Lublin Parish Marks 100th Birthday

The Thorp Courier (Thorp, WI)
November 19, 2009
Transcribed by Dolores Mohr Kenyon

It made all the sense in the world.  On the day Lublin parishioners celebrated their parish’s centennial; Bishop Emeritus Raphael M. Fliss said in his homily that love of God presumes love of neighbor.
 
In this close-knit little village of predominately Polish descendents, the welcome mat was definitely out on Oct. 26 as the neighbors and parishioners of St. Stanislaus parish looked back, over its 100-history, cooked up a storm of ethnic foods and wrapped their arms around generations of celebration.
 
Lublin, named after a large city in Poland, is in Taylor County, just a stone’s throw from the southernmost boundary of the Superior Diocese.  Lublin was organized into a village in 1902 as immigrants bought land for farms and supplemented their incomes by working in the woods during winters.
 
At first, Roman Catholics attended services in Thorp, 12 miles south, until 1908, when Bishop Augustine F. Schinner, the diocese’s first bishop, OK’d the building of a church in Lublin.  Originally named All-Saints, it was changed to St. Stanislaus in 1920, according to parishioner, 83-year-old Pat Kowalczyk Liszewski who has organized much of the history for this centennial.
 
About the same time, another faith community sprang up in Lublin.  This was Holy Assumption Orthodox Church dedicated to St. Demetrius and founded by immigrants from Carpatho-Russia.
 
Later, in 1926, the Polish National Catholic Church established itself in Lublin, celebrated Masses in homes and then built a new church in 1927 and named it St. Mary’s Polish National Catholic Church.
 
All three churches still stand and, while years ago members did not mingle, they now attend each other’s dinners, funerals and weddings, Liszewski said.  “We live in neighborly fashion.”
 
In the past 100 years, the economic landscape has altered dramatically in Lublin, as it has in most of its neighboring villages.  The Soo Line Railroad came through in 1910 and connected Lublin to the rest of the world.  While once bustling with grocery, shoe and general stores: butcher shops, blacksmiths, tanneries, cheese, box and furniture factories; a rooming house and restaurant, a pool hall and barber shop (the barber also taught music); Lublin is now bereft of commercial enterprises.  There is no school and the children of Lublin are bused to Gilman, about 10 miles north in the county.
 
Many Polish descendants, whose great-grandparents made their living on the rich Wisconsin farmland, have moved away for work outside of their agricultural roots.
 
Memories of the early days are kept alive in stories and in the food that dates back to the first wave of immigrants.
 
Countless handmade pierogi, golabki and great pots of sauerkraut with kielbasa simmered in the basement kitchen during the centennial Mass upstairs.  Many dozens of paczki pastries had been baked for the occasion along with poppy seed-filled breads and a plethora of other sweet desserts.  And while the meal represented many days of preparation for the women of the parish, there really is no comparison to the labor-intensive church festivities of the first-and second-generation settlers.
 
An elder of the parish, Anna Kwiatkowski Grajek, before her passing in August at the age of 97, relayed her memories of early church suppers to Liszewski, who wrote the account down.
 
“The ladies (of the church) had to butcher and dress the chickens, which were donated, live,” Grajek said in her oral narrative.  “They made chicken soup, roast chicken, potatoes and whatever vegetables were available.  It meant firing up the cook stove, hauling water and hoping the firewood was dry enough to get a good hot fire.”
 
This was in addition to getting to church over miles of rough roads and trails by horse and wagon, or in the winter by sleigh.
 
The personal stories of parishioners are touching and abundant.  Like Farmer Joe Szepieniec’s memory of 11 days of rain and floods that washed his grandfather’s heifers away to their deaths; or longtime parishioners Frank Ogurek and Frank Staniec’s stories of their days as altar boys in the 1930s.  The men said that their pastor would pay them five cents to serve at Masses during the week before they went to school, or to have them accompany him to homes where wakes were held.
 
One hundred years is a long time and St. Stanislaus parishioners seem to savor the past as heartily as they ate the meal of the day.  And as Fliss’ birthday was the day before the centennial celebration, they broke out into song for him with the Polish birthday blessing,” “Sto lat, sto lat, sto lat, neih ziem nam (may you live 100 years).”  It seemed a warm and fitting wish for their retired bishop, and perhaps for their beloved parish Ö may St. Stan live another 100 years.
 
This article has been reprinted with the permission of the Superior Catholic Herald.  The article was originally featured in the October 30, 2008 issue of the publication.