A little over a year ago, community member Tom Layloff lamented with family on the decline of the institutions and social fabric of their Croatian heritage.  Concerned that the legacy of the Croatian community was drifting away and that the history would be lost, Layloff enlisted the University’s help in establishing a Croatian Heritage Project to collect, inventory, study, and preserve cultural items.

With the help of Historical Studies Professor Laura Fowler, Layloff then worked to form a Croatian Heritage Project Advisory Committee to assist in identifying and soliciting items to be donated to SIUE for archiving and study.  Funds were collected to support graduate assistant Tracy Speakman, and the project is now underway.

The end result of the project will be a website that will tell the history of the Croatian Home, Inc., a community center in Madison, Illinois that went bankrupt in November 2005.  The records and materials that were housed at Croatian Home were then transferred to Lodge 44, another Croatian Mutual Aid society in Granite City.

Fowler received a donation of materials from members of Lodge 44 this spring, at which point Speakman began reviewing the documents to reconstruct the history of the Croatian community in Southwestern Illinois.  Commenting on the logistics of such a task, Speakman notes, “It will be sometime before any true assessments are made about the material.  Because the items are coming to us in printer paper boxes and plastic bags, the first order of business is to process the material so that there is a sense of organization and break down of the material.”

A handmade flag hung inside the Croatian Home in Granite City, IL.

Speakman discussed some of the expectations she has going into the project, saying “Many of the people that we have talked to in the community have expressed a concern for the lack of interest in Croatian culture on the part of younger generations.  This seems to be a common occurrence in many cultural groups.  By about the third generation, the interest is tenuous at best.  Within the material collected for this project, I hope to pinpoint where this begins to happen and why.  One focal point of the Croatian culture in Madison and Granite City has always been the music and dance.  To this day, Tamburitzan music has been at the center of the Croatian Home, even attracting many of its non-Croatian members.  It will be interesting to see the many roles that this music has played within the material given to us.”

Advisory Committee member Frances Irwin, a member of the Croatian Fraternal Union and the Tamburitza Association of America, earned her doctorate with a dissertation on using Balkan folk music to teach irregular meter.  She notes, “There are many Croatians on the St. Louis side who have artifacts that should be retained and preserved…Many of the old Croatians have a wealth of history that should be recorded, and items that should be saved somewhere.  So, this project hopefully will gain attention.”

The project’s eventual website will grant community members access to the information gathered through the Croatian Heritage Project.  The site will explore the impact of Croatian culture on local community as well as the impact of local community on Croatian culture.  Plans are also underway to eventually accept permanent donations of records and mementos from the Croatian community into the Louisa H. Bowen University Archives, which would serve as a central location for such materials to be accessed throughout the Greater St. Louis area.

Complementing the project last fall was an oral history course in which students interviewed approximately 50 members of the Croatian community throughout the metropolitan area.  The students interviewed immigrants who left Croatian during the communist era, as well as those whose families came to the United States early in the twentieth century.  Professor Anne Valk explains that the interviews served to “elicit people’s memories about institutions, such as the lodge, families, and churches, that were important to the community and through which cultural traditions were passed along to younger generations.  In addition, the interviews focused on neighborhoods, workplaces, and events that are important in understanding the evolution of this community and its impact on the local area.”

Commenting on the overall significance of the project, Layloff emphasizes, “We all have a heritage which generally is lost as we assimilate into the great melting pot of the USA.  To preserve this heritage for our children and their children, it is important to secure the historical items and memorabilia in an institution which has continuity and commitment.  We are fortunate in our area to have such an institution in SIUE, which serves not only to educate us but also to bring cultural enrichment to our lives…

I encourage all of the people of Croatian descent or those with interest in our local heritage to support this effort with their contributions of funds, memorabilia, and historical items.”

Academically speaking, Fowler stresses, “This project is a wonderful opportunity for masters-level History and Museum Studies students to delve into local history and to see the challenges and rewards of community work.  We hope that we can continue to receive funding from the community to hire graduate assistants to assist with this project.”

Fowler is actively pursuing project funds, including an Illinois Humanities Council Major Grant she is applying for this February.  Donations made payable to the SIUE Foundation are tax deductible as allowable by law. Convenient and secure online donations may be made at:

https://secure.conveniencepay.com/wfapp/siuef/customer/

For more information about making a contribution, contact the CAS Development Director:

Marilyn Marsho
College of Arts and Sciences
Phone: 618/650-5048
Email: mmarsho@siue.edu

For more information about the project, see:

http://www.siue.edu/%7Elmilsk/Site/About%20Me.html

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