dailies serve the needs of
readers in that busy Western metropolis alone. One
champions the cause of the socialists, another pro
claims itself the organ of the Catholics, the tend
ency of the third is anti-clerical, the fourth seeks
to be independent. Cleveland and New York sup
port two dailies each, Omaha one.
"Published in the interest of the Cecho-Slavs
in America" is a legend that is printed under the
headlines of pretty nearly every journal, irrespec
tive of religious or political affiliation. Usually, if
not always, the paper is being issued in the interest
of one Cecho-Slav — namely, the publisher.
1 Thomas Capek: Padesdt Let ceskeho tisku v Americe (Fifty Years
of Cech Letters in America), p. 185. New York, 191 1.
171

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
To the dictates of the American political parties
the Cechs responded readily and loyally. Demo
crats and Republicans were, of course, always rep
resented in the press. The old Prohibitionist party
never made any conquest among them. The Slavie
under Jonas's management was a stanch Demo
cratic partisan. The Pokrok Zdpadu, while John
Rosicky owned and edited it, was a steadfast Re
publican adherent. A dyed-in-the-wool Republican
among the veteran editors was John A. Oliverius,
who was never happier than at election time when
he could measure swords with Jonas' in a newspaper
encounter. He was a fortunate publisher, indeed, who owned
a printing press. Generally the beginner had only
sufficient funds to buy a modest stock of type, cases,
galleys, and stones. The paper was set up in the
shop, but sent out to an American or German press
room to be printed. It was only after a time that the
publisher, if his venture proved successful, was able
to buy a printing press, usually on the installment
plan. Bruce's type foundry in New York was among
the first in the country to yield to the demand for
Cech type. To the great misery of typesetters,
Bruce and later Spindler cast no other than lower
and upper case type. Accented job type was sup
plied by the foundries at a much later date. Type
setters who knew the trade from the old country
were few. Most, if not all, the printers were initi
ated into the mysteries of this craft in America.
172

NEWSPAPER HOMES
The Svornost, Chicago; The Hospodar, Omaha; The Hlasatel, Chicago

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
Every pioneer newspaperman, publisher, and edi
tor knew in detail the tricks of the business and
could, in case of an emergency, such as a strike, not
only edit, but set up and print his own paper. Long
is the roster of editors who rose from the case to a
seat in the editorial sanctum sanctorum. Proud was
the publisher, jubilant the typesetters, apprecia
tive the readers, when the paper appeared dressed
in brand-new type from Bruce's or Spindler's
foundry. Every one on such an occasion had a word
of praise for the publisher's spirit and enterprise.
However, such events were exceedingly rare. Many
papers, alas! never lived to wear a second suit of
clothes. A Cleveland weekly, now happily defunct,
will be remembered with a shudder for its battered
type and general ragged looks.
Editor! Journalist! A time was when the editor
not only wrote for the people; he literally thought
for them. His advice on matters relating to the
affairs of the community never failed to command
attention. Grumblers there were, of course, who dis
sented from the editor's views, but sooner or later
the opposition was sure to fall victim to the mighty
man's wrath.
The editor was invariably picked out to umpire
quarrels, many of which, by the way, were of his
own making. He was chosen as orator to address
meetings and conventions; played leading r61es at
amateur theatricals; taught the local Cech language
school; helped to organize new lodges; was called
173

THE CECHS IN AMERICA _
upon to write funeral orations, political speeches,
and banquet toasts.
When Jonas was in the heyday of his power, his
word in the Slavie was law and his decision admitted
of no appeal. Now lawyers, doctors, teachers, mer
chants, and professional politicians help the editor
to mould public opinion.
In towns where there were two or more rival
journals there were bound to be two or more con
tentious factions. The editor, in each case, was the
fixed star around which the lesser lights circled.
Stories of Indian life were as popular with the
veteran reader as are the conventional detective
thrillers of the present day. Without an exception
every paper fed its patrons on them.The scribe who
translated them into fustian Cech seemed to revel
in them no less than the reader himself. The curious
feature of it was that the border settler, who should
have been the last person in the world to entertain
romantic notions about the redskin, was most fond
of stories of Indian adventure. Singularly enough,
not one of the devotees of this trashy reading
seemed to know enough to translate the wholesome
tales of James Fenimore Cooper. Instead, they
wasted their time on such worthless rubbish as the
Dragon of Silver Lake, or the Old Backwoodsman,
Hukah Jim, the Cruel Modoc, Wild Katie, or the
Prairie Outlaw. If reproved, the editor excused his
course by arguing that first you must teach people
to be readers before you begin to educate their taste.
174

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
The Russo-Turkish War (1877) and the occupa
tion by Austria-Hungary of Bosnia and Herzego
vina happily diverted the readers' attention from
the redskin and the cowboy to the South Slavs.
Promptly the Indian fell into disfavor, and the edi
tor, answering the call of Slavic blood, turned to
the life of the Balkan Slavs and their age-long strug
gle against the Turkish master. Then it was that
Prokop Chocholousek,1 a writer whose romantic
tales from South-Slavic countries had enjoyed
great popularity in Bohemia, came to his own.
There was hardly a paper which did not, during the
period of the Russo-Turkish War, lend generous
space to Chocholousek's South-Slavic heroics.
With the rise of modern Cech literature, novels
by Alois Jirasek, Karel Rais, Vaclav Hladik, and
other writers of recognized ability, began to dom
inate more and more the columns reserved for fic
tion. It is no secret that Cech-American publishers
are dependent for this sort of reading matter on the
literary output of the mother country. Copyright
laws have no terrors for the publisher or the editor,
accustomed to literary pillage. When the book mar
ket abroad was poor, as it was thirty or forty years
ago, the reader here was made to starve in a liter
ary sense. One can imagine what dearth of reading
matter there was half a century ago when the St.
1 Prokop Chocholousek (1819-64) was a writer who imitated
Walter Scott. His stories, though lacking the finish and preparation
of his favorite master, exercised a powerful spell over the reader,
particularly of the younger set.
175

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Louis Pozor, a weekly circulating among the work
ing classes, was driven by dire need to reprint
Klacel's unpalatable Dobroveda. Of the old-time
romances none were in greater demand by the pub
lishers than Herloszsohn's The Last Taborite, or
Bohemia in the Fifteenth Century} We dare say that
this historic novel will be found reprinted in every
paper dating back to the seventies.
Anti-clerical journals, the Pokrok, Dennice No
voveku, Svornost, and Sotek, maintained a special
column in which the editor registered, or reviewed,
each week, the transgressions of the clergy. Bitt-
ner's "Clerical Peep Hole" in the Sotek made un
comfortable reading for the priest who happened to
get into the focus of the " Peep Hole."
Of sensational disclosures by nuns who had made
their escape from convents, there were published
several variants. Sister Lucy tells in the Svornost of
her harrowing experiences in an English convent.
Sister Agatha confesses her troubles to the Dennice
Novoveku. Sister Therese bares the alleged secrets
of her life, also in the Svornost. Zdrubek translated,
for the Svornost, Chiniquy's Priest, Woman and Con
fessional. Exposures, confessions, revelations are
1 George Charles Reginald Herloszsohn, in Cech Herlo§, was born
in Prague in 1804; died in Germany in 1849. Although his stories
were written by him in German, he betrayed his nativity in every
historic novel. A passionate admirer of Bohemia's past, he liked to
sketch the stern heroes of the Hussite Wars, when Bohemia hurled
defiance at papal Europe. Though uncritical, his historic novels
are still popular.
. 176

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
many; there is the Confession by Pope Alexander VI,
"iby Altaroche; Priest's Victims, by J. E. Ball; the
Secrets of the Spanish Inquisition, by M. V. Fereal;
Hierarchy and Aristocracy, by F. Hassaurek.
Discussing some of the commercial aspects of
^journalism Vaclav Snajdr, has this to say: * ". . .
/Two or three Cech houses established a reputation
' as steadfast and dependable advertisers. The firms
of Severa (Cedar Rapids) and of Triner (Chicago)
settled their bills promptly on the day and on the
hour. The checks from firms like these made it pos
sible for many a newspaper to meet its expenses.
"Forty- five years ago typesetters were paid
twenty-five cents per thousand ems. Of course,
much depended on the typesetter himself and on
the locality where the paper was published. Girls
who had been trained for the work by the publisher
received less.
"The wages of typesetters on the Dennice Novo
veku were $15, later $18, payment being made
promptly on wage day. I would rather have left the
shop empty-handed myself on Saturday, than not
to have paid the employees. I know, however, that
certain publishers treated their men scandalously
in this respect. When daily papers began to gain a
firm footing and Cech typographical unions had
organized their men, the wages of typesetters rose
so markedly that many a reporter gave up his job
1 Specially communicated in 1915 to the author by Vaclav Snajdr,
at present living in retirement in Cleveland.
177

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
at the desk and took to typesetting. At the case the
reporter felt he was more independent; the pub
lisher did not require him to attend, in the interest
of his paper, dances, amateur theatricals, concerts,
meetings. Furthermore, as a typesetter, he was se
cure from the impertinence of petty demagogues,
who made miserable the life of the editor.
"The Slavie' s high- water mark in the matter of
subscribers was 4000. The highest figure reached
by the Dennice Novoveku was 3000. Considering the
paper's radical policy, this was considered as en
viably large. But in time a recession came. Pub
lishers started to manufacture 'patent inside'
weeklies and bi-weeklies filled with material taken
bodily from the dailies. Against these factory-made
weeklies, as they might be called, the genuine week
lies could compete in everything save in the quan
tity of reading matter.
"Except for occasional help, the Slavie never em
ployed a salaried associate editor. It was always a
partnership, or a profit-sharing arrangement of one
kind or other. Korizek and Barta had agreed to
divide the profits; but as matters were there was
nothing to divide. On the contrary, the paper would
have been run at a loss but for extras earned by
Korizek as a musician. After the merger of the
Ndrodni Noviny and the Slowan Amerikdnsky,
Mracek and Barta were to have drawn a certain
salary. This salary was not paid as agreed, for the
simple reason that there were no available funds.
178

VACLAV SNAJDR

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
Mracek and Barta, as you know, went to Russia
on a special mission. In Jonas's and Korizek's time,
the old system of profit-sharing was again put into
practice and continued until 1868, when I bought
out Korizek's share. After that Charles Jonas and
I drew $50 a month each. The profits, if any, we
divided at the end of the year. My salary as asso
ciate editor never exceeded $50 per month. About
the same stipend was paid to J. V. Sladek who
worked for the Slavie a few weeks. Joseph Jiri Krai
received a compensation of $60 or $65 a month. I
am not certain how much other publishers were
paying, but my impression is that John A. Oliverius
did not receive more on the Pozor than $45 or $50.
Zdrubek began with $50. Joseph Pastor had a prom
ise of more on the Nova Doba of Chicago; however,
the receipts were never such as to warrant the extra
compensation. In those days $50 a month was gen
erally thought a fair honorarium. As to your in
quiry concerning circulation. Until 1865 readers
were counted by the hundreds only. The Slavie
probably had at that time 2000 subscribers. When
I bought out Korizek in 1868 the circulation was
2500; readers began to increase after the seventies.
Advertisements were at first inserted not so much
for revenue as to fill the space. In 1870 advertise
ments netted the Slavie $200. Later there was a
steady accession of advertising matter. The best-
paid advertisement was that of the North German
Lloyd — $25 yearly. 179

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
"What the Bartas doled out to Klacel as editor
of the Slovan Amerikdnsky, I do not know, but it
could not have amounted to much, for the old pro
fessor never wearied complaining to his friends that
he was in want and that his pay was beggarly.
"After his return from Europe, where he had
gone to report on the Franco- Prussian War, Jonas
began publishing a small weekly, a sort of a supple
ment to the Slavie, which he named the Amerikdn.
He was enough of a business man to see that the
Slavie could not keep two editors busy, and he was
anxious to earn an extra dollar from this new enter
prise. The typesetting on the supplement was done
almost entirely by his wife Christine, who, like her
younger sister, Celia, later my wife, had become
a skilled typesetter.
" Meantime Edward Rosewater,1 who had served
for a time in the Civil War as a field telegraph oper
ator, issued in Omaha, besides his daily paper the
Bee, a Cech weekly, the Pokrok Zapadu. One of the
contributors to the Pokrok Zapadu was carpenter
Vodicka. The sheet led a precarious existence, be
ing more of an advertising medium of land specula
tors than a purveyor of news. Obviously this state
of things did not tend to raise the paper's reputa
tion among its readers. Seeing that the Cechs were
beginning to settle in Nebraska in increasing num
bers, Rosewater decided to raise the standard of the
1 Kvety Americke, September 28, 1887. Biography and portrait.
Rosewater was born in 1841 and arrived in 1854.
180

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
Pokrok Zapadu, and he offered me, upon whose ad
vice I do not remember, the editorship, at a weekly
salary of $25, in addition to giving me lodging in
the printing shop. This salary Rosewater paid me
regularly; and to show my gratitude, I toiled night
and day, taking charge not only of the editorial
columns, but of business correspondence as well.
Advertisements were few, because Cech business
men, other than saloon-keepers, grocers, bakers,
and butchers, were but a handful. That publishers
accepted advertisements at ridiculously low rates
is true. Some papers were content to receive almost
any price; again others were satisfied to be paid by
the advertiser in kind — clothing and footwear for
the printers, dress material for the women folks.
The Dennice Novoveku in the initial years owed its
existence to profitable advertisements which I so
licited personally in my off hours, after my editorial
duties were done. Subscriptions from readers came
in tardily and were inadequate to keep the paper
going." As they have lived so they have died — in hon
orable poverty. Bittner, the greatest talent of them
all, left his family in utter destitution. Janda, an
other gifted journalist, died pitifully poor. A chari
table relative drove the proverbial wolf away from
Oliverius's door more than once. Klacel was all but
a public almoner living on the scant pittance of his
admirers. The income from the newspaper drudg
ery barely sufficed to keep soul and body together.
181

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Palda repeatedly jeopardized his business interests
by his unconquerable passion for journalistic work.
In his memoirs Palda laments: " If times were hard
in Cleveland they were intolerable in New York.
The employees, to be sure, had to be paid promptly.
We three publishers divided the income as follows:
John V. Capek, being single and having supposedly
smaller needs, drew five dollars weekly; I received
eight wherewith to support myself, wife and three
children; Skarda and his wife kept the balance."
Believing he was taking a final leave of the profes
sion Capek in the last number of the Cleveland
Ndrodni Noviny (1873) says with ill-concealed bit
terness: " I throw away my pen with which I have
wasted here three of the best years of my life." To
Pastor, ambitious and clear-headed, the outlook
appeared so dismal that he made haste to with
draw while still young and turn his energy to a
more gainful employment. Zdrubek was one of the
few favored ones who accumulated a competence.
But Zdrubek's main revenue was derived, not from
journalism, but from paid functions incident to
his position as Speaker of the Liberal Union in
Chicago. No ordinary journalist was Frank Mracek J
(born in Moravia in 1828, died, 1896, in Odessa,
Russia), whom the publishers of the St. Louis Nd-
1 John Borecky : Chapters on the History of Cech- Moravians in
America, p. 9. Cedar Rapids, 1896. The Pokrok Zdpadu, March 10,
1896.
182

JAN BARTA LETOVSKY

ANTON MALINOWSKI

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
rodni Noviny called in i860, to edit that paper. His
biographer said of him that he had been sentenced
to serve a twenty-year term in the military prison
at Kufstein, in the Tyrol, for having taken an ac
tive part in political agitation in Prague. After the
amnesty in 1857 Mracek emigrated to the United
States. In the first years of the Civil War, a farming
element, discontented with conditions here, con
ceived the somewhat fantastic plan of migrating
to Asiatic Russia. Mracek and Barta Letovsky
were chosen as envoys to go to the Czar's land,
there to pick out a suitable region for the future
New Bohemia. Happily, the contemplated emigra
tion to Russia never took place ; so far as is known
only one emigrant settled in Russia pursuant to the
plan. That emigrant was Mracek himself. To his
countrymen in the United States Mracek's leave-
taking was a real loss, for he was a cultured gentle
man, a born leader and organizer. Mracek's widow,
who is still living (or rather was living before the
war) in Russia, draws a pension from the United
States Government; he served in the Army during
the Civil War.
Charles Jonas (1840-96), the "first Cech in
America," as Carl Schurz was the "first German,"
came to the United States in 1863, as an under
graduate of the Polytechnic at Prague. To save
himself from arrest for actively participating in the
Cech national movement, Jonas had fled to Lon
don; from that city friends invited him to come to
183

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Racine to take charge of the Slavie. When he as
sumed editorship of that paper he was but twenty-
three years old, an alarmingly immature age for
an editor. Yet Jonas's youth was not without its
compensations, for it enabled him to master more
quickly the English language and to grow up, so to
say, with the surroundings. Even before he came to
America he had evinced a marked liking for public
affairs, to which in the United States he could give
free rein.
In his student days he wrote a political pam
phlet in German wherein he sought to prove that
a confederacy of free nations was the only solu
tion of the Austrian problem. His quick wit told
him he must master the English language before he
could aspire to leadership among his people here.
At a time when others were still hesitating whether
they should stay in America or emigrate to Amur,
Jonas' busied himself with English. Though a mere
youth, he was sagacious enough to recognize the
unwisdom of opening the columns of the Slavie to
religious disputes. That the temptation to do so
was strong is easily believable, for Jonas was a lib
eral through and through, and there was no mistake
as to where his sympathies lay. Among his journal
istic colleagues he attained an exceptional position:
friend and foe alike learned to look up to him as an
authority, from whose decision but few had the
courage to appeal. Such was the weight of his word
that his views and his opinions on matters relat-
184

CHARLES JONAS

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
ing to the national life of the Cechs in America
were regarded as final; not perhaps that he was
always right, but because it was Jonas who said
it. About 1872 the Slavie ranged itself openly on
the side of the Democratic Party, with the result
that probably the majority of Cechs followed Jonas
willingly and embraced the creed thereof. His liter
ary work was entirely of the useful kind. Though
he had been trained, as stated, for the career of a
technicist, he plunged courageously into philology
and lexicography. His initial volume was the Bo
hemian-English Interpreter, published in 1865. x In
1876 appeared the Bohemian-English and English-
Bohemian dictionaries. The fact that these diction
aries have gone through sixteen editions, in each
case amplified and improved, is the best testimony
of their merit and usefulness. In 1884 followed
the New American Interpreter; in 1890 Bohemian
Made Easy. The American Law and Golden Book
for Farmers are compilations. Other Cechs have
achieved higher political honors than he; Jonas
was state senator (1883), consul to Prague (1885),
lieutenant-governor of Wisconsin (1890), consul to
Petrograd (1894), consul to Crefeld (1894). Yet in
1 Adolph William Straka, political exile living in London, preceded
Jonas' by three years with his English Grammar, published in Prague
in 1862. This is the first book of its kind in the Cech language. Inas
much as Jonas' came to Racine from London and had associated in
the English capital with Straka, the inference is that it was Straka's
example which inspired Jonas to devote himself in America to the
same line of literary work.
185

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
the estimation of the old-timers, Jonas was with
out a peer. He died at Crefeld, Germany,1 and was
buried in Prague. His tombstone bears this inscrip
tion: "Charles Jonas, first United States Consul of
Cech nationality, born October 30, 1840, died Janu
ary 15, 1896. I have one wish. Bury me in the loved
Cech land, for which I have fervently longed and
for which I have sacrificed all." 2
Journalism will not forget the name of Joseph
Pastor, the fighting editor of the ultra-radical
weekly Pokrok. Pastor was born in 1841, and af
ter graduation from a Latin school (gymnasium),
being too poor to continue his studies in the uni
versity, he joined a religious order. He appeared
in New York in 1866. There he earned a niggardly
living at cigarmaking. Later he entered the service
of the New York Staatszeitung as a stenographer.
1 In order to set at rest the stories current as to the causeof Jon&S's
death, the author addressed a letter of inquiry to the State Depart
ment. Here is the answer: Department of State, August 10, 1918
Mr. Thomas Capek.
Dear Sir : In response to your inquiry of July 29th I regret to in
form you that the Department's records show that Mr. Charles
Jonas', American Consul at Crefeld, Germany, died of heart failure,
January 15, 1896.
Herbert C. Hengstler,
Acting Chief, Consular Bureau
2 The Kv&ty Americkd, July 15, 1885, autobiography and portrait;
the Slavie, January 22, 1896, obituary by J. J. Krai and portrait; the
Svetozor, Prague, xxxii: 120-21, portrait of tombstone; the Slavie,
May 31, 1912, eulogy by J. E. S. Vojan, on the occasion of the un
veiling of a monument to Jonas in Racine.
186

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
Pastor was a thorough German scholar. His letters
from New York to the Slavie attracted the atten
tion of Jonas and of Korizek, who offered him the
editorship of the Pokrok. While no one questioned
Pastor's ability and sincerity, the more cultured
element deplored his rough-and-tumble style of
handling his adversaries. Father Joseph Molitor, of
the Chicago Katolicke Noviny, was a particular suf
ferer at Pastor's hands. Wearied of the miseries of
journalism, he removed to Hamburg, where he
established himself as a steamship ticket agent.
During his residence in Hamburg he issued in 1884
a periodical, the Ceske Osady v Amer ice (Cech Settle
ments in America), containing much useful statis
tical information. Pastor was a warm admirer of
America and of its free institutions.
The KvSty Americke (American Blossoms) 1 had
this to say of Vaclav Snajdr, from 1877 to 191 1 the
publisher and editor of the Dennice Novoveku: "He
holds a notable rank in our national life, enjoying
the esteem and confidence of the liberal element
among Cechs in America. After the retirement of
Jonas from active journalism, Snajdr occupied
without doubt a foremost place as a newspaper
writer; as a poet he has not been equaled (among his
countrymen here). Pity, though, that the exhaust
ing work of journalism has stifled in him the poet."
1 The Kvety Americke, August 17, 1887. Biography and portrait;
Thomas Capek: Fifty Years of Cech Letters in America, pp. 120-21,
autobiographical note. I87

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Snajdr, who was born in 1847, came to the United
States the same year as did Klacel. Preparatory to
his taking charge of the Dennice NovovSku, which he
founded in 1877, he received journalistic training
on the Slavie, Pokrok Zapadu, and Pokrok. Several
of his compilations — his favorite author appears
to have been Ingersoll — were published in pam
phlet form. The estimate of Snajdr by the Kvety
Americke is correct in the main, except for the asser
tion that he ranked next to Jonas as a journalist.
The truth is that disciplined readers appraised
Snajdr as the abler newspaperman of the two. This
estimate of Snajdr's abilities was sustained as Jo
nas, in later years, began to neglect journalism for
the more exciting, though not profitable, game of
politics. Snajdr was always frank, at times dis
agreeably so. Jonas' as an aspiring politician was
necessarily wary, diplomatic. Except for a few
pamphlets, all Snajdr's literary production is stored
in the Dennice Novoveku, and the thought is a
mournful one — a tragic feature of the journalism
of a small nation — that a man's life effort should
be bound up in the archives of a newspaper of
which there exists but one copy, the copy which is
called the editorial file.
An original personality among the old standard-
bearers was John Borecky (1828-1908).1 Though
he received no more than a village school education
1 The Kvety Americke, November 10, 1886; St. Louiske Listy,
January, 1909.
188

VACLAV SNAJDR AND
HIS BROTHER-IN-LAW
CHARLES JONAS (standing)

VACLAV SNAJDR AND
JOSEPH V. SLADEK (left)

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
and notwithstanding the fact that he was a stranger
to the mysteries of Cech orthography, to quote a
journalistic opponent, Borecky was capable of writ
ing thoughtful, and if the subject-matter related
to the doings of pioneers, exceedingly informative,
articles. Aggressive to rashness, Borecky was un
afraid even of Klacel, if he believed himself in the
right. In newspaper disputes he had no hesitancy in
attacking Snajdr, Zdrubek and Palda. His great gift
was his remarkable memory which, even in his ex
treme old age — he died at Little Rock, Arkansas,
in his eightieth year — served him unerringly. If a
controversy arose over the details of some long-for
gotten event, all that was needed was to knock at
the door of old man Borecky and he promptly sup
plied the missing facts. His scrap-book was deadly
and men with shady pasts felt uneasy when Borecky
became reminiscent. It was he who silenced Hynek
Sladek,1 a poor newspaper scribe; it was he who
made J. B. Erben, the first editor of the St. Louis
Ndrodni Noviny and the intimate of his youth, dis
gusted with journalism.2 In addition to articles
1 For details from Sladek's life, see article, "One of the Pioneer
Cech editors," the Kvety Americke, Omaha, July 10, 1902; another
account, the Kvety Americke, November 10, 1886. Hynek Sladek
should not be confounded with J. V. Sladek, the poet.
2 J. B. Erben was born in 1837, and according to latest advices,
lives with his daughter in retirement in St. Louis. His past has been
the subject of heated controversies, in which Borecky, his chief de
tractor, invariably led the opposition. Osvlta Americkd, January 16,
1907, and Borecky's letter, dated March 15, 1907, published in the
St. Louiske Listy.
189

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
scattered in various newspapers, he wrote a brief
treatise, Kapitoly (Chapters on the History of
Cech-Moravians in America). Only that part of the
tract which contains the personal reminiscences of
the author is of value; the rest, in which Borecky
debates with the protagonists of liberalism, is
rambling. Following a newspaper quarrel, Borecky
left the liberal party and joined, in theory at least,
the socialists. He came to the United States as a
journeyman tailor and resided alternately in Mil
waukee, St. Louis, Chicago, and Little Rock.
John A. Oliverius (i 843-1 904) was not nick
named "newspaper grave-digger" without reason.
His name is associated with sixteen papers on which
he had been active as editor or in which he was in
terested as publisher. Not one newspaperman could
boast of such a record. Oliverius's head was ever
afire with lofty ideals and far-reaching plans, the
latter invariably aiming to save from racial extinc
tion his countrymen in America. Among other
things he advocated the founding of a New Bo
hemia, preferably in Oregon, where it would be
protected on one side by the sea. Charles Jonas', his
political adversary — Oliverius championed the
Republican Party while Jonas' was a Democratic
partisan — was wont to call him a visionary and a
fool; yet Oliverius was far from a fool. On the con
trary, he was, on occasions, a shrewd judge of men,
far-sighted, almost prophetic in some of his conclu
sions. In a newspaper melSe, it is true, he often lost
190

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
all sense of proportion. Despite his long residence
in America (Chicago), he never learned the art of
making money, a circumstance all the more remark
able, since he had been trained in his youth for a
merchant's career. But for the charitableness of a
relative abroad he would have suffered what Klacel
bitterly termed, vulgar want. His nickname, " news
paper grave-digger," was not wholly undeserved,
yet it was Oliverius' s cash and his alone, which
went to pay for all the newspaper graves that he
dug. In 1890 he published in pamphlet form a lec
ture on the Cultural Meaning of the Queen's Court
and Green Hill MSS. (144 pp.). In view of the fact
that both of these manuscripts were proved to be
spurious, the treatise has but an antiquarian inter
est. Not even his opponents questioned his probity
or his rugged patriotism. "Oliverius was impracti
cable," "Oliverius was an idealistic visionary," was
the worst they could say of him. He died in poverty
and is buried in Prague.
Ladimir Klacel x created nothing in America of
enduring value. Driven by dire need to seek a liv
ing in unprofitable and unappreciated newspaper
work, again and again changing his residence, — he
1 The Kvety Americke, September 15, 1885, biography and por
trait; Vaclav Snaj'dr: Ladimir {Francis) Kldcel: His Life and Teach
ing. 49 pp. Cleveland, 1908; same, the Dennice Novoveku, April 9,
1908. The monument above his grave in Belle Plaine bears inscrip
tions in Cech, English, and Latin. The English text is: "Professor
Ladimir Klacel, the Cech Patriot, Philosopher and Freethinker,
born at Ceska, Tfebova, April 7th, 1803. Died at Belle Plaine, March
17th, 1882. Erected by his grateful countrymen."
191

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
lived successively in Iowa City, Chicago, Coopers-
town, Kossuthtown, Keewaunee, Krok, Milwau
kee, Belle Plaine, — Klacel lacked that repose of
mind and sense of security which, if not indispens
able, are yet conducive to scholarly pursuits.
Snajdr, who visited Klacel in his flat in Chicago,
thus describes the plight of the hapless philosopher:
" He occupied one room partitioned off by a screen;
the front part was used as a kitchen and sleeping-
place by the housekeeper, Mrs. Moll. In the other
lived Klacel surrounded by his books. Dejection
and poverty were reflected in his sorrowing eyes.
' We subsist on bread and milk and at times we lack
even that; besides, my clothes are falling apart,' he
complained, pointing to a black alpaca coat, such
as the clergy wear. Neither I nor my companion
could repress our emotions. I shall not forget this
visit." A fellow countryman found Klacel weeping on
the steps of a country church in Wisconsin, in
which, in his utter destitution, he was compelled, as
a means of earning a scant pittance, to conduct
services to a motley congregation. What poignant
suffering it must have caused him to again put on
priest's vestments and repeat before the altar the
ceremony which he had often ridiculed.
To a friend he wrote that he wished to publish in
America a newspaper "serving the needs of a cul
tured people, who strive after truth, righteousness,
love. Yet, what do I find? Every lofty ideal meets
192

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EARLY NEWSPAPERS

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
with derision. Nevertheless I persist and try to
please the minority, at least, hoping that in the end
victory may be our reward. But it is disheartening
to have to struggle with vulgar want." And this
in a communication to an admirer: "How deeply
grieved I am that they [the Bartas] should treat me
as if I were a day laborer, from whom they accept
what suits them, paying me what they please for
services rendered. All too readily do they forget
that the 1500 subscribers [of the Slovan Amerikdn
sky] are due to my endeavor."
"Klacel's American writings," comments Anton
Novak of Milwaukee, "were printed in editions at
no time exceeding 500; of this number about one
half was sold, the remaining half was knocked about
on the shelves for years until I gave the stuff away
or threw it out on the rubbish heap, in order to gain
shelf -space for other books. It was very poor busi
ness; there were issues that did not bring in enough
to pay the cost of the print paper. The Vecny Kal-
enddr (Perpetual Calendar) had about 150 sub
scribers; the Historie Spojenych Statu Americkych
(History of the United States) barely 100. That
under such circumstances I could not go on with
other of Klacel's publications is self-evident."
One cannot speak of Klacel as a journalist. Judg
ing his work in the retrospect, we get the picture of
a sorrowing old man, captivated by dogmas; one
who had no adequate conception of the realities of
American life. Is it to be wondered that readers
193

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
grumbled that "Klacel wrote too learnedly"? In
the Hlas Jednoty spoke not an American journalist,
whose function is to record the events of the day,
but an old-fashioned schoolmaster.
Among self-made men, who, to use a homely but
an expressive phrase, pulled themselves up by
their boot-straps, the best known was L. J. Palda
(1847-1912). An eloquent speaker, an independent
thinker, a gifted journalist, an indefatigable organ
izer, Palda might have risen high, had he been able
to tear himself away from the diminutive world to
which his birth had chained him, but which he
adored above all else. He had many of the faults and
virtues of the great men, of the Mirabeaus, Gam-
bettas, Cavours, and Riegers of history. His life
gave every evidence of his strong personality. He
organizes workingmen, advocates socialism — he
is rightfully called the father of Cech socialism — by
appealing speeches tries to sustain, when and wher
ever called, the waning courage of strikers, drudges
as editor and as pamphleteer. It is hard to decide
which of his achievements deserve higher praise.
Is it his work as a publicist? Or his efforts as an or
ganizer of labor? Even his enemies — and Palda had
plenty of them (he was vainglorious, they said) —
will not gainsay his splendid gift of eloquence. So
cialists will not detract from his merits, though the
more radical element repudiated him, at one time,
as a reactionary. An idealist and humanist despite
unending disappointments, Palda wrote, in 1902, a
194

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
remarkable booklet, which he entitled Myslenky o
novem ndbozenstvi (Thoughts on New Religion). In
it the thinking man sets out to analyze his creed;
not satisfied with evasion he demands solution of
the perplexing problem of religion. He arrives at the
conclusion that mere non-belief, negativity, is not
enough. "I yearned by this exposition of my faith
partly to ease my troubled mind, partly, if possible,
to assist in the approaching regeneration of our lib
eral party. I see this possible only in a new religion,
which shall embrace all our desires, all our ideals,
our teachings, our views. ... I realized more and
more that mere negativity, renunciation of the be
liefs, will not suffice to fill a spiritual void." Palda's
New Religion, however, pleased neither the ortho
dox among the rationalists nor the old-fashioned
believers. The latter challenged the author through
the person of Father Tichy of Minnesota,1 who was
of the opinion that there was no need to go in search
of new creeds. All that was necessary was an abid
ing constancy in the old, the true faith. As for the
rationalists, they passed a scathing resolution in
which they, metaphorically speaking, ejected Palda
from their ranks as an apostate and undesirable.
Palda's last years were spent in Cedar Rapids,
where he operated a cigar factory on a small scale.
By trade he was not a cigarmaker; he came to the
United States in 1867 as a journeyman weaver.
Journalism always attracted him and he yielded to
1 Odpoved* Paldovi (A Reply to Palda). 1906. A pamphlet of 88 pp.
195

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
its allurements, though his business often suffered in
consequence. He received but little more than a
common school education; yet those who had the
good fortune of knowing him intimately agreed
that he was not only an amiable companion, but a
cultured man. A well-stocked library was his only
college. As a journalist he towered far above Zdru
bek and as a student he outranked Jonas, who had
more of a practical than contemplative mind. His
tragic death occurred in Cedar Rapids in 1912.1
Frank Boleslav Zdrubek was born in 1842 of a
poor family. He was sent to a Catholic theological
seminary to be educated for the priesthood. Hav
ing, as he says, experienced a change in religious
faith, Zdrubek left the Catholic for a Protestant
seminary, from which latter he graduated. Emi
grating before the seventies to the United States,
he took charge, at Caledonia, Wisconsin, and at
Wesley, Texas, of evangelical congregations of
Cech-Moravian Brethren. But his career as a min
ister of the gospel was of brief duration. The par
ishioners complained that their pastor was too radi
cal in his views; the pastor again was dissatisfied
because his flock was not progressive enough.
When Joseph Pastor resigned from the anti-cleri
cal weekly Pokrok, Zdrubek gave up the pulpit,
removed to Chicago, and "notwithstanding his
1 The Kvety Americke, August 15, 1885, autobiography and por
trait; Dr. F. Soukup: article in Prague Prdvo Lidu, reprinted in Hlas
Lidu, July 10, 1913; article in Prague Cos, reprinted in Hlas Lidu,
July 8, 1913. I96

FRANCIS B. ZDRUBEK

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
retiring disposition and his aversion to public life,"
accepted the post of editor of that paper. "He did
this all the more readily, as he felt that as a minister
of the gospel he could not make an honorable living
unless he chose to make of his vocation a vulgar
traffic and practice from the pulpit pious extor
tion." x
Zdrubek was an iconoclast who believed in no
miracles save those which science performed.
Though a pulpiteer of considerable experience, it
could not be said of him that he was an orator.
As a journalist he was distinctly commonplace.
Most prolific of all the Cech literati,, he was, in fact,
not a creative writer, but a translator. Yet in the
end Zdrubek managed to raise himself to the fore
most place among his countrymen and the liberals
bowed to him as their chief. What was the secret of
his success? Zdrubek was a man who triumphed not
by reason of genius, for he was not above medioc
rity, but rather because all his life he had been a
hard, conscientious worker, a man of unblemished
reputation. The liberal ideas which he imbibed
•from Voltaire, Paine, Ingersoll, Klacel, and other
thinkers, he espoused with a zeal, which no one
would have suspected in this meek and humble ex-
pastor. His life-work proceeded along two dissimi
lar lines: like Jonas he compiled dictionaries and
grammars. At the same time he combated, orally
and in writing, clericalism in all its forms. The
1 The Kvety Americke, June 23, 1886, autobiography.
197

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
English Grammar came out in 1870. Then followed
successively, How to Pronounce in English, Cech
English Interpreter, Pocket Dictionary of the English
and Cech Languages, and a grammar or two for
Cech elementary schools. His translations from
English and German include: Das Leben Jesu, by
David Friedrich Strauss (1883) ; The Age of Reason,
by Thomas Paine (1884); Die Konventionellen Lu-
gen der Kulturmenschheit, by Max Nordau (1885);
Kraft und Stoff, by Ludwig Buechner (1889).
Then there are the Sermons, delivered on various
occasions, but chiefly as a Speaker of the Liberal
Union in Chicago between 1879 and 1894. His
rhymed Comic Bible (1885) is maladroit. In 1877
he took part in a public disputation with Father V.
Coka, a Chicago priest. Zdrubek's contribution to
this debate was printed under the title, Two Reli
gious Disputations, etc. Jointly with August Ger
inger he founded, in 1875, the Chicago Svornost,
remaining uninterruptedly at its head up to his
death in Chicago in 191 1. An adversary thus epit
omized Zdrubek's life-work: "With tireless en
ergy worthy of a better cause, he propagated the
teaching of infidelity, and he admired greatly
the doctrines of that American agnostic, Robert
Ingersoll." The roster of pioneers would be incomplete with
out the name of John Rosicky of Omaha.1 A self-
1 A Souvenir, published in memory of John Rosicky, American
Cech journalist and patriot. 90 pp. Omaha, 1910.
I98

JOHN ROSICKY

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
made man, Rosicky came to be recognized as one
of the forceful members of the journalistic profes
sion. In 1 87 1 he took over from Edward Rosewater
the weekly Pokrok Zapadu (Progress of the West) ,
then a small sheet, without influence and without
readers. In time Rosicky raised the Pokrok Zapadu
to the front of Cech weeklies. That his tastes were
higher than mere commercial journalism, he proved
in 1884, when he set up the Kvety Americke, the
first genuine attempt at a Cech literary periodical.
Bravely the Kvety AmericM strove to live up to the
programme outlined in the prospectus of the pub
lisher. But the most ambitious plans of a publisher
are doomed to miscarry if the reading community
fails adequately to support him. Tiring of the re
current deficits, Rosicky was forced to modify his
original plan with the Kvety Americke. Out of the
compromise emerged, in 1903, a publication called
the Osveta Americkd (American Culture), half com
mercial, half literary. By far the most profitable of
Rosicky's ventures proved to be an agricultural
paper, the Hospodar (Husbandman). This publica
tion now claims a larger circulation than any other
agricultural paper printed in the Cech language.
Rosicky was a newspaper man and not an author.
Only one brief booklet — businesslike and to the
point — bears his name, Jakje v Americe ? (America
as it is), compiled "for the guidance of newly ar
rived compatriots in America." A man of compel
ling individuality, he rendered helpful service to
199

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
settlers west of the Missouri River. He was born in
1845, came with his parents to America in 1861,
and died in Omaha in 1910.
John V. Capek was a humorist whom no Cech
writer in America has yet equaled. His homely hu
mor was of that rustic grain — Capek was peasant
born — which, like a happy after-dinner speech,
provokes both good feeling and mirth. His ready
pen turned out droll rhymes with the same aston
ishing ease and neatness with which a magician
pulls things out of his hat. The comic Life of St.
Anthony of Padua (New York, 1883) in verse is
fairly indicative of Capek's skill in this respect.
The life of the Italian saint, by the way, is not a
translation of Wilhelm Busch's Der Heilige St. An-
tonius von Padua. Only the illustrations are bor
rowed from that German writer-artist. The text is
original. Capek's humorous weekly, the Diblik
(Puck), will long be remembered by discriminating
lovers of clean, sparkling humor. As a journalist
and writer of fiction, he was thought of highly by
contemporaries, and would have added consider
ably to Cech letters here, since he was a man of fine
culture and broad views, had not experiments in
electricity lured him away from literature. He was
born in Bohemia, in 1842, studied in the Univer
sity of Prague, and came to America in 1871 in
answer to a call from the publishers of the Cleve
land Pokrok. He died in New York in 1909.
F. K. Ringsmuth possessed more than a versi-
200

JOHN V. CAPEK

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
fier's adroitness at turning out rhymes. He, too, had
in him the material of which genuine poets are
made. Marital troubles were accountable for Rings-
muth's complete desertion of literature. Pecksnif-
fian colleagues called him a turncoat; in a sense,
Ringsmuth was a turncoat. From a social democrat
and a rationalist, which he was in his younger years,
he turned for consolation to the Scriptures, be
coming first a missionary, later a Protestant min
ister. The Kytice Bdsni (Bouquet of Poems, New
York, 1882) discloses a man of decided poetic
talent. Josephine Humpal-Zeman (1 870-1 906), a news
paper writer, and advocate of woman's suffrage,
was the very opposite of Frances Gregor. An un
fortunate marriage forced her to earn her own liv
ing. Incidentally, marital experiences lent a sharper
angle to her estimate of the new woman. Mrs.
Zeman first obtained entrance into American circles
through the good offices of certain women inter
ested in a Chicago settlement house. One of these,
Mary Ingersoll, Mrs. Zeman called, in a book dedi
cation, "My second mother." Presumably due to
the generosity of this woman, Mrs. Zeman was sent
to a seminary. From the seminary she brought
home two very valuable assets: first, a fair com
mand of the English language, and secondly, a
broader general knowledge. Later in life, when she
put herself at the head of the woman suffrage move
ment, she was enabled to make excellent use of
201

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
these acquirements. With other women she founded
in Chicago, in 1894, a weekly paper, the Zenske
Listy (Woman's Gazette). Aside from journalism
she was active as a lecturer, speaking to audiences
in English or in her mother tongue, as circumstances
required. She was the pioneer in this work. Un-
gallantly, Bartos Bittner was wont to chaff her in
the Sotek with the sobriquet, "Mrs. General." Mrs.
Zeman was a type that shone to greatest advantage
on the lecture platform championing the rights of
her sex, or in woman's clubs, where her readiness as
a debater was a great asset. We have only one book
from her, Amerika v pravim Svetle (America in its
True Light), published in Prague in 1903. "The
book contains three of the lectures I delivered while
on a visit to my native land, in some thirty towns in
Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia." The "three lec
tures" is a pamphlet full of bright bon mots. The
observations in America in its True Light are clev
erly phrased but superficial. She died in Prague in
1906. Using the popular history by Benson John Loss-
ing as a model and "from various other sources,"
Joseph Cermak of Chicago has compiled a History
of the United States. In the preface Cermak asks the
forbearance of the critic, his compilation being, as
he explains, "an extra work, done at odd evening
hours, in addition to the hurry-up work of a news
paper editor." Even the most indulgent reviewer
will readily agree with the compiler that his His-
202

Catherine M . Capek

Josephine Humpal-Zeman

Frances Gregor Dr. Anna F. Novak
PROFESSIONAL WOMEN

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
tory of the United States was done as extra work. A
standard history of the United States, preferably
a translation by a competent translator of some
approved textbook used in our schools, is one of the
existing needs of American Cech literature. And
this need, unfortunately, Cermak' s history does not
fill. Cermak is an authority on the technique of
physical training and his book (4.12 pp.), Physical
Training; Being a Practical Aid to Cech American
Instructors of Youth, has earned the praise of Sokols
here and in Bohemia.
No visitor has written so many glaring inaccu
racies and screaming untruths about America as
John Wagner (1856-1905, in Prague). The man
simply could not treat America seriously or soberly;
he only knew America as the land of "unlimited
impossibilities," America farcical and grotesque.
Wagner was a Cech Munchausen, and judging from
some of his performances one is inclined to believe
that if Bill Nye's Comic History of the United States
had fallen into his hands, he would have pro
nounced it a genuine history of America. Wagner
should have known better, for he was not a Sunday
tourist who studies a country by looking at it from
the window of a railroad train and then describes it.
He lived in the United States for a considerable
time, doing newspaper work in New York, Omaha,
and Chicago. His pamphlet, Transatlantic Gossip,
was published in Prague in 1898.
Frances Gregor was born in Bohemia in 1850, but
203

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
was brought to this country when an infant. In
Wisconsin, where her parents settled on a farm, she
became a school-teacher. Ambitious to better her
self, she entered Cornell University, from which she
graduated with honors. The supreme wish of her
life was realized when friends enabled her to go to
Prague, there to devote herself to literary work and,
incidentally, to improve her knowledge of the Cech
tongue. The fruits of her stay abroad were, first,
a translation of Bozena Nemcova's charming story
from rustic life, Babicka (Grandmother), and later,
the History of Bohemia. In translating Nemcova's
Babicka into idiomatic English — the first story
book by a Cech author, so honored — Frances
Gregor rendered a real service to literature. Many
an American Cech youth has had his or her first
glimpse of Cech rural life from the English version
of Babicka. Gregor's History of Bohemia has since
been superseded by abler historical narratives. An
incurable malady not only interfered with her liter
ary work, but made life, especially towards the end,
unendurable. She died in 1901, in Colorado.
Literary critics will assign to Bartos Bittner
(1861-1912) 1 a leading place as an essayist. Bittner
was intended for the law; but tiring of the Austro-
Cech Blackstone, he gave up his law studies and
entered a Catholic theological seminary. From this
1 Quill and Vojan: Orgdn Bratrstva, C.S.P.S., May, 1913; " Rem
iniscences of Barto§ Bittner," C.A.T.K.; "Leave-Taking of BartoS
Bittner," Hlas Lidu, May 10, 1912.
204

BARTOS BITTNER

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
he ran away and came, in 1884, to this country.
Soon after arriving, he secured a position as a
teacher in a language school in Cedar Rapids.
Journalism, however, attracted him, and presently
we find him at it in New York and later in Chicago.
In the Western metropolis he set up a humorous
and satirical weekly, the Sotek (Imp), which soon
achieved marked success. He reached the height of
popularity about 1894, when the Chicago Bene
dictines, angered by his philippics — Bittner's
raillery was particularly aimed at Abbot Jager —
brought a suit for criminal libel against him.
Though as poor as the proverbial church mouse,
Bittner was able promptly to raise among his ad
mirers $20,000 bail. The winning of the suit still
more enhanced his reputation. Having lost the
Sotek, owing to poor business management, Bittner
became a literary free lance, working for whom he
pleased and when he pleased; that, for one of his
capricious temperament, meant that he worked
irregularly, often not at all. But whatever issued
from his facile pen bore unmistakable evidence of
a talent of high order. He employed political satires
with great effectiveness. As a matter of fact there
were two Bittners; one, who at times was given to
conviviality. This Bittner was introspective, brood
ing, wretched, a grave study for the psychologist.
The other Bittner was a poet and a thinker, a mas
ter of Cech diction, who defied the greatest lumi
naries among his countrymen. His essays, poems,
205

THE CECHS IN AMERICA ,
and humorous discourses, if edited, would fill vol
umes. His end was as tragic as had been bohemian
the life he elected to lead. Separated from his fam
ily he died alone, unrecognized, in a squalid Chi
cago lodging-house.
Dr. Ales Hrdlicka, who is in charge of the Divi
sion of Physical Anthropology in the United States
National Museum in Washington, was born in Bo
hemia, 1869. He immigrated with his parents as
a lad. In New York he studied and for a short time
practiced medicine. From the general practice of
his profession he soon turned his attention to the
anthropology of the insane and other defective
classes. His writings, notably those on the antiq
uity of man in North and South America, are
numerous and acknowledged by scientists as au
thoritative. Hrdlicka did research work in Eu
rope, Argentine, Peru, Panama, Mexico, Siberia,
China, Egypt. He is a member of many scientific
bodies in this country and in Europe, of the Cech
Academy of Sciences among them. Since 191 8 he
has edited the American Journal of Physical Anthro
pology, of which publication he is also the founder.
Readers of the Dennice Novoveku have not forgotten
the instructive articles in Cech which Dr. Hrdlicka
contributed years ago.
Cech America has had but a few talented writers
of fiction. Three names have found an echo in the
old country, Paul Albieri (1861-1901), John Hav-
lasa, and J. R. Psenka. Albieri came to America
206

DR. ALES HRDLICKA

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
with the reputation of a successful narrator of
stories of military life. In time he might have
achieved distinction as a journalist, his fitness for
newspaper work being undeniable, if only his rest
lessness, ever driving him into new ventures, had
not set at naught every serious effort that he made
in that direction. That he was a poor judge of men
and a worse critic of things he proved time and
again by his notes on America, published in Prague
papers. Bohemian in a double sense (that is, by
birth and by habits) he was withal a delightful
companion and a gifted conversationalist. He met
death in a railroad accident in Texas.
A Chicago girl (Vlasta Charlotte Kozel, 1873-
1901), writing under the name of Pavla Cechovi,
contributed to newspapers colorful articles of strik
ing originality. Though born and bred in Chicago
and notwithstanding the fact that she had never
seen the inside of a Cech schoolroom, Miss Cech-
ova acquired a remarkable command of Cech, pre
ferring to compose in that language exclusively.
Though it is uncommon for American-born chil
dren to use the Cech for literary expression, Miss
Cechova was by no means an isolated case. Miss
Rose Rosicky, who was born in Omaha and edu
cated in the schools of that city, and who has only
a book acquaintance with the native country of her
parents, never having been in Bohemia, edits with
ability the woman's page in the Omaha Kvety
AmerickS. Mrs. Ludmila Kuchar-Foxlee, a New
207

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Yorker by birth and schooling, writes excellent
Cech. Miss Sarka B. Hrbkova, a native of Iowa,
was formerly professor of Cech in the Nebraska
State University. For a while she was editor-in-
chief of a college students' monthly, the Komensky.
Alois Janda, a theologian, actor, journalist,
teacher, was more than an everyday versifier; he
was a gifted poet. Janda's first offering in book
form, Ceskym Dusim (To Cech Souls; St. Louis,
1894), proves it beyond all doubt. When maturer
years had tempered his judgment, Janda wrote
articles for the Chicago Svornost remarkable for
depth of thought and dignity of expression. He
died in penury in Chicago, in 191 1.
J. J. Krai, for years editor of the socialist daily
Spravedlnost (Justice) in Chicago, now an employee
of the Government in Washington, belongs to the
younger set of writers. His most ambitious literary
effort is a volume called Vira a Veda (Faith and
Science), 213 pp. Neither Klacel, nor Zdrubek, nor
Snajdr can claim authorship to anything equaling
Krai's Vira a Veda. The book is replete with tell
ing arguments and seemingly unanswerable facts.
Krai's other brochures are, the Life of Abraham
Lincoln, Life of Ladimir Klacel, . American Law
(the author was admitted to the bar), Darwin's
Descent of Man and the Law of Natural Selection.
John Vranek, a Catholic clergyman in Omaha,
published in Chicago a volume of poems, Na
AmerickS PudS (On American Soil), 263 pp. Among
208

THOMAS CAPEK

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
the Catholic clergy with literary tastes, Vranek
ranks high. The life which country priests are con
strained to lead, notably those in charge of congre
gations of foreigners, is sufficiently dreary and
monotonous to silence the talent of the most am
bitious ones. Father Vranek's lyric muse is too true
to be silenced.
John Stephen Broz (1865-19 19), a studious and
learned Nebraska priest (died at South Omaha) did
research work in anthropology. No scholar was
better informed on the subject of skeletal remains
of the aborigines in Nebraska than Father Broz.
On the anthropology of Indians he read papers be
fore scientific societies to which he belonged. He
was, besides, an authority on the history of Cech
immigration to Nebraska.
V. A. Jung resided in the United States a num
ber of years. He received his journalistic training
on Rosicky 's Pokrok Zapadu, some time in 1882.
For a Prague house he translated from Byron and
from Russian and Polish poets. He is the author of
unabridged English-Cech andCech-English diction
aries. None of his books were published in America.
E. St. Vraz, a traveler, author and lecturer, who
makes his home in Chicago and collaborates on the
Svornost and the almanac Amerikdn, has written
extensively on travel. He is well posted on condi
tions in South America, having lived in the tropics
for years. All his travel books have been published
in Bohemia. 209

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Who did not know or has not heard of Dr. John
Habenicht (i 840-191 7), the author of the Dejiny
Cechuv Americkych (History of the Cechs in Amer
ica) ? Countless are the anecdotes which the profes
sional humorist relates about the amiable doctor:
of his innocent stage affectations and mannerisms
and of his other notable failing, that is, an aggra
vated case of wanderlust. In his prime an amateur
actor of no mean ability, Dr. Habenicht was never
happier than when he got a chance to talk over the
histrionic triumphs in the past of himself and of his
stage cronies. The amateur stage was an obsession
with him; a close acquaintance said of him that he
knew the heroes and the villains of Shakespeare
dramas better than the master minds of medi
cine and surgery. The wanderlust led him to try, in
a professional way, Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland,
Baltimore, and towns in Texas, Nebraska, Minne
sota. Chicago, however, was his favorite stamping-
ground and to Chicago he unfailingly returned. It
was on his itineraries through the Southwest, he as
serts, that he picked up the data on Cech immigra
tion for the Dejiny. Faulty and biased, the history
is not without merit, particularly as regards the
names and biographies of old settlers. The "unbe
lievers" and the "materialists" the author excori
ates with gusto.
Although only thirty-eight years of age, John
Havlasa has a whole row of volumes to his credit.
Havlasa's predilection for the uncanny and the
210

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
occult has been pointed out by the critics. During
the war he spent a few months in an Austrian de
tention camp for presuming to criticize the Govern
ment. He completed a tour around the world in
company with his wife and had planned to lecture in
his native country on what he had seen and experi
enced in America (for several years he resided in
California), Tahiti, Japan, and elsewhere, when the
war broke out. Apropos, his wife is a granddaughter
of John Herman, a Wisconsin and Nebraska pio
neer. Havlasa came to the United States at the time
of the St. Louis Exposition (1904) and liked this
country so well that he stayed until 1914.
Ladislav Tupy1 (1872-19 18) was an ardent col
lector of old-time newspapers. From time to time
the need of an American Cech museum has been
considered ; if the project is ever put through Tupy's
invaluable collection of journals should be ac
quired for it. Another of his fancies was to keep
a record of the doings (and of misdoings as well)
of men and women prominent in the public eye.
This record Tupy kept with punctilious attention
to details in much the same way as a merchant
makes entries of sales and purchases in his ledgers.
Tupy had been associated with Bittner on the
Sotek, and at the time of his death (he died in a
train accident near Chicago) was publisher of the
Slavie.
The war has been the making of the reputations
of some men; on the other hand, it has been the
211

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
undoing of others. Dr. Frank I§ka, editor pf the
defunct Vesmir (Universe), is one of the idols
whom the war has brushed down ruthlessly from
the high pedestal of public favor.
At the outset ISka, like every Cech journalist in
the country, was whole-heartedly against Austria
and Germany. By degrees, as the war progressed,
his paper, the Vesmir, was noticed to swerve to the
side of the Austrophiles. Readers of the paper were
puzzled. Associated with Iska on the Vesmir was
an Obscure journalist, A. C. Melichar, a pre-war
arrival, who was strongly suspected of maintaining
friendly relations with Austrian officials in Wash
ington and in New York.
Dr. Iska gravely compromised his reputation,
not so much by reason of charges made against him
on January 26, 19 16, by the Providence Journal,
as that in the Vesmir he pursued a policy that was
distinctly pro-Austrian. By this Dr. Iska has put
himself in a class all by himself. Fifty-odd years of
Cech journalism in the United States does not re
cord a single instance of a paper having taken its
cue from official Austria. That the obloquy which
Dr. Iska brought on his name will react unfavor
ably on the rationalist movement, of which he was,
until the wary one of the strong men, is obvious.
The ghost of Clement Wenzel Nepomuk Lothar,
Prince of Metternich, the crafty diplomat and
statesman of the Austria of bygone days, must have
been rudely shocked when Charles Pergler was
212

Copyright by 1'irie Mac Donald

CHARLES PERGLER

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
appointed Commissioner in the United States of
the Cechoslovak Republic. Think of it, the repre
sentative in Washington of sixty-six per cent of
what was Austria before the war a commoner, an
out-and-out Cech, a diplomat schooled, not in the
Vienna Terezianum, but in the law office of a town
in the Middle West — Cresco, Iowa!
Before the war a Cech stood small chance of
getting a consular post and none whatever of a
diplomatic appointment in the service of the old
Austro-Hungarian Government. The diplomatic
and consular service was reserved for German bar
ons, Magyar counts, with now and then a Polish
szlachtic. Austro-Hungarian embassies and con
sulates everywhere were regarded by Cechs as
enemy territory. The Austro-Hungarian Consul-
General in New York was once asked what he
thought of the American Cechs. "Of all the races
of the Hapsburg monarchy we like the Cechs best.
Why? Because they never come here and they
never bother us for favors."
When the Bohemian National Alliance, which
was then in its swaddling clothes, began to issue
manifestoes to the public at large signed by men
representing various factions, certain New Yorkers
asked inquiringly, "Who is Pergler?" All that New
Yorkers knew about him was that he had written a
handbook on American civics, a brief biography of
Wendell Phillips, and that he had been on the staff
of the Chicago Spravedlnost. One day Pergler came
213

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
to New York to address a meeting of nationals.
He spoke on his usual topic, Cech emancipa
tion. After this meeting censorious New Yorkers
no longer asked, "Who is Pergler?" He has been
heard many times since, and every appearance
has strengthened the conviction that as a speaker
Pergler has no peer among American Cechs. Palda
had the reputation of being a speaker of rare gifts,
but Palda was handicapped in that he spoke in
his mother tongue only, while Pergler is equally at
home in both English and Cech.
Like Palda and other American Cechs who ac
quired prominence he is a self-made man. He was
eight years old when his parents emigrated to the
United States. In Chicago he graduated from the
public schools. A year or two later his widowed
mother returned from Chicago to Bohemia with
the family. In Prague Pergler clerked in a store for
a while. Even as a youth not yet out of his teens he
took a keen interest in public affairs, writing items
for party organs, and on occasions delivering fervid
speeches at meetings of the younger set of the So
cial Democratic Party. At twenty-three we find
Pergler back in Chicago once more, doing respon
sible work on the daily Spravedlnost. From journal
ism to law was the next step in his career. He was
a country lawyer in Iowa when he was drafted for
the work of the Bohemian National Alliance.'
The lectures and talks he has delivered before
chambers of commerce, economic leagues, bar asso-
214

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
ciations, college clubs, legislative bodies, and before
men of affairs generally, contributed in no small
degree to a clearer understanding by the thinking
American people of the past history and future as
pirations of the reborn Cechoslovak State.
In addition to all his absorbing duties he found
time to write virile articles for magazines and book
lets on Cechoslovak subjects. The Heart of Europe
and the Czechoslovak State are his best publications.
Vojta Benes, since 191 6 general secretary of the
Bohemian National Alliance, is by profession a
school-teacher. Before the war the Matice Associa
tion invited him to the United States, first, to re
form the Cech language schools, and secondly, to
provide these schools with up-to-date textbooks.
As a result of his sojourn here a Prague publishing
house printed in 1912, "for the Patrons of the Lib
eral School in New York," Ceska Citanka (Cech
Reader, 430 pp.) "for the use of Cech-Slavic Youth
in America." Later two more readers were brought
out by Benes. Returning to the United States in
the late summer of 1915, Benes at once joined in the
work of political emancipation of his nationals. In
1916 the Bohemian National Alliance appointed
him its organizer and general secretary in place of
Joseph Tvrzicky, who was transferred by the
Alliance to the Publicity Bureau. The Readers are
not Benes's only books; he has set down his war
impressions in several brochures.
As a young man Dr. Jaroslav F. Smetanka, editor
215

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
of the Czechoslovak Review, thought he wanted to
be a minister of the gospel, and so, upon graduation
from a gymnasium in Bohemia, he matriculated in
the Union Theological Seminary in New York.
The seminary course finished, Smetanka began to
take more than a layman's interest in Blackstone's
Commentaries. The upshot of it Was that, instead
of putting on the cloth, he entered a college out
West and took up the study of the law in earnest,
securing in the end a doctor's degree. When the
world war started, Smetanka had a well-established
law office in Chicago. In the winter of 191 7 the
Bohemian National Alliance decided to publish a
monthly in English. The executive of the Alliance
offered the post of editor to Smetanka, who ac
cepted, and closing his law office, he became hence
forth a journalist. A man of broad views, Smetanka
edits the Czechoslovak Review ably and conserva
tively. Recently the Czechoslovak Government
named him Consul in Chicago. Francis Kopecky,
Consul General in New York, was the first con
sular appointee to this country.
Informed opinion is that J. E. S. Vojan, Joseph
Tvrzicky, Karel HOrky, and F. J. Kutak, stand
at the head of the journalistic profession.
Jaroslav E. Salaba Vojan, former editor of the
Prague Nova Ceska Revue, is a writer of subtle in
tellect and of pronounced artistic tastes. In a news
paper polemic he is distinguished by that urbanity
and dignity which men like Pastor misinterpreted
216

DR. J. F. SMETANKA
DR. J. E. S. VOJAN JOSEPH TVRZICKY

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
as weakness or as fear of an adversary. Vojan's
Cesko- Americke Epistoly (Cech- American Epistles;
Chicago, 191 1) is an illuminative review of the
so-called national life in America, of its bright
and dark sides. Though all the deductions in the
Epistles are not to be unquestioningly accepted,
the author's courage and sincerity are worthy of
praise. Vojan's articles written in Cech are noted
for faultless phrasing and literary finish.
Joseph Tvrzicky, of the Czechoslovak Informa
tion Bureau in Washington, rendered a peculiarly
helpful service in the crystallization of public opin
ion in the first years of the war. Over his colleagues
Tvrzicky has the advantage that he knows person
ally many of the men prominent in literature and
politics in Bohemia. In Prague he had been a poten
tial force in the club life of academic youth.
From Karel Horky, who landed in the fall of
191 6, the public expected much and not without
reason, for the reputation of a capable writer pre
ceded Horky from the other side. Ted" anebo Nikdy
(Now or Never), a brochure on Bohemia's aspi
rations, made Horky's name a by-word in every
household. Soon after his arrival, Horky started a
weekly in New York, the Podebradka. This journal
might have prospered, if the publisher (Horky) had
been half as clever a business man as the editor
(Horky) was. On the spur of the moment he rushed
out a pamphlet, which on the face of it was a
defense of his father-in-law, Dyrich, a disavowed
217

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
leader of the Cechoslovak troops in Russia; in real
ity the pamphlet turned out to be a vitriolic attack
on the men who were directing in foreign countries
Bohemia's propaganda for independence. For good
measure the pamphleteerslapped back at American
Cechs. Horky's fall, as a result of the pamphlet,
was as sudden as had been rapid his rise in public
favor. Charles Dickens, it is said, never ceased re
gretting the authorship of the American Notes. The
time will come — if it is not already at hand —
when impressionist Horky will repent having pub
lished his pamphlet, Dyrich' s Nation and Benes'
Public (52 pp., New York, 1917).
F. J. Kutak is a well- poised newspaperman who
has a way of going straight into the essentials of a
topic. His articles are relished by readers who ap
preciate the value of clarity, order, and arrange
ment. Kutak is editor of the Organ Bratrstva,
C.S.P.S. He conducted the Rozhledy (Review), an
illustrated weekly which he established in 1905
in Chicago.
If fiction writing assured to authors not wealth,
but sufficiency, J. R. Psenka, editor of the Chicago
Svornost, and author of Washington Zdvora and
other romances from the life of American Cechs,
would have in all probability given up journalism
for fiction writing. Psenka served in Africa in the
French Foreign Legion and in one of his stories he
describes his adventures as a legionary.
Journalists who are looked up to are: Hynek
218

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE
Dostal, of the St. Louis Hlas, conceded to be the
ablest of the Catholic laymen; Vaclav J. Petrzelka,
of the Svornost; Joseph Martinek, of the Americke
Delnicke Listy in Cleveland; F. Holecek, editor-in-
chief, and his associate, A. J. Havranek, of the
Chicago Denni Hlasatel; Otakar Charvat, of the
Omaha Pokrok Zapadu; Stanislav Serpan, editor
oi the Bratrsky Vestnik (Fraternal Bulletin) ; Joseph
J. Novy of the New Yorske Listy and B. Gregr of
the Hlas Lidu. The latter two are New Yorkers.
There are two veteran journalists in Texas: Joseph
Bunata, a free-lance contributor to the liberal
press, and L. W. Dongres (Just A. Man). J. J. Kar-
nik of New York, who is interested in Cech lan
guage schools, wields a trenchant pen.
A large and steadily increasing group of books
comprises literature of the useful kind: Pocket Dic
tionaries, English Instructors, Interpreters, Read
ers, Spellers, Almanacs, Memorial Books (pub
lished chiefly by fraternal organizations to record
their anniversaries), Cook Books, Books of Toasts,
Guides in Household Economy, Farmer's Guides,
Manuals of Felicitations, Patriotic and Folk Songs,
Handbooks of Declamations for Sociables, Hand
books of Speeches and Ceremonials for the use
of Clubs and Fraternal Societies, Handbooks of
Funeral Addresses for use at non-church burials
(by F. B. Zdrubek, J. Kalda, B. Pavlikova), and
so forth.
There are no less than six manuals on American
219

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
civics discussing American judicature, immigra
tion, and naturalization laws. They are by Charles
Jonas, J. J. Krai, Charles Pergler, Vladimir A.
Geringer, J. F. Smetanka, Louis Pacak. The man
ual by Pacak is the newest and most comprehen
sive of all.
The output in prose and verse as a rule does not
get beyond the newspapers, but there are, of course,
a few exceptions. The published collection, in addi
tion to the books enumerated in the foregoing, in
clude: F. J. Skaloud, Bordinkdri (Boarders, a bit
of romance from the life of Chicago Cechs) ; J. A.
Trojan, V boji za ideal (Battling for an Ideal);
Otakar Charvat, Kresby a Povidky (Portraits and
Tales); F. Stankova-Bujarkovi, Po stopdch ceskS
krve (On the Trail of Cech Descendants, a Civil
War narrative); Jiri Marin,. Pod Mrakem (Beneath
Dark Clouds) ; Joseph Mach, Na obou polokoulich
(In Both Hemispheres).
This chapter would be incomplete without men
tioning writers of Cech birth or extraction who seek
to express themselves in both languages or who
write in English only.
Anna V. Capek: Bibliography. Frances Gregor: History, transla-
Thomas Capek: Bibliography, tions of fiction.
history, politics. Jeffrey D. Hrbek: Poetry.
Thomas Capek, Jr.: Journalism. Sarka B. Hrbkova: Literature.
Jaroslav Cisaf : Politics, trans- Ale§ HrdliSka: Ethnography, an-
lations of poetry. thropology.
Anthony M. Dignowity: Mem- J.R.Jicinsky:Sokolbodyculture.
oirs. Charles Jonas': Dictionaries,
F. Francl: Grammar. grammars.
220

CLARA VOSTROVSKY WINLOW
Author of " Our Little Czechoslovak Cousin"
" The Story of the Slav Races," etc.

JOURNALISM AND LITERATURE

R. J. Kerner: Bibliography.
Otto Kotouc: Translations of
poetry.
J. J. Krai: Folk-music, biogra
phy, translations of fiction,
economics, grammars.
Antonie Krejsa: Translations of
fiction.
L. Zelenka Lerando: Music.
Beatrice M. Mekota: Transla
tions of fiction.
J. V. Nigrin: Grammars.
Charles Pergler: Politics, his
tory, economics.
Godfrey R. Pisek: Medicine.
Vincent Pisek: Translations of
folk-songs.
E. F. Prantner: Politics, eco
nomics.
Charles Recht: Translations of
poetry, drama.

Rose Rosicky: Translations of
fiction.
B. Simek: Politics.
Joseph Sinkmajer: Ecclesiastical
history.
Jaroslav F. Smeta'nka: Politics,
journalism.
Anthony M. Soukup: Diction
aries, language manuals.
Edward O. Tabor: Political econ
omy.
Ladislav Urban : Music.
J. E. S. Vojan: Art, music.
Clara V. Winlow: Child study,
juvenile fiction, history.
F. B. Zdrubek: Grammars, dic
tionaries.
Jaroslav J. Zmrhal: Grammars,
civics.

That American Cechs of the younger generation
have not, heretofore, taken a more general interest
in English Bohemica is both surprising and regret
table. They have shown their mettle in commer
cial and professional pursuits — why the aloofness
from literature? 1
1 For a complete list of English Bohemica, see Thomas Capek and
AnnaV. Capek: Bohemian (Cech) Bibliography. 256 pp. Illustrated.
Fleming H. Revell Company. New York, 1918.

CHAPTER XV
MUSICIANS, ARTISTS, VISITORS FROM ABROAD
A BRASS band or a symphony orchestra with
out a Cech is unthinkable. At Fortress Mon
roe, at Presidio, at West Point, Annapolis, the
Brooklyn Navy Yard, in the Philippines, Hawaii,
Porto Rico, at Western army posts, where there is a
brass band a Cech musician is certain to be around.
Joseph Buchar, veteran of the Civil, Indian, and
Spanish-American Wars, was bandmaster at the
Academy at West Point. William Emanuel Bo-
leska (Bolech) was bandmaster at the Brooklyn
Navy Yard. He had served with the Navy since
1874. During the Civil War he was bandmaster of
the Sixth Regiment of United States Infantry.
Bandmaster Vondracek (Von Drack), from New
York, wielded the baton for a quater of a century
at various army posts. Hanzi Lochner, also a New
Yorker, was bandmaster aboard a man-of-war
stationed off Guam. Jaroslav Jicha conducts on the
battleship South Carolina; F. Karasek, at the
Arsenal in Columbus, Ohio; Jacob Schmidt was,
during the war, bandmaster at Camp Cody, New
Mexico. V. F. Safranek, formerly at Fort Snelling,
is conductor at Fort Kamehameha, Hawaii. Before
that he was attached to a post in the Philippines.
M. Torovsky^ leads a band at Annapolis. Major
222

MUSIC
Vincent F. Faltis, now an American citizen and res
ident of New York, was a bandmaster in Cairo.
He wears a number of British, Egyptian, Bulgarian,
and German ribbons. "Kryl and his Band" is an
organization of recognized merit in the Middle
West. The Mudra and Zamecnik bands of Cleve
land were in their day unrivalled in Ohio.
If it were possible to enumerate all the musicians
who are dependent wholly or partly on income de
rived from music at dances, funerals, and amateur
theatricals, one would get a formidable total. At
one time (1903) there were eleven Cechs in the
Theodore Thomas Orchestra.
When in 1883 a certain fledgling of the Prague
Conservatory of Music was leaving the Cech capi
tal for a concert tour to the United States, John
Neruda memorialized the event by one of his in
imitable feuilletons in the Prague Ndrodni Listy,
so unusual was the occurrence, so venturesome
appeared the project! Who could count all the
pupils and graduates of that conservatory now con
nected with the various musical organizations, or
earning their living as teachers?
Instances of musical families are not uncommon.
Take the Ondriceks. The founder of the family re
nown was Francis Ondricek, violinist, who visited
the United States in 1895. He went back, but four
of his kinsfolk came here to live. Emanuel has a
music school in Boston; Charles, who had been a
member of the Kneisel Quartet, is established in
223

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Toronto. One sister, a violinist, is married to Karel
Leitner, piano teacher in New York; the other sis
ter, a piano teacher, is the wife of Bedrich VaSka,
a cellist with the Eastman Quintet in Rochester.
Vaska is said to have organized the Sevcik Quartet,
an organization well known in Europe. The On-
driceks have inherited their gift from their father,
whom old Prague remembers as an inveterate
fiddler. The Ersts, of Chicago, grandfather, father, and
son, three generations of musicians, were all grad
uates of the Prague Conservatory of Music: the
grandfather, Stephen Erst, in 1846 as clarionet-
ist; the father, Stephen Erst second, as vocalist in
1883; the son, Stephen Erst third, in 1910 as pian
ist. Stephen Erst second is choirmaster in a prom
inent church in his home city.
How many musical families in the United States
can equal the record of the Hrubys of Cleveland?
Local No. 4, American Federation of Musicians, has
enrolled twelve Hrubys as members. Lagging some
what behind the Hrubys in numbers, yet a force to
be reckoned with, is the Zamecnik clan of the same
city: John Zamecnik (honorary), John S. Zamec
nik, Joseph Zamecnik (honorary), Joseph E. Zamec
nik, Joseph J. Zamecnik. The directory of member
ship of Local No. 4 contains 179 Cech names.1
Bohumir Kryl of Chicago, a popular cornetist,
has two daughters who are accomplished musicians.
1 American Federation of Musicians, Local No. 4, Cleveland, p. 78.
224

MUSICIANS
Josy Kryl, a pupil of Ysaye, is a violin virtuoso;
Marie Kryl has won recognition as a pianist. Joseph
Kryl, Bohumir's brother, plays the French horn
with the Chicago Philharmonic Society.
Francis Ondricek and Jan Kubelik lead as violin
ists. Kubelik's first visit occurred in 1901. One
year after that Jaroslav Kocian came. "Before my
time," writes J. H. Chapek, violin teacher in Chi
cago, "no Cech violinist had given concerts in this
country except Wenzel Kopta. In 1866 Kopta was
soloist with the Theodore Thomas Orchestra and
the New York Philharmonic Society. The following
year he traveled with Max Strakosch. He married
Flora Pauline Wilson of Philadelphia, returning
thereupon to his native country. In Prague Kopta
and I belonged to the same musical organization
and Antonin Dvorak often came to hear us play.
If my memory serves me right, Joseph Kaspar of
Washington, D.C., toured the country in 1879-80."
Many years ago Kopta removed with his family
from Bohemia to southern California and he died
in the coast State in 191 6. His wife has translated
a volume of Cech poems into English.
The largest colony of artists is of course found in
New York.
Wenzel A. Raboch, in former years organist in
the Trinity Church, is frequently heard at organ
recitals, and critics have declared that on the or
gan, his favorite instrument, Raboch has not many
equals. 225

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Joseph J. Kovafik, of the New York Philhar
monic Society, was pronounced by Safonov, the
Russian conductor, one of the best viola players
in the country. An intimate friend of Dvorak, — it
was at Spillville, Iowa, Kovafik's birthplace, that
the great composer put the finishing touches to
the "New World Symphony, " — Kovafik is thor
oughly familiar with Cech music. In the Prague
Conservatory, he made the personal acquaintance
of many prominent Cech composers.
There is in the metropolis, Joseph Stransky, con
ductor of the Philharmonic Society of New York.
Rudolf Friml, pianist and composer, began his
career as Kubelik's accompanist. Friml now devotes
himself entirely to composition and in his light
creations he has met both with professional and
financial success. The musical comedies "Fire
fly," "High Jinks," " I Love You," and others, have
attained wide popularity, notably in New York.
Victor Kolaf , violinist, who on occasions con
ducted the Damrosch Symphony Orchestra, aims
higher as a composer of music than mere commer
cial profit. He writes serious music, and those who
know this striving young musician predict he will
make a mark for himself. His better known com
positions are: " Lyric Suite," "Hiawatha," " Indian
Scherzo," "Fairy Tale," "Americana," and "Sym
phony D-dur." Kolar introduced himself to musi
cal America some dozen years ago, when he came
over with the "Cech Trio" (Kola?, violin, Reiser,
226

VACLAV KOPTA, violinist

J. J. KOVARIK, viola

Hp»"

^B 1

1 1 1 Bl

i i ^MKm v?

1

B|
¦. j^H
¦ngp^ A
 IM
J. H. CAPEK, violinist
V. A. RABOCH, organist
MUSICIANS
violoncello, Volavy, piano). The story is that Jan
Kubelik "discovered" Kolaf in Budapest.
Alois Reiser (Kolaf 's colleague from Prague),
won in 19 1 8 the Elizabeth Coolidge (Berkshire
String Quartet) second prize in composition.
John Mokrejs, a piano teacher, has composed a
number of piano suites. He is the author of Les
sons in Harmony and Lessons in Rhythm.
Ladislav Urban, composer, wrote the booklet,
Music in Bohemia.
Ludvik Schwab, teacher and composer, came to
New York as Kubelik's accompanist.
Margaret Volavy, pianist, teacher in the Volpe
School of Music was schooled in Vienna, while
Marie Mikova received her training in Paris.
Emil J. Polak, composer and accompanist, has a
clientele largely among the Metropolitan 'Opera
singers. Ludmila Vojackovi-Wetche, pianist, is a gradu
ate of the Prague Conservatory ; so is Joseph Franzl,
instructor on the French horn in the Institute of
Musical Art, and Anna Fuka-Pangrac, organist.
Last but not least, Otakar Bartik is master of
ballet in the Metropolitan Opera.
A composer of unquestioned ability was the late
Otakar Novaeek, who played first violin with the
Boston Symphony Orchestra, later with the New
York Symphony Orchestra. He died in New York
in 1900.
Music teachers, as may be inferred, are most
227

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
numerous in cities populated by their nationals.
The Directory of Bohemian Merchants and Traders
of Chicago contains the cards of twenty-two con
servatories and nineteen bandmasters. However,
enterprising talents are found everywhere.
Pupils of the Prague Conservatory who have
helped to make Cech music better known are:
Charles Rychlik, John S. Zamecnik, and Edward
Krejsa, of Cleveland. All three have studied under
Dvorak and all three compose.
Joseph Cadek is master of a conservatory of
music in Chattanooga. He gave a violin recital in
the White House during McKinley's administra
tion. On this occasion for the first time Cech music
was heard in the official residence of the Presidents.
Marie Herites-Kohn teaches the violin in the Agri
cultural and Mechanical College at Stillwater, Ok
lahoma; August Molzer is head of a school of
music at Lincoln, Nebraska; J. Gerald Mraz, au
thor of Systematized Intervals, a work on violin
technic, is the founder of the Mraz Violin School in
Oklahoma City; Vratislav Mudroch is with the
Mudroch School of Music in Nashville. The Malek
Music School in Grand Rapids, Michigan, takes its
name from Otakar Malek, pianist, formerly assist
ant conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic Society.
Though born in Egypt, Emil Straka has not lost
through the accident of his birth the inherited bent
of his race for music. Straka's music school is in
St. Paul. Before he settled permanently in America,
228

MUSICIANS
L. Zelenka Lerando was concert harpist to the
Duke of Devonshire and later at the court of Det-
mold, Lippe. He toured America in 1911-15.
A Cech by birth (on his father's side) was Joseph
Mischka, for more than half a century a teacher of
music in Buffalo. Born in 1826, Mischka settled in
that city with his parents in 1853. John Borecky,
who knew Mischka personally, counts him as a
fellow countryman, spelling his name Myska. He
died in Buffalo in 1913.
Born in the same year as Mischka and like him a
teacher among the Germans was Hans Balatka.
In Milwaukee Balatka achieved wide renown as
author, conductor, and musical critic (writing for
the Illinois Staatszeitung) . In former years he was
happy to get into touch with his nationals. He did
not deny his Cech birth ; environment, he declared,
had made him a German.1
A genius in his own way was John Reindl, who
came to New York in 1869, with Slavjansky's Rus
sian Concert Company. In Prague Reindl sang in'
the Russian Cathedral with the wife of Antonin
Dvorak. For a time he was soloist in the Russian
Cathedral in San Francisco and while in that city
he took up the study of Chinese, and friends claim
he was the only Cech who could carry on a conver
sation in that language. Reindl died in New York
in 1906 in poverty.
Singers almost forgotten by the present genera-
1 The Pokrok Zdpadu, April 25, 1899. Balatka's obituary.
229

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
tion are Anna Drazdil (Drasdil) and Clementine
KalaS. Anna Drazdil, contralto, was the pioneer song
bird to appear in the United States. Her greatest
success is recorded from Philadelphia, where she
sang in the Academy of Music, September 20-27,
1876, with Theodore Thomas. To Peter Capek, a
Milwaukee musician, she confided that she was
born in Budejovice and that she first visited the
United States in 1872, arriving from London. In
the early eighties she married a New York mer
chant after which she retired from the concert
stage.1 Clementine KalaS, a contralto and composer "of
rare literary attainments and esthetic culture,"
belonged to Colonel Mapleson's operatic ensemble.
She died in Brazil while on a concert tour, in June,
1889, sincerely mourned by the literary and artistic
set in Prague. Vrchlicky wrote a poem in her mem
ory, "E Morta." The Clementine Kalas founda
tion, in the Cech Academy of Sciences and Arts,
awards prizes for the best compositions.
On "Bohemian Day," August 12, 1893, at the
Chicago Columbian Exposition, two masters of
music conducted their own compositions; one was
Antonin Dvorak, the other Vojtech I. Hlavac of
Petrograd. Hlavac returned to Russia, the country
of his adoption, where he died a few years ago. To
the American musical public Antonin Dvorak,
1 The Pokrok Zdpadu, October 27, 1875.
230

ANNA DRAZDIL

FRANCES R. JANAUSCHEK

DRAMATIC ARTISTS
composer of the "New World Symphony," re
quires no introduction. He came to New York in
1892, to take charge of the National Conservatory
of Music, founded by Jeannette Thurber, remain
ing until 1895.
Ernestine Schumann-Heink is not a Cech, though
born in Libeii, near Prague; the same is true of the
late Gustav Mahler, whose affiliations had been
with the Germans of Bohemia, not with the Cechs.
Frances Janauschek (1830-1906) was a Cech,
notwithstanding the fact that she had never acted
on the Bohemian stage, having played first in Ger
man and later, when she mastered English, in that
language. The author had many interesting talks
with Madame Janauschek in 1899 and corre
sponded with her. She frankly admitted to him that
her people had been of pure Cech stock. But her
dramatic training was German, as indeed Prague at
the time of her girlhood had the veneer of a German
city. Upon one visit, when Madame Janauschek
was already gravely ill, she surprised the author by
saying the Lord's Prayer (Pater Noster) in fluent
Cech, though, as she remarked, she had lived the
greater part of half a century outside her native
country. In the national tongue the name is spelled
Janousek. Joseph Smaha, regisseur of the National Theater
in Prague, gave a number of readings and dramatic
performances (with the support of amateurs) in the
larger Cech communities, notably in Chicago, the
231

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
year of the Columbian Exposition. The sojourn
of this noted actor was productive of much good;
the amateur enthusiasts (no community, however
diminutive, is without these) had an opportunity
to study at close range Smaha's histrionic art and,
incidentally, to better their own.
An event of unusual importance was the arrival
in 1893 °f Ludvik's Theatrical Company from
Bohemia. Heretofore the burden of producing plays
in the Cech language rested entirely on the shoul
ders of the much-worked amateur clubs. Ludvik
came over with an ensemble of twenty-two men and
women and after he had toured pretty thoroughly
all Cech America, amid the acclaim of people, most
of whom had not seen a play acted in their mother
tongue by professional actors in years, if ever, Lud
vik settled in Chicago, where his company has
remained ever since. It is the only Cech dramatic
organization of professionals in the United States.
In 1898 Ludvik took his actors on a trip to Bo
hemia and if the press agent's accounts can be
trusted, they captured theater-goers with their
repertoire of American plays translated. l
In the winter of 1898 there arrived in New York
the Cech Humoristic Troupe consisting of Henry
Kovaf, Joseph Wanderer, Rudolph Prusa, Engel-
berta Heisler, Rose Breicha. They toured the larger
1 1893-1003. Memorial of Ludvik's Theatrical Company, published
on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of a Cech playhouse in
Chicago. Illustrated. 52 pp. 232

VISITING MUSICIANS
settlements with success. The Cech Singing Quar
tet (Mikolas, Cerny, Novak, Svojsik) paid a pro
fessional visit to their American nationals in 1902.
Two American actresses of Cech descent have
been flatteringly noticed by dramatic critics:
Blanche Yurka of New York and Adelaide Novak
of Chicago. Blanche Yurka's high talent was recog
nized in "Daybreak," in which play she achieved
conspicuous success. There is still another Novak,
namely Jane, a well-known photoplay star.
Four or five of the visiting musical artists bear
European reputations: Jan Kubelik, violin virtu
oso, Emmy Destinn, prima donna of the Metropoli
tan Opera in New York, Carl Burian, tenor, who
will be remembered by the older patrons of the
Metropolitan Opera. Newspapers have put down
Leo Slezak as a Bohemian tenor, though he pro
fessed to be " Internazional."
One season (191 5) the roster of the Metropolitan
Opera in New York contained the name of Erna
Zarskd, soprano.
Bogea Oumiroff, baritone, at present living in
Paris, visited the United States three times. During
the winter season of 1903, Oumiroff, accompanied
on the piano by Rudolph Prusa of New York, sang ,
Cech and Slovak folk songs in the White House be
fore President Roosevelt. "This appearance in the
White House I consider one of the artistic triumphs
of my life," declared Oumiroff. Cech folk songs, by
the way, were again heard in the White House; this
233

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
time they were sung by Louise Llewellyn, an Amer
ican soprano, whose interpretation of them, critics
agreed, was exceptionally felicitous.
Rose Matura, a dramatic and operatic artist of
the National Theater in Prague, gave a number of
recitals here in 1903. Later two Prague singers,
W. Florjansky (accompanied on the piano by
Francis Veselsky) and Bohumil Ptak toured the
country. Such as they were, their artistic successes
were confined to audiences of nationals.
The high position of Cech graphic art is ably sus
tained in the United States by three names, Preis
sig, Ruzicka, Vondrous.
Rudolph Ruzicka of New York is credited as
being without peer among wood engravers plying
the art in America. He is president of the Czecho
slovak Arts Club in New York.
J. C. Vondrous, etcher, also a New Yorker, be
longs to the Anglo-American school, a classifica
tion of which he may well be proud.
No collection of American war posters can be
complete or representative without the colored
posters which Vojta Preissig designed for the Bo
hemian National Alliance. Preissig's posters are
animated, masterful. The artist, full of patriotic
wrath, is seen inflicting unsparing chastisement on
Austria-Hungary, "the embodiment of centuries-
old crime against the liberty of mankind." Preissig
is professor in the Wentworth Institute in Boston.
Albin Polasek and Joseph Mario Korbel are the
234

ILLUSTRATORS AND PAINTERS
two foremost sculptors of Cech birth in America.
Polasek is professor in the Chicago Art Institute.
Korbel is a New Yorker with a growing patronage
among the wealthy.
Illustrators of Cech birth or extraction are many.
A pioneer illustrator is Emanuel V. Nadherny, for
more than twenty-five years member of the art
staff on the New York Herald. Vincent A. Svoboda
of New York specializes in poster drawing; some of
his genres, however, have been genuinely admired.
Harrison Fisher inherited his talent from his Cech
father. The elder Fisher, who died in California,
was a painter though not as successful as his son.
Joseph Mrazek of New York is the leading repre
sentative in the United States of Cech peasant art.
Jan Matulka, also a resident of New York, won the
Joseph Pulitzer prize in the Academy of Design.
Next to New York Chicago has the largest com
munity of artists. A veteran among these is Marie
Koupal-Lusk, painter. She immigrated with her
parents in 1867 and studied in New York and Paris.
A. Sterba, painter, and Albin Polasek, sculptor,
teach in the Chicago Art Institute. Some of the
other painters, designers, illustrators, and sculptors
are, Rudolf F. Ingerle, Thomas F. Ouska, Oldfich
Farsky, August Petrtyl, Rudolf Bohunek, A. Lukas,
Jarka Kosar.
Of the visiting artists Alfons M. Mucha is by far
the most widely known. While in America Mucha
received a commission from Charles R. Crane, of
235

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Chicago and New York, to paint a cycle of alle
gories symbolical of the evolution of the Slav.
When completed, the canvases are to be presented
by Crane to the municipality of Prague.
Bohuslav Kroupa, illustrator, traveler, author,
lecturer, knew the Northwest and the American
cowboy and Indian as intimately as any native.
He illustrated the publication, From Ocean to
Ocean; Sanford Fleming's Expedition through Can
ada in 1872. His experiences of travel and of life
among the Indians he stored in an English pub
lication, An Artist's Tour in North and Central
America and the Sandwich Islands. (London, 1890.)
The Prague illustrated papers printed many of his
sketches. That America. is an object of ever-increasing con
cern to the people on the other side is apparent
from the long list of transatlantic visitors — publi
cists, artists, business men.
The earliest known guests were the Reverend
Hefman z Tardy and the Reverend L. B. Kaspar
who came in 1869 in the interest of the Cech Re
formed (evangelical) Church. The Reverend Kas
par described the journey in a Report of Pilgrimage
undertaken to America i86q.
Joseph V. Sladek, one of Bohemia's major poets,
a Shakespearean scholar, a translator of Bret Harte,
Henry W. Longfellow, Frank Richard Stockton,
Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Lord Byron, Robert
Burns, S. T. Coleridge, spent a few months in the
236

CHARLES J. VOPICKA, OF CHICAGO
United States Minister to Rumania

VISITORS FROM ABROAD
United States (1869-70), to the enduring profit of
his country's literature.
Another stranger was Dr. Joseph Stolba, whose
volume, Beyond the Ocean, published upon his re
turn in 1873, long retained primacy among books
on American travel. Like all Stolba's travelogues,
Beyond the Ocean is written in a light, rather humor
ous vein, making no attempt at deeper research.
The Chicago World's Fair (1893) brought hither
a number of travelers, two authors of prominence
among them: Francis Herites and Joseph Korensky.
The latter-named set out from Chicago, with his
friend and traveling companion (Reznicek), on a
tour around the world, which he described in two
large volumes, Travels around the World in 1893-04.
Herites's study of American conditions was favor
ably commended at the time for its fairness and
accuracy. Dr. Emil Holub delivered a series of lectures on
his African travel and discoveries before ethno
graphic and geographic societies in 1894.
An exceptional interest attached to the visit in
1902 of Thomas G. Masaryk, then the leader of the
realist party in Bohemia. Five years later Masaryk
returned. He spoke on political, national, economic,
and philosophic topics. Incidentally Masaryk lec
tured at the University of Chicago on the "History
of a Small Nation."
The Louisiana Purchase Exposition and the
Inter-Parliamentary Congress, held in St. Louis
237

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
(1904) were attended by engineers, manufacturers,
and men of affairs generally. George Stibral, Su
perintendent of the Art and Industrial School in
Prague, jointly with Architect John Kotera, had
charge of the arrangement of the technical part of
the Austrian section of the exposition.
President Masaryk is not the only one who knows
America from close-at-hand study; three ministers
of his first cabinet — Vaclav J. Klofac, Minister of
National Defense, the late General Milan R. Ste-
fanik, Minister of War, Dr. Francis Soukup, Min
ister of Justice, have traveled here more or less ex
tensively — while a fourth (Gustav Haberman,
Minister of Education) lived in the United States
long enough to have been entitled to citizenship.
None appeared to be more profoundly impressed
with the industrial potentialities of the New World
than Dr. Soukup. His volume, America; a Series of
Pictures from American Life, which he published
in 1912, stamps the author as a wide-awake, astute
observer, though by no means a flatterer. To Dr.
Soukup, who is a social democrat and who sat as
deputy in the old Austrian Parliament, was ac
corded the privilege of speaking before the House
of Representatives in Washington.
Gustav Haberman toiled in New York and in
Chicago on socialistic newspapers. He made three
journeys to America, in 1889, 1892, 1913, as one
learns from his volume, From my Life, published
in 1914. 238

VISITORS FROM ABROAD
Stefanik traveled across the continent for the
first time in 19 10 bound for Tahiti for the purpose
of making astronomical observations on that island.
During the war Stefanik twice revisited America.
The Cech Sokol Union paid to the American
Sokols a long-deferred visit in 1909. The "Sokol
Excursion to America," as the Sokol annalists call
it, was led by Dr. Joseph Scheiner, the president of
the organization. At least three of the excursionists
set down in print their observations. Dr. Scheiner's
book is entitled, Sokol Excursion to America in iqoq.
At the instance of the Cech Press Bureau in Chi
cago, Count Liitzow in the winter of 191 2 delivered
lectures in American universities and colleges on
the "Bohemian Question." His subjective ideas
Count Liitzow embodied in a pamphlet, written in
German, Amerikanische Eindrucke.
Other visitors who wrote their impressions of
America were: Cenek Kricka, architect, lately
elected to the National Assembly (published his
notes in the Prazskd Lidovd Revue, 1905-06), and
J. F. Votruba, writer on economical subjects. Dr.
George Guth, John Havlasa and F. Sokol Tuma
were commissioned by Prague papers to "write up "
the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. Havlasa found
California, to which he repaired, so congenial that
he prolonged his stay for years. The American
rationalists asked Dr. Theodore Bartosek (1907)
and Charles Pelant (1908), both active in the ra
tionalist movement in Bohemia, to lecture to them.
239

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
A delegation of the Prague Chamber of Com
merce came in 1912 to repay a visit that had been
previously made by the Boston Chamber of Com
merce. Not only merchants, but scientists joined
the delegation.
Dr. Charles Veleminsky made a fruitful study of-
the American school system in 191 2. Dr. Vele
minsky, who holds a responsible position in the
Ministry of Education, purposes introducing in the
Czechoslovak Republic many of the school features
thought to be distinctively American.

CHAPTER XVI
THE LANGUAGE SCHOOLS: TEACHING OF CECH
THE Slovanski Lipa Society in Milwaukee
opened a Cech language school June 22, 1862.1
Joseph W. Sykora, in a letter from Cleveland to<
the Slavie, announces that July 24, 1864, after the/
saying of the mass, instruction to children would/
be given in spelling, reading, and arithmetic, in the
schoolrooms of the St. Joseph Church.2
The first language school in Chicago was organ
ized in the fall of 1864. " Instruction in the mother
tongue will be conducted every Saturday from
10 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Sundays from 1 p.m., for adults
in the Hall of the Slovanska Lipa."
New York's first school dates from September
24, 1865, and we are told that thirty-nine children
were in attendance at the opening.3
In 1881 the Slovan Americky began agitating the
question of founding a Cech College somewhere in
the Middle West, in or near some larger settlement.
A society for that purpose was incorporated in John
son County, Iowa, and the Slovan Americky, the
originator of the idea, undertook to raise a founda
tion fund. But the Slavie — because the idea had
not emanated from the editor of that paper, the
1 The Slavie, June 18, 1862.
2 Ibid., July 14, 1864. 3 Ibid., May 22, 1867.
24I

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Slovan Americky charged — while not openly hos
tile to the scheme, expressed grave doubts concern
ing its feasibility. " Our opinion is that we can ven
ture into it with a fair hope of success," commented
the Slavie, "if we raise $20,000 to start with. If
American Cechs want the college, they will no doubt
subscribe this sum." The $20,000 endowment fund
was not subscribed, and the college was notfounded.
At the instance of the American (Congregational)
Home Missionary Society, Oberlin College organ
ized in 1885 a Theological Seminary in connection
with its Slavic Department. Through the Anne
WalwOrth bequest of 1905, Oberlin College came
into possession of a fund, the income of which is
sufficient to provide for the instruction and main
tenance of about ten students.1 Professor Louis
Francis Minkovsky is chairman of the faculty com
mittee of the Slavic Department.2 The Reverend J.
Prucha of Cleveland is certain that of all American
higher institutions of learning Oberlin College was
the first to introduce in its curriculum the study of
Cech. "Our mother tongue has been taught in this
school for more than five years," he wrote in 1894.3
At Lisle (Du Page County, Illinois), the Bene
dictines have established what the college sylla
bus describes as the only higher Cech-Slavic educa-
1 The Bulletin of Oberlin College, March 10, 1916, p. 6.
2 The establishment of the Slavic Department was due to the un
tiring efforts of the Reverend H. A. Schauffler.
3 Communication by the Reverend J. Prucha, the Pokrok Zdpadu,
February 7, 1894. 242

ST. PROKOP COLLEGE, LISLE, ILLINOIS

TEACHING OF CECH LANGUAGE
tional institution in America. This college was
opened in 1887, in Chicago, but was removed in
1901 to Lisle, where a more suitable building had
been erected for its needs.1 The founders dedicated
the school to St. Prokop (Procopius), whose name
it bears.Between the language schools, which the liberal
element support out of voluntary gifts, and the
Catholic parochial schools, there is the essential
difference that while the Catholics give full instruc
tion to children, the liberals practically confine
their school courses to teaching the Cech language
only, sessions being held after public school hours.
The liberals, needless to say, are opposed to sec
tarian instruction, contending that children should
not be deprived of the advantages which the public
school offers.
All told the number of children receiving instruc
tion in the liberal schools is from 7500 to 8000.
Chicago, with its suburbs, maintains nineteen
schools, attended by 1340 pupils.2 The school in
New York City is attended by 800 pupils. Cleve
land sends 700 children to the language schools.
"In five years we have succeded in getting into
our organization 69 schools with 5292 children,"
says J. J. Karnik.3
1 Annual Report of St. Procopius College, at Lisle. 1908-09.
2 Directory and Almanac of the Bohemian Population of Chicago,
p. 66. 1915.^
3 Ceskd Skola, v. xvm, p. 16. Published by the Ceska Amencka
Matice Skolska in 1915, in commemoration of the death of a great
243

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
The University of California has had a lecturer
on Cech (George R. Noyes) since 1901. During the
year 1919-20 courses in elementary Cech with exer
cises in conversation, reading, and composition will
be given in Columbia University (A. B. Koukol).
For a time B. Prokosch taught it in the University
of Wisconsin and L. Z. Lerando in the Ohio State
University. Prokosch also lectured on Cech and
Russian in the University of Chicago. Coe College
in Iowa (Anna Heyberger) and the State University
of Texas (Charles Knizek) give courses. The best
organized departments teaching not only the fun
damentals of the grammar, but the reading of more
difficult texts, prose and poetry, with exercises, are
found in the Dubuque College and Seminary (Alois
Barta), the St. Procopius College (Kosmas Vesely),
and Oberlin College (Louis F. Minkovsky) .
A Cech department was established in the Uni
versity of Nebraska in 1907. The late Jeffrey D.
Hrbek was put in charge. After his death, his sister,
Sarka B. Hrbkova, succeeded him, remaining at its
head until 1919, when it was abolished.
Between 1913-15 instruction in the language was
given in the State University of Iowa (Anna
Heyberger). Cech is taught in one or two high schools in Chi-
Cech, Master John Hus. Edited by J. J. Karnik; Discourses on school
subjects and pedagogical manuals of the Cech American School
Association (Matice). Last pamphlet is numbered v. xxi; Vojta
BeneS: Contribution to the Reform of the Cech Schools in America,
vs. iv and V. 88 pp. Cleveland, 1914.
244

SARKA B. HRBKOVA

TEACHING OF CECH LANGUAGE
cago, in the high schools at Wilber, Prague, Crete,
Clarkson, Brainard, Fremont, Verdigre, and Milli-
gan, in Nebraska.
"In addition," writes Dr. R. J. Kerner, of the
University of Missouri, "Harvard University (Dr.
Leo Wiener), University of Michigan, University of
Notre Dame, University of Pennsylvania, Univer
sity of Wisconsin, gave courses in Slavic languages
and literatures usually Russian, in the case of
Notre Dame, Polish."1
1 For much of this information the author expresses his gratitude
to Dr. Kerner, Dr. Lerando, and Professor Hrbkova. Professor
Meader of the University of Michigan wrote in 1913 for the Russian
Review (published by the University of Liverpool) a short, but good,
account of the origin of Slavic work in the United States.

CHAPTER XVII
THE CHURCHES
THE strength of Catholics and of Protestants
may be approximated by the number of
congregations and pastors which they respectively
support. According to their official organ,1 the Catholics
had, in 1917, 270 priests administering 320 par
ishes, missions, and branches. Several of these were
1 The Katolik. Cech American Almanac for the year. Register of
Cech priests in America, pp. 194-97. Register of Cech Catholic Set
tlements in America, pp. 197-207.
Reading: Rev. Anton Peter Hou§t: The Cech Catholic Settlements in
America. St. Louis, 1890. Rev. Joseph Sinkmajer: (e) "The Bohe
mians in the United States. ' ' The Catholic Encyclopedia, v. 11, pp. 620-
22. Rev. Valentine Kohlbeck: (e) "The Bohemian Element. Short
History of the Bohemian Catholic Congregations in Chicago," The
New World, pp. 136-40. April, 1900. The First Annual Report, or a
catalogue of the St. Prokop College in Lisle, Illinois, for the year
1901-02. Rev. J. G. Kissner: (e) "The Catholic Church and the
Bohemian Immigrants," The Charities, Dec, 1904. New York. Rev.
Valentine Kohlbeck: (e) "The Catholic Bohemians in the United
States." The Champlain Educator, January-March, 1906. The First
Cech Catholic Convention. Held in the St. John Nepomuk Church, in
St. Louis, September 24-26, 1907. 54 pp. Rev. Prokop Neuzil: Memo
rial of the St. Prokop Congregation. Twenty-five Year Jubilee of the
Consecration of St. John Prokop Church, pp. 7-29. Chicago, 1908.
Rev. Prokop Neuzil : Twenty-five Years of Endeavor. Report on the
work of Cech Benedictines of the St. Prokop Abbey in Chicago,
from the year of their coming to Chicago in 1885 to 1910. 73 pp.
Chicago. Dr. John Habenicht: The History of the Cechs in America.
St. Louis. 1904. Rev. John Rynda: A Guide through the Cech Catho
lic Settlements in the Archdiocese of St. Paul (Minn). 233 pp. Chi
cago, 1910. 246

ST. PROKOP CHURCH
AUport and Eighteenth Streets, Chicago

THE CHURCHES
mixed; that is, Cech-German, Cech- Irish, Cech-
Polish. The St. Prokop Parish in Chicago is rated
the strongest and supposedly the richest in the
country. No State supports a greater number of Catholic
centers (churches, missions, stations, either wholly
Cech, or mixed, that is, Cech-Irish, Cech-Polish,
etc.) than Texas — 68. Wisconsin ranks next with
57 centers. Then follow: Nebraska, 48; Minnesota,
28; Iowa, 21; Kansas, 16; Illinois, 14 (of which
10 congregations are situated in Chicago) ; South
Dakota, 12; North Dakota, 9; Michigan, 7; Mis
souri, 6; Ohio, 6 (all 6 in Cleveland) ; New York, 6
(2 in New York City); Oklahoma, 5; Maryland, 4;
Massachusetts, 2 ; Pennsylvania, 2 ; Indiana, 2 ; Vir
ginia, 2 ; and 1 each in New Jersey, Oregon, Colo
rado, Washington.1
The first Catholic house of worship was built in
St. Louis, in the autumn of 1854. It was dedicated
to St. John Nepomuk. Father Lipovsky of Lipovice
was the first priest.2
Under Father Joseph Hessoun, who took charge
of the St. John Nepomuk Chapel about 1865, St.
Louis grew to be the center and stronghold of Ca
tholicism. To the present day the older immigrants
harbor a peculiar affection for St. Louis even though
1 The Katolik, for 1917, pp. 197-206.
2 The Reverend Henry Lipovsky, scion of a noble family, had an
active career. He was assigned as a missionary to London, Rugby,
and Cardiff; later he served in China as chaplain to British troops
stationed there. He died in Prague in 1894, aged sixty-seven years.
247

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
the Chicago Benedictines wrested the scepter of
leadership from it. In St. Louis Father Hessoun
lived and labored for many years. He was the great
est prelate the American Cech Catholics have had.
Considering that in the mother country the Cath
olics constitute ninety-six per cent of the entire
population and the Protestants less than three per
cent,1 the number of Cech-Prdtestant churches and
congregations in the United States might seem to
be disproportionately large. If the old country per
centage were to hold good the Protestants should
have four houses of worship instead of thirty-five
which they really possess.
The Protestants, among whom the Presbyterians
are very active, notably in the East, maintain
1 60 centers as follows: Presbyterians, 55 centers;
Union of the Bohemian-Moravian Brethren in
North America, 30; Baptists, 28; Methodists, 21;
Congregationalists, 19; Independent Reformed, 5;
Reformed Congregationalists, 2.
Several congregations are mixed; in Pennsyl
vania they are Cech-Slovak. About one hundred
pastors have charge of the spiritual welfare of the
evangelical parishioners. The Jan Hus Presby
terian Church in New York, Dr. Vincent Pisek,
pastor, with 1057 children attending the Sunday
School, leads the list.2
1 According to the official Austrian statistics.
2 The Sion, National Almanac for the year 1917. Schematism of
the Cech-Slavic Evangelical Churches in America.
Reading: The Reverends William Siller, Vaclav Prucha, and
248

MONSIGNOR JOSEPH HESSOUN

THE CHURCHES
Trying as the beginnings of the Catholics have
been, they cannot be compared with the difficulties
which beset the old-time Protestants. When the life
story of the Reverend Francis Kiin is told the emo
tions are moved as when reading a chapter from
Sienkiewicz's novel Quo Vadis, depicting the hard
ships of the early Christians. Lack of churches and
priests were the main drawback of the Catholics.
Then, too, the clergy had to contend with religious
indifference and in many instances the open hostil
ity of the people. The Protestants of two genera
tions ago had neither houses of worship, nor min
isters, nor — religionists. So long was the evangeli
cal faith discriminated against in Austria that at
the time the ban against it was removed, by the
Patent of Tolerance, there were scarcely any Prot
estants left in Bohemia and Moravia. There was not
one regularly ordained minister in either country
to attend to the spiritual needs of the scattered
few who survived the anti-Reformation. Pastors
(known to the church history as "Tolerance Pas
tors") had to be literally borrowed from neighbor
ing Hungary to help.
Before the Union Theological Seminary in New
York and the Slavic Theological Department in
Oberlin College trained the first pastors of Cech
R. M. De Castello: Memorial of Cech Evangelical Churches in the
United States; containing the description of all Cech congregations of
Presbyterians, Independents, Reformed, Congregationalists, Metho
dists, and Baptists as they existed in 1900. 290 pp. Chicago, 1900.
Souvenir of Slavic Baptists in America. 34 pp. Chicago, 1909.
249

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
nationality, the entire burden of missionary work
devolved upon non-Cechs, In New York it was a
Magyar, the Reverend Gustave Alexy, who sought
out, instructed, and organized Cech Protestants.
That was in 1874. The theological training of the
first Cech minister in New York, Dr. Vincent Pisek,
was not completed until 1883. The Reverend H. A.
Schauffler, a member of the noted family of Amer
ican divines of that name, did apostolary work
among the Cechs in Cleveland. Having learned the
language, Dr. Schauffler came to be recognized as
their leading religious adviser and the champion of
their wants before American co-religionists (Con
gregationalists). The Bethlehem Chapel in Cleve
land, dedicated in 1885, was the result of Dr.
Schauffler's untiring effort; the Slavic Theological
Department in Oberlin College is likewise conceded
to have been his idea and his achievement.1
Dr. Schauffler figures prominently in the religious
revival of Chicago Cechs. At a Conference of the
Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions held
in that city in 1883, Dr. Schauffler argued some
thing like this: "What have you ddne for your
38,000 Cechs? Nothing. Chicago has the largest
settlement of Cechs of any city in the land. Their
newspapers advocate free thought and there are
other reasons why evangelical endeavor should be
1 (e) The Slavic Department of Oberlin College, Under the super
vision of the Slavic Committee of Theological Seminary. 21 pp.
Oberlin, 1916.
250

VINCENT PISEK. D.D.

THE CHURCHES
furthered among them." A few weeks after the hold
ing of this conference, Dr. Schauffler had the satis
faction of reporting to his friends that his appeal
had not been a fruitless one; that the Reverend
E. A. Adams, his colleague in Prague, would give
up his post in the Cech capital and would de
vote himself wholly to missionary work among
the Chicago Cechs.
Proficient in the Cech language like Dr. Schauf
fler, Dr. Adams won in time the respect and affec
tion of the Chicago community. Even the liberals
learned to esteem this amiable, tolerant Yankee
churchman. In the autumn of 1884 Dr. Adams de
livered his prefatory sermon before a congregation
consisting of some sixteen persons; in 1890 that
same congregation, with the help of American
friends, was able to build the Bethlehem Chapel at
a cost of $35,000.
A few words of tribute should be paid to the
pioneer evangelist, the Reverend Kun, who founded
the mother church at Ely, Iowa. Descended from
a family of preachers, — his grandfather had been
one of the Tolerance Pastors called from Hungary
to Bohemia and Moravia to care for Protestants
there and his father also had been a minister of the
gospel, — Klin's relation to the early Protestants
was precisely the same as that of Father Hessoun's
to the Catholics: he was an admired leader, and an
unselfish friend. Of his stern resolve and his devo
tion to what he considered his dkity to co-religion-
251

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
ists, we can form a faint conception when we re
member that he often braved a trip of sixty miles
through roadless country to visit his people. That
was before and during the Civil War. He preached
in English, Cech, or German, as circumstances re
quired. To the United States Kun emigrated in
1856. Before coming he was warned that " the pros
pects for a Cech pastor were not encouraging."
Kun was wont to make an annual tour to parish
ioners in Iowa, Minnesota, Dakota, Kansas. Ten
houses of worship were built and as many congre
gations organized along his customary route. The
worthy man died at Ely in 1894 m his sixty-ninth
year. The first evangelical service in Cech was held in
Texas. The pastor conducting it was the Reverend
Joseph Zvolanek, a colleague in Moravia of the
Reverend Kun; the year was 1855 and the place,
Fayetteville. However, it is not Fayetteville, but
Wesley, in Washington County, which claims pre
cedence as having the oldest evangelical congre
gation in Texas. The organization of the parish at
Wesley dates to 1864. Among the pastors at Wesley
is mentioned no less conspicuous a person than
F. B. Zdrubek, who had charge of the parish in
1872.1 The Protestants maintain 43 centers in Texas; 23
in Pennsylvania (mostly Slovak); Nebraska, 14;
Illinois (Chicago), 12; Ohio (Cleveland), 11; Iowa,
1 Memorial of Cech Evangelical Churches in the United States, p. 130.
252

WMii

j-" y^ mil

Jf!

JAN HUS CHURCH AND NEIGHBORHOOD HOUSE, NEW YORK

THE CHURCHES
10 ; Minnesota, 10; Wisconsin, 5; Kansas, 5; New
York, 5; South Dakota, 4; Oklahoma, 3; Maryland
(Baltimore), 2; Missouri (St. Louis), 2; Virginia, 2;
1 each in New Jersey, Delaware, Michigan, Ten
nessee.1
1 The Sion. National Almanac for 1917, pp. 115-25. As to Bap
tists: Souvenir (book) published to commemorate the first conven
tion of Baptists of Slavic nationality held in Chicago, 1909. Preface
by the Reverend V. Kralicek.

CHAPTER XVIII
FRATERNAL AND OTHER SOCIETIES
THERE are no dependable figures relative to
the number of various Cech fraternal organ
izations in the United States. All is guesswork in
this regard. Generally it is thought that the number
of lodges and clubs is not below 2500. The Chicago
community is credited with no less than 500. In
1 91 5 the Chicagoans were represented in the Build
ing Association League of Illinois with 227 Building
and Loan Associations.1
Two distinct classes are recognizable: benevolent
Or conf raternal organizations which pay a benefit in
case of sickness or death, and non-benefit associa
tions. Of the non-benefit class the most interesting
are the Sokols (gymnastic),2 the amateur theatrical
clubs, and the choral societies. No community of
any consequence is without at least one of the three.
The Cech loves song and the choral society offers
him an opportunity to sing; so long as the profes-
1 The Directory and Almanac of the Bohemian Population of Chi
cago, p. 44. 1915.
2 J. R. JiEinsky: The Memorial of the National Union Sokol (Na-
rodni Jednota Sokolska) in the United States. In commemoration of
its twenty-fifth anniversary. 224 pp. Chicago, 1904; J. R. Jiclnsky,
editor: Tracing the History of the American Sokols. 43 pp. Chicago,
1865-1908; Henry Ort: The First All-Sokol Convention, held in Chi
cago, August 26-29, 1909. 132 pp. Chicago, 1909. Josef Scheiner:
The Sokol Excursion to America in iqoq. 108 pp. Prague, 1910; Josef
Oswald: The Excursion of Cech Sokols to America. 1909. Pribram,
254

FRATERNAL AND OTHER SOCIETIES
sional stage in America will not grant entrSe to the
dramas and the comedies of his native playwrights,
he will have amateurs act on the amateur stage his
kings, his heroes, his peasants, his maids. And what
Cech youth would not enrol as a Sokol and give
ready assent to the truism that only a healthy body
can give lodgement to a sound mind?
The parent society, there is no doubt, originated
in New York. Havlicek's Slovan, of May 7, 1851,
contains this direct reference to it: "As an interest
ing piece of news for our readers we here give a brief
extract of a letter of March 3, received by us from
a Mr. T. who emigrated five years ago to New
York." The writer, Mr. T., proceeds to tell how the
Cech residents of New York had organized a club
the year before (1850) giving it the name, Cech
Society. Nationals who contemplate going to Amer
ica are advised to write to the club if they desire
trustworthy information about the country.
Who was T.? Presumably none other than the
army deserter, Tuma, who fled from the garrison
at Mainz either in 1847 or 1848, and who opened a
saloon (casino) in New York.
From the diary of Vojta Naprstek we learn that
the club alluded to by T. bore the name "Cech
Society." Vaclav Pohl was president; Andrew
Hubacek, vice-president; F. V. Cerveny, treasurer;
Joseph Cilinsky, secretary; Vojta Naprstek, libra
rian. The Cech Society met in the hotel (saloon)
of Colonel Charles Burgthal (erroneously spelled
255

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Burgthaler), 14 City Hall Place. This ramshackle
building has been torn down to make room for the
present Municipal Building. Colonel Burgthal was
no colonel at all, but a non-commissioned officer in
the Austrian army. He received his chevrons of
colonel, not from the Austrian army command,
but from the admiring patrons of his tavern. The
fact that his wife was of Cech birth made the
colonel's resort homelike to the countrymen of his
wife. Before the end of the year forty-two men had en
rolled as members. Vojta Naprstek, at his own re
quest, took charge of the society's library. Apropos,
books were Naprstek's hobby; it is said that among
the treasured volumes he had brought in his grip
sack from Europe were the works of Voltaire, Fou
rier and Saint-Simon. An insatiable reader and a
modernist in the fullest sense of the word, Naprstek
was never happier than when he could lend his
books to book-lovers.
Of the members of the Cech Society, none rose to
greater prominence than Francis Korbel and Vojta
Naprstek. By a singular twist of fortune the Gov
ernment, which in 1848 tried to apprehend Korbel
as a revolutionist, appointed him in 1894 Austrian
Consul in San Francisco. Having retired from ac
tive business long ago, Korbel is living quietly in
the Cech capital, from which he was forced to flee
in 1848-49.
A picturesque member was Joseph Krikava.
256

FRATERNAL AND OTHER SOCIETIES
After various unsuccessful ventures — he tried
photography and farming — Krikava opened a
wine-shop at 50 Avenue B, which became the favor
ite haunt of the old-timers. ' ' Grandfather Krikava, ' '
as his boon companions called him, died in New
York in 1888. Vaclav Pohl claimed to have fought
in 1848 behind the barricades in the short-lived
revolution in Prague. A radical of the Havlicek
type, Pohl converted many a pioneer to his way of
thinking. By trade he was a cabinet-maker and a
wood-carver, although he tried his luck at many
trades.1 Andrew Hubacek 2 was related to the well-known
family of that name. August Hubacek's saloon in
East Fifth Street, New York, was for years the
center of Cech social life. Great was the renown
of the Hubacek name in New York. One of the
Hubaceks who settled in Rochester is reputed to
have planted in that city the Bohemian prune
tree. F. V. Cerven^ was of respected stock. The Cer-
venys of Kralove Hradec, in Bohemia, have been
far-famed since 1842 as makers of musical instru
ments. F. V. Cerveny, too, was apprenticed to this
craft and worked at it in a shop at 16 John Street,
1 Almanac Amerikdn, 1890. Pohl died in Kewannee, Wisconsin,
in 1893.
2 Wilson's City Directory of the City of New York for 1850-51 con
tains the name of Joseph Hubacek, capmaker, 73 First Avenue; the
same directory forr 1852-53 has Andrew Hubaczek, engraver, 86
East Broadway. 257

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
New York City.1 Like Naprstek, Cerven£ removed
early from New York to Milwaukee. There he died
at the age of eighty-one.
Accounts vary as to the official name of the Cech
Society. On the title-page of a volume which Na
prstek donated to the society's library, there is this
inscription : To the Cech-Slavic Union in New York
(Cesko-Slovanske Jednote v New Yorku venuje
V. N. 18552).2 Tuma thinks the title was Cech
Society (Ceski Spolecnost). A. Hubacek is certain
the full title was the First Cech Slavic Society in
America (Prvni Cesko-Slovansky Spolek v Amer-
ice).3 Lastly, Anton Kotzian contends it was the
Cech Linden Tree (Ceskd Lipa).
The oldest existing fraternal organization (estab
lished in March, 1854, m St. Louis) is the Cech
Slavic Benevolent Society, known by its initials,
C.S.P.S. In miniature the history of the C.S.P.S.
is the history of Cech America — rather of the
half of it which inclines toward liberal thinking —
for the C.S.P.S. fraternity stands ,for liberalism.
Its potentiality first began to be felt after the
eighties. Before that time the influence it exercised on Cech
affairs was unimportant, unless the C.S.P.S. is to
1 Doggett & Rode: New York Directory for 1851-52.
2 The initials V. N. are undoubtedly in the handwriting of Vojta
Naprstek, though they may be those of Vaclav Nebesk^ (1818-82),
Klacel's literary friend and associate.
3 Reminiscences of A. Hubacek (of San Francisco), Pokrok Zd-
padu, August 1, 1894. 258

JAN HUS MONUMENT, BOHEMIA, LONG ISLAND

BETHLEHEM CHAPEL, LOOMIS STREET, CHICAGO

FRATERNAL AND OTHER SOCIETIES
be given credit for things done not by itself as an
organization, but by its members.
Affiliated with the C.S.P.S. is the Union of Cech
Women (Jednota Ceskych Dam). The Western
Cech Fraternal Union is an offshoot of the C.S.P.S.
Owing to conflict of interests between the East and
the West, which the convention, held in St. Paul,
Minnesota, in 1896, failed to reconcile, a number of
opposition delegates met in a conference in Omaha
the year following the St. Paul convention and or
ganized there a wholly independent body, giving it
the name Western Cech Fraternal Union. John
Rosicky, the Omaha editor, led the opposition.
Fortunately the secessionists have affirmed their
adherence to the ideals of liberalism which have
ever been the distinguishing feature of the parent
society. To stand well in the opinion of his American
neighbor was (and for that matter still is) the su
preme concern of the immigrant. When a news
paper made a slurring remark about his nationality
or, what hurt his sensibility still deeper, ignored or
underrated him at this or that public function,
grumbling was general. On the other hand, all
rejoiced and felt proud when the race name, Bo
hemian, Cech, had been linked to some noteworthy
act or when a Cech here or in Europe had been
featured in the press.
Societies have been organized and newspapers
established with the sole aim of "interpreting to
259

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Americans Cech ideals; of defending the honor of
the Cech name in America." The National Union
(Ndrodni Jednota), the Cech American National
Committee (Cesko- Americky Narodni Vybor), the
National Sentinel (Narodni Straz), the National
Council (Narodni Rada), the Slavic Alliance (Na
rodni Sdruzeni), the Cech American Press Bureau
(Cesko-Americki Tiskova. Kancelaf) were some of
the societies dedicated to this object. Every one of
them performed some good service, removed some
prejudice, added in some way to bringing knowledge
of the Cech to Americans.
No society started out with brighter prospects of
success than the Cech American National Com
mittee. Backed by the C.S.P.S., which fathered it
(1891), supported by the entire liberal press, it bid
fair to become the institution of all Cech factions.
According to a programme outlined by L. J. Palda,
its president, the Cech American National Com
mittee proposed to open a press bureau in Prague
to the end that American newspapers might be sup
plied with impartial news relative to Bohemia and
the Cechs; to publish a monthly magazine in the
English language; to publish in English or assist in
the publication of the history of Bohemia; to found
a library of English language works dealing with
Cech and other Slav countries; to gather statistical
and other data bearing on Cech immigration to the
United States; to foster closer cultural and commer
cial relations between Bohemia and the United
260

FRATERNAL AND OTHER SOCIETIES
States; to urge upon Cech immigrants the vital im
portance of American citizenship and of the knowl
edge of English, preserving, as far as practicable,
the Cech tongue, so that Americans of Cech ances
try might be able to read, in the language of their
fathers, the story of the sufferings of the Cech race
and through this lesson prize more highly the bless
ings of liberty enjoyed by them in America. Rob
ert H. Vickers's History of Bohemia, the first story
of the nation in English, was published. The Bo
hemian Voice was issued as the "organ of the Bo
hemian National Committee" (with Thomas Capek
as editor). The other tasks the Committee could
not realize at all, or only partially. The following
Cechs and Slovaks were members of the Commit
tee: L. J. Palda, Charles Jonas', John Rosicky, F.
B. Zdrubek, Bohumil Simek, Anton Klobasa, J. V.
Teibel, J. H. Stepan, Vaclav Snajdr, V. W. Woy-
tisek, J. V. Matejka, Joseph Wirth, I. J. Gallia,
Hynek Opic, F. Choura.1
The Society for the Promotion of Higher Edu
cation (Matice Vyssiho Vzdelani), established in
1902, was planned chiefly by two men. Bohumil
Simek was its intellectual organizer. The practical
promoter, the man who financed it, was W. F.
Severa, manufacturer of proprietary medicines in
Cedar Rapids. Severa's substantial endowment
gift made the Matice not only realizable, but what
1 Minutes of the Second Meeting of the National Commitee, held
in Chicago, the 24th, 25th, and 26th November, 1892, 28 pp.
261

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
is more essential, he laid an enduring foundation
thereto. An auxiliary of the Society for the Pro
motion of Higher Education is the Federation of
Komensky's Educational Clubs. Everywhere in the
Middle West where there is a college, and students
of Cech birth or extraction attending it, there is apt
to be a Komensky Club.
The Cech American Press Bureau (originating
in Chicago in 1909) owed its existence to the gen
erosity of Francis Korbel and rendered, aside from
its purely reportorial function, meritorious serv
ice on two distinct occasions. It invited to Amer
ica Count Liitzow, pioneer in English Bohemica.
Liitzow delivered a series of talks in colleges, before
audiences composed of youth who will mould the
public opinion of to-morrow. No man was better
qualified than Liitzow to lecture on Bohemia before
cultured Americans. His renown as an author and
his thorough mastery of the language — Liitzow
was English on his mother's side — gave additional
interest to his authoritative presentation of the
subject. The Press Bureau cooperated with Burton
Holmes in making motion pictures in Bohemia and
in giving illustrated lectures in principal American
cities. .
' Following a bad precedent and grouping them
into Catholic and non-Catholic, the principal fra
ternal organizations, which pay full or only nom
inal sick and death benefits, are:

262

BIRTHPLACE OF THE C.S.P.S.

KONSTITUCE A
- ., MIMOZi&QNY
CECHQ-SLOVAHSKEHQ PQOPORUJICIHO
V
ST. LOUISU,
STATU MISSOURI.

Tiak „N4rcdnjch Noviu."

BY-LAWS AND TRAVELING PASS OF THE
C.S.P.S. BROTHERHOOD, ISSUED IN 1865

FRATERNAL AND OTHER SOCIETIES
Catholic Organizations l
Members
Cech Roman Catholic First Central Union in the United
States (Ceska Rimsko-Katolicka Prvni UstFedni Jednota
ve Sp. St. Americkych)  5,i88
Central Union of Women in the United States (Ustredni
Jednota Zen ve Sp. St. Americkych)  9,580
Catholic Workingman (Katolicky Delnik)  3,931
Cech Roman Catholic Central Union in Wisconsin (Ceska
Rimsko-Katolicka Jednota ve Statu Wisconsin)  900
-Catholic Union in Texas (Katolicka Jednota Texaska)  2,186
Western Cech Catholic Union (Zapadni Ceska Katolicka
Jednota)  _..... 3,703
Cech Roman Catholic Union of Women in Texas (Cesk&
Rimsko-Katolicka, Jednota 2en ve Statu Texas)  2.070
Cech Roman Catholic Benevolent Union under the patron
age of St. John Nepomuk in Ohio (Ceska Rimsko-Kato
licka Podporujici Jednota pod z&stitou sv. Jana Nepo-
muck6ho ve Statu Ohio)  2,200
Cech Roman Catholic Union of Women in Cleveland, Ohio
(Ceska Rimsko-Katolicka Jednota 2en v Cleveland, O.) . . . 1,500
Catholic Union Sokol (Katolicka Jednota Sokol)  1 ,650
Total  32,908
Non-Catholic Organizations 2
Cech Slavic Benevolent Society (Cesko-Slovansky Podporu
jici Spolek, C.S.P.S.). Official report, February, 1919. . . . 23,680
Western Cech Fraternal Union (Zapadni. Cesko-Bratrska
Jednota, Z.C.B.J.). Official report, November, 1918  21,149
Union of Cech Women (Jednota Ceskych Dam, J.C.D.).
Official report, February, 1918  23,000
1 For these figures the author is indebted to the Reverend Valen
tine Kohlbeck, editor of the Chicago Ndrod and Katolik. He writes
(December 4, 1918): "These figures are official and, therefore, accu
rate. Quite a number of our people belong to other organizations,
such as the Catholic Order of Foresters, Knights of Columbus, etc.
These organizations are not Bohemian, although many of the soci
eties (lodges) are entirely composed of Bohemians."
2 For these figures the author's thanks are due to B. 0. Vaskfl,
editor of the C.S.B.P.J. Orgdn. 263

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Members
Sisterhood Benevolent Union (Sesterska Podporujici Jed
nota, S.P.J.). Official report, May, 1918  12,000
Sokol Community in America (Sokolska Obec v Americe).
Official Report, 1919  10,302
Slavic Benevolent Union in the State of Texas (Slovansk&
Podporujici Jednota Statu Texas, S.P.J .T.). Estimated.. . 9,500
Cech Slavic Union (Cesko-Slovanski Jednota, C.S.J. ). Offi-
__ cial report, December, 1918  6,385
Cech Slavic Fraternal Benevolent Union (Cesko-SlovanskS.
Bratrska Podporujici Jednota, C.S.B.P.J.). Official report,
January, 1919  3,667
Union of Taborites (Jednota Taboritu, J. T.). Estimated. . . 2,500
Cech American Union (Cesko-Americka Jednota, C.A.J.).
Estimated  2,000
Cech Slavic Benevolent Woman's Society (Cesko-Slovanske
Podporujici Damskd Spolky, C.S.P.D.S.). Official report,
February, 1919  2,500
Association of Cech American Women (Sdruzeni Cesko-
Americkfah Dam, S.C.A.D.). Estimated  3,000
Union of Cech Patriotic Women (Jednota Ceskych Vlaste-
nek, J.C.V.). Estimated  3,500
Total  123,183

CHAPTER XIX
THE PART THE AMERICAN CECHS TOOK IN THE WAR OP
LIBERATION
AT the time he was taking leave of his compa
triots in America, President Masaryk (Farewell,
Address, November n, 191 8) declared that in the
. history of -liberation the American Cechs and Slo
vaks are assured honorable mention.
The American Cechs played a double r61e in the
drama which ended in the humbling in the dust of
the Hapsburgs and the final disruption of the Dual
Monarchy. In the first place they financed the ex
ternal revolutionary movement. They are consid
ered the richest, as they are admittedly the strong
est, branch of the race outside the motherland.
Secondly, it was expected of them that they would
present the cause of the Cechoslovaks before the
country and would endeavor to win for it American
public opinion.
That it was Masaryk who had the rare insight
and foresight to get away from Austria while it was
yet time was regarded as a happy augury. On the
occasion of his two previous visits Masaryk had
made a host of friends here. The liberal and, not
ably, the intellectual element held him in high es
teem. Masaryk is sincere in all his actions, and as
Carlyle expresses it, "sincerity, a deep, great, genu-
265

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
ine sincerity, is the first characteristic of all men
in any way heroic." He enjoyed full confidence of
the leaders at home. Vienna feared him, for it found
that he was unassailable. Shortly before the war the
readers of a Prague journal took a test vote on the
question: if Bohemia were a republic, who would
be elected its president? Significantly, Masaryk re
ceived the majority of the votes.
The external revolution against Austria was set
in motion the moment Masaryk reached Swiss soil.
For obvious reasons the first few months the propa
ganda he and his confreres planned had to be car
ried on in secrecy. Prague was known to swarm with
spies and informers and no one must be unneces
sarily compromised or sacrificed.
On July 6, 1915, the day of the quincentenary of
the burning of Bohemia's national hero and mar
tyr, Hus, Ernest Denis lectured on the essence of
Hussitism in the Hall of the Reformation at Geneva,
Switzerland. On this day Masaryk, in a few curt
sentences which he delivered without any attempt
at oratory, laid down the nation's platform : " Every
Cech must now elect whether or not he is in favor
of reformation or anti-reformation; must now say
whether or not he is in favor of the Cech idea or the
Austrian idea. Austria is the mouthpiece in Europe
of anti-reformation and reaction."
Months before the Hus celebration in Switzer
land, where Masaryk first publicly arraigned Aus
tria, the American Cechs were busy at work. In
266

CECHS IN WAR OF LIBERATION
September, 1914, the New Yorkers formed the
American Committee for the Liberation of the Cech
People. An organization nation-wide in scope was
formed in Chicago as a result of a conference held
in that city, January 2-3, 1915. After June 6, 1915,
this society was officially designated as the Bohe
mian National Alliance (Ceske Narodni Sdruzeni).
Rapidly the Alliance spread a network of branches
throughout the country ; by the time the war ended,
these branches numbered some 350. Dr. L. J.
Fisher, a Chicago physician, now in the service
of the Czechoslovak Government in Prague, was
elected president, remaining at the head of the
Alliance almost until the end of the war. Upon his
departure for the front in France, Dr. Joseph F.
Pecival assumed presidency. Joseph Tvrzicky was
chosen executive secretary and manager of the
Press Bureau. Since 1916 Vojta Benes acted as
organizer. The important office of treasurer was
entrusted to James F. Stepina,' president of the
American State Bank. For a time Dr. J. E. S. Vojan
functioned as secretary, J. J. Zmrhal and Dr. J. F.
Smetanka attending to English language corre
spondence. When the United States declared war
on the Central Powers, the Alliance promptly re
adjusted its programme to meet the new conditions
incident to the war. Heretofore the Alliance had
labored for Cechoslovak freedom. From that time
on its branches became the sentinels of wholesome,
loyal Americanism, efficient agencies for the sale of
267

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
Liberty Bonds, rallying points for volunteering and
for war activities in general. That the Cechoslovaks
bought as many Liberty Bonds as the official fig
ures disclose they did, is due, in a large measure,
to the efforts of the Alliance and its branches and
to the Slovak League. The women kept an even
pace with the men. Their sewing and knitting
"Bees" turned out sweaters and comfort kits for
the soldiers in France, Italy, and Russia. Many of
the societies of the "Bees" became in war-time
auxiliaries of the American Red Cross. Libule S.
Motak of New York, prominent in relief work,
has been appointed since Representative for the
United States of the Czechoslovak Red Cross,
If cannon is the ultima ratio regum, the last ar
gument of kings, money is an indispensable weapon
of the up-to-date revolutionary. Precisely how large
a fund was raised by the American Cechs and Slo
vaks has not yet been made public; when official
figures are available we may be surprised to find
that the total runs not into the hundreds of thou
sands but into millions. The money was gathered
by means of self -taxation, donations, bazaars— not
without hard work, scheming, and pinching. Three
centuries of subjection, political and economic,
have pushed the Cechoslovaks into the employee
class; wealthy men are the exception. How to raise
millions from workmen was a problem.
Not a dollar was asked for or accepted from
any foreign source. Those were Masaryk's orders.
268

REV. OLDRICH ZLAMAL

CECHS IN WAR OF LIBERATION
"This is our revolution, and we must pay for it with
our own money." The first bazaar of consequence
was held in New York in the winter of 1916. It
yielded $22,250. This was thought an extraordi
nary achievement. The bazaar given in Cleveland
in March, 191 7, netted $25,000 and one closely fol
lowing it in Chicago, $40,000. The comparatively
small Omaha community surprised all by making
$65,109.20 in September, 1918. A few weeks la
ter the Texas Cechs got together at a bazaar f6te
in Taylor another $50,000 or $60,000. The bazaar
at Cedar Rapids (Iowa) turned in $25,000. The
Thanksgiving Day offering in 1918, which was na
tion-wide, totaled $320,000. To this Chicago gave
over $100,000, Cleveland $40,000. All the money
was not spent for political purposes. Large sums
went to relieve distress on the other side. For in
stance, one million francs were cabled to the Cecho
slovak Minister of Foreign Affairs in Paris for the
purchase of food.
In order to reach and stir up the masses it was
necessary to hold meetings without number. Meet
ings are the salt, the ferment of all questions requir
ing public discussion. Meetings sustain the spirit
of the waverer, they dispel the doubts of the pes
simist. Press publicity was another, though more
subtle, lever of the agitator. Both agencies were
employed as needs required or means permitted.
Speakers visited every community of fellow coun
trymen from Canada to Texas. The majority of these
269

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
speakers were, of course, Americans. Before he ac
cepted service in the Military Intelligence Division
of the United States Army, Captain Emanuel V.
Voska of New York held in his hands the threads
of the propaganda in the East.
Lecturers and propagandists came from Europe,
too. F. Kopecky, a plain-spoken artisan from Lon
don, brought tidings from the small colony of Cechs
there. Personal contact with the Cechoslovaks in
Russia was established through Captain Ferdi
nand Pisecky, who reached America in 1917. Under
the auspices of the Alliance Captain Pisecky toured
the principal Cech and Slovak settlements. Four
officers, Lieutenants Miloslav Niederle, Antonin
Holy, Joseph Horvath, and Oldrich Spaniel, ar
rived in the winter of 191 7-1 8. Although they came
from France — rather from the Cechoslovak Army
in France — all four were war veterans from Rus
sia. The object of their journey was military; they
were after recruits for war service in France. Sol
diers who came here on missions connected with the
war, military, political, and diplomatic were: Gen
eral Milan R. Stefanik, Colonel Vladimir Hurban,
Captains Zdenko Fierlinger, Jaromir Spacek, and
V. Houska, Major John Sipek, Lieutenants F.
Danielovsky' and Charles Zmrhal.
It is not known that many a Teuton plot to fo
ment strikes, to set warehouses and docks on fire,
to blow up munition-carrying ships was bared and
many an evil-doer apprehended and sent to prison
270

CECHS IN WAR OF LIBERATION
on evidence furnished to the Government by loyal
Cechoslovaks. To run down the malefactors and
checkmate their nefarious activity, Cechoslovak
agents were scattered throughout the industrial
centers in the East, to warn the Slavic workmen
not to strike unless they wanted to do the bidding
of the Kaiser and his paid agents.
Newspapers and magazines were established in
foreign lands. At home the press was muzzled ; the
censor would not permit it to speak out the nation's
will, the nation's hope. Since Prague was forced to
keep mute, exiles living in Russia, France, Switzer
land, England, and the United States, must speak.
And they did speak. The Cechoslovak prisoners of
war started a paper in Russia, which they called
the Cechoslovak. It printed articles in Cech, Slovak,
and Russian. Professor Ernest Denis, of the Sor-
bonne, brought out in Paris, May, 1915, La Nation
Tcheque. A few months later appeared the Cesko-
slovenskd Samostatnost (Cechoslovak Independ
ence), also in the French capital. The New Europe,
with Masaryk among its collaborators, came out in
London, October, 191 6. The Alliance started pub
lishing the Bohemian Review in Chicago in Febru
ary, 191 7; since November, 191 8, it has appeared
under the corrected title, Czechoslovak Review.
Leaflets, pamphlets, and books printed in French,
English, Russian, Italian, and Cech were turned
out unstintingly and sent to college libraries, clubs,
to men of affairs, men influential in politics and
271

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
literature. Suffice it to give the titles of some of
these books and leaflets: Bohemia under Hapsburg
Misrule (Capek); Bohemian Question, Heart of
Europe (Pergler); Voice of an Oppressed People,
Problem of Small Nations (Masaryk); Future of
Bohemia (Seton- Watson) ; Bohemia: her Story and
her Claims (Marchant) ; Case of Bohemia, Czecho
slovaks, an Oppressed Nationality (Namier); Bo
hemia (Benes and Zmrhal) ; Bohemia's Claim for
Freedom (Prochazka); Bohemia's Case foY Inde
pendence (E. Benes) ; Czechoslovaks, a new Belliger
ent Nation (Hazen) ; Austrian Terrorism in Bohemia,
etc. The Slav Press Bureau was opened in New
York; this formed the nucleus out of which grew
the Czechoslovak Information Bureau now exist
ing in Washington. Unobtrusive work was done
outside the organization, too. For instance, the
author of this volume made it a practice to send,
during the war, propagandist letters to men promi
nent in public life in the United States and England.
The alarming news cabled to America of the
massacres of rebellious soldiers, of executions of
civilians, of trials for treason (Dr. Charles Krama?,
the first Premier, and Dr. Alois Ra§in, the first
Minister of Finance were sentenced to death;
President Masaryk's daughter, Dr. Alice G. Masa
ryk, was thrown into prison), of confiscations by the
Government of properties of those found guilty of
treason or desertion, or espionage, or opposing the
armed power of the State, nerved the workers, if
272

CECHS IN WAR OF LIBERATION
anything, to greater effort. More indignation meet
ings, more appeals for protection to the State De
partment, more pamphlets, more intensive agita
tion, more cables to agents and couriers in Europe.1
Then there was the minor detail work. Artistic
stamps and post-cards were put into circulation,
buttons and badges and diplomas were sold for the
benefit of the campaign fund. Vojtech Preissig, of
the Wentworth Institute in Boston, designed mas
terful war posters. Most of such interesting trifles as
badges, buttons, post-cards, came from the work
shops of the members of the Cechoslovak Arts
Club of New York. This Club decorated in an ar
tistic manner the show windows of prominent
business houses on Fifth Avenue with Cechoslovak
colors, views and portraits, maps, posters, and
printed matter. A most valuable exhibit from an
educational point of view proved to be a huge port-
1 Some of the news items cabled here were, fortunately, mere in
ventions of the war reporter. The St. Petersburg correspondent of
the New York Herald, cabled on August 20, 1914, the particulars of
a revolutionary outbreak in Prague which never took place: "The
Kieff correspondent of the Novoe Vremya sends details of an uprising
in Bohemia, when Czech Polish troops shot down their German offi
cers, shouting, 'Down with William! Down with Austria! Long live
Russia!' Prague for a whole day was in the hands of the mutineers.
The next day the Austrians, who had been reinforced, reentered the
city and took fearful reprisals. Every Cech caught in the street was
killed. The river Moldavia, it is declared, ran red with Cech blood.
The finest monuments in the city were destroyed and shops were pil
laged. A new uprising occurred two days later, followed by fresh re
prisals. Among the victims was Dr. Kramarzh, M. Klofatch, a pro
fessor Masaryk, who was executed in the citadel. A similar fate is
believed to have overtaken the Russian consul, Mr. Zhukovsky."
273

THE CECHS IN AMERICA ,
able map of Central Europe. This map showed the
racial boundaries of the reborn state and marked
the strategic positions of the Cechoslovak troops
astride the Trans-Siberian railroad in Russia. The
map was placed in front of the Public Library on
Fifth Avenue and Forty-second Street. Thousands
of New Yorkers passing by daily were compelled to
take notice of the map. Who are the Cechoslovaks?
Are they a faction of the Bolsheviks? Are they re
lated to the Bohemians? What connection, if any,
is there between the Bohemians living on the up
per east side of New York and the Bohemians in
Greenwich Village? Many a grown-up New Yorker
learned his primer in Cechoslovak history by study
ing the map. From New York the map traveled to
inland cities, to repeat there the errand of education
it performed so admirably on Fifth Avenue.
At first it was confidently expected that the lib
eration of the race from thralldom would come
from the east. The Russians were blood-brothers;
they freed the Serbs and the Bulgarians, and they
would redeem the Cechoslovaks next. Hence the
propagandists concentrated their efforts on Russia.
The Russian front collapsing, however, owing to
Bolshevik betrayal, the center of activity was
shifted to Paris. Two trusted lieutenants of Mas
aryk took charge of matters in the French capi
tal, Dr. Edward Benes (first Minister of Foreign
Affairs) and the late General Milan R. Stefanik
(first Minister of War). 274

MOR HO! MOR HO ! za nasi svobodw w predu s

OS-ARI

FRANCU SVQJHO RODU HODNf I

CECHOSLOVAK WAR POSTERS
Designed by Vojta Preissig, Wentworth Institute, Boston

CECHS IN WAR OF LIBERATION
An important conference was held in Cleveland
in October, 191 5, between the leaders of the Alli
ance and the Slovak League. Complete accord was
reached and the two race groups, Cechs and Slo
vaks, agreed to work hand in hand, in pursuance
of one aim under one supreme leadership.
February 5, 1917, a meeting was arranged in
Chicago between the Catholic Party and the repre
sentatives of the Alliance. The Catholics expressed
themselves as willing to share in the work of the
Alliance and the Slovak League, but, standing fast
on the ground of belief, how could they collaborate
with the other side which held to unbelief? The
Reverend Oldrich Zlamal, a priest from Cleveland,
took a dissenting viewpoint. "The Cech of Catholic
faith," he pleaded in the Farnik (The Parishioner),
"without in any way jeopardizing his religion and
church interests, has no good reason why he should
sympathize with the present-day Austria." One
version, said to be the true one, of why the Catholic
Party wavered so long was, that the Right Rever
end Joseph M. Koudelka of Wisconsin, a Bishop of
Cech nationality, in the first months of the war
appended his signature to a public declaration,
which sought to exculpate Austria and Germany
for bringing on the war. Whatever the motive of
the abstention, the Reverend Father Zlamal and
other brave and patriotic priests prevailed in the
end and the Catholic Party joined the Alliance. Thus
at last all the factions, the liberals, the socialists,
275

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
and the Catholics, were fraternally united and
pledged to work for the liberation of the Father
land. Masaryk reached the Pacific Coast on his way
from Russia, in April, 1918. His arrival lent new
zest to the drive which the propagandists were
making to win American public opinion. Impressive
receptions were given in his honor, in Chicago,
New York, Baltimore, Cleveland; speeches were
delivered before packed audiences in Carnegie Hall
and elsewhere; interviews to newspapermen were
granted. The publicity campaign took a sharp curve
upward. Slowly but surely, Cechs and Slovaks were
worming themselves into the headlines of the
American press.
Meantime Austrian statesmen still pretended to
believe that there was no such thing as a Bohemian
or a Cechoslovak question ; if there was, that it was
one of internal Austro-Hungarian politics with
which the Governments of Vienna and Budapest
would concern themselves when the proper time
came. But the principle of self-determination of
nations — that government must rest upon the
consent of the governed — was by this time rap
idly gaining converts in America. The statesmen
of Austria and Hungary knew that the principle of
self-determination would mark the doom of the
Hapsburg Empire.
June 30, 1918, President Poincare of France jour
neyed to the war zone to make a formal presen-
276

VLADIMIR A. GERINGER
United States Trade Commissioner to the Cechoslovak Republic
Publisher of the Chicago "Svornost"

CECHS IN WAR OF LIBERATION
tation of the Cechoslovak flag to the soldiers of
that nationality. On that occasion M. Pichon, the
Foreign Secretary, speaking for the government of
the Republic, "deemed it equitable and necessary
to proclaim the rights of the Czechoslovak nation
to independence."
Recognition by the British Government is dated
August 13, 1918. "In consideration of their efforts
to achieve independence, Great Britain regards the
Czechoslovaks as an allied nation and . . . recog
nizes the right of the Czechoslovak National Coun
cil as the supreme organ of Czechoslovak national
interests and as the present trustee of the future
Czechoslovak government. ..."
September 2, 191 8, the United States Govern
ment through Secretary Lansing declared that " the
Government of the United States recognizes that
a state of belligerency exists between the Czecho
slovaks thus organized (that is, prosecuting their
purposes for independence) and the German and
Austro-Hungarian Empires. ... It also recognizes
the Czechoslovaks."
The Declaration of Independence, severing for
ever the ties binding Czechoslovakia to Austria-
Hungary, bears date October 18, 1918, in Paris, and
is signed by Thomas G. Masaryk, Prime Minister
and Minister of Finance; Milan R. Stefanik, Minis
ter of National Defense; and Edward Benes", Min
ister of Foreign Affairs and of the Interior.
November 2, 191 8, delegates representing all
277

THE CECHS IN AMERICA
political parties met in Geneva, Switzerland, and
after adopting the draft of a constitution for the
Cechoslovak Republic, patterned after that of the
United States, elected unanimously as its first
President, Thomas Garrigue Masaryk.
A full and impartial account of the Liberation
Movement has not yet been written. The events
are too recent and the persons concerned too close
to enable the historian to form a critical estimate
of the degree of credit due.

THE END

APPENDIX

APPENDIX1
The theme of Cech emigration to the United States has been con
sidered from every conceivable viewpoint, not only by American
Cechs, but by visitors from the mother country as well. The conclu
sion of writers from overseas not unfrequently discloses a lack of
preparation, if not an utter non-comprehension of American realities;
moreover, much of the Americana printed abroad is light reading,
calculated not so much to inform as to amuse the reader.
Dr. Joseph Stolba: In North America. 181 pp. Prague. 1876.
The earliest visitor from abroad, however, was not Dr. Stolba, but
two Protestant ministers, Ludvik B. Kaspar and Herman z Tardy.
The first-named, Kaspar, prepared for his superiors a summary
of the journey in A Report of a Pilgrimage to America in the Summer
of 1869.
Ladimir Klacel, in the initial numbers of the Hlas Jednoty Svo-
\ bodomyslnych (no. 1 is dated February 19, 1872), collected data on
pioneer immigration.
Joseph V. Sladek, poet and Shakespearean scholar, wrote for the
Prague Osveta and Lumir of his American experiences. "On a Cech
Farm in Texas," by Sladek, appeared in Lumir in 1884. Sladek was
among the first to translate the American Constitution into Cech.
For the information of the emigrant, Joseph Pastor published in
Hamburg, in 1884, a monthly journal, Cech Settlements in America.
John Palacky, son of the historian Francis Palacky, compiled the
United States of America. 142 pp. Prague. 1884. Palacky's work deals
wholly with statistics; Charles Jonas' assisted this author, who knew
America by hearsay only, never having visited here.
John Wagner: The Cech Settlers in North America. 63 pp. Prague.
1887. Unreliable and gossipy.
Thomas Capek: Monuments of Cech Immigration to America.
First ed. 1889; second ed., revised, 112 pp. Omaha. 1907.
Anton Peter HouS?: The Cech Catholic Settlements in America. St.
Louis. 1890.
1 All the sources quoted or referred to in the text or in the foot
notes are in the Cech language except those marked (e) English and
(g) German.
28l

APPENDLX
R. W. Turner: (e) "Emigration from Bohemia," U.S. Consular
Reports. 1890.
Charles Jonas': (e) " Bohemian and Hungarian Emigration to the
United States," U.S. Consular Reports. 1890.
Joseph Cermak: The History of America, after Benson J. Lossing
and other sources; contains the lives and experiences of Cech sol
diers who fought in the Civil War. Chicago. 1910.
Thomas Capek: (e) "The Bohemians in America," The Chau-
tauquan, October, 1891.
Joseph Kofensky: Journey around the World in 1893-94. Refers
to New York Cechs in v. 1, pp. 43-50. Prague.
John Wagner: Transoceanic Gossip. 155 pp. Prague. 1898. The
same comment is pertinent to this book as to the author's other
work. Reverends William Siller, Vaclav Prucha, and R. M. de Castello:
Memorial of the Cech Evangelical Churches in the United States. 290
pp. Chicago. 1900.
Dr. Vladimir Novak: Journeying through the United States of
America. 51 pp. Prague. 1900.
Josephine Humpal-Zeman: (e) Bohemian Settlements in America.
Industrial Commission Reports, 1901.
J. Buzek: (g) " Das Auswanderungs-problem und die Regelung
es Auswanderungswesen in Oesterreich," Zeitschrift fur Volks-
\sirtschaft, Socialpolitik und Verwaltung, v. 10. Wien. 1901.
J. J. Vlach: (e)"Our Bohemian Population," Proceedings of the
State Historical Society of Wisconsin, pp. 159-62. Madison. 1902.
., E. A. Steiner: (e) "Character of the Bohemians in the United
States," Outlook, April 25, 1903.
Dr. George Guth : My Vacation in America. Feuillelons and Caus-
eries from a Trip to the St. Louis Exposition. 137 pp. Prague. 1904.
Josephine Humpal-Zeman: (e) "Bohemia: a Stir of its Social Con
science," The Commons, July, 1904.
Vaclav §varc: (e) "The Culture which the Slav offers America,"
The Charities, July 1, 1905.
Francis Sailer: America. 47 pp. Prague. 1905. This travelogue by
Sailer reads like a tale from the Thousand and One Nights fabulous
stories. Dr. John Auerhan: "The Cechs in America," Pokrokovd Revue.
Prague, v. 7, no. 16, April, 1906, pp. 420-28; no. 17, pp. 481-86. Dr.
Auerhan is another commentator, who knows America by hearsay
only. John Rosicky: America as it is. Omaha.
282

(w

APPENDIX
E. G. Balch: (e) "The Story of a Bohemian Pioneer," The Chau-
tauquan, February, 1906.
E. A. Steiner: (e) On the Trail of the Immigrant. New York. 1906.
Marie Ziegler: Artist's Impressions. 68 pp. Prague. 1907. "A Press
Agent's Impressions" would have been a more appropriate caption
for this pamphlet abounding in magniloquent phrases of a journey
through America.
J. F. Votruba: "Americanization and American Cechs," Prazskd
Lidovd Revue, v. iv. Prague. 1908.
E. G. Balch: (e) "The Peasant Background of our Slavic Fellow
Citizens," The Charities, August 6, 1910.
John Habenicht: History of the Cechs in America. 773 pp. St. Louis.
1910. E. G. Balch: (e) Our Slavic Fellow Citizens. 536 pp. New York. 1910.
R. H. Schauffler: (e) "The Bohemian," Outlook, March, 1911.
Thomas Capek: Fifty Years of Cech Letters (Journalism and Litera
ture) in America. From January 1, i860, when the first Cech lan
guage newspaper was published in America, to January 1, 1910.
With supplements to the beginning of 191 1 . 280 pp. New York. 191 1 .
"Emigration to America," The Moravskd Orlice. Brno, Moravia,
January 16, 191 1.
Anton Pimper: "The Cech Americans and their Cultural Prob
lem," The Samostatnost. Prague, July 20, 191 1.
J. E. S. Vojan: Cech American Epistles. 192 pp. Chicago. 1911.
Dr. Francis Drtina: Cultural Relations of American Cechs with
their Motherland. A speech delivered in the presence of American
Cechs in the MSstanska Beseda, Prague, July 4, 1912.
Dr. Francis Drtina: "The American Cechs," The Ceske Slovo.
Prague, March 1, 1912.
Dr. Frank Soukup: America; a series of pictures from American
life. 363 pp. Prague. 1912.
Directory cf Cechs in the United States. 104 pp. Compiled by E. St.
Vraz with the collaboration, as to Chicago statistics, of J. Kramer
Tvrzicky. Dr. John Auerhan, John Hejret, and A. Svojsik: The Cech Emigra
tion. Reprint from Osveta. Prague. 1912.
Dr. Emanuel Gregr: "A Discussion of Economic Subjects with
American Cechs," in the Me"St.anska Beseda, Prague. Reported in
the Prague Herold, June 30, 1912.
Count Francis Liitzow: (g) American Impressions, gleaned on a
lecture tour on Bohemia, given in several institutions of learning.
Prague. 1912.
283

APPENDIX
Francis Herites: American and Other Sketches from my Journeys.
252 pp. Prague. 1913.
Dr. Anton Boha£: Random chapters from Slavic statistics.
" The Emigration of Slavs to America," The Slovansky Prehled, v. 15.
433 PP- Prague. 1913.
E. A. Steiner: (e) "Among the Bohemians," From Alien to Citizen,
pp. 169-76. New York. 1914.
Sarka B. Hrbkova: (e) The Bohemians in Nebraska. Nebraska
State Historical Society. 48 pp. Lincoln. 1914.
Gustav Haberman: From my Life. 299 pp. Prague. 1914.
Anton Pimper : Emigration Problem. 80 pp. Prague.
Dr. Navratil: Cech Physicians in America. 25 pp. Prague. 1914.
Francis J. Swehla: (e) "The Bohemians in Central Kansas,"
Kansas Historical Society Collections, pp. 469-512. Topeka. 1915.
B. S(h)imek: (e) The Bohemians in Johnson County. Iowa. 10 pp.
Archibald McClure: (e) " Leadership of the New America, Racial
and Religious," Bohemians, pp. 47-60. New York. 19 16.
Karel Pelant: The Real America, v. 1. 135 pp. Moravska Os
trava, Moravia. 1919.

INDEX

INDEX

Adams, E. A., 251
Albieri, Paul, viii, 44, 206
Alexy, Gustave, 250
Americanization of children, 102 ;
of names, 115
Anarchism, 143 ; revolutionary
propaganda, 145; no creative
thinkers, 146
Auerhan, John, 282, 283
Babka, John J., 90
Balatka, Hans, 39, 229
Balch, Emily G., v, 283
Barta, Alois, 244
Bartosek, Theodore, 239
Bern, Franta, 79, 106, 107
BeneS, Edward, 140, 272, 274,
277
BeneS, Vojta, 119, 215, 244, 267,
272
Bilek, Thomas V., 8, 13
Bittner, BartoS, viii, 133, 176,
181, 202, 204, 205, 211
Bohac", Anton, 284
Bohemia, conditions in, about
1848, 53
Bohemia Manor in Maryland, 1 1
Bohemian Voice, 261
BohunSk, Rudolf, 235
Bolton, Robert, 12
Borecky, John, viii, 36, 38, 54, 79,
80, 121, 188, 189, 190, 229
Bro2, John Stephen, 47, 209
Building and loan associations
in Cleveland, 75; in Chicago,
76
Bujarkova, F. S., 220
Bunata, Joseph, 138, 139, 219 2

Burian, Carl, 233
Business men; Jews carriers of
Slavic names, 76
Buzek, J., 27, 282
Capek, Anna V., 220, 221
Capek, Catherine M., 90
Capek, John V., 41, 85, 133, 182;
talented humorist, 200
Capek (Chapek), Joseph H., 225
Capek, Norbert F., 64
Capek, Peter, 230
Capek, Thomas, vi, xi, 48, 171,
186, 187, 220, 221, 261, 272,
281, 282, 283
Capek, Thomas, Jr., 220
Castello, R. M. de, 282
Catholics build first church, 247;
St. Louis center, 247; St.
Prokop 's parish, 247; early
trials, 249; societies, 263
Cechs, idealists, self-reliant, lit
erate, xi
Cech-American National Com
mittee, 260
Cech Colony (Ceska Osada), 170
Cech Press Bureau, 239
Cech Humoristic Quartet, 232
Cech Singing Quartet, 233
Cech Society, 255, 256, 258
Cermak, Joseph, 157, 158, 159,
202, 203, 282
Cerven£, F. V., 255, 257
Charvat, Otakar, 161, 219, 220
Children are American, 102
Chladek, Adolph, 87
Choral Societies, 254
Chotek, Hugo, 42, 43
87

INDEX

Choura, Frank, 140, 151, 261
Cigar-making in New York, 71,
72, 73
Cilinsk^, Josef, 255
CfsaF, Jaroslav, 220
Crane, Charles R., 235, 236
Crime; personal violence and
assault, 94; burglaries in Chi
cago, 94
Czechoslovak (Bohemian) Na
tional Alliance center of Lib
eration movement, 267
Danielovsk£, Lt. F., 270
Democratic party followers, 171,
172, 185, 190
Denis, Ernest, 3, 266, 271
Destinn, Emmy, 233
Dignowity, Anthony M., 88, 108,
220
Distribution of stock in Middle
West, 61
Dongres, L. W., 219
Dostal, Hynek, 64, 219
Drazdil, Anna, 230
Drtina, Francis, 283
Dvo?ak, Antonin, 225, 226, 228,
229, 230
Egle, William Henry, editor, 23
Eisner, Anton, 165
Erben, J. B., 105, 134, 189
Ersts (See Musical families)
Farsky, Oldrich, 235
Faust, Albert B., 37, 109
Fernow, Berthold, editor, 14
Fierlinger, Capt. Zdenko, 270
Fisher, Harrison, 235
Fisher, L. J., 84, 267
Florjansky, W., 234
Foxlee, Ludmila Kucha?, 207

Francl, F., 220
Fraternal societies, 254; C.S.P.S.,
258
Friml, Rudolph, 226
Geringer, August, 160, 166
Geringer, Vladimir A., 64, 220
Germans; settlements in U.S.,
109, no, in; Cechs mass in
same centers, 112; hold social
functions in German-owned
halls, 56
Gindely, Antonfn, 3
Greer, George Cabell, 16
Gregor, Frances, viii, 90, 101, 201,
203, 204, 220
Gregr, B., 219
Gregr, Emanuel, 283
Guth, George, 239, 282
Habenicht, John, vi, 44, 49, 86,
87, 121, 210, 246, 283
Haberman, Gustav, 151, 238, 284
HaiduSek, August, 50, 86
Hallk, St. J., 44
Hanzlik, Paul J., 93
Havlasa, John, 206, 210, 211, 239
Havlicek, Charles, x, 26, 33, 48,
49, 120, 125, 135, 136, 137,
255. 257
Havranek, A. J., 219
Hazen, Charles D., 272
Heink, Ernestine Schumann- 231
Hejret, John, 283
Here, Bernhard, 142
Herites, Francis, 237, 284
Herman, John, 38, 48, 211
Herrman, Augustine, first known
Cech immigrant, 9; lord Bohe
mia Manor, n, 14, 15, 17, 105
Hessoun, Joseph, 128, 247; fore
most prelate, 248, 251

288

INDEX

Heyberger, Anna, 244
Hlavac, Vojt&h I., 230
Hlava&k, Frank J., 142, 146,
147, 149, 150, 168
Hojda, John C, 134
Holecek, F., 219
Hollar, Wenceslaus, 7, 14
Holmes, Burton, 262
Holub, Emil, 237
Holy, Lt. Antonfn, 270
Horky, Karel, 216, 217, 218
Horvath, Lt. Joseph, 270
Housing conditions in New York
City, 40; Cleveland, 43; Chica
go, 44
Houska, Capt. V., 270
HouSt, Anton Peter, 246, 281
Hrbek, Jeffrey D., 220, 244
Hrbkova, §arka B., 46, 208, 244,
245. 284
HrdliCka, AleS, 206, 220
Hrubys (See Musical families)
Hubacek, Andrew, 82, 255, 257
Hubacek, August, 77, 80, 257,
258
Hubacek, Joseph, 82, 257
Hurban, Col. Vladimir, 270
Hus, John, 19; greatest Cech
born in Bohemia, 123; 244
Hussitism issue in Bohemia, 122 :
deeper meaning, 123; lecture
on, in Geneva, 266
HybeS, Josef, 140
Illiteracy, xi
'Immigration after 1848, 28; even
ratio males and females, 29;
tables, 29, 30, 31; officials
discourage, 33; pour through
Hamburg, etc., 34
Ingerle, Rudolf F., 235
ISka, Frank, 133, 212

Janauschek, Frances R., 231
Janda, Alois, 133, 181, 208
Jandus, William, 139
Janota, Frank, 151, 152
JanouSek, Franta, 106
Jews immigrate before others, 43
Jiclnsky, J. R., 46, 126, 220, 254
Jirsa, Maj. Vladimir, 162
Johnson, Amandus, 17
JonaS, Charles, ix, 39, 44, 64, 89,
105, 106, 146, 165, 166, 167,
168, 170, 174, 179, 180; "first
Cech in America," 183, 184,
185; buried in Prague, 186;
187, 188, 190, 196, 197, 220,
261, 281, 282
JonaS, Frederick, 85, 90
Journalism preceded book litera
ture, 165; first newspaper, 165;
in German script, 169; editor
and his influence, 173; reading
matter, 174 ; commercial aspect,
177; salaries of editors, 179;
live and die in poverty, 181
Jung, V. A., 209
Juranek, Thomas, 130
KalaS, Clementine, 230
Kalda, Joseph, 134, 219
Karel, John, viii, 38, 89
Karnik, J. J., 219, 243, 244
KaSpar, Joseph, 225
KaSpar, Ludvik B., 236, 281
Kerner, R. J., 91, 221, 245
Kissner, J. G., 246
Klacel, Ladimir, viii, 105, 121,
122, 125, 128; arrives in Amer
ica, 130; expelled from college,
131 ; dreamer and visionary,
132; 133. 137. 176, 180, 181,
188, 189; creates nothing in
America, 191; suffers grinding

289

INDEX

poverty, 192; 193, 194, 197,
208, 258, 281
Kleych, Wenzel, 20
Klofag, Vaclav J., 238, 273
Knfzek, Charles, 244
Kralicek, V, 253
Krejsa, Edward, 228
Kochmann, Leo (Vive la Liberte),
141, 142, 146
Kocian, Jaroslav, 225
Kohlbeck, Valentine, 246, 263
Kola?, Victor, 226, 227
Komensky (Comenius), John
Amos, Bishop, 5, 6, 20
Komensky Educational Clubs,
262
Konop, Thomas, 90
Konvalinka, John, 83, 86
Kopecky, Francis, Cechoslovak
Consul General, 216
Kopta, Flora P. Wilson, 225
Kopta, Wenzel, 225
Korbel, Francis, 256, 262
Korbel, J. Mario, 234, 235
KoFensky, Joseph, 10, 237, 282
Ko?izek, Frank, 38, 166; Nestor
of Cech journalism, 167; 168,
169, 170, 178, 179, 187
KoSaF, Jarka, 235
Kotouc", Otto, 47, 221
Koudelka, Bishop Joseph M., ex
culpates Austria from war
guilt, 275
Koukol, Alois B., 244
Kova?, Joseph, 64
Kova?fk, Alois, F., 92
KpvAHk, Joseph J., 226
Kozel, Vlasta Charlotte (Pavla
Cechova), 207
Krai, J. J., 179, 186, 208, 220, 221
KramaF, Charles, 272, 273
Krejsa, Antonie, 221

Krejsa, Edward, 228
K?icka, Cenek, 239
K?ikava, Josef, 256, 257
Kroupa, Bohuslav, 236
Krouzilka, William, 150
Kryl and his Band, 223, 224, 225
Kubelik, Jan, 225, 227, 233
Kudlata, Vaclav, 149, 150, 151
Kun, F., 249, 251, 252
Kutak, F. J., 216, 218
Land ownership, source of wealth,
75
Language; corruption of, 116;
English dominant, 116
Language schools, 241 ; supported
by gifts, 243; teaching of Cech,
243
Lassak, Francis W., 83
Leitner, Karel, 224
Lerando-Zelenka L., 221, 229,
244. 245
Letovsky, John B., 38, 106, 167,
178, 179, 180, 183
Letovsky, M. B., 89, 193
Liberda, John, 20
Lier, MiloS, vi
Lipovsky of Lipovice, Henry, 247
Literature, chiefly translations,
164; first book, 165; writers in
English, 221
Ludvik's Theatrical Troupe, 45,
232
LukaS, A., 235
Lusk, Marie Koupal, 235
Liitzow, Count, 231, 262, 283
McClure, Archibald, 284
Mahler, Gustav, 231
Mallery, Charles Payson, 9
Marchant, Francis P., 272
Marriage with Teutons and
others, 96

290

INDEX

Martinek, Joseph, 219
Masaryk, Alice G., 45, 272
Masaryk, Thomas G., 135, 237,
238, 265, 266, 268, 272, 273,
276, 277, 278
Masek, Matthew, 160
MaSek, Vojta, viii, 38, 39, 80
Mashek, Nan, 39
Matgjka, J. V., 261
Matulka, Jan, 235
Matura, Rose, 234
Meilbek, Leo, 89, 138
Mekota, Beatrice M., 221
Melichar, A. C, 212
Michalek, Anton, 89
Mihal6czy, Geza, 156
Mikolanda, Jacob, 140, 148, 149
Mikova, Marie, 227
Miller, Kenneth D., 49
Mily, Edward, 140, 150
Mineberger, V. (Harris Zachar),
64- 134
Mischka (Myska), Joseph, 36,
229
MiSkovsk^, Louis F., 242, 244
Mokrejs, John, 227
Moravians, 20, 23, 24
Moravian Cechs favor Texas, 48 ;
are conservative, 120
Moravian Church, 19; in Georgia,
23; Pennsylvania, 24
Motak, LibuSe S., 268
Mottl, Jacob, 77
Mracek, Frank, viii, 106, 178,
179, 182, 183
Mrazek, Joseph, 235
Mucha, Alfons M., 235
Mudra Band, 223
Musical families: the OndFiceks,
223; Ersts of Chicago, 224;
Hrubys and Zamec' of
Cleveland, 224, 228

Nadhenry, E. V, 235
Namier, Lewis B., 272
Naprstek, Vojta, viii, 38, 39, 105;
protagonist of liberalism, 125;
planned Cech community, 126;
admirer of America, 127; 136;
originator of Cech newspaper
in U.S., 168; 169, 255, 256,
257> 258
Navratil, Dr., 284
Nebesk£, Vaclav, 258
Neisser, George, 21
Neuzil, Prokop, 246
Niederle, Lt. Miloslav, 270
Nigrin, J. V., 15, 64, 221
Novacek, Otakar, 227
Novak, Anton, 39, 64, 166, 193
Novak, Vladimir, 282
Novy, Frederick G., 91
Nov£, J. J., 219
Noyes, George R., 244
Oberlin College, 242
Occupation. Farmers predomin
ate, 69; musicians numerous,
70; cigarmakers in New York,
7X> 72, 73; pearl button mak
ers, 74; table of occupations,
81 ; tailors in Chicago, 84; Cech
intelligence, 85
Oliverius, John A., viii, 105, 106,
172, 179; "newspaper grave-
digger," 190, 191
OndFicek, Emanuel, 223
Ondricek, Francis, 223, 225
Ort, Henry, 254
Oswald, Josef, 254
Oumiroff, Bogea, 233
OuSka, Thomas F., 235
Paca, William, of Cech lineage,
15

291

INDEX

Pacak, Louis, 220
Paces, Joseph, 151 ; Cech Valjean,
152, 153
Paclt, Cengk, 159, 160
Palacky, John, vii, 281
Palda, L. J., viii, 46, 72, 135;
father of Cech socialism, 137;
138, 139, 142, 147, 182, 189,
194, 195, 214, 260, 261
Pantata, 115
Pastor, Joseph, viii, 40, 121, 122,
127, 128, 133, 179, 182; anti
clerical, 186; 187, 196, 216, 281
Pavlikova, B ozena, 219
Pearl button makers, 74, 75
Pecival, Joseph F., 64, 267
Pecka, Joseph B., 146, 148
Pelant, Charles, 239, 284
Pergler, Charles, 212; accredited
to U.S., 213; eloquent speaker,
214; 220, 221, 272
Pescheck, Adolph Christian, 20
Petrtyl, August, 235
Petrzelka, Vaclav J., 219
Philipse (Flypsen), Frederick, 12;
"Bohemian merchant prince,"
13; 14- 18
Pimper, Anton, 283
Pfsecky, Ferdinand (Ma?fn, Ji?i),
220, 270
Pisek, Godfrey R., 221
Pisek, Vincent, 221, 248, 250
Pivany, Eugene, 155
Pohl, Vaclav, 255, 257
Polak, Emil J., 227
Polasek, Albin, 234, 235
Pondelicek, Joseph, 148
Prantner, E. F., 221
Pregler, Anton, 44, 86
Preissig, Vojta, 234, 273
Prochazka, Charles, 165
Prochazka, J., 272

Prohibition party, no adherents,
172
Prokosch, B., 244
Protestant exiles, 4; in New
Netherlands, 9; Virginia, 15;
Barbadoes Islands, 17; cling to
proscribed faith, 19; in Penn
sylvania, 23; Cechs a Protest
ant nation, 124; difficulties of,
249 ; organized in U.S. by non-
Cechs, 250; mother church, '
252
Prucha, J., 242
Prucha, Vaclav, 248, 282
PSenka, J. R., 206, 218
Quill (pseudonym), 204
Raboch, Wenzel A., 225
RaSin, Alois, 272
Rau, Albert G., 21
Recht, Charles, 221
Reichel, W. C, 24
Reincke, Abraham, 24
Reiser, Alois, 226, 227
Religious defection, 119; reasons,
122; influence of press, 127;
clergymen renounce faith, 130
RepiS (Revis), William, brings
libel suit, 128
Republican party followers, 171,
172, 190
Riis, Jacob, 41
Ringsmuth, F. K., 165, 200, 201
Robbins, Jane E., 41
Rosewater, Edward, viii, 48, 89,
90, 180, 181, 199
Rosicky, John, viii, 48, 166, 198,
199, 209, 259, 261, 282
Rosicky, Rose, 64, 207, 221
Rupp, I. Daniel, 24
Ruzi£ka, Rudolph, 234

292

INDEX

Rychlfk, Charles, 228
Rynda, John, 45, 246
St. Margaret's Congress, 140
St. Prokop College, 243, 244
Sabath, A. J., 90
Sadflek, F. J., 52
Salak, Caroline J., 64
Sailer, Francis, 282
Saloonkeeper, pioneer business
man, 77; influence, 77; not
always a liability, 78
Schauffler, H. A., 242, 250, 251
Schauffler, R. H., 283
Scheiner, Josef, 239, 254
Schlesinger (Slesinger), A. L., 47,
48
Schwab, Ludvik, 227
Schweinitz, Edmund de, 21
Sealsfield, Charles (Karl Postl),
131
Segregation of nationals, 58
Serpan, St., 219
Settlements, farming, in Wis
consin, 36; alluring advertise
ments, 37 ; in footsteps of Ger
mans, 112; city settlements,
36; New York a jumping-off
ground, 40; St. Louis first me
tropolis, 41; Chicago wrests
scepter, 42 ; separate comrjiun-
ities, 105, 126; Slavic Congress,
105; proposed emigration to
Amur, 106
Severa, W. F., 177, 261
Shimek (Simek), B., 47, 64, 92,
93, 159, 221, 261, 284
Siller, William, 248, 282
Siller, Joseph, 49, 86
Sinkmajer, Joseph, 221, 246
Sfpek, Maj. John, 270
Skaloud, F. J., 220

Skarda, Anna, 90
Skarda, Frank, viii, 90, 137, 138,
141, 147, 182
Sladek, Hynek, 189
Sladek, Joseph V., 179, 189, 236,
281
Slavic Alliance, 260
Slavfk, John, 77
Slezak, Leo, 233
Slovanska Osada, 107
Smaha, Joseph, 231, 232
Smetana, Augustine, excommu
nicated, 131
Smetanka, Jaroslav F., 215, 216,
220, 221, 267
Snajdr, Viclav, viii, 121; for 33
¦ years editor Dennice Novo-
vSku, 129; 167, 177, 187, 188,
189, 191, 192, 208, 261
Socialism introduced, 137; com
rades organize, 138; influx of
socialists, 140
Society for Promotion of Higher
Education (Matice VySSiho
VzdSlani), 261
Sokol Excursion, 239; Sokols, 254
Soldiers in Civil War, 157; Span
ish Campaign, 160; World
War, 160
Sosel, Joseph, 85
Soukup, Anthony M., 221
Soukup, Francis, 151, 153, 196,
221, 238, 283
Spacek, Capt. Jaromfr, 270
Spaniel, Lt. OldFich, 270
Stefanik, Gen. Milan R., 238,
239, 270, 274, 277
Steiner, Edward A., 122, 282, 283,
284
Steiner, Josef, 141
StSpina, J. F., 267
StSrba, A., 235

293

INDEX

Stolba, Joseph, 237, 281
Straka, Adolph William, 185
Stransky, Josef, 226
Stransk^, Paul of Zapska
Stranka, 6.
Svarc, Vaclav (Ven), 282
Svoboda, Vincent, 235
Svojanov communities, planned
by Klacel, 132
Svojsik, A., 283
Swehla, Francis J., 51, 284
Sykora, Joseph W., 43, 85, 86,
105, 241
Tabor, Edward 0., 221
Tardy, He?man z, 236, 281
Theatricals, amateur, popular,
254
Thuma, Joseph F., 41
Tichy, F., 135, 195
Triner, Joseph, 177
Tuma, Cech Columbus, 25
Tuma, F. Sokol, 239
Tupy, Ladislav, 64, 211
Turner, R. W., 282
Trojan, J. A., 220
Tvrzicky, Joseph, 215, 216, 217,
267, 283
Urban, Ladislav, 221, 227
Vancura, Henry, 3
VanSk, Vaclav, 135
VaSka, Bed?ich, 224
VaSkfl, B. 0., 263
Veleminsk#, Charles, ix, 240
Vesely, Kosmas, 244
Vickers, Robert H., 261
Visitors from abroad, 236, 237,
238, 239, 240; Czechoslovak
ministers in America, 238
Vlach, J. J., 39, 282

Vojan, J. E. S., 41, 45, 76, 119.
186, 204, 216, 217, 221, 267,
283
Volav£, Margaret, 227
VondrouS, J. C, 234
Voska, E. V., 270
Votruba, J. F., 239, 283
Vranek, John, 208, 209
Vraz, E. St., 209, 283
Wagner, John, 159, 203, 281, 282
Watson, R. W. Seton, 272
Wetch6, Ludmila Vojacek, 227
Wiener, Leo, 245
Wilson, James Grant, 1 1
Wilson, President Woodrow, 162
Winlow, Clara V, 64, 90, 221
Woytisek, V. W., 261
Yurka, Blanche, 233
Zamecnik (See Musical families)
Zarska, Erna, 233
Zdrubek, F. B., viii, 44, 45, 121,
I28; 35 years editor Svornost,
129; 132, 133, 134, 150, 164,
166, 176, 179; Speaker of Lib
eral Union, 182; 189, 196; not
creative writer, 197; 198, 208,
219, 221, 252, 261
Zelen£, John, 92
Zeman, Josephine Humpal-, viii,
44, 201 ; suffragette leader, 202,
282
Zeyer, Julius, 126
Ziegler, Marie, 283
Zlamal, 01d?ich, 275
Zmrhal, Jaroslav J., 211, 267, 272
Zmrhal, Lt. Charles, 270
Zoula, Norbert, 140, 146, 147,
148
Zvolanek, Joseph, 252

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