The Czechoslovak Review/Volume 4/Slovaks and Czechs in Cleveland

SLOVAKS AND CZECHS IN CLEVELAND.

That the foreign born look upon the Americanization movement with suspicion cannot be denied. Nor can one wonder at it, when Americanization is interpreted by legislators as the imposing of restrictions upon the immigrant—suppressing his newspapers, forbidding him to use in public meetings the only language he knows, compelling him to become naturalized on pain of losing his job, in short making him a patriotic American by brute force. To be sure, most of these Americanizing proposals are pigeonholed in committees of congress and state legislatures, but the foreign born read of them and become mistrustful of the very word of Americanization.

And that is unfortunate, for Americanization in harmony with the old liberal ideals of the United States is needed by the foreign born. The Cleveland Americanization Committee, for instance, goes about its task in a different spirit than some of the legislators. They realize that the problem is not merely to bring to the immigrant the knowledge of America, its language, customs and ideals, but also to interpret the foreigner to the native American. As they express it, “without a common understanding of the best each has to offer no real fusion of new and older Americans will ever take place.”

Moved by this ideal the committee published pamphlets on the foreign born citizens of Cleveland. Our readers will be interested in two of them, “The Slovaks of Cleveland” and “The Czechs of Cleveland”, both written by Mrs. Eleanor E. Ledbetter.

The author is librarian of the Broadway Branch of the Cleveland Public Library. She knows the people about whom she writes; she is acquainted personally with their leading men, and she has taken the time and trouble to get her facts and get them right. An American who writes about the immigrant is likely to gather a few facts and base wide generalizations upon them. Mrs. Ledbetter’s method is different; she gathers a great many facts and makes sure that they are facts, and then lets the facts speak for themselves.

The article on Slovaks of Cleveland gives also, as the title states, some general information on the race. It was written in summer of 1918, when Slovakia was still subject to Magyar tyranny, although the day of liberation was already seen at hand. Physical, economic and political conditions of Slovakia are described with some detail, and then the author tells of Slovak settlement in the United States and the beginnings of their settlement in Cleveland. She describes their churches, fraternal societies, newspapers, loan associations, their qualities as desirable addition to America. The account is sympathetic, sober and true.

In dealing with the Czechs, the author planned her story on slightly different lines. She wrote, when the Czechoslovak Republic was already in existence, and she assumed that the Czechs (Bohemians) are better known than the Slovaks. So after a brief introduction she plunges into a history of the Czechs in Cleveland. The first Bohemians in Cleveland came in 1850, thirty years ahead of the Slovaks. They were great home builders which leads the author to speak of their savings and loan associations. She goes on to describe their musical and dramatic organizations, the peculiar religious situation prevailing among the Bohemians in America, their churches, national organizations, the share they take in Cleveland’s industrial and civic life, and their share in the great war. The pamphlet presents a very full and fair account of the life of Czechs in Cleveland.

Both pamphlets are well got-up, and their interest is increased by numerous good illustrations.

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