Polish America · Polish Chicago
For much of the twentieth century Chicago was the capital of Polish America, with a Polish population larger than that of most cities in Poland. If your family arrived between 1870 and 1920, there is a good chance they lived, worked or at least passed through here.
The Polish neighborhoods
Polish Chicago grew around its parishes, and Chicagoans still name the old neighborhoods after them. The main areas of settlement were:
- Polish Downtown on the Northwest Side, around Milwaukee Avenue, Division Street and Ashland Avenue, centered on St. Stanislaus Kostka (founded 1867) and Holy Trinity. The headquarters of the Polish National Alliance and the Polish Roman Catholic Union were here.
- Back of the Yards and Bridgeport, beside the Union Stock Yards on the South Side, where many Poles worked in meatpacking
- South Chicago and the steel mills on the lake shore, with Immaculate Conception parish
- Pilsen and the Lower West Side, shared with Czech and later Mexican neighbors, with St. Adalbert’s
- Avondale, known as Jackowo after St. Hyacinth (św. Jacek), the heart of the post-war and Solidarity-era arrivals
- Archer Heights, Garfield Ridge and the southwest suburbs, where families moved after the Second World War
Parish records
Polish parish registers are the most valuable Chicago source, because Polish priests wrote the names correctly and often recorded the village or parish of origin at marriage. Records of open parishes are kept by the parish; records of closed and merged parishes are held by the Archdiocese of Chicago. FamilySearch has filmed many Chicago Catholic registers from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
See our article on Polish-American parish records for what to look for and how to request entries.
Cook County vital records
Births, marriages and deaths in Chicago are registered by the Cook County Clerk. Genealogical copies are available once a record is old enough: births after 75 years, marriages after 50 and deaths after 20. The Chicago Fire of October 1871 destroyed most earlier county records, so vital records before 1872 are scarce.
- Death certificates give the birthplace, the parents’ names and the cemetery
- Marriage licenses and returns give ages and sometimes the parents
- Birth certificates name the parents and their birthplaces, sometimes the Polish village
Cemeteries
Most Polish Catholic burials were in St. Adalbert Cemetery in Niles and Resurrection Cemetery in Justice, both run by the Catholic Cemeteries of the Archdiocese. Their interment records give dates and grave locations, and the gravestones often carry Polish inscriptions with the place of birth.
Polish-language newspapers
Chicago supported several Polish daily papers, including Dziennik Chicagoski and Dziennik Związkowy. Death notices and obituaries in these papers often name the village in Poland, which the English-language press almost never did.
Libraries and societies
- The Polish Museum of America, founded in 1935, has a large library and archive of Polish-American organizations
- The Polish Genealogical Society of America, based in Chicago, publishes indexes to Chicago Polish parishes and newspapers
- The Newberry Library holds Chicago directories, maps and local histories
Chicago Poles often came in chains: relatives and neighbors from the same village settled in the same parish. Neighbors and godparents in Chicago records can lead you to the village.
How we can help
Immigration & Passenger Records assembles the Chicago side of a family from vital, parish, census and naturalization records, and Ancestral Village Identification uses them to find the parish in Poland.
Keep reading
Where Polish immigrants settled in America