Names and Genealogy, a Sad American History of Ignorance, Mockery and Prejudice
As a genealogy buff, one of my online projects has been to document badly neglected families who immigrated to Pennsylvania from Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Russia, and Italy. They are an integral part of American history. They worked in the coal mines throughout Pennsylvania, and eventually manned the steel mills of Pittsburgh. Their families were enormous, at times, and largely unknown, yet they have populated and built our cities.
One set of my maternal great-great-grandparents immigrated from Scotland to Pennsylvania, and my great-great-grandfather died there, trying to build a railroad for a coal mine, hence my interest.
I have communicated with one family whose sole English speaking member lives in Germany, and he has been delighted to find his great-Aunt's true history in America.
One thing that makes this history so difficult is the carving up of bits of Austria, Germany and Russia in 1918 to create what we now know as Poland. Also in 1918 Czechoslovakia was hacked out of the body of Austria and Hungary. WWI destroyed countries, churches, and records. WWII completed the job.
Another reason these families are SO difficult to document, is that no American official, (then living), who recorded any of their records was able to spell their names the same way twice.
But another, more insidious reason, was the mockery and prejudice they obviously encountered in the late 1800's right up until the second world war.. By the 1920's, after fleeing war torn Europe, some of these families anglicized their names for their own sanity, apparently.
One can only imagine what they went through...the names they were called by the ignorant...the lame jokes they had to endure. I have a friend on this website whose ancestors in Pennsylvania were called "Hunkies". "Hunkies" were workers from east central Europe, mocked for their broad backs and strength for brute labor.
I have also heard the names "Polack", "Wop",(from the Italian word Guappo, and used to refer to ALL Italians), "Rooski", and "Gypsies", applied to entire segments of our population. The jokes that some of us heard were all about the stupidity of the "Polacks", the dishonesty of the "Gypsies", and so on, ad nauseum.
Many of these families removed the "ski" from the back half of their surnames. Some of them were able to translate the meaning of their Polish names to English, et voila! Their last name is now an English word written on their gravestones.
One such family has lost almost all reference to their past and their history. Their gravestones are all in English, containing an English word for a common plant as their new last name, and their present day descendants seem to have no idea why.
To live comfortably in a flawed America filled with the illiterate or semi-literate, they had to erase their own history.
And it is my belief that they should retrieve it...research it...and bring it back. If you are a member of such a family I encourage you to befriend someone who can find your ancestors, who speaks the language of the land of your origin, and who can help you to find and read your family's records.
One set of my maternal great-great-grandparents immigrated from Scotland to Pennsylvania, and my great-great-grandfather died there, trying to build a railroad for a coal mine, hence my interest.
I have communicated with one family whose sole English speaking member lives in Germany, and he has been delighted to find his great-Aunt's true history in America.
One thing that makes this history so difficult is the carving up of bits of Austria, Germany and Russia in 1918 to create what we now know as Poland. Also in 1918 Czechoslovakia was hacked out of the body of Austria and Hungary. WWI destroyed countries, churches, and records. WWII completed the job.
Another reason these families are SO difficult to document, is that no American official, (then living), who recorded any of their records was able to spell their names the same way twice.
But another, more insidious reason, was the mockery and prejudice they obviously encountered in the late 1800's right up until the second world war.. By the 1920's, after fleeing war torn Europe, some of these families anglicized their names for their own sanity, apparently.
One can only imagine what they went through...the names they were called by the ignorant...the lame jokes they had to endure. I have a friend on this website whose ancestors in Pennsylvania were called "Hunkies". "Hunkies" were workers from east central Europe, mocked for their broad backs and strength for brute labor.
I have also heard the names "Polack", "Wop",(from the Italian word Guappo, and used to refer to ALL Italians), "Rooski", and "Gypsies", applied to entire segments of our population. The jokes that some of us heard were all about the stupidity of the "Polacks", the dishonesty of the "Gypsies", and so on, ad nauseum.
Many of these families removed the "ski" from the back half of their surnames. Some of them were able to translate the meaning of their Polish names to English, et voila! Their last name is now an English word written on their gravestones.
One such family has lost almost all reference to their past and their history. Their gravestones are all in English, containing an English word for a common plant as their new last name, and their present day descendants seem to have no idea why.
To live comfortably in a flawed America filled with the illiterate or semi-literate, they had to erase their own history.
And it is my belief that they should retrieve it...research it...and bring it back. If you are a member of such a family I encourage you to befriend someone who can find your ancestors, who speaks the language of the land of your origin, and who can help you to find and read your family's records.
