Chicago’s Draugas (Friend) is the longest-running Lithuanian newspaper in the world. More than a century old, the newspaper is still being published every week, but its readership is declining. It is a symbol of the changing Lithuanian community in Chicago.
On a frosty but sunny morning in northern Illinois, Leonas Putrius greets visitors to the Lithuanian National Cemetery in Chicago. Although he is delighted to hear Lithuanian, he feels more comfortable speaking English, as he was born in the US to a Lithuanian family and has spent his entire life here.
Putrius says he has never visited Lithuania. He has only heard about the Baltic country from his relatives and read about it in books.
However, he says he feels a connection to his parents’ homeland, so he took a job as the administrator of the historic Lithuanian cemetery in Chicago.
“It’s an honour to work here. It’s important to me that this history goes on,” Putrius says in a mix of English and Lithuanian.
The Lithuanian National Cemetery was established in 1911 some 30 kilometres southwest of central Chicago. It was a remote location at the time, but the endless suburbs of the third-largest American city have already closed in.
The cemetery is one of only two major Lithuanian cemeteries in Chicago. The other is for Catholic Lithuanians, while the Lithuanian National Cemetery is for less religious people.
The second cemetery was established after atheists were refused burial with the Catholic Lithuanians in Chicago.
After the Second World War, the urn of Jonas Šliūpas, the activist of the Lithuanian National Revival, who died in Germany, was transferred to the Lithuanian National Cemetery in Chicago.
There is also a monument to President Kazys Grinius, who died in Chicago and whose remains were brought to Lithuania after the end of the Soviet occupation.
Moreover, the cemetery is the eternal resting place of a generation that contributed to Washington never recognising the Soviet occupation in Lithuania, including Lithuanian-American journalist Mykolas Vaidyla.
The writers and editors of the Lithuanian newspapers in Chicago are also buried here. In total, there are around 13,000 Lithuanian graves in this cemetery.
Dying readers
Chicago is also home to the longest-running Lithuanian newspaper Draugas, which has been in circulation since 1909. It is still printed every week and sent to Lithuanian subscribers across the US.
Vytas Stanevičius, the chairman of the Draugas board, is laying out freshly printed newspapers in a building designed by a Lithuanian-American architect in the 1950s. “In total, we will send out almost 900 by post today.”
In its heyday, the newspaper had more than 12,000 subscribers “Those were good times,” says Ramunė Lapas, the editor-in-chief of Draugas.
Until a few decades ago, Draugas was published daily. In the old Lithuanian district of Chicago, people used to queue up in the morning waiting for the newspaper to arrive, Lapas recalls.
Today, the historic editorial office has only a few employees. The number of Draugas’ subscribers has dropped significantly not only because of the rise of the internet but also changes in the Lithuanian community in Chicago.
“Our readers are dying. Our loyal readers, those who waited in queues and couldn’t live without Draugas, are leaving one by one,” Lapas says.
More spread out
Lithuanian Plaza is the name of a street in the Marquette Park area, which was dominated by Lithuanians until a few decades ago.
In the park, the massive monument to Darius and Girėnas’ flight across the Atlantic reminds of the Lithuanian heritage.
Nearby is the Lithuanian Youth Centre which was built after the Second World War when Lithuanians started feeling a threat to their Lithuanian identity.
After the war, there were many Lithuanian Saturday schools teaching Lithuanian language and culture near Catholic Churches in Chicago, says Audrius Plioplys, an artist and neuroscientist of Lithuanian descent.
But a local bishop started closing these schools: “The idea was that immigrants should forget the country they came from, forget the language.”
Plioplys’ uncle, the priest Vaclovas Gutauskas, travelled across the US collecting donations for the future Lithuanian Youth Centre. Today, the Lithuanian school attended by hundreds of children still operates in the building.
However, the population of the formerly Lithuanian neighbourhood in Marquette Park has changed, with Mexican flags now the most visible.
When asked why Lithuanians left the area, old Lithuanian Chicagoans give a similar answer: the racial makeup of the neighbourhood has started to change.
But the Lithuanian community in Chicago is still large and active, they stress. The main difference is that Lithuanians who used to concentrate in one area, are now more spread out across the state of Illinois.
Read more: Once important diaspora centre, Lithuanian community in Chicago is shrinking
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