Small Town Germans: The Germans of Lawrence, Kansas, from 1854 to 1918

The thesis, Small town Germans examines the lives of German immigrants in Lawrence, Kansas, from 1854 to World War I. German-born immigrants arrived in Lawrence after the Kansas-Nebraska territory was opened for settlement. The numerous Emigrant Aid Companies of the North, and later, the railroads and the Kansas Board of Immigration played an important role in attracting German settlers to Kansas. To serve the growing German community of Lawrence, German immigrants established two German speaking churches in town; the St. Paul's Lutheran church and the German Methodist Episcopal Church. A German-language newspaper, Die Lawrence Germania, was published from 1877 until 1918 to inform its German readers of news from the United States, Germany and Douglas County. Additionally, a German gymnastic and social club, the Turnverein, served Lawrence's Germans as [an] important cultural and social center. By the time of World War I, second generation Germans refused to carry on their parent's ethnic background, and social pressures from the dominant culture forced the German community of Lawrence to disappear. Besides the reconstruction of German life and its institutions in Lawrence, Kansas, the work compares the similarities and differences of German immigrants in metropolitan areas of the United States and small towns. According to the results, Germans in Lawrence had a different immigration experience than the Germans in metropolitan areas, such as Chicago or New York. The acceptance and assimilation of the minority group into the dominant culture led to a faster integration of German immigrants into American society, but also resulted in the decline of the German community