By Gabriela Bereghazyova
In an age where millennials struggle with mortgages and the cost of living, it's easy to romanticize the past.
The immigrant stories are a source of hope, encouragement and inspiration. (Source: Library of Congress)
Today, life is not a stroll through a rose garden. But for the purpose of a reality check, it is worth contrasting our current challenges with those of our ancestors who chose to pursue a brighter future in the New World just over a century ago.
Let's take a look at what life was like for our ancestors at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. Countless people in Slovakia, then Upper Hungary, lived in poverty. Their homeland did not offer them a way out of the vicious circle of destitution.
When an opportunity to get rich in America came, countless people heeded the call. This was a chance at a better life for them and their children. But it would not be easy.
The United States really was full of opportunities, but these were not served on a silver platter. The journey itself came at a huge cost—countless aspiring emigrants had to sell houses and land just to afford a steamship ticket. When they stepped off the boat at Ellis Island, the struggle was far from over.
The only jobs available for Slovak immigrants were those dirty and dangerous ones at the bottom of the social ladder – in mines and steel mills. Which was better? It was a toss-up between the risk of a ceiling collapsing in a damp mine and the prospect of losing a limb in the sweltering heat of a blast furnace.
Mining in America was one of the most dangerous jobs on the planet. Between 1900 and 1909, the deadliest decade in U.S. mining history, 3,660 coal miners perished in 133 mine accidents. Miners parted with their wives before their shift knowing that they might not return home.
Steel mills were a bit better, but a simple moment of absentmindedness in insufferable heat could cost someone an arm, a leg or life.
In return for risking their health and lives, Slovaks earned an average of $1 to $1.50 a day, which was half of the normal wage in the U.S. Yet, an average Slovak could still earn 10 times more in the New World than at home. It was worth it.
So jobs were tough, but perhaps the reward for hard work was a good standard of life.
Not exactly and not by our standards.
In America, workers with families were often provided with company housing near their workplaces. Rows of shanty housing were constructed near mines and steel mills to keep the workers and their families close to work.
Accommodation usually consisted of a four-room shack, primitive by American standards. Hygiene was poor, child mortality was high and the cleanliness of the immigrant neighbourhoods was appalling. In cities like Pittsburgh, the streets were black from coal dust and soot, shielding the sun and dirtying the water. When it rained, everything turned into a muddy and slippery mess.
There was no social or health security. If a man was hurt or, God forbid, died on the job, the employer would simply replace him with another eager immigrant from Eastern Europe. Nobody cared what happened to his family, which relied on him.
And yet, despite the unimaginable hardships, these men and women who came to America with nothing prevailed.
The immigrants went on to have families, often large families, and they managed to provide for them, even saving enough money to buy a house. All that on humble wages. The secret recipe? Resilience, resourcefulness, and a willingness to sacrifice far more than comfort to live a wholesome life. They succeeded. Today, some two million Americans identify as Slovak descendants.
Hearing these stories does make one wonder: is life today really as harsh and impossible as it seems to us? The immigrant stories are a source of hope, encouragement and inspiration – where there is a will, there is a way.
Team Global Slovakia
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