Eastern European Immigration
Why They came to America
General History
• Immigration during the early 1900s
occurred due to the industrial revolution
that had swept across Europe during the
previous century.
• People also came to America for political
and economic reasons, but less so during
the very early 1900s.
Countries in Eastern Europe
• The borders of the Eastern European
countries changed a lot during the first
half of the 20th century.
• The main countries considered part of
Eastern Europe:
• Poland
• Russia
Poland’s First Wave of Immigration
• The first wave of
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immigrants came to
America from the
1800s up to WWI
mainly for economic
reasons, but also
political and religious.
They immigrated from
Krakow, Rzeszow, and
the Carpathian and
Tatra mountains.
• Many Poles intended to return once they
made money
• Very few Jewish Poles intended to return
to Poland because of the oppression they
faced as Jews in Poland.
• The First wave became part of the
working class in America, taking poor
paying jobs.
Poland’s Second Wave of
Immigration
• The second wave came to America following
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WWII.
The war wrecked the country economically,
politically and population wise.
6 million of Poland’s 35 million population were
killed during the war.
Poland was liberated by Soviet’s and as a result
became Communist.
Second Wave Continued
• Immigrants were mainly political prisoners
and refugees who were intellectual and
skilled workers.
• In America, these refugees who were
educated, separated themselves from
Polish communities and assimilated
themselves into middle class American
professional groups.
Poland’s Third Wave of Immigration
• This wave started in December of 1981 after martial law
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was imposed on the country.
Some of these immigrants did so through a visa lottery
Some of these immigrants were well educated and
highly skilled.
Many of the educated ones became professors at
universities.
The poorer ones who immigrated, still live for the most
part in low income settlements in Polish quarters.
Where they Settled
• In all three of the waves of immigrations,
Poles stuck together in urban cities,
mainly New York, Chicago and Detroit.
• Illegal Poles relied on Polish contacts for
jobs.
Immigration by the Numbers
• Illegal Polish immigrants are currently in
the 70,000s and ranks 10th in the US
making obtaining a visa difficult
Contributions to America
Mikail Baryshnikov
- Lived in Latvia
- In 1967, joined Kirov Ballet
- Left Soviet Union in 1974 to gain personal
and artistic freedom
• Made debut with American Ballet Theater
in 1974
• Helped influence male dancing
• Head dancer and artistic director
• In 1990, found White Oak Project with
Mark Morris- Mixed Russian Ballet into
American Modern Dance
Elie Wiesel
• Born in Romania in
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1928
During WWII, he was
deported to a German
concentration camp
Freed by allies in
1945
• Became a citizen of the US in 1963
• He was a professor of humanities at
Boston University in 1976
• He wrote Night- describes a father and
son being deported to Auschewitz and
what the terrible conditions they endured.
• From 1980 to 1986, he was the chairman
of US Presidents Commission of Holocaust
• Established Elie Wiesel Foundation for
Humanity in 1987
• Currently a Judaic Studies professor at
City College in New York City.
Madeline Albright
• Born in Prague in
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1937
Went to the United
States in 1948 when
she was 11
Went with family to
seek political asylum
• Legislative Liaison for National Security
Council
• Developed programs to help women in
international affairs
• In 1989, President of Center for National
Policy
• She was Secretary of State during the
Clinton Administration
Hyman G. Rickover
• Born in Poland in
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1900
Graduated from Naval
Academy in 1922
Submarine training in
1930
• Major impact on WWII – head of the
Electrical Section in the Bureau of Ships
for the US.
• Received a Legion a merit for the
accomplishment
• Had training in nuclear power
• Director of naval reactors branch in the
Bureau of Ships
• Developed world’s first nuclear powered
submarine
• Called USS Nautilus
• Served for 64 years in the US Navy
Samuel Goldwyn
• Born in Warsaw
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Poland in 1879
Lived a life of poverty
Went to New York
where he worked in a
glove company
• He and his brother- in- law formed the
Jesse Lasky Feature Photoplay Company
• First film he helped produce was called
Squaw Man in 1914
• Helped found Metro Goldwyn Mayer, a
major motion picture company which is
still in existence today
Polish Culture
• Poles found what it meant to be Polish in
the U.S.
• In their own country there is no real sense
of nationalism because the country was
always split between other countries.
• Only recently Poles gained a country of
their own.
Polish Holidays
• Pulaski Day is a holiday that celebrates two
noblemen named Tadeusz Kosciuszko (17461817) and Casimir Pulaski (1747-1779). They
both fought for the rebels in the Revolutionary
War. Pulaski was killed in the battle of Savannah,
is still honored by Polish Americans and each
year they celebrate by annual marches on
October 11. President Harry Truman decreed it
an official remembrance day in 1946.
Religious Culture
• The main religion of Poland is Roman Catholic. The
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Catholic Church of Poland was seen as a way to hold
their cultural values together. Catholic Church was seen
as a rock for peasants to depend upon. The priests were
seen as leaders for the peasants.
The church in American communities is seen as a central
institution for communities in American cities. Polish
Americans took church politics seriously.
They built many institutions and they provided religious,
educational, recreational, and cultural- without recourse
to host the host society.
Most Polish immigrants built these communities that
were like their own world.
National Dress
• The national dress for men consists of a headdress like
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felt or straw hats or caps.
Trousers are often white with red stripes, tucked into
boots or worn with mountaineering moccasins typical to
the Carpathians.
Vests or jackets caver the white shirts, and the favorite
colors of red and white replicate the flag.
The women wear a combination of a blouse and
petticoat covered by a full, brightly colored or
embroidered skirt, an apron, and a jacket or bodice, also
gaily decorated. Their headdress ranges from a simple
kerchief to more elaborate affairs made of feathers,
flowers, beads, and ribbons decorating stiffened linen.
• Polish is a west Slavic language, part of the
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Lekhite subgroup, and is similar to Czech and
Slovak.
Modern Polish, written in the Roman Alphabet,
stems from the sixteenth century.
Its vocabulary is in part borrowed from Latin,
German, Czech, Ukrainian, Belarusan, and
English.
Dialects include Great Polish, Pomeranian,
Silesian and Mazovian. Spelling is phonetic with
every letter pronounced. Consonants in
particular have different pronunciation than in
English.
Art
• Poland has a long history of art, especially in the 1940s’
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when communism was taking root in Poland.
Art became a release for many people, but had to be
kept secret because artistic freedom was not approved
by the government. But Krakow was like an island in
Poland where artists and literature thrived.
There were artists, however like Zbigniew Herbert
(1924-1998), a legendary Polish poet, essayist and
moralist who fought for Polish rights and equality.
Stanislaw Lem is another famous Polish science fiction
writer known for his satire, humor, and frequently
irreverent reflections of society.
There were also great music composers like Stanislaw
Moniuszko (1819-1872) was, apart from Chopin, the
most outstanding composer of 19th century Polish
music.
Reasons for Immigrating
• Ownership of land is what drove Poles to the
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U.S.
To Polish people land was considered a form of
wealth.
Most of the polish population were peasants and
didn’t have land. They have a strong belief in
good vs. evil and that resulted in the belief in
the devil, witches, the evil eye, bees building a
hive in ones house, the house will catch fire, and
goats were seen as lucky. Wolves, crows, and
pigeons were seen as unlucky
Traditions in the US
• Most Polish people were working in industrial jobs and
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only 10% saw the dream of owning land.
Poles were moving up the economic status ladder slowly
by slowly, but most are blue collar workers.
They believe that education is the way of the future, but
in the past they were against education till the 1960’s.
They have the traditions holding strong because of their
communities revolving around the Polish Christian
Orthodox Church. The only hope to keep the culture
vibrant in the U.S. is for new Polish immigrants to arrive
and keep their culture vibrant and alive in America.
Polish Jobs
• Since most immigrants from Poland were
peasants and had a few skills most worked in
the industrial society, but they were strong and
knew how to work hard. They offered labor in
steel mills, stockyards, mines, tanneries, or
other heavy industries where machines had
reduced technology to do most simple tasks
requiring brute strength. They worked at
factories because they planned to head back to
Poland to buy land.
Facts by the Numbers
• In 1969 sixteen percent attended college, 45%
of males had white collar jobs. About 25% were
skilled workers and 30% were semi skilled or
unskilled workers In 1980 the total changed to
23.9% for polish people who had four years of
college. At the same time 16.2-17.1% of the
total population of whites made it to college for
four years. At this time 23.5 percent of Poles in
U.S. were in the managerial or professional
categories. About 31.8% are in technical and
administrative positions. Only 18% were
operators, labricators, or laborers.
Assimilation into America
• The first generation Polish Americans were
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likely to send their sons to work in the mills at
a very young age in order to pay the bills.
The second generation had leaned toward
more ambitious attitudes toward work and
education.
Also the vast culture of the U.S. was mainly
Protestant and the Polish immigrants were use
to the Polish Roman Catholic ways. Their
Church was different because of mysticism
involved in it.
• The Polish immigrants’ believe in the
Polish Roman Catholic Church. They made
their community revolve around the
church in order not to lose their cultural
ties to their homeland. They still celebrate
their holidays the way they would in their
old country. They also held on to their
roots of Polish folklore and national roots
of their former homeland.