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Kaunas Swings in the Jazz Age

Birutė Vaičjurgis Šležas Couples stepping smartly on the dance floor to the sounds of a foxtrot, the bandleader directing black and white musicians in jazzy renditions of the latest hits, the haughty diva strutting through a glittering crowd to the posh table reserved for celebrities. Is this London, New York, …

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The American Yeshiva: Its Roots in Lithuanian Jewish Heritage

by Gil S. Perl. Route 195 cuts across the midsection of New Jersey. Travel eastward from the state capital of Trenton toward the Atlantic coast, take exit 28A for route 9A South and you’ll find yourself in a rather nondescript section of East Coast suburbia. Continue heading south, though, for …

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Authorization required error with Microsoft Edge Browser

Subscribers using the new Microsoft “Edge” browser have been having problems accessing the Draugas News and Lithuanian Heritage PDF archive files (which are password-protected and open to subscribers only). When using the Edge browser, when clicking on a password protected link to one of the .PDF files, what should happen …

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Joninės… or Is It Rasos?

In Lithuania, the midsummer night and day are still celebrated with rituals and ceremonies whose origins date back to pagan times. ROMANCIENT TIMES, PEOPLE MARKED THE time of the return of the sun and the year’s longest day. In olden times in Lithuania this day was called Rasos or the …

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The Four Wives of Jogaila

BY EDVARDAS BARANAUSKAS IT IS INTERESTING TO NOTE HOW Jogaila (1350–1434), the ruler of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, became involved with the Polish royal family, and his eventual marriage to their young queen. Very little is mentioned by historians that he was widowed three times, that his fourth marriage …

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Culture: Goldsmithing in Lithuania: Seven Centuries Plus

BY K. PAUL ZYGAS The complete absence of gold or silver-bearing ores in their country has never stopped the Lithuanians from appreciating and crafting the noble metals. Jewelry found in archaeological sites reveals that silver has been prized and fashioned in Baltic lands continuously since times immemorial. While small deposits …

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Our Immigrant Heritage: the Truth About ‘The Jungle’

BY TOM GREGG Social reform er/novelist Upton Sinclair averaged a book a year over his ninety-year life. But none matched the impact of his disturbing and controversial 1905 blockbuster about Lithuanian im m igrants in Chicago. HE WOULD HAVE BEEN JUDGED a failure at most jobs. Yes, on the one …

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Lithuanian History Highlights: the Bajorai of Lithuania Then and Now, First of Two Parts

By K. Paul Žygas WHE THE BAJORAI ESTABLISHED A SOCIETY IN VILNIUS several years ago, the announcement was generally met with a fair measure of genuine surprise. Most everyone believed that, given the long record of assimilation, waves of deportation, and the generations lost through war, the bajorai had become …

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