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Ute
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Post Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2011 12:48 am      Post subject: Arranged marriages among Polish immigrants
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A cousin of mine told me that the marriage of his grandparents in 1910 was an arranged marriage. His grandfather married a girl from a neighboring village who was brought over to America to marry him. Was that a common practice back then? Has anyone heard of something like that in their family?

Last edited by Ute on Wed Sep 05, 2012 11:58 pm; edited 3 times in total
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Currentsea



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Post Posted: Thu May 19, 2011 3:49 pm      Post subject:
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My mother told me a similar story. A marriage was arranged for my paternal grandparents. Jacob Czajkowski arrived in 1904 and his bride to be, Frances Rychczyk, arrived in 1912. I know he was from Glowno, Ludz, but am still trying to find out where my grandmother came from to try and confirm the age old story.
Chris
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joannes



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Post Posted: Wed Sep 05, 2012 1:24 pm      Post subject:
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I do not know of any arranged marriages Poland to US, however, I know of a arranged mariage in Poland. I can not verify this as this is a family tale. The story is this:
My great Grandfather was a hide merchant. He took a young lad under his wing and had him trained as a cobbler. He reportedly said that if the young lad would make him a fine pair of boots, he would give him one of his daughters as a wife. The young lad eventually learned his trade and made a fine pair of boots and was given a daughter in marriage. This daughter bore nineteen or twenty children, of which only 6 or 7 lived to maturity. My grandmother always remarked that she was sold for a pair of boots.
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Ute
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Post Posted: Thu Sep 06, 2012 12:03 am      Post subject:
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joannes wrote:
I do not know of any arranged marriages Poland to US, however, I know of a arranged mariage in Poland. I can not verify this as this is a family tale. The story is this:
My great Grandfather was a hide merchant. He took a young lad under his wing and had him trained as a cobbler. He reportedly said that if the young lad would make him a fine pair of boots, he would give him one of his daughters as a wife. The young lad eventually learned his trade and made a fine pair of boots and was given a daughter in marriage. This daughter bore nineteen or twenty children, of which only 6 or 7 lived to maturity. My grandmother always remarked that she was sold for a pair of boots.

Thank you, Joannes and Chris!

I assume arranged marriages happened (and still happen) in many cultures, for various reasons, and without the girl’s consent.

Among my ancestors I also have many marriages where bride and groom came from the same village or a very close by village; marriages where the wife died and the husband married his dead wife’s sister; and some cross-cousin marriages. I assume this tendency to marry [or re-marry] within the village or family in many cases were not marriages for love but for practical or mercenary reasons.
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James
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Post Posted: Thu Sep 06, 2012 9:49 pm      Post subject: arranged marriages
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My grandmother, Mary Witkowski, and grandfather, Franciszek ( Frank ) Cybulski, were an arranged marriage , here in the USA.
My grandfather immigrated to the USA in 1909, when he was 4 yrs. old.
My grandmother was born here, Perth Amboy, N.J. Her parents immigrated here in 1899 + 1900.
Franciszek was working with Mary's father , doing road construction. So they knew each other.

My grandmother gave this information to my cousin.
I had heard and read, that arranged marriages were common in Poland, but was not familiar with this in the USA.
Maybe the old customs were sometimes carried over , after immigrating here ?
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James
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Post Posted: Thu Sep 06, 2012 10:09 pm      Post subject: arranged marriages
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also ..........

My gg grandmother Jozefy Cybulska nee Szultz, died in child birth, with her 7th child. Jozefy was 51 yrs old.
Two of her children died very young, 2 yrs' + 10 yrs.
Her husband, my gg grandfather, Franciszek Cybulski, remarried a woman who was from the same town. His new wife was Marianny Nokonowska, and she was 15 yrs younger than him.
It seems probable that he needed a mother to care for his 4 remaining children.
I'm glad that he remarried, because he and his new wife had two children, of which one was my great grandfather. Smile
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Bernadine Kennedy



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Post Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2012 9:58 am      Post subject:
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My father who was born in Poland but came to thr USA as a 3yr old would often tease me when I was a teenager that he was going to sell me for a bottle of whiskey at the local pub. This was never done by anyone I knew but apparently he knew this was done somewhere at some time
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Shellie
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Post Posted: Sat Oct 13, 2012 5:29 pm      Post subject:
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This is an excerpt from a story posted on Ancestry .com. It recounts the memories of Jozef Przednowek, son of Michael Przednowek who was born 1866 in Podlesina, near Narol (in the southeast area of Poland, near the Ukraine border). He emigrated to Cook's Creek, near Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada. Read the entire story at: http://trees.ancestry.com/tree/15921986/person/323409051?pgNum=1


... My mother on her marriage had an extra large dowry on account of that she was a bit handicapped (she was hard of hearing). In those days it wasn't a matter of love, it was which girl had the most to offer in regards to property...

On one or two occasions my father spoke about how it came about. They held a sort of council before marriage with my grandfather. My grandfather thought it would be a good idea, because the girl that is my mother was getting so much dowry. My father listened to him, as it was a strict rule in their home to obey the parents and the elderly. My mother was slightly deaf at the time of marriage. The council figured that with God's Blessing and the dowry that everything would be okay.
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Shellie
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Post Posted: Fri Jan 18, 2013 1:39 pm      Post subject:
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My great-grandmother went to America in place of her younger sister who was to marry a man in the US, but could not bear to leave the boy she loved behind. When she arrived in the US, my great-grandmother wasn't too happy about the chosen groom either.

We were told that just minutes before the wedding, my G-grandmother tore off her veil and stomped on it, refusing to marry him. Looks like she didn't get her way - and it's written all over her face! ! Laughing



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Ute
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Post Posted: Sat Jan 19, 2013 12:07 am      Post subject:
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Shellie wrote:
My great-grandmother went to America in place of her younger sister who was to marry a man in the US, but could not bear to leave the boy she loved behind. When she arrived in the US, my great-grandmother wasn't too happy about the chosen groom either.

We were told that just minutes before the wedding, my G-grandmother tore off her veil and stomped on it, refusing to marry him. Looks like she didn't get her way - and it's written all over her face! ! Laughing

Shellie,
The whole wedding group doesn't look too happy! I'm sure it caused a lot of unhappiness in the past to be forced into a marriage and to live with a person you don't love because your parents want it. Aren't we lucky nowadays that we can decide who we marry?? Not that we always make the right decision, but if we look at our grandparents' and greatgrandparents' lifes, I wouldn't want to trade with them.


Last edited by Ute on Sun Jan 20, 2013 8:13 am; edited 2 times in total
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brianminnie



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Post Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 1:16 am      Post subject:
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Shellie,

That's a great story and the photos sure seems to back it up... sure wish my family had stories of any kind to pass through the generations. Despite the anguish it must have caused your great-grandmother, this provides some rich history for your family I'm sure!
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Arlene Vic



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Post Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 8:39 am      Post subject: Re: Arranged marriages among Polish immigrants
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Ute wrote:
A cousin of mine told me that the marriage of his grandparents in 1910 was an arranged marriage. His grandfather married a girl from a neighboring village who was brought over to America to marry him. Was that a common practice back then? Has anyone heard of something like that in their family?


Yes, I always wonder about this. In this cases I have been hearing and reading about arranges marriages by their parents or grandparents.

1. Couple was forced to marry cousin’s parents chosen for their children.
2. Couple was forced to marry outsiders because it is against the laws.

Was this problem back then??? Long ago people married their brothers or sisters or cousins because of same blood types. Or they didn’t know who their relatives are.

Some countries still practiced cousin’s marriages and Brazil is one of most cousins’ marriages. I think South America and Mexico. I am not sure about it.

Maybe that is why we can't search our ancestors with all different spellings.
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trishsa2
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Post Posted: Tue Jan 07, 2014 4:09 pm      Post subject:
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I was just reading this post from last year and have a similar story. My grandmother, Anna Todorowski, told me that at some group gathering (I would think either church or Polish organization) the women and men were lined up across from on another. The men picked their wives from the line of females. My grandmother said that she gave my grandfather, Joseph Buczynski, a flirty eye so he would pick her, which he did. She thought that he looked like a man who did not smoke or drink. Both assumptions were wrong! How hard women's lives were back then. This happened after she had been in the United States for a couple of years.
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hannahblack26
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Post Posted: Fri Oct 31, 2014 1:56 am      Post subject:
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I'm new to this site and still learning the ropes (recently discovered my great-grandparents were from different regions in Poland but apparently met and married over in the US in 1909), but since their marriage was so unhappy, I was assuming they were put together in an arranged marriage. The only complication I can see is that he was 30 and she was 25. Is that a bit old for marriage in the Polish way of things?
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rsowa
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Post Posted: Fri Oct 31, 2014 5:05 pm      Post subject:
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Hannah...the marriage ages you cited are not unusual at all. For my Polish ancestors (both in Poland and in the US), the vast majority of women married between 20-25, and the vast majority of men married between 24-30. There were plenty of them older and younger as well.
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