Haylock 1 Charles Haylock Prof. Nancy Shoemaker HIST 2100 3 October 2016 Newspaper Report Introduction As part of my ongoing effort to study three generations of the Warhola family and the society they lived in, I have now consulted newspaper articles from the 19 th and 20 th centuries. For the purposes of this report, and for the history methodologies class it is an assignment of, I will be not only reporting on findings, but also reporting on the actual methodology employed in my research. For this report, I primarily relied on two newspaper databases provided by the University of Connecticut Libraries: America's Historical Newspapers and ProQuest Historical Newspapers.
Transcript
Haylock 1
Charles Haylock
Prof. Nancy Shoemaker
HIST 2100
3 October 2016
Newspaper Report
Introduction
As part of my ongoing effort to study three generations of the Warhola family and the
society they lived in, I have now consulted newspaper articles from the 19 th and 20th centuries.
For the purposes of this report, and for the history methodologies class it is an assignment of, I
will be not only reporting on findings, but also reporting on the actual methodology employed
in my research.
For this report, I primarily relied on two newspaper databases provided by the
University of Connecticut Libraries: America's Historical Newspapers and ProQuest Historical
Newspapers.
My hopes with this report consisted of two broad goals and one specific one. I wanted
to reflect on historical research methodologies when searching newspapers, the impact of
newspapers as primary sources in history, and more specifically what newspapers have to say
about both the time the Warholas lived and – if possible – the Warholas themselves; not just
Andy Warhol.
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Early American Newspapers – Also known as America’s Historical Newspapers – Provided by
Newsbank: American Sentiments towards Czechoslovakia and Czech immigrants
I knew right away that it would be hard to find enough information about the Warholas -
thinking of Andrew Warhola Sr and Julia Warhola in particular – in this database. In my
genealogy report, I could not find too much information about Julia Warhola through genealogy
information databases, but the information seems to point that Andrew Warhola and Julia
Warhola were already married and they immigrated together to the United States on
November 1912 from what is listed on Andrew’s naturalization record as the nation of ‘Czecho
Slovakia’ through Bremen, Germany. They arrived at the port of New York on the vessel
‘George Washington’.1 Knowing that they came not until 1912, I did not expect to find any
specific information about them on Early American Newspapers since the database indexes
newspapers from 1690 to 1922. However, I thought it would be beneficial to search for
newspapers about the then nation of Czechoslovakia and U.S. sentiments about said nation and
its immigrants coming to the United States.
For initial research into what newspapers had to say about the nation of Czechoslovakia I
tried two queries:
1. “czechoslovakia” yielded 4,129 results
2. “czecho-slovakia” yielded 2,490 results
1 National Archives and Records Administration, Naturalization Records of District Courts in the Southeast, 1790-1958, Microfilm Publication M1547, Records of District Courts of the United States, Record Group 21, www.ancestry.com, accessed 29 Sep. 2016.
My first initial observation was noting that the Early American Newspapers database is not
case sensitive, I tested it out by doing a query for both “Czechoslovakia” and “czechoslovakia”
and both yielded 4,129 results.
My second observation was that there was not a defined standard naming convention for
Czechoslovakia. In fact, a short letter to the editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer on July 21, 1918
asked for clarification into some of the many names for certain regions inside the empire of
Austria-Hungary. A professor from the university of Pennsylvania eventually explains by going
into detail about the differences between two particular terms: ‘Juzo-Slavia’ and ‘Czecho-Slavia’
(which the professor corrects to ‘Czecho-Slovakia’).2 The professor also briefly explains that the
Czechs can be referred to as Bohemians since they occupy what was the former kingdom of
Bohemia.
Using the professor’s account, and the fact that it had less results, I decided to utilize the
query of ‘Czecho-Slovakia’ over ‘Czechoslovakia’. I also tried utilizing ‘Bohemia’ as a query, only
to end with the astonishing amount of 66,838 results.
Under the ‘Czecho-Slovakia’ query, I found a few relevant articles regarding American
sentiments towards Czechoslovakia. The sentiment was that Czechoslovakia was a nation full of
intelligent, yet oppressed people, a nation of vast resources, yet stagnated economy due to
foreign dominance.3 An Evening News newspaper article from San Jose, California explained the
Czech-Slovak unified national identity in the region by stating that: “The Czechs and the Slovaks
2 “Everybody's Corner Queries and Answers, Letters to the Editor, Etc”, Philadelphia Inquirer, 21 Jul. 1918. 3 “New Field for U. S. Trade American Prestige is High in Czecho-Slovak Republic. French Business”, The Kansas City Star, 7 Sep. 1920; “The New Republic Born of the War Czechoslovakia: A Story of the New State Made” Grand Forks Daily Herald, 11 Feb. 1919.
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use slightly different variations of the same languages, and are slightly different in other ways,
but consider themselves as one oppressed nationality.”4
The previous newspapers I have cited also mention the overall U.S. sentiment to see a free,
democratic Czechoslovakia, free of foreign oppression. For instance, the previously cited
Evening News newspaper article mentions that “[t]he Allies have stated that one of their
objects is to free the ‘Czecho-Slovaks from foreign domination.’” An opinion article, also from
the Evening News, stated that one of America’s peace terms to end World War I should be to
demand “the changing of the Austro-Hungarian constitution so that Czecho-Slovakia and
Croatia-Slavonia can have autonomy[.]”5 I even found a small piece by the U.S. Democratic
Party claiming support of nations like Czecho-Slovakia in their quest to “develop the institutions
of true Democracy.”6
For my second search topic in the Early American Newspapers database, I focused on trying
to search information regarding Czech immigration to the United States. For this part I used the
following queries on the database jointly with a Boolean Operator (AND):
1. “Czecho-Slovakia” AND “Immigrants” yielded 17 results of not so great relevance.
2. “Czechoslovakia” AND “Immigrants” yielded 44 results (including the 17 above).
I found the most relevant newspaper articles by using the “Czechoslovakia” AND
“Immigrants” query.
4 “The True Bohemia”, The Evening News, 24 Aug. 1917.5 “America’s Peace Terms”, The Evening News, 10 Jan. 1918. 6 No Headline, Salt Lake Telegram, 2 Jul. 1920.
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By most accounts, Americans thought of Czech immigrants as being well educated people
from a country known for its rich resources, history, culture and intellectualism. A country that
Americans saw as being the victim of foreign oppression. This begs the question: Did Americans
accept Czech immigrants with a more positive mindset and a greater sense of sympathy
compared to other immigrants due to Americans feeling that Czech immigrants were the
product of clear misfortune? After all, it was not hard to find newspaper articles detailing the
glories of Czechoslovakia and their later misfortunes under both Austrio-Hungarian and German
oppression.
In particular, I found accounts on the high literacy levels of Czech immigrants – a seemingly
highly desired trait by Americans of the time. The Grand Forks Daily Herald of North Dakota
mentioned that “[a]s a class the immigrants from the Czecho-Slovakia state have made good
citizens, for there is a low per cent of illiteracy among them.”7
I found another account, this time from The Kansas City Times newspaper, also praising the
high literacy rates among Czech immigrants. This one was strikingly relevant to my research,
since it provides a statistic of Czech immigrants coming to the United States in 1912 to the port
in New York – this is the same year Andrew Warhola Sr and Julia Warhola arrived to the U.S. via
the port in New York according to Andrew’s naturalization record. The newspaper reads:
Nor is there any foreign country which harbors so many Czechs as the United
States. Incidentally, of the 8,420 Czech immigrants who passed through New
7 “The New Republic Born of the War Czechoslovakia: A Story of the New State Made”, Grand Forks Daily Herald, 11 Feb. 1919.
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York in 1912 – the last year on which I have statistics at hand – only seventy-five
were illiterate. 8
ProQuest Historical Newspapers
My research on ProQuest Historical Newspapers resulted in two relevant newspaper
articles. Alas, it was just two. On this database, which covers more recent time periods, most
results for “Warhola” and “Pennsylvania” resulted in articles about the now famous Andy
Warhol. I did find two relevant articles that give some info about the other brothers: Paul and
John. In one of the articles I finally learn of Andrew Warhola Sr’s demise: he died after
consuming contaminated water at his job at age 56.9 Did he received compensation for this? As
an immigrant? The same article also states that Julia Warhola “never fully mastered English.”
An article from The Washington Post has John as being a retired Sears Co. machinist with age
69. The article also has Paul seemingly helping carry Andy Warhol’s legacy at age 72. After
Andy’s death, according to the article, John Warhola became the vice-president of the Warhol
foundation, and part of Andy’s post-mortem fortune now returns to Slovakia, in particular to
“Mikova, Julia Warhola’s home town.” The other article does not really reveal anything of
significant sustenance. It merely describes Paul Warhola’s own art aspirations in the context of
his late brother’s art legacy. 10
In an effort to better understand the context of the most relevant article I found on the
ProQuest Historical Newspapers database, I decided to browse the entire issue of the source
8 “New Field for U. S. Trade American Prestige is High in Czecho-Slovak Republic. French Business”, The Kansas City Star, 7 Sep. 1920. 9 “Their Brother’s Keepers”, The Washington Post, 15 May 1994. 10 “Warhola Brother Tries His Hand at Art World”, The Hartford Courant, 18 Nov. 1989.
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newspaper (The Washington Post) for that day of May 15th, 1994. Looking at the whole issue
reveals some minor, yet interesting details. First is that the article in question is also the cover
for the art section of The Washing Post issue for that day. The art section is quite vast, and
having an article mostly about Andy Warhol’s brothers – not Andy himself – is a testimony of
just how quintessential of a figure Andy Warhol was, and still is, in American art. The actual
front cover of the entire newspaper has post-war Vietnam and issues with the developing
Rwandan genocide as its center pieces.
Observations and Further Study
Doing research on newspaper databases greatly improved my sense of what direction I
want to embark this research on. With the newly found data on the Early American
Newspapers database, and using ProQuest Historical Newspapers to find more about Andrew
Warhola Sr and Julia Warhola, I intend on researching about the immigration experience of
Czechs into the United States right before and during World War I. I particularly intend on
focusing on their struggles as immigrants living in the U.S., the perceptions Americans had of
not only them, but also the struggling nation of Czechoslovakia.
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Addendum
I. Select Newspapers
Source: “The New Republic Born of the War Czechoslovakia: A Story of the New State Made”, Grand Forks Daily Herald, 11 Feb. 1919.
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Source: “New Field for U. S. Trade American Prestige is High in Czecho-Slovak Republic. French Business”, The Kansas City Star, 7 Sep. 1920.
