Americans of Polish descent. How many of us are on Polish forums?

My Mother was German/Austrian descent. Dad is Polish and part German descent, his Mother was full-blooded Kashubian (part German as well).
My folks came here to America between 1853 and 1888, so I am American through and through but I enjoy learning about my roots and especially studying history.

you still have some polish in you, and family history is very interesting, same as any
other history, like American history, its amazing to find things about your family that
you never knew happened, wars the participated in, uprisings, military, owing large farms
and lots of land, family still living in same town and if your lucky, like me, you will still have
current cousins living there.. We have always been in contact with.

we are a ocean apart, but they still think of our family as polish.. even though we are
American citizens :)

My family are all pollacks.

but that's obvious.

Well, what the hell, there's no stigma in that.. on the contrary.. where are the Romans that tried to kill us off?

I saw a documentary about Poles who came to Texas in the 19th century, hardly any of them look Polish today, more like a Polish Mexican mix

We're quite proud of it.

we ate romans for breakfast.

The ones that escaped went west and are mostly still in England still yearning to control the breadbasket of Europe so be careful.

seriously though, I think a lot of wealth left Poland around 1900. our grandparents that came here, great-grandparents, I think lots of them were running from the socialism/communism that was starting up in central/east europe back then. There was nasty stuff going on. My great-grandparents on my mom's paternal side of the family were killed within a couple years of arriving here, so my grandfather and his sister were taken in by the church as toddlers, orphans. My mom's mom had a huge family, 2 girls, 6 (or 7) boys.. great-granddad was an engineer, all the boys went to college even way back then, became engineers and scientists.. one became a priest.. my dad's side of the family mostly all became steel workers.

I have some really old family photos, they took lots of pictures, a couple photographers in the family too, one on my mom's side, one on my dad's side.

All of my great-grandparents came from Poland. My mother's side emigrated legally from the Prussian part of the partition near the end of the 19th century. My father's side emigrated illegally shortly before the First World War, via a ship that docked in Baltimore, from the Austrian and the Russian parts of the partition.

Patrycja19

While I am not American but Canadian. I did not know of or was aware of family in Poland until I started doing the genealogy over 6 yrs ago. I was going on just a couple of letters, 2 pieces of paper that provides a typed address for 2 different people with the same last name that matched with the letters and an individual who married my great grandmothers' sister.

Not only that, there was some photos as well. It was by pure chance that I was contacted by a relative from there because I had made a posting in regards to the letters and trying to determine if that individual was a relative to the husband of my great grannys' sis. That is the first contact with this part of the family since my grandparents died over 30 years ago.

As for me, I have Canadian, German and am trying to prove Polish. The traditions are just the ones you would find here in Canada.

They weren't running away from politics, they were running away to make more money. Indeed, plenty of them didn't want to live in the newly established Polish state.

I have to get in on this. My parents came over to America in the early 1900s. Dad got off of the boat with $14.00 in his pocket. He met Mom who came from Turin, and the married here in America.

Dad and I talked a lot.. He loved Poland but loved America more,for what it gave him. When i asked why he left. They were hungry. This song will explain it'

videozone.sk/goralu-czy-ci-nie-al-v11105.html

Say what?Only poor pesants who had nothing in Poland were going to America.You Polams have to accept the fact that your ancestors were the lowest class of society.Really nothing to be proud of.

I am a proud American citizen. I am equally proud of my poor Polish peasant ancestors who were brave enough to make an overseas journey to start a new life in the early 1900s, as well as my poor Irish ancestors who left Ireland during the potato famine in the 1840's. I'm sure it never occurred to either my Polish or Irish family that several generations later, their descendants would be able to finish high school, go to bed with food in our stomachs and worship in the way we wish. Simple things for which I am grateful.

A family photo, about 1928 I think. My great grandparents, great aunt and uncles, my grandmother in the back row at center.

My grandparents wedding day, 1930. Best man and maid of honor at left, my grandparents on right.

cheehaw, Nice pics, all polish?


thats what I hear alot of people say, but back in the day if you owned more then
one cow, you were rich.. my uncle told me that his mothers parents owned alot
of cows.. not just two, so they were like modern day ranchers with a cattle farm.
but of course, she up and came to America cause most of her cousins came and
quite a few stayed.

All Polish. This side of the family from western Poland, near Auschwitz.

mine too, from my moms side , they were maybe a mile or two away from

Auschwitz.

:)

Again ... you should visit. When the rest of the world visits ... why not u!

Anyways ... u got my PM?

Do you have any old pics? Maybe our families knew each other. my family came in through Ellis Island and settled around Buffalo, NY. where did yours go?


My sister visited a few years ago. she wasn't very impressed.


btw, 'the lowest class of society' has never had the resources to make a leap overseas, not now, not then.

That is why you were left behind.

born in America, my paternal grandparents were born in Poland. I wonder if anyone on here is my cousin. :P

MY mom gave me two documents with my grandpas name on them and grandma on one
of their marriage cert and naturalization papers.

then later she gave me my other grandmas green card. she was still citizen of poland.
she even had to do the paper work during the war again cause of all the immigrants
and had to prove how long she had already been here. get letters from her friends.


I dont have old pics of when they came, if they took any, they got lost. I do have
one of my grandfathers old home.

my family came and settled in detroit. but they did come thru ellis.

Hi Patrycia,
Yes I would estimate I am ethnically about 1/3 Polish but I am not lucky enough to have any relatives that I know of in Poland. I'm planning on going there in a few years and maybe I'll run into some. :)


Obviously you have no clue and broad generalizations such as this only make you sound like a fool...


The Poles of South Texas (I am not from here) are from Upper Silesia and established the first pemanent Polish settlement in North America. I believe they started coming here in the 1850's or so. I did not see that program but I suppose that some of them mixed with the local population which is Hispanic. Some of the ones I know are still 100% Polish though. There are also quite a few folk of Czech ethnicity as well.

Nice pictures Cheehaw, thanks for sharing!

where was Trzebiska before the wars? anyone have any idea?

My dad's father emigrated from there..

Edit,

was not the right town...

27. Josef XXXXX (surname removed) Trzebiska, Austria 1911 17 View View View

that's what I got at the Ellis Island website, I am real sure that's my dad's father. But Trzebiska does not seem to exist.

y'all, the elllis island website is here to search records:

ellisisland.org

Trzebinska?

cheehaw those are nice pictures of your family.

They look like they became good American citizens :)

They did their best anyway.

I have not posted the photos of my grandparents from the more eastern Polish side yet.. maybe later. I have some qualms about it being that there are so many cousins on the net i might get trampled.

Then perhaps her heart was not set in Poland ...

When your family came to the US in 1900 they were asked 3 questions:

Name? (what should I write down your name is)
Where you from? (country of origin)
Who paid your fare? (name of your sponsor)

Next, an individual was scanned by a "doctor" who checked for any signs of a disease, after that a decision was made if a person can enter the US or not. Many people were simply shipped back, sometimes a family had to make a quick decision on who stays who goes back.

You can’t find this on the web, but if you whish to learn more visit Galveston immigration museum.
It was a jaw dropping experience for me. Identical process was followed at the Elis Island if not worst. If I had to summarize, overall it was a very messy procedure not much different from herding animals.

My point to all of this is that Trzebinska may not be a town but a name of a person that sponsored your family.

I agree, that’s a surname, most likely her maiden name. Cheehaw: it all depends on what document you have your info from but definitely not a town or village.

That's the conclusion I came to also.. both my grandparents on that side of the family spoke very little English.. My grandmother spoke next to zero English, up till the day she died at almost age 95.. my grandfather spoke 5 languages but his English, as I recall, was never real good. I never knew either of them very well, my grandfather died at age 72, I was only 5 or 6 years old.

Probably his sponsor or perhaps even his mother's name.. tracing that side of the family back isn't easy. I have a cousin who is trying to do in depth genealogy, maybe he will find some answers.

That side of the family had a big drinking problem which isn't helpful either.