Atheists in the year 1900, my grandparents came from Poland to USA for our 1st Amendment Freedom of Religion, which includes the right to not believe

 Wadja & Janik Jendrzewski

They arrived at Ellis Island in the year 1900, both age twenty from Warsaw.  Both were dressed sharp, bright eyed, and excited to be starting a new life in the United States; there was determination and accomplishment in their every move.  The previous years they’d been regulars at the downtown cafes, where young Poles gathered to share animated talk about politics, philosophy, and the hundreds of new scientific and socio-political theories developing in their country. A near century of despotism had not stifled the Polish human spirit of creative and innovative ideas. Janik was from a Christian home and Wadja a Jewess, young adults questioning norms in a way no generation had for centuries.

My grandparents were part of the “intelligentsia” or counter culture of the 1860s to 1890s, like the hippies a hundred years later where I came of age.  

As a demographic, “the intelligentsia” were young adults coming of age at a time of great social upheaval, and, as a generation, embracing the chaos of extreme change,  thriving on it.

My grand parents came to America in the year 1900 for Freedom of Religion, which for them meant the freedom to be atheists and practice no religion. They were that passionate about the right to not believe that at age twenty they packed up what belongings they could take on a ship to New York and left behind everything they’d known all their lives.

To be free to be atheists thanks to the First Amendment in USA.

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My atheist grandparents were part of a late nineteenth century movement known as “the intelligentsia,” a cultural movement much like the hippies of the 1970s, in which, funny enough, I was an active participant.

 Per Wikipedia

The 1870s in Poland were a time of creativity and innovation-

With self-help organizations that promoted economic advancement and work on improving the competitiveness of Polish-owned businesses, industrial, agricultural or other. New commercial methods of generating higher productivity 

They called such public service employment “organic work”

Another major area of effort in organic work was educational and intellectual development of the common people.

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The intelligentsia like my grandparents were the hippies of the 1890s. When you went out for a day on the town in Warsaw, you could end up at an intelligentsia era “reading room”

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Most of my grandparents friends from that era in Poland were atheists. They laughed out loud at persons who believed in the what they experienced as the authoritarian dictatorial Catholic Church, including my parents when we would visit the Jendrzewskis, To my grandparents, being religious was a sign of low intelligence. 

The added element that Wadja was raised by Jews and Janik by Christians made the couple feel even more detached from “the establishment” laws and mores everywhere they lived, Warsaw Poland or Gary Indiana. In the old country, not only were they forced to follow their parents’ beliefs, but they were never going to be allowed to marry each other. Even their friendship drew glares of disgust from family and friends in the old country.

Likely, in an ardent conversation in a Warsaw cafe, the young couple first heard about The First Amendment of USA and “freedom of religion” and I'm sure the concept of being free to be an atheist amplified their growing enthusiasm about emigrating to America.

“In America you are not only free to be any religion, you are free to believe there is no Creator God at all.” You might hear that idea in conversations at tables all over each café in Warsaw, where the Catholic hierarchy ran government and institutions with rigid authority.

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So I was raised by an atheist Polish Jew married to a Catholic

My mom had no idea what she was getting into when she agreed in 1920s to convert to Catholicism so she could marry my dad.

Recent tweet that got me started writing this post:

My grandmother and her husband were both atheists in Poland who came to USA in 1900 as we have religious freedom here, which means right to have No Religion. They were very intellectual and kinda political about it
8:32 AM · Oct 19, 2021·Twitter Web App
@Ro….
They were both age 20 upon arrival in 1900. Since teen years they heard that US 1st Amend meant "freedom of religion" which included not believing in God. They met as adamant atheist  teenagers in Warsaw. Hmm, I should write this story... See what your tweet started

They fell in love as teenagers and dreamed of going to America where they’d have the freedom to not believe in God.

The freedom to not believe, Wadja would say often out loud, with astonished passion.

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In late 19^th century Poland religious leaders were preoccupied with eschatology:

es·cha·tol·o·gy /ˌeskəˈtäləjē/

noun

1.    the part of theology concerned with death, judgment, and the final destiny of the soul and of humankind.

At the café table I can hear my grandma age 19:

“Eschatology," Wadja hollers, “they keep us always in mourning as a way to control us. You can’t argue or point out injustice when people are running around wild eyed talking about the End Times.” Janik agrees.

Per Wikipedia: Mourning was part of enforced religion and dominated culture in late 1800s Poland.  

Me: The people wore black baggy clothing and stood with a straight back

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I don't know what took my grandparents in 1900 from Ellis Island to Gary Indiana. They settled in the Lake Michigan city and opened a bakery which they ran for decades, in a quadrant of the city where everyone was Polish.

They openly called their neighborhood a ghetto. 

Today Gary has a Polish National Catholic church.

I wonder if I would find their name Jendrzewski or any info about my Polish relatives in old newspapers and other historical documents in a Gary Indiana public library. I could take a trip there, someday maybe (I'm 74 and rarely leave my house so kinda not likely….)

Interstate 80 actually is like Main Street here in South Lake Tahoe where I live today, and goes east all the way through a dozen states and straight to Gary.

My wanderlust will see me to my grave.

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POST SCRIPT: I did not learn my grandma was part Jewish until my mom was in her eighties, dad was gone, she was living on her own in an apartment in a senior building downtown San Clemente. Suddenly it was okay to tell the family secret. To be Jewish would get Wadja more antagonism in life than being atheist, apparently, in the early twentieth century. 

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Posted by Kay Ebeling

Producing City of Angels Blog since Jan 2007

Not just L.A., the city of angels is everywhere