Up to Milan ~ An American Revitalization

Up to Milan An American Revitalization…

By Barbara Thompson

By Barbara Thompson

Up to Milan An American Revitalization…

Up to Milan An American Revitalization‌

By Barbara Thompson Revised Edition Copyright Š 2018 All rights reserved by Barbara Thompson.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the author. Printed in the United States of America.

Dedication For those with boundless enthusiasm, the possibilities are endless.

Introduction

When I first started writing this story about the Yugoslav chapter in Milan’s history, it never occurred to me that I was writing about people whose names were as familiar – and unremarkable – to me as “Smith,” “Jones,” or “Thompson.” They were my neighbors – the Culichs, on Woody Row Road, the Udiljacks on Milan Hill, the Lesicas, Juranics and Justinichs, on Battenfeld, the Zics on St. Paul Road, then more Juranics, and the Ranciches and Marovitches on Sawmill Road – and their children rode the bus to school every day with mine.

One Saturday afternoon I was in the Milan Town Hall when a woman from upstate New York stopped by to talk to Bill Jeffway about her grandfather’s house, which she had just found. She showed me a photo and I immediately recognized it as the Bernard Center house, just a little way from ours on Academy Hill Road. She said it had been her grandfather’s. Louis Odak.

I was speechless. Another Odak family, but way east of Tom Odak’s, on Salisbury Road.

The Culichs I knew because he operated a dairy farm at the top of Woody Row, and the Udiljacks, too, because my husband and I had looked at their house for sale. We knew the Zitzes, as well as Pat and Ed Rancich, because of the Milan Fire Company. But the others were just names – neighboring families whose history had begun decades before, bringing them from Yugoslavia to new lives in Milan.

In the Beginning

Known as the town “in between” the Hudson River and Connecticut, Milan’s history has long reflected its hilly, up-and-down topography. First settled by Johannes Rowe, who bought and started farming 911 acres of the former Little Nine Partners Patent from Robert Livingston in 1766, Milan steadily prospered. Taking stock of its vibrant outlook and rising population, on March 6, 1818, the New York State legislature created the Town of Milan, from the western part of the Town of North East. Milan’s farms, mills, lead and iron mines continued to flourish, and the population reached a peak of 1,745 in 1840.

Over the next half-century, however, its fortunes began a slow, steady decline. In the aftermath of the Civil War, commodity prices dropped steeply and farmers everywhere suffered. Then came the financial panic of 1873, followed by similar blows in 1893 and 1896.

Faced with ever-shrinking prices and increased competition from larger farms in the west, Milan landowners turned more and more to leasing or selling their farms altogether.

In turn, their tenants couldn’t keep up. Under-capitalized and ignorant of or unwilling to adopt newer, more efficient farming techniques and conservation methods, they mined the soil for all that could be gotten from it. By the dawn of the 20th Century, Milan farmland prices reached record lows and a collective hush had settled over the town’s future.

The Pull of a New Life As Milan declined into the 1890s, the Balkan Region of central Europe – including Bosnia, Croatia, Dalmatia, Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Slovakia and Slovenia – was sliding into the ethnic, social and political unrest that shortly would erupt into the chaos of the First World War, bringing an end to both the decrepit 700-year old Ottoman Empire and the upstart Austro-Hungarian Empire’s aggressive drive to dominate the region.

Across the Balkans, the subsistence farmers who made up the bulk of the population

began emigrating in droves to the United States. Like so many before them, they were driven by the desire for political and cultural freedom, yes, but most important was the pull of abundant, affordable farmland. In the New World, they could join relatives who had come before, work hard, save money, and start farms for themselves and their families.

Getting Started

From Slovenia in the north to Montenegro in the south, those who would eventually call Milan “home” came mostly from Croatia, arriving either through Philadelphia or Ellis Island, New York City’s fabled portal to a better life. Above all, they were farmers or sons of farmers with much in common – language, the same or neighboring home villages, helpful relatives or friends who had journeyed ahead, minimal or no education, youth and, especially, a ferocious desire to succeed. They immediately set to work: as longshoremen on New York’s bustling docks, carpenters, hospital laundry workers, ship riggers, factory hands and more.

Their wives or the women whom they would meet and marry followed their friends and families into the garment industry or domestic service.

Together, they scrimped, saved, dreamed – and began searching for good farms.

Milan Beckons

Drawn to Milan, they found properties of 100 acres or more that had been farmed for generations. An 1850 map of the town shows some that would soon come under their new, hopeful ownership: G.N. Hoffman’s farm, on Sawmill Road, the Staats farm on what is now St. Paul’s Road, and those of Peter Shook and Daniel Cookingham, on Shookville Road, and the Phillips farm on what is now Odak Farm Road. Also, there were Henry Haviland’s place on Academy Hill Road and J. Kilmer’s on Woody Row Road.

The First to Arrive

GeorgeZitz wins the honor of being the first of Milan’s immigrants to arrive. Born April 22, 1884, in Hungary, he came to New York in 1901, at age 17. In 1909, he met and married Frances Mickolic, who was born January 25, 1885, in Slovakia. Their first child, John Lawrence was born November 18, 1909, and that same year they bought the 126-acre David Coopernail farm, on Shookville Road, from John and V.S. Judson. However, for some unknown reason, they remained in New York City, where daughters Helen and Dorothy were born, respectively, in 1911 and 1919. By 1920, they are on the farm in Milan and that year welcome another daughter, Elenore, into the family, and last but not least, son George, Jr., born March 12, 1922.

George and Frances Zitz’s “Neverdun” Farm.”

(Photo by Author)

Proud of his adopted country, in 1917 George registered for the World War I draft, listed as 5’9” tall, with blue eyes, black hair and being “rather stout.” He became a naturalized citizen on June 5, 1920, and patriotic as ever, registered for the World War II draft in 1942. By then, however, age had taken its toll and his eyes and hair are listed as gray. At the time of his death on March 6, 1951, he had been a charter member of the Orchard Valley Dairymen’s Cooperative Association for 30 years. Frances lived on until her death in August, 1975.

It was not dairying but growing all kinds of fruit – apples, peaches, plums, pears and grapes – that first attracted George to farm life, probably as his family had done in the Old World. He kept a few cows and pigs and she raised chickens and sold the eggs to neighbors.

The fruit was taken to Rhinecliff and from there to the City on the New York Central Railroad. As was the custom for the Croat and Slovenian neighbors of their time in New York, they also took in weekend and summer boarders. Although they were escaping the heat of the city, these were not indolent vacationers but additional hands expected to help with the chores.

Neverdun” barns, and silo in the late 1940s.

After milking on “Neverdun” farm, circa 1950.

(Photos courtesy of Gregory Zitz)

After his father died, George, Jr. let go most of the fruit and added more cows to the barn and began dairying in earnest on what he christened “Neverdun” farm. A member of the Class of 1940, the first to graduate from the then-new Red Hook Central School (now the Linden Avenue Middle School), he married Madeline Burns on October 22, 1950. They had five children: Melinda, Gregory, Wayne, Robert and David.

At first they milked by hand and the boys would transfer the milk from heavy pails into larger milk cans for shipment. Later, things got a little easier when they installed a bulk tank, but the boys still had to fill it by hand. Then it was time for Dick Staats to arrive at the farm to back his tanker truck up to the barn, attach a pipe to the tank, pump in the day’s milk and be on his way.

George, Jr. died on March 27, 2003 and his wife, Madeline, on April 10, 2008. They are buried in St. Paul's Cemetery, Red Hook.

George, Jr’s brother, John, left “Neverdun” to go off to college, in Potsdam, New York, in 1940. He later invented and patented a nozzle for spraying apples, opened a shop in the Village of Red Hook and married Caroline Naomi Veach. He died April 10, 1955, and is buried in St. Joseph's Cemetery, Rhinecliff.

Sister Helen also lived on the homestead until 1940.

George Zitz, 1940 Red Hook After graduating from Red Hook High School in 1930, she Central School Yearbook. (Courtesy attended Krissler Business Institute, in Poughkeepsie, then Historic Red Hook) spent many years with the First National Bank of Rhinebeck, retiring as vice president. She was married to Royce VanKeuren and died at 98, on June 22, 2000. She and her husband are buried in the Rhinebeck Cemetery.

The Odaks Put Down Roots

Before settling down in Milan, four Odaks, all from Slivno Ravno, a town on the Dalmatian coast of Croatia, arrived in New York City around the turn of the century. They were: brothers John and Nicholas, in 1902 and 1903, respectively, and another pair of Odak brothers (possibly their cousins), Joseph and Louis, in 1903 and 1906.

John Odak

Born April 23, 1878, John Odak was 24 when he arrived via Antwerp, Belgium. Unable to read or write, his native tongue is listed as Slovenian. He worked as a laborer. On April 28, 1912, he married 18-year old Madeline Parma, a fellow Slovenian-speaker who had made it to New York in 1911. They soon had two sons, George J., in 1913, and Michael Lewis, born October 17, 1917. The 1917 and 1918 Manhattan residence directories place them at 526 10th Avenue.

Despite his lack of education, he must have done well for his family because, in 1919, he and Madeline – perhaps with his brother, Nicholas, although this is unclear – were able to buy the Robert Becker farm, on Cokertown (now Becker Hill) Road. Traditionally, this 123-

acre parcel had belonged to John Fulton, who had sold it to his brother, Isaac, in 1855, who passed it on thirty years later to Robert Becker in May of 1886, except for a 12-acre piece Fulton sold to Arthur Phillips the same year.

In 1933, John sold a 400' x 500' parcel to Frank Mladinich, bounded by the land of Michael Barich. Except for that, he kept the farm intact, operating a dairy and growing fruit with his sons until he retired to Red Hook in 1942 at the age of 64.

Despite his years, he had registered for the wartime draft. He was The Odaks’ “Shadblo Hill” Farm 5’10”, weighed 157 (Photo by Author) pounds, had brown eyes and gray hair. He died two years later and was buried in St. Joseph's Cemetery, in Rhinecliff. His wife, Madeline, lived long after, dying in 1983 at age 99. She is interred beside him. Son George died in Hollywood, Florida, and lies buried in Sacred Heart Cemetery, Barrytown. George’s brother Michael lived in Red Hook and Rhinebeck for many years before moving to Budd Lake, New Jersey, in 1996, and then to Sparta, New Jersey, where he died on February 23, 2005.

Nicholas Odak

We know little more about Nicholas Odak than that he was a brewer by trade who became a longshoreman after landing in New York to join his brother. The 1910 census lists him as single, boarding at an address on 11th Avenue, in Manhattan. By 1915 he is recorded as living (at an unknown address) with John, then 33, and, presumably, these other members of the family: Matthew, 40, Matilda Odak, 22, and two-year old George. Apparently in 1931, Nicholas sold whatever share he held of the Becker farm to his brother and, on August 22 of that year, married Diane Ozurovich, who was born March 12, 1880, in Milna, Croatia, and they moved back to The Bronx.

At the time, they are listed as living at 2123 Newbold Avenue, in The Bronx. Her father, John Ozurovich, also lived on Newbold but at another address. He was chief engineer of the Asbestos Pine Factory, in New York He bought three acres of land from John Odak at the top of Becker Hill Road.

Joseph Odak

Joseph Odak was born February 17, 1881, in Slivno Ravno, and emigrated to New York in 1903 at the age of 22. In 1907 he married Anna Besjidica, who was born June 29, 1889 in the village of Orasac, about an hour away from Joseph’s home village. They had six children: Mary, born in 1911, Nettie, in 1913, Victoria, 1914, and Madeline, 1915, followed by Thomas (“Tom”), in 1920, and Reba M., in 1925.

Like his cousin John, Joseph was a laborer who also succeeded in establishing his own, profitable dairy farm. In 1919, he bought the 204-acre Edwin Phillips farm on Salisbury Road with a Michael Bjelis, who subsequently deeded over his share to Joseph. As of the 1930 Census, the farm was valued at $15,000, equivalent today to some $220,000. The family had secured their American Dream.

On January 25, 1935, Joseph became a naturalized citizen and in 1941, even at 61 years of age, dutifully registered for the World War II draft. He was a robust 5’9” and 195 pounds.

Anna was finally naturalized on October 7, 1948, and together they lived out their lives on the farm, except for a three-month return visit in 1953 to Croatia, by then part of Yugoslavia. At the advanced age of 93, Joseph died on December 3, 1974, and was buried in St. Joseph’s Cemetery, Rhinecliff.

Tom Odak

Along with many, many other admirers, I knew Tom Odak very well. He always had a twinkle in his eye and a friendly smile for all. In addition to buying and operating “Shadblo Hill,” the family farm, from his father in 1951, he served as Town of Milan supervisor for 28 years, crisply and efficiently setting out and achieving many worthy goals for us. Then he was appointed General Manager of the Dutchess County Fair, leading it to greater and greater success over the next 27 years until retiring in 2006.

Also, he was a charter member and president of the County Board of Supervisors and a past-president of the New York State Agricultural Society. He was a director of the Farmers Mutual Insurance Co., the First National Bank of Red Hook, the Red Hook Farmers’ Cooperative Association, and member of the Dutchess County Conservation Committee, and member and past-president of the Milan Volunteer Fire Department. He died on December 13, 2013, survived by his wife Louise (Mikolajczyk) Odak and sons Tom Odak, longtime Stephen, Thomas and Perry.

Milan Supervisor and Dutchess County Fair manager. (File Photo) .

Louis Odak

Joseph's younger brother, 16-year old Louis ("Luka") arrived in New York aboard the SS Sofia Hohenberg, from Trieste, on September 28, 1906. With the exception of a Polish family from Hungary, 28 of his shipmates also were from the Dalmatian coast. Ten of them were listed as farm laborers – all bound for the same address in Canon City, Colorado, to “see a brother, cousin, friend, brother-in-law." They were enticed by the opportunity to buy federal land and start farming.

Louis became a laborer and married Keti Kristovich on August 5, 1923. She had come from her Dalmatian village of Draac, in 1913. They had two children, Thomas Louis, born in 1924, and Mary Martha, in 1928. The 1930 Census lists Louis as a longshoreman and the family living at 542 West 40th Street, Manhattan.

Like the other Odaks before them, Louis and Keti did well enough to buy a farm of their own in Milan.

On March 10, 1931, they purchased Robert Pells’s 175-acre place on Academy Hill Road. It had a spacious house, several barns and, as the deed records, was bounded on the north by the lands of Daniel Morehouse (formerly Mathias Neher’s), on the east by Mark Rowe, the west by Hoteling and Henry Slippery, and the south by George Cotter (formerly, Seth Morehouse). Louis died in June 1969 and lies buried in Sacred Heart Cemetery, Barrytown. Keti soon left the farm to live with their daughter, Mary, and her husband, in Rochester, and died on July 1, 1973.

Louis and Keti Odak’s farmhouse on Academy Hill Road.

(Photo by Author)

The Zics Move Up to Milan

One of the last immigrants to come up to Milan was Vincent Zic, a native of Punat, Krk Island, Croatia, born on July 21, 1890, who had arrived in September of 1931 from Trieste. The ship’s manifest incorrectly listed him as being 40 years old, his occupation as “washer.” (Also listed was a Simon Zic, 48, from Aleksandrovo, Croatia, and a farmer. Since this is his only reference, we don’t know if they were related. It is also worthwhile to note that, in some cases, the name Zic was anglicized to “Zitz" or “Ziets" on immigrants’ arrival.)

Records further indicate that Vincent’s wife was Margaret Orlich, born September 10, 1892, in Croatia, the daughter of Anthony and Catherine (Zic) Orlich. They had two children, Marija (Maria) and Danelo (Daniel), who was born February 11, 1919, in Punat. In 1940,

Vincent is recorded (again incorrectly) as 45 years old, and living then only with 21-year old Daniel at Parsons Blvd and 45th Street, Queens. (Where were his wife and daughter?!)

Surprisingly coincidental, too, the Zics and all the other residents of their apartment house were employed at the Flushing Hospital & Nurses Home.

After years in Queens, in 1948 the family bought the Milan farm of Nicholas and Mary (Zic) Orlich, on St. Paul’s Road, and moved north. Perhaps they had been attracted to Milan from boarding occasionally on Michael Juranic’s farm or through the Orlich family connection. In any case, Vincent – who had never farmed – spent the rest of his life doing just that. They ran a dairy and fruit farm: about 30 cows, with grapevines west of the house, an apple orchard to the east, and generations of chickens and pigs to further sustain the farm.

Their house was quite old, with eyebrow windows and a porch all around, that had once been owned by Henry Staats. Sadly, it burned to the ground in 1982 due to faulty electrical wiring. A new house was built on its foundation.

Vincent and Margaret died within months of each other, she in August of 1972 and he the following November, survived by their son, Daniel, and daughter, Maria, who had returned to Croatia (by then part of Yugoslavia), and Margaret’s brothers (also in Yugoslavia), Nick and Vincent Orlich.

From 1941 to 1945, Daniel served in the U.S. Army during World War II, in both Europe and Panama. He married Mary Scuba on December 6, 1952.

Tellingly, the 1940 Census lists Mary, then 17, living at home with her parents, Emerick and Sophia Scuba, brother, John F., and two stepbrothers: Ignatz Orlich, 26, and Barton Orlich, 29.

Mary Scuba and Daniel Zic on their 50th wedding anniversary.

(Photo courtesy of Daniel J. Zic)

Daniel and Mary had one son, Daniel J. (“Danny”), and together they operated the dairy farm until Daniel retired in 1986. He was a member of the Dairyman's League, died November 2, 2001, and is buried in St. Paul’s Cemetery, Red Hook.

I had the privilege of talking with Mary (Scuba) Zic in 2017. A diminutive, strong 94-year old, a little hard of hearing but with a firm handshake, her amazing blue eyes sparkled as she recounted all the good memories of the past, of the friendliness of the people, of their always giving a helping hand to neighbors, and the laughter they shared.

Mary (Scuba) Zic (Photo courtesy of Daniel J. Zic)

Unraveling the Orlichs… and the Zics of Red Hook and Milan

There are the Red Hook Orlichs and the Milan Orlichs, probably second or third cousins, originating from Punat. And most or all of them are related to the Zics. Anton Orlich was born in Punat on August 10, 1880. He came to America in 1901 and, somewhat later, married Sophia Madlenak, who had emigrated at age 16 to the U.S., also in 1901. By 1912 they had moved to Fraleigh’s Rose Hill Farm, in Red Hook. The 1920 Census records they had five children: Marie L., Henry, Barton, age 8, Ignatz, 6, and Anthony.

In extensive interviews in 2017 with Ignatz’s daughter, Deborah (“Debbie”) Bozydag, and her cousin, Elizabeth Platt, Barton’s daughter, I learned much about Anton and Sophia’s early lives in America that is so relevant to many of Milan’s immigrant families. For instance, that their “Grandma Sophia would always refer to Yugoslavia as the ‘old country’” and that, indeed, she was just 16 when she and Anton had arrived “on different ships, probably through Ellis Island.”

Edith recalled that “both worked in New York City but for how long and what Grandpa Anton did for a living, I do not know. But Grandma was a household domestic.

Family lore has it that they met at a dance sponsored by a big hotel, possibly the Waldorf Astoria; that back then the hotel was aware that our new immigrants did not speak English very well, if at all. So the hotel would hold separate dances for different nationalities in order to give them an opportunity to socialize with ‘people of our own,’ as Grandma put it.”

From Debbie, "I don't know when they came to Red Hook or what may have attracted them, but I do know that Grandpa was a tenant farmer for the Fraleighs. Aunt Betty showed me and my sister, Dorothy, the house where my father was born on August 3, 1911, when Grandpa was still working as a tenant farmer.

“He had a love for farming. So much so that they saved enough to buy their own farm.

Later, they had eleven of us grandchildren running around on what we called the ‘old farm.’

There was a two-story farmhouse, quite small, with no plumbing or electricity. The kitchen appeared to be the largest room and held a six-burner stove. The parlor and another enclosed room, possibly a bedroom, were across the entryway from the kitchen. The stairs were in the entryway and led up to three bedrooms. There were no closets but two or three hooks on the back of the doors, probably for their Sunday dresses and everyday clothes.

“Their home was in remarkably good condition when I was there 35 or 40 years ago.

Twenty or thirty yards away stood a large grey barn. To one side a perfectly round hole was cut through and on the other side a wagon wheel was left leaning up against its strong weathered siding, attesting to the workmanship and materials used at that time.

“About 1930 our grandparents moved to the ‘new farm,’ which had 55 acres, a house with plumbing and electricity, and at least a dozen or more milking cows. It's this new farm we know and love. It’s the memories, the unbridled freedom that Grandma allowed us to have, we now cherish so much. This farm, I am sure, served our grandparents quite well."

The Milan Orlichs

The first Orlichs in Milan were John and Mary Orlich and Nicholas and Mary (Zic) Orlich. Born in Punat on December 6, 1886, Nicholas had arrived in the U.S. in 1907, found work as a longshoreman and wed Mary in 1911. How Nicholas and John were related is unclear. What is known is that John and Nicholas, together, bought the 217-acre Henry Staats farm (formerly that of Jacob Shook), near Rock City, in March of 1921. Staats, who had received the farm in 1834 from Jacob Moore (an heir to George Shook), died in 1874 and the property must have passed through several owners or tenants before the Orlichs acquired it.

On April 14, 1929, records show that Nicholas became sole owner of the farm.

Subsequently, in 1943, he and Mary sold 30 acres of fields and woods to Arthur and Margaret Stickle and, in 1944, another 1.52 acres on Sawmill Road to Nicholas Orlich. Born May 1, 1912, Nicholas was the son of Nicholas and Mary. He was to marry Johanna Zagar, live in Rhinebeck as caretaker for the Crosby Farm for forty years, have a son of his own (named Nicholas, naturally!), die October 28, 1996 and be buried in the Red Church Cemetery, in Tivoli. His mother, Mary, is buried in St. Joseph’s Cemetery, Rhinecliff.

So here are the Zics and Orlichs, intertwined again!

Michael Juranic

Michael Juranic was born in Punat on August 23, 1895. Aside from knowing that he only attended school until fifth grade, which was typical for children of his time in Croatia, his life remains unaccounted for until 1927, when he purchased 160 acres from Alfred Frazier of Red Hook, known as the Peter Shook Farm. This property was bounded by the lands of John Feller, Peter Doyle, Vincent Zic (the former Henry Staats farm), Forman Gray, John I. Teats

and William Coon. The farm has two very old, beautiful barns, near the intersection of Shookville and Battenfeld Roads, that probably date to the early 1800s – Peter Shook’s era.

Michael does not appear in the 1930 Census but does so in 1940, when he and his wife, Pauline, born in 1902, in Czechoslovakia, are listed as owning their own house and dairy farm

Michael Juranic’s “very old, beautiful barns…”

(Photo by Author)

on Cokertown Road, and taking in boarders. Pauline was famous for cooking “mammoth meals for the guests.” In 1947 they sold 51 acres along Battenfeld Road to Martin Justinich, at a point on the north line of the land of Arthur Stickle formerly described as the "Stone House Lot.” The Juranics had three children: Walter, who was born in 1916 and died September 2, 1946, in Manhattan; Kathryn, 1918, and Pauline, in 1930. The senior Juranics, Pauline and Michael, died in 1966 and 1967, and are buried in St. Joseph's Cemetery, Rhinecliff, where Walter also was interred.

John Kralich

Although John Kralich never settled in Milan, his story provides a direct connection to the town’s immigrant saga. He was born November 8, 1894 in Malinsky, Krk Island, Croatia. A family of little means but great ambition, John’s father paid a captain of a sailing ship “one hog and four chickens” to take his son to America. So off went John to Philadelphia, whereupon he jumped ship and eventually made his way to Ellis Island. In 1915 he is listed as a tugboat man and then water boy to Grace Lines longshoremen. He lived in The Bronx as a boarder and, in 1919, met Magda Briska and married her on March 22. In 1920 they moved to an apartment on East 67th Street in Manhattan.

The 1930 Census lists the family as John and Magda, both 33 years old, and daughters Margaret, 8, and Beatrice, 2. He is now a foreman of stevedores and, by 1940, they are living in Weehawken, New Jersey. In 1942, perhaps with an eye to retirement, John and Magda bought a large house, called “Blue Echo,” just outside the Village of Red Hook. Beatrice is in high school, in New Jersey, listed in the school’s 1943 and 1944 yearbooks as “Patricia.” And Patricia she remained for the rest of her life – which she was to spend in Red Hook and Milan.

The Rancich-Kralich Family Connection

On one of her frequent visits to New York City, Patricia met Edward Rancich, son of Anton Rancich, who was a native of Fianona, Italy (subsumed by Yugoslavia after World War I and renamed Plomin). Anton had arrived in New York in 1913 and worked on the piers for the rest of his life. A German speaker, he was illiterate but could speak English. The 1930 Census lists him as a ship rigger, living with his wife and five children – Catherine, Thomas, Edward, Renata and Richard – in a 9th Avenue, Manhattan, apartment. In 1940, twins Catherine and Thomas are 14, Edward is 13, Renata, 11, and Richard, age not listed.

Subsequently, Thomas became a New York City detective, sister Catherine lived in New Jersey, and Richard became a recluse, never leaving New York.

Edward Rancich

Although born on April 1, 1927, Edward Rancich was to prove no one’s fool. At 16, he graduated from high school and tried to enlist in the U.S. Army but couldn’t without his parents’ consent. They refused so, instead, he enlisted in the Merchant Marines which by 1943 had lost so many men they would take anyone – without needing permission.

Unfortunately, just as Ed was about to take his chief engineer’s exam, he got drunk and missed his ship to Panama – and the rest was history: the seamen’s union revoked his membership. Eventually drafted into the Army, he served in the Korean War and was honorably discharged on September 8, 1952.

He and Patricia married that year and they lived in the attic of Blue Echo for two years while building a house on Sawmill Road, in Milan. Once there, Ed began a successful oil supply business. He and Pat had three children: John, born May 7, 1954; Sandy, on February 21, 1957, and Tom, born August 29, 1962. An invaluable member of the Milan Volunteer Fire Department, Ed died August 1990 and is buried in St. Sylvia's Cemetery in Tivoli. Sandy took care of her Mother until her death in 2010, then moved into the Sawmill Road house.

In 2015 Sandy and her brothers went to Croatia in search of the house where their grandfather, John Kralich, had been born and raised. Through trial-and-error, they finally found it in the village of Sveti Ivan, on Krk Island. Upon her return to Milan, Sandy redid the stone steps of the family house, subconsciously replicating those that she’d seen leading up to her grandfather’s house on a hill in his village.

Tom Rancich poses in front of grandfather John Kralich’s house in the Croatian village of Sveti Ivan; note the stone steps later replicated by Sandy Rancich at the family house in Milan. (Photo courtesy of Sandy Rancich)

The new stone steps on the Rancich house replicating those leading to Grandfather Kralich’s house on Krk Island, Croatia. (Photo by Author)

Thomas Udiljack

Born May 10, 1886, in Dalmatia, Thomas Udiljack grew into a 6’2” tall man with an easy going personality. A peddler by trade, he traveled widely through Austria, the Balkans, Germany and Italy selling household goods, acquiring an education through his travels. He emigrated from Belgium to New York in 1908 and worked on a Hoboken, New Jersey, milk route. Like so many of his peers, he lived in a Slavic neighborhood, where the talk was of a better way of life and what opportunities there might be in the country.

Most probably, he heard about Milan boarding houses like Michael Juranic’s, came for a stay and liked what he saw. In 1923, he and his wife, Helen (b. May 17, 1893), with John Yeljinich and John’s sister, Mary, bought property from George Tallman, mortgaging 107 acres and a woodlot of “15 acres, 3 roods and 19 perches”to Frederick Lee of Red Hook. The farm was on Milan Hill Road, bounded on the north by Haney Weaver, the west by John Haines, south by Philip Teats and east by Henry Weaver.

In 1942, Thomas registered for the draft, even though his hair was gray, and he and Helen had four daughters: Maudaline, 10, Anna, 8, Helen, 4, and one-year old Estelle. They were close-knit with Milan’s other Croatian and Slavic immigrant families, especially the Mike and John Juranics, the Lutiches, Zics, Zitzes, Bariches and Odaks.

Sadly, sometime in the 1920’s, a vagrant stopped at the Udiljaks house and asked Helen for a handout. But she spoke no English and he left. Shortly thereafter, as she and Thomas were sitting in the kitchen upon his return from doing errands in Red Hook, they smelled smoke.

They looked out, saw the barn Tom Udiljak proudly surveys his new corn crop, circa 1930. on fire and rushed to quickly put (Photo Courtesy of Lina Rismodo) it out.

But just a short time later, the barns were on fire again and this time there was no hope. Unfortunately, Thomas was injured fighting this latest conflagration that, like the first, everyone believed had been set by the vengeful but vanished vagrant. Thomas died in 1944 and was buried in St. Joseph’s Cemetery, Rhinecliff.

The Udiljak farmhouse and barn on Milan Hill Road.

(Photo by Author)

In July of the following year, Helen sold 27 acres to Allen Silverman and, three years later, nine acres to Michael and Marie Barich. Helen died in Litchfield, Connecticut, in 1977, and was returned to Rhinecliff to lie beside her husband.

John Lesica

John Lesica was born into a subsistence farming family on September 24, 1907, in the village of Vid, Croatia. He worked a ship that brought him to Philadelphia in 1938, whereupon he, too, jumped ship and made his way to New York City. Unfortunately, the immigration authorities nabbed him and sent him to Canada. Happily, however, just six months later he was able to emigrate to New York. Legally.

Finding work as a longshoreman, he moved to Astoria, Queens, and married Dragcia Justinich (b. November 20, 1920), the daughter of fellow Croatians Ivan and Anna Justinich.

John and Dragcia had three children: John S., born June 22, 1943, who, sadly, died less than a year later, on April 24, 1944; Dennis, born December 23,1945, and Linda, born November 29, 1954, during an extended trip to Yugoslavia by her parents.

John Lesica’s passport photo, circa 1950. (Photo courtesy Dennis Lesica)

Since summers in the City can be very uncomfortable, the day after school let out each year, Dragcia would flee with the children to Michael Juranic’s boarding house in Milan to escape the heat. They’d do odd jobs before rejoining John before school started.

Later, Dragcia’s uncle, Martin Justinich, bought 40 acres at the intersection of Battenfeld and Shookville Roads from Michael Juranic. He built a new house on the property’s old foundation and it was there that John and Dragcia ultimately settled down in Milan, upon John’s retirement in 1961.

Their son Dennis married Dolores Molinari, whose parents were also from Croatia, in the northwest of Istria.

They had two sons, John and Dennis W. John went to Marist College, graduated with a Computer Science degree and is a Network Computer Service Specialist at Red Hook High School. Brother Dennis W. was born September 15, 1982, worked for Pump Audio, in Tivoli until Getty Images bought Pump and moved Dennis to Los Angeles, where he now lives and works for a company that produces video games.

Dragcia and John Lesica celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary.m(Photo courtesy Dennis Lesica)

The new house built by Martin Justinich near the intersection of Battenfeld and Shookville Roads. (Photo courtesy of Dennis Lesi).

More Juranics

John, Sr., John, Jr. and John comprise another part of the Juranic family. John Sr. was born August 10, 1883, in Punat, shortly before his wife, Frances Galanich, was born there, too, on September 18, 1883. Before sailing to the U.S. in 1911 aboard the SS Alice, out of Trieste, their son, John, Jr., was born on July 10, 1910. In America, John Sr. became a longshoreman and Frances worked as a domestic for a city family. Another son, Anthony, was born July 24, 1921.

In 1927, John, Sr. and Frances bought the old George N. Hoffman farm of 137 acres, in Milan, from a man named Joseph Solum, who lived on Long Island. Coincidentally, that was the same year that Michael Juranic bought his Milan farm. The Dutchess County Liber numbers for the two transactions couldn’t be closer: 474:275 for John's and 474:277 for Michael's. John’s property abutted both Michael’s property and Vincent Zic’s farm (the former Henry Staats farm).

John, Sr.’s farm encompassed both sides of Sawmill Road, up to the very top of the hill. The house was quite old, with eyebrow windows and walls of lath and plaster. John, Sr. mainly grew apples and plums but also had some dairy cows, and chickens, and draught horses for making hay. Before going off to market in New York City, he proudly stamped his apple crates for identification. John, Sr. died in 1960. Frances followed in April of 1980 and both are buried in St.Joseph's Cemetery, Rhinecliff.

Spraying the orchard, circa 1930s. From left: John III, John Sr., John Jr..

John III, John, Sr.,. John, Jr. sets out to survey the farm.

Mary (Marianich) Juranic tends the chickens.

(Photos courtesy Brian Juranic)

John, Jr. makes hay the old way, with a team of draught horses.
 (Courtesy of Brian Jurnanic).

John, Sr. and son, Anthony, share a moment on the tractor in the 1940s.

(Photos courtesy Brian Juranic)

A gathering of Juranics, Orlichs and “Big Pete” Maurich, circa 1945.

(Photo courtesy Brian Juranic).

Anthony was six when the family moved to the Sawmill Road farm and lived his whole life in Milan, building three houses, including a block house on the farm. He married Dorothy Teator on July 8, 1944, and they had two daughters, Cynthia and Carolyn. He helped organize the Red Hook Gun Club, now defunct, belonged to both the Red Hook Boat Club and the Milan Volunteer Fire Department, and was a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Christian Lodge #379, in Red Hook. After working on the family farm, he was employed by the Poughkeepsie Foundry, Staats Dairy Transport and the Dutchess County Department of Public Works. Dorothy died July 30, 2001, and Anthony on December 15, 2001. They are buried in St. Paul's Cemetery, Red Hook John, Jr. and Sons John, Jr. was born August 10, 1910, in Punat, and lived on the family farm. He married Mary Marianich June 19, 1943 and, at one time, may have been Superintendent of Barrytown’s long-gone Cardinal Farley Military Academy, though I cannot confirm this. He was also a charter member of the Milan Volunteer Fire Department. He and Mary had three sons: John, III, Francis (“Frank”), and Byron. In 1959, he sold his dairy cows and, in 1964, a part of the farm.

After finishing high school, John, III and his brother, Frank enlisted in the Air Force. John, III served in France with NATO, in 1964 and 1965. He returned home, worked for the Red Hook Telephone Company and lastly for AT&T. He and his wife have sailed extensively in Long Island Sound, along the Atlantic Coast and around the Bahamas. They have homes in Florida and Tennessee. Frank was a radio controller in Okinawa, and returned home to a career at IBM. He, too, has homes in Florida and Tennessee.

Byron (b. May 5, 1959), the youngest brother, married Shari Kilgour, an administrator at St. John's Reformed Church, in Upper Red Hook. Their daughter, Christie was born May 26, 1985. Byron, a mechanic, has worked for Vinnie Zitz, Ruge's and is now with UPS. He also operates his own landscaping business, Realty Management. His house sits on part of the original Juranic farm, at the top of the road, and has a spectacular view of the Hudson Valley.

John, Jr., Mary and sons, John III and Francis, circa 1946.

(Photo courtesy of Brian Juranic)

Peter Weisz: A farmer asks, “Did progress pass us by?”

Thanks to Mary Ann Weisz, we have the following local newspaper interview of Peter Weisz describing taking over the old Peter Cookingham farm on Academy Hill Road: “Peter Weisz, one of Milan’s leading senior citizens and a former town tax assessor, recalled, “When I came to the town of Milan, years ago, it had two post offices and four schools.”

“Mr. Weisz, who lives on Academy Hill Road, unrolled a map of Dutchess County to underline his point. “When I came here in 1933 I saw a great future for the town. See how it lies between three communities, Red Hook, Rhinebeck and Pine Plains. It seems to be a natural center.

But the people don’t even know they are living in Milan,” he lamented.

“When the Taconic Parkway was built the people in the The Peter Weisz farm. Weisz was an early advocate of organic farming surrounding communities and a firm believer in “acting straight…” called it a wonderful thing for (Photo by Author)

the growth and development of their towns. Well, it runs right through the heart of Milan – and nothing has happened here, he continued.

“Mr. Weisz operates a 200-hundred-acre farm alone. He says he can’t keep it up as well as he used to, but a quick look around belies that. “Would you believe that I once grew tomato plants over eight feet tall on this land! My neighbors always wondered how I did it. It was simple. I operated my farm like a balanced aquarium,” he explained.

“When I first moved in my neighbors wondered what I was doing. For example, when I planted beets, I left a hole in the ground next to each plant. I filled the holes with natural fertilizer and got large, wonderful beets. They used lime. Naturally when the sun beat down, the beets were ruined. I could tell you a dozen stories like that,” he declared.

“Mr. Weisz uses natural fertilizer for the plants, feeds his 26 sheep, 4 cows and 2 chickens with part of his crops. He uses the balance for himself. The animals provide a further source of food. “My sheep keep me warm in the winter,” he said, displaying a sheepskin that he had tanned himself. “And when a man came around to sell me a power lawn mower, I got a good laugh at his expense. My lawn mowers fertilize as they mow, are edible and keep me warm in winter.

“Born in Austria in 1881, Mr. Weisz and his wife came to this country in 1906. They first settled in Atlanta, Georgia, where he studied steam and gasoline engines and engineering.

They later moved to Larchmont. “When I first came to Larchmont, I was afraid to keep chickens,” he grinned. “There was some sort of law that didn’t permit people to keep roosters because they kept people up at night with their crowing. So I didn’t keep chickens. Almost a year later, a friend of mine split his sides laughing at me. He told me that roosters are necessary to have hens lay eggs. But I was young then,” he added.

“Before moving to Milan, Mr. Weisz and his wife looked over 52 farms between Larchmont and Schenectady. When they first saw the Milan farm and bought it, it was a mess.

“If my wife hadn’t been with me all the way I never could have done it,” he said, with a heavy note in his voice. When she died I felt I had lost the most precious thing in the world. She was my partner and the rock I leaned on when the going got tough.

“With his wife’s help he cleaned out and rebuilt the farmhouse, built a barn and a garage. At first he worked the farm with a team of oxen. Later he bought a Fordson tractor with all the accessories for $300. He still uses it around the farm.

“Mr. Weisz never went to college; he claims experience as his teacher. “I got my knowledge through the college of life. Wherever I saw something that made sense, or saw someone making something in a better way, I learned from him. One day my wife and I went to a wedding of a relative. I notice the church steps were very easy to climb. It was like walking up a gentle slope. I bent down to measure the risers and the treads. The younger people laughed. But here was a wonderful thing I had never seen before: the risers were four inches and the treads were 18. I learned from that.

“The young people today don’t enjoy working and act as if they are going to get something for nothing,” he says. “I’ve always lived by a few simple rules. First of all, act straight with everyone. You can sleep at night. You can look people straight in the eye. Second, don’t be afraid of progress. You can learn from people around you and make your life better for it.”

Peter Clements A Slovenian-speaker born in Yugoslavia in 1881, Peter Kievets (who eventually anglicized his name to Clements) emigrated to the U.S. in 1905. In the 1920 Census he is listed as a longshoreman living with his wife, Ella, in Hudson, New Jersey (as was Thomas Udiljack).

They are in the same apartment building as Steve Veskov and Steve Councel, who, coincidentally, are listed on the same 1920 Census page as Clements.

In 1922, he and Ella bought the 150-acre farm of Flora A. (Rider) Teator. First surveyed by William Cockburn in 1797 as “Farm #1, Lot 54.” Theodore Phillips lived there for many years. In 1912, Lavinia Link is recorded as having sold it to Henrietta Pells Clarke, who sold it to Peter and Ella ten years later. In turn, the records show that on March 31, 1922, they sold a portion of the farm to Krizau and Lusiya Pelayett.

By 1930, Clements has become a naturalized U.S. citizen. He is farming on Spring Road in the north part of Milan and employs John Meyer, age 68. He is 51, Ella 45, and their home is worth $5,000. Ten years later, the 1940 Census lists his hired hands as Meyer, 21-year old New York City native Anthony Plesh, and a Yugoslav émigré, Verey Oloy, who is 56. And that’s the last record we have of the Clements. We don’t know if or where they might have gone after 18 years in Milan, or when and where they died and are buried.

Peter (“Big Pete”) Marovich Peter Marovich was born in Punat, Kirk Island, Croatia on May 12, 1894, and came to New York City in 1913, where he worked as a longshoreman. Sometime after, he married Mary Trubac and their son, Peter, Jr., was born in 1921 while they were living in District #1 in Manhattan. Between 1925 and 1940, the historical record is silent on the Maroviches.

However, the 1940 Census lists him still as a longshoreman and naturalized citizen. In addition to still living in Manhattan, he is recorded as having a house on Rock City (or Sawmill) Road, in Milan. The northern line of his property adjoins John Juranic’s southern border. He appeared before the Draft Registration Board in 1942. No longer a longshoreman, he is described as being “self-employed,” five-foot-eight-inches tall, 210-pounds with gray eyes.

Big Pete passed away in 1960, Mary in 1968, at age 71, and they rest together in St. Joseph’s Cemetery.

Michael Barovich At the recent Milan Bicentennial celebration, a woman approached me and demanded why I hadn’t included Michael Barovich in the first edition of Up to Milan. I told her I hadn’t known about him nor his connection to Milan, so she gave me the brief, following history: Michael Barovich was born December 24, 1893, in Dubrovnik, Croatia, emigrated to New York City around 1915 and found work as a clerk. He married Maria Toussaint on October 14, 1920. By 1930, he has become a naturalized citizen, they have a two-year-old daughter, Hilda, and are living on Park Avenue, in Union City, New Jersey. He is a bank accountant. In 1940, the Census lists the family as renting a house in Weehawken. Later he registers for the draft as “Michael Christian Barovich” and they are living in Hudson, New Jersey.

Seemingly, the Baroviches’ connection to Milan began in Weehawken, where they apparently were friends with Tom and Helen Udiljack – they whose Milan barn was probably

torched by the vagrant because Helen couldn’t understand English. Left with four daughters – Madalina, Anna, Helen and Estella – to raise by herself after Tom’s death in 1944, she had to earn a living.

Photograph by author.

This meant selling part of their farm – 9.86 acres to Michael and Maria Barovich, on June 18, 1949. The little brick house that Michael and Maria then built at the end of Woody Row Road, opposite the Udiljack’s old farm, stands today in silent witness to the strong Slavic connections that helped to revitalize Milan in the 20th Century.

Rounding out the family’s tale, the woman who approached me at the Bicentennial told me that daughter Hilda suffered from Multiple Sclerosis and had moved to Portugal. And that in 1959 her parents had returned to New York City aboard the S.S. United States from a trip abroad to their home in Weehawken – not Milan. If and when they left Milan, or maintained homes in both places, she didn’t say. But she did tell me that Michael died in January 1974 in Red Hook.

Nicholas Lucich Tracing “Nicholas Luciches” through the public records is a tricky business. Between 1805 and 1932, there are several to be found: three in various California cities, one in Nevada, another in Montana, several in Michigan and, at last, some in Queens and The Bronx.

Sometimes, their birthdays are close – for example, a pipe fitter in a Queens asbestos factory – but do not coincide with “our” Nicholas Lucich.

Born in December of 1887 (or October 26, 1886, as his World War II draft card later records) in Dalmatia, Croatia, Nicholas Lucich arrived in New York City from Trieste, Italy, on December 12, 1905. According to the ship’s manifest, he was 19 and bound to be with his brother, Antoni, at 533 West Street. From then until 1932, the record goes silent.

But Nicholas must have prospered because, on October 5, 1932, he is recorded as buying 135 acres in Milan from Clara L. Teator. The only hint of its location is “south line of farm and center line of the highway from Elizaville to the Cokertown School House,” in the area of Salisbury Turnpike and Odak Farm Road as we know it today. I believe Bowman was a lawyer and the executor of the properties sold to Peter Clements and George Bautovich.

The 1940 Census lists Nicholas as a naturalized citizen, 53 years of age and single, owning and operating a dairy farm on Spring Road. He lives with Antonia Lucich – possibly his sister or, perhaps, his brother Anton. We’ll never be certain because the ship’s manifest is so scrawled it’s practically impossible to decipher his housemate’s gender!

The rest of the story is brief: Nicholas registered for the draft in 1942. He’s grayhaired, blue-eyed, and stands five-feet-eleven-inches tall and weighs 180 pounds – a stature which goes well with being a self-employed dairy farmer. He lived in Milan’s Enterprise hamlet that year, died on June 2 and was buried in Sacred Heart Cemetery, Barrytown.

Michael Barich

“Michael Barich, born 3 January 1880, died 12 March 1959” reads the tombstone in the Red Church cemetery in Tivoli. Over his long life, Michael and his wife, Susan Beleuit, with whom census records show he arrived in New York in 1913, would leave their mark in both Milan and Red Hook.

In 1925, they are reported to be living on a farm in Milan at the top of Jackson Corners Road, now called Becker Hill Road. Michael’s daughter, Mary Kelly, confirmed that they primarily grew apples like the Juranics, Zitzs and Orlichs, and had a cider press. Most probably, they had purchased the farm from John and Madelaine Odak because a later, 1933 deed to a 400-foot by 400-foot lot from the Odaks to Frank Mladinich delineates it as being “on the division line of Michael Barich.”

About 1930, the Bariches’ house burned down and it was time to leave Milan. Michael is then 50 years old, Susan 35, and the children are: Thomas, 9, Susie, 7, Esther, 5, Henry, 4, and Michael, 3. On June 4, 1930, they buy one acre of land from Leslie R. Coon, on the east side of Route 9 just north of the Village of Red Hook, and move there with their 15-year-old helper Christina Malkovich. The house sat along the road and had a gas station out front.

A decade later, the 1940 Census lists Michael as a 59-year-old naturalized U.S. citizen, owner of the same house since 1935 and working the whole of 1939, generating income from the gas station and other sources. Registering for the draft in 1942, he is listed as slim, grayhaired and employed by the Atlantic Asbestos Company at their Spring Lake factory.

Other family members lying beside him in the Red Church cemetery include his wife Susan (May 3, 1887 – April 21, 1992), daughter Susan L. (d. July 21, 2006) and sons Thomas (d. December 20, 2004) and Henry (d. October 12, 1994).

John Vocich

Last but certainly not least among Milan equals, we have John Vocich and his wife Filomena. He was born (we don’t know where) on March 18, 1910. She was born on February 15, 1911, in New York City, to John Markowitz and Mary Cudis. Filomena and John were married in Brooklyn on May 25, 1933. The 1940 Census data for Filomena confirms her age as

30, that she is married to John, also 30, and that they have a son, John, Jr., born July 26, 1935.

Records also show that John was naturalized on March 30, 1944.

On May 29, 1945, the family bought property (the same as that sold to Jacob Stahl by Ella Mooney in 1889) and moved north to a house at 472 Battenfeld Road, Milan. After that, the record dims. The final addresses we have for John and Filomena are in Elizaville, then on County Route 6, in Germantown. He died in 1983, in Naples, Florida, and is interred in the Rock City cemetery. We don’t have her final date or resting place.

Lastly, there is a record for a John G. Vocich – perhaps their son – as being a U.S. Marine, Private 1st Class, stationed in Dallas, Texas, then later at Cherry Point, North Carolina.

Afterword

For Milan’s immigrant families, getting off to a good start in the New World was all about neighborhoods – and neighbors helping each other. For example, when Nick Ulrich was a New York City longshoreman, he lived in a building that housed mostly Croatian dockworkers. And Thomas Udiljak’s fellow milk route drivers in New Jersey and their families were Croatian, while Dennis Lesica’s neighbors were either Croatian or Slovenian.

They all attended the same neighborhood churches, went to the grocery stores that stocked familiar foods, and gathered on front porches with the families next door to share the latest. They knew who was doing what, where they were going and, fortunately for Milan, where to find a better life. They all felt that working the New York docks, being an asbestos pipe fitter, delivering milk, operating an elevator or doing laundry for a hospital was not

Milan’s newest families celebrate summer, circa 1940.

(Photo courtesy Dennis Lesica)

lifetime employment. These men were farmers – or "peasants" as the elite who controlled their lands had called them. But in the New World, they were free men set on owning their own farms.

Henry Riddleberg, a German native and Milan resident, often took the Hudson River Day Liner down to the city to meet and talk to the immigrants. He told them about Milan, about the farms that were coming available. They listened closely. Then one came up to Milan, then another, and so on: George Zitz bought his farm in 1909, Anton Orlich in 1911, Joseph Odak eight years later, in 1919, followed by Tom Udiljak in 1923, Louis Culich in 1925, and Nick Orlich and both Juranics in 1927. The 1930 Census for Milan lists others but not when they came.

Meanwhile, all this activity didn't go unnoticed in Rock City, as the Red Hook Journal “Rock City” column of December 6, 1907 noted: “City people continue to buy or are trying to buy small farms in the suburbs." Again, on February 17, it noted, "A city gentlemen is trying to buy several hundred acres of land out in the suburbs with many hills and much woods acres for a hunting ground." And on June 9, 1911, "There are a number of city people having a regular picnic in the county already in the suburbs." Suburbs? of Rock City!

At any rate, times were changing, even for the people of Rock City. These newcomers were worthy farmers. They helped each other and the town’s older residents when help was needed. They were civic minded, joining the fire departments and being politically active, with one, Tom Odak, serving as Town Supervisor for 28 years. They rejuvenated a town that was slowly losing its third-generation families. They brought dairying back to the old farms, raised Angus cattle, grew apples and all sorts of other fruit, and cut and put up hay for the animals.

They came with a true sense of responsibility and a love for the land in Milan.

Interviews:

Acknowledgements

Dennis Lesica Brian Juranic Mary Scuba Zic Sandy Rancich Linda and Stella Rismodo Deborah Bozydag John Juranic Mary Anne Weisz

Bibliography:

Dutchess County Clerk, Deeds Dutchess County Naturalization Records, 1932-1989 Glenny, Misha The Balkans New York Death Index, 1880-1956 New York, New York Guard Service Cars, 1906-1918; 1940-1948 New York, New York Marriage License Index, 1907-1995 New York Passenger Lists, 1825-1957 New York State Census – 1910, 1915, 1925 Steves, Rick Croatia & Slovenia, 6th Edition United States Cemetery & Funeral Collections, 1847-2017 United States Department of Veterans Affairs, BIRLS Death File, 1850-2010 United States Federal Census – 1920, 1930, 1940 United States Find-a-Grave Index, 1600-Current United States Phone and Address Directories, 1993-2002 United States Public Records Index, 1950-1992, Vol. II United States Naturalization Records Index, 1794-1995 United States School Yearbooks, 1900-1990 United States Social Security Index, 1935-2014 United States Social Security Application & Claims Index United States World War II Draft Registration Cards, 1942 Wikipedia -- Emigration And for dealing with the intricacies of the online network, many thanks to my editor, Chris Klose, whose discipline and humor, made this story possible.