THE QUEST IS HISTORY
At 80, Chicago’s Polish Museum of America tries to stay relevant with new digital approach
For the Sun- Times
In a city that could once boast of having the largest number of residents of Polish ancestry anywhere outside of Poland, the Polish Museum of America in West Town was long a centerpiece of the largest and oldest ethnic- Polish neighborhood in Chicago.
But New York surpassed Chicago in the number of Polish residents in the past 15 years, according to U. S. Census Bureau. And the Polish Museum, 984 N. Milwaukee Ave., struggled to remain relevant as its core constituency of Polish-Americans moved elsewhere in the city and suburbs.
Now, as it marks its 80th anniversary, the museum is aiming to reach a broader, younger audience who might not know the neighborhood at one time was Chicago’s Polish downtown. The area was home to a flourishing business district filled with Polish butchers, bakers, bars, grocery stores, photo studios, newspapers and insurance companies and a total of more than 100,000 parishioners attending six Polish Roman Catholic churches.
The new effort involves digitizing its collection of historic documents and culturally rich art and artifacts to make them more widely accessible, starting with its photographic archive and including an audio guide that’s in the works.
So far, 5,000 images from an estimated 25,000 photographs have been digitized and posted online, says Julita Siegel, the museum’s photography collection curator and archivist.
Siegel also put together a traveling exhibition, unveiled this month, of archival photos showcasing the area’s history from 1850 to 1941. The 16 panels of photos with text will travel to cities with large Polish populations and cultural centers before being shown in Poland.
The effort to post the Polish Museum’s collections online is a much slower, more complicated process than it would be at a major museum, Siegel says.
“Digitization at a bigger museum or archive might be an equally large- scale, stream- lined operation,” she says. “For us, it means having one 11- by- 17 scanner, one computer and a single pair of hands, with occasional help from volunteers and interns. You go box by box, folder by folder.”
The museum’s collections include:
Documents of American Revolutionary War heroes Gens. Thaddeus Kosciuszko and Casimir Pulaski.
Letters written by Polish kings on parchment paper with wax seals. The oldest is a 1555 royal seal of King Zygmunt II August, considered unmatched and priceless.
Extensive records from Polonian churches, organizations and businesses.
The archive of Dan Rostenkowski, the longtime Northwest Side congressman whose tenure in Washington ended with a felony corruption conviction, and his ancestors.
Paintings, textiles, sculpture, graphic art, folk art and military and currency artifacts from the 1939 New York World’s Fair’s Polish Pavilion. There’s also a 23- foot- tall, stained- glass window from the New York World’s Fair titled “Symbol of Poland Reborn,” depicting various regions, trades, craftsmen, musicians, artists, intellectuals and symbols of Polish nationality and achievement.
Alongside the museum is a lending and research library with books in Polish and in English, which is also home to the Polish Genealogical Society of America.