Wiarus (Winona, Minn.)
Historic newspapers carry the language, views and graphic reporting of their time, including racist content. They are shown to teen and adult profiles.
1,375 issues from 1895 to 1919, published in Winona, Minnesota, digitised for Chronicling America.
On February 11, 1886, the first issue of the Wiarus (“Veteran Defender”) was published in Winona, an early center of Polish immigration in Minnesota. The first editorial notes that despite the large Polish population, earlier Polish-language newspapers in Winona, such as Przyjaciel Ludu (“People’s Friend”) and Kurjer Winonski (“Winona Courier”) never survived beyond a second issue due to lack of local support. In contrast, the well-organized Wiarus had the support of a board of enthusiastic Polish-American citizens whose slogan was “Boze zbaw Polske” or “God Save Polonia.” Its members expressed their “…wish to unify our forces so as to be firm against our adversities, to preserve our holy faith in its purest form, to save our ethnic traditions, to educate our youth, and to secure for ourselves a respectable position in the United States in political and ethnic fields.” Located on the Mississippi river in southeastern Minnesota, Winona was an early entry point for Polish immigrants. With steamboats and later railroads serving the city, lumber and milling industries developed, as well as farming on both the Minnesota and Wisconsin sides of the Mississippi River. Over time, the Polish-American families in and around Winona sought to build churches and schools for their community, just as interest also grew in having a Polish-language newspaper.
Despite the ambitions of its board, the Wiarus had a difficult start. After losing two editors in ten issues, including an alleged…
- Genres
- News
- Published in
- Winona, Minnesota, United States
- Language
- Polish
- Collection
- Chronicling America
- Licence or status
- None stated by the archive
- Rights
- The Library of Congress believes that the newspapers in Chronicling America are in the public domain or have no known copyright restrictions. Newspapers published in the United States more than 95 years ago are in the public domain in their entirety.
- Credit
- Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities
- Who can read it
- Teens profiles and older (placed by Invisible Network from what the archive says; archives give no ratings)
- Archive
- Library of Congress