Australian Lithuanian History

Support Deportees from Siberia Šalpa Sibiro Tremtiniams komiteto The Adelaide Lithuanian community would at times organise special committees for various projects.   Formed on 24 March 1996, Support Deportees from Siberia committee was presided over by Stase Paceviciene. During the period 1941-1953, some 132,000 Lithuanians were deported to remote areas of the USSR, in Siberia, the Arctic Circle areas and Central Asia. They were not allowed to leave the remote villages they were brought to. More than 70 percent of the deportees were women and children. Around 50,000 of the deportees were not able to return to Lithuania ever again. Those that did return to life in Lithuania, faced discrimination for jobs and social guarantees, their children were denied higher education. Money was raised from donations, lunches, in lieu of flowers at funerals.   Money was divided and sent to different areas around Lithuania.   Each place that received funds provided a d...

Sometimes one can find treasurers in the Lithuanian Archives here.  I had looked at the documents below several times and didn't think much of them at first.  It wasn't until I scanned them that I realised these documents relate to Lithuanians in China.  I read the word Charbine in the documents, registered that that was an odd word in Lithuanian, and then it clicked that it was Harbin in English.  I did recall reading that some Lithuanians who arrived in Australia had done so from China . Harbin, China, is located 1500 miles inland in Heilongjiang Province, a region also referred to as Manchuria. In 1898, an influx of Eastern European migrants, mainly Russians arrived to build and service the Chinese Eastern Railway on land leased from China.   Many staff members of railways with their families remained in Harbin after the October coup, and then came immigrants from Russia, torn by civil war and destroyed by terror. In the first half of last c...

  Before Netflix, internet downloads, even DVD's, videos were the latest technology back in the 1990's.  To make its way to Adelaide, a world away from Lithuania came a tv series called Gimines (Relatives).  The series dealt with the various problems in a newly independent Lithuania.   Issues of land reclamation, racketeers, mafia and love triangles.  The series ran from 1993 to 2007. The series came as 10 videos (40 episodes), available for borrowing from the Adelaide Library for only $3 per week per video.  One needed to request the videos as the whole Adelaide Lithuanian community seemed to want to watch it (Duplicate copies were made).  The serial was purchased by the Adelaide Lithuanian Community Council and Adelaide Lithuanian Union. It seems almost laughable now, that something so small as this caused a great stir in the community.  But Lithuanians in Australia would have never seen a program on tv in...