Bohemians & Czechs



The St. Louis Bohemian population grew from immigrants traveling from their native country to New Orleans, Louisiana, and up the Mississippi River to St. Louis, beginning about 1848. They settled in the Frenchtown area, then referred to as Bohemian Hill, now called Soulard. The boundaries of Bohemian Hill on the near south side of the city were Lafayette Ave., 7th St., Russell Blvd, and 18th St.

The St. Louis Public Library had a branch in the Soulard neighborhood and this became the repository for a Bohemian collection. In the late 1960s, this collection was donated to the library at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville, Illinois, and became a part of a larger Slavic collection.

In 1854, St. John Nepomuk Church, located at 12th and Russell Streets, in St. Louis, was the first Czech Catholic parish formed in the United States. In 1895, St. Wenceslaus Catholic Church was formed. Czechs that lived in the southern portion of St. Louis County attended St. Paul Catholic Church in Fenton, which was organized in 1887. Before 1887 they attended Assumption Catholic Church in Mattese.

Early publications, newspapers, and historical items from St. John Nepomuk Parish are housed at the Library of the Illinois Benedictine College in Lisle, Illinois. Extant copies of the Catholic Central Union’s publications are housed here. This insurance association. published the name and date of death when a member died. It also has a complete set of the newspaper, Hlas, an early Czech Catholic newspaper that was published by St. John Nepomuk.

The Czech Catholics primarily used two cemeteries, Ss. Peter and Paul Catholic Cemetery and Resurrection Catholic Cemetery.

Members of the Czech community usually used the following funeral homes.
       Moydell Funeral Home, 1859 Russell Blvd., on Bohemian Hill.
       Kutis Funeral Home, 2906 Gravois Ave.,
         across from St. Wenceslaus Catholic Church.
       Kutis Funeral Home, 10151 Gravois Rd., in Affton.

In 1854, the Ceskko-Slovanksy Podporujici Spolek, or C.S.P.S., was formed in St. Louis In 1889 this Freethinking Czech-Slavonic Benevolent Association built the Bohemian National Hall at 1701 Allen Avenue in St. Louis. In 1965 the original hall was torn down for construction of Interstate 55 in South St. Louis City. The organization moved to their current location at that time.

    American Czech Center
    4690 Lansdowne
    St. Louis, Missouri 63116
    314-752-8168

Extant C.S.P.S. records are housed at the Czechoslovak Heritage Museum, Library and Archives, in Oak Brook, Illinois.

The Czech and Slovak Immigration Archives at the University of Chicago Library maintains a collection emphasizing Freethinking and Protestant records.

Thank you to St. Louis Genealogical Society member June Marie Sommer for submitting this information for publication in the 1980 St. Louis Genealogical Society Quarterly, volume 13, number 4, pages 119–121. In 2006, June Sommer updated the information for this website.

Bibliography

125th Jubilee of St. John Nepomuk Parish, St. Louis, Missouri. St. Louis: n.p., 1979.

Centennial of St. John Nepomuk Church, St. Louis, Missouri: History of the First Czech Catholic Church in the United States and the Priests who Served This Congregation, Together with Congratulatory Messages, Program of Celebration, and Other Items. St. Louis: St. John Nepomuk Parish, 1954.

Centennial of St. Wenceslaus Society of St. John Nepomuk Parish, No. 1 of Catholic Central Union: St. Louis, 1856–1956. St. Louis: Centennial Jubilee Committee, 1956.

Corzine, Jay, and Irene Dabrowski. “The Ethnic Factor and Neighborhood Stability: the Czechs in Soulard and South St. Louis.” Bulletin Missouri Historical Society  33 (January 1977), pages 87–93.

Habenicht, Jan. Dejiny Cechuvy Amerikých. St. Louis: privately printed, 1910. (History of the Czechs in America)

Habenicht, Jan. History of the Czechs in America. St. Paul [Minnesota]: Czechoslovak Genealogical Society International, c1996. (Translation of  Dejiny Cechuvy Amerikých)

Harris, Eileen Nini. Bohemian Hill: An American Story. St. Louis: St. John Nepomuk Parish, 2004.

Jerabek, Esther. Czechs and Slovaks in North America–A Bibliography. New York: Czechoslovak Society of Arts and Sciences in America, 1976.

Jones, Patricia L. “What Ever Happened to Bohemian Hill?” Gateway Heritage, 5 (Winter 1984-1985), pages 22–31.

Kimball, Stanley B. Slavic-American Imprints: A Classified Catalog of the Collection at Lovejoy Library. Edwardsville, Illinois: Southern Illinois University, 1972.

Miller, Olga K. Genealogical Research for Czech and Slovak Americans. Detroit: Gale Research Co., 1978.

Prokes, Albert J. Rev. Golden Jubilee of St. John Nepomuk Parish Dramatic Club: 1912–1962: Czech Catholic Culture in St. Louis. St. Louis: St. John Nepomuk Parish Dramatic Club, 1962.

Schlyter, Daniel Martin. A Handbook of Czechoslovak Genealogical Research. Buffalo Grove, Illinois: Genun, 1985.

Sommer, June M. Czechs in Missouri. St. Louis: St. Louis Genealogical Society, 1987.

Sommer, June M. History of the Czechs in Missouri, 1845 to 1904. St. Louis: St. Louis Genealogical Society, 1988. (Translation of the “Missouri Chapter” of Dejiny Cechuvy Amerikých)

Soulard: The Ethnic Heritage of an Urban Neighborhood. St. Louis: Washington University Press, 1975.

Sullivan, Margaret LaPiccolo. “St. Louis Ethnic Neighborhoods, 1850–1930: An Introduction.” Bulletin Missouri Historical Society 33 (January 1977), pages 64–76.