SLOVENIAN HISTORY, CULTURE, RELIGION AND HERITAGE Part 2

 

Slovenian Migration

            Slovenian immigrants can be difficult to identify and track through historical records as they are often lost within the larger descriptions of  “Austrians.”  Like many other European emigrants, in the 1880s, Stari Trg ob Kolpi and the surrounding Črnomelj municipality—located in the traditional southeastern Slovenian region of Bela Krajina (White Carniola)—suffered a perfect storm of economic devastation that triggered a mass transatlantic exodus.

            The primary catalysts for the large-scale migration to America during this decade include:

1.     The Phylloxera Epidemic (The Vine Disease)

            The most direct blow to the local economy was the arrival of phylloxera (trsna uš), a microscopic aphid that destroyed grapevines. Viticulture was the absolute backbone of the agricultural economy in Bela Krajina. This epidemic decimated nearly half of the region's vineyards, stripping local farmers of their main source of income, trade, and livelihood.

2.      Economic Isolation and Lack of Industry

            Land division: The Slovenian farmers suffered from the same system of inheritance as much of the other Slavic people.  By the 1880s, the land holdings were too small and overcrowded to support basic subsistence farming, creating intense demographic pressures.

            Lack of Industrial Enterprises:  While other parts of Europe and the Austro-Hungarian Empire were industrializing, Bela Krajina remained economically isolated and neglected by the central government in Vienna. There were virtually no local factories or industrial centers to absorb the massive influx of displaced, unemployed farmers.

3.     The Pull to America

            During the 1880s, thousands of young, single men left Stari Trg and Bela Krajina. They traveled to the U.S. to work in the iron and coal mines of Minnesota, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, or the heavy industries of Cleveland, Ohio, and Chicago, Illinois. In addition, the meat packing plants in America’s heartland of Kansas City provided many immigrants with opportunities.  While many initially intended to earn money and return home, the scale of the devastation in Slovenia meant that a vast majority stayed, eventually sending for their families and creating permanent Slovenian-American communities.

            Both Slovenian and Croatian immigrants often lived in crowded boardinghouses, with individuals from the same village forming cooperative households to share expenses. Major labor strikes the Slovenian and Croatian immigrants distinguished themselves by their support for the laborer and the leadership they provided their fellow striking workers. Slovenes joined with Croatians to build Catholic churches and were also active in supporting cooperative stores.

            Note:  Slovenians and Croatians are a South Slav people who are closely related, but Serbians are separated by history, language and religion. Croatians and Slovenians are largely Roman Catholic, while the Serbs are primarily Eastern Orthodox Catholics.

Kansas City--A Magnet for Immigrants

            Kansas City’s meatpacking industry grew from small frontier stock pens in the West Bottoms into one of the nation's largest agricultural and industrial powerhouses by the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

            Early Beginnings and Infrastructure (1860s–1870s):  The stockyards were built to provide better prices for livestock owners. Previously, livestock owners west of Kansas City could only sell at whatever price the railroad offered. With the Kansas City Livestock Exchange and the Stockyards, cattle were sold to the highest bidder.

            The stockyards were built around the facilities of the Central Overland California and Pikes Peak Express Company which had outfitted travelers on the Santa Fe Trail and Oregon Trail following the Kansas River. The company went out of business in 1862 following the failure of its Pony Express business from St. Joseph, Missouri, to Sacramento, California.

            Expansion (1871–1874): The stockyards were established in 1871 on the Kansas side of the Kansas River along the Kansas Pacific and Missouri Pacific railroad tracks. Local railroad executives fenced off five acres in the West Bottoms near the confluence of the Kansas and Missouri rivers to build small stock pens. An additional 13 acres were added, followed by a major investment from eastern capitalist Charles Adams Jr. and Chicago packer Philip Armour, who built a modern processing facility.

            Rail and Refrigeration: The convergence of expanding railroads from Texas cattle trails and the invention of the refrigerated boxcar allowed fresh meat to be safely shipped nationwide, eliminating the risk of spoilage.

            In 1878 it expanded to 55 acres, added loading docks on both the Kansas and Missouri Pacific tracks, new sheds for hogs and sheep, and developed one of the largest horse and mule markets in the country.

            According to the Kansas City Kansan:

"In the heyday year of 1923, 2,631,808 cattle were received at the Kansas City yards. Of these, 1,194,527 were purchased for use in Kansas City by the packing houses and local markets; the remainder or about 55 percent was shipped out. Of 2,736,174 hogs received, 879,031 were shipped out; of 377,038 calves, 199,084 were shipped out; of 1,165,606 sheep, 445,539 were shipped and of 42,987 horses and mules, all but 1,664 were shipped out."

            Boom and Industrial Peak (1880s–1940s):  Major packers began to arrive in Kansas City.  Gustavus Swift built a massive 13-acre facility in 1887, followed by other dominant national operators like Armour Packing Co., Swift & Co., and Cudahy Packing Company. The stockyards straddled the state line, which runs through the site on the east side of the Kansas river; two-thirds of it were located in Kansas and one-third in Missouri. Quarantine yards were located on the west side of the river. At its peak 16 railroads converged at the yards.

             At its height, the Kansas City Stockyards covered over 200 acres, processed millions of animals per year, employed more than 20,000 workers, and accounted for up to 91% of the city's industrial output. The stockyards flourished through the 1940s. At its peak only the Union Stock Yards in Chicago was bigger.

            Decline and Decentralization (1950s–1960s):  Business dropped off dramatically after the Great Flood of 1951 which devastated the stockyards and associated businesses and slaughterhouses. After the flood, the stockyards never recovered.  By the mid-20th century, aging multi-story urban plants became obsolete. In the 1960s and 1970s, meatpacking companies abandoned major urban centers like Kansas City and Chicago to build single-story, decentralized plants closer to rural cattle production and grain supplies in the Great Plains.