Dvořák in Iowa | Hacker News Reader

Dvořák in Iowa

plough.com

74 pointsanimalcule34 comments

I grew up just a short distance north of Spillville, Iowa. Even in those days, the town was very Czech. In Dvorak's time, it was as Czech as San Francisco's China Town was Chinese. In Dvorak's day, the brewer delivered a bucket of beer to your front door every morning, as was custom in the old country. (Somebody start that business in Sunnyvale :)

Spillville and Protivin were so Czech even when I was in school that I had bilingual classmates, because their grandparents spoke mostly Czech, still. And I can tell you this.... when you are a substitute teacher for a 2nd-grade class where one third of the kids have vowel-challenged names, oh the misery. Before you are half-way done taking attendance you will have suffered so much derisive laughter for the mispronounced names that you will have lost control of the classroom for the rest of the day.

Anyway, Dvorak felt very much at home in Spillville. During his day, Czech was the language of main street and the neighborhood.

That was captivating. Thank you.

Ahoj from the Czech Republic. :-)

> Spillville and Protivin were so Czech even when I was in school that I had bilingual classmates, because their grandparents spoke mostly Czech, still.

My grandparents were from southeastern Iowa, and I understand that their town was mainly German-speaking. It was pretty established, too: they grew up speaking it as third-generation Americans.

It stopped with their generation though, their town was harassed quite a bit during WWI, and that pushed people to assimilate.

It really interesting how much linguistic diversity America had that's only gone extinct within living memory.

I have heard similar stories from other ethnic Czechs (they have obviously intermarried in the generations since) from Iowa. As mid-western cultures go, some people from Norwegian communities in North Dakota still speak archaic Norwegian. To a lesser extent (probably more melting-pot effect?), Swedes in Minnesota and Germans in Wisconsin.

I never thought I would see something about my hometown of 300 people in rural Iowa on Hackernews. There are several Dvořák murals in town as well as a museum for handmade grandfather clocks made by the Bily brothers. One of their descendants was my bus driver growing up and my grandfather grew up speaking Czech and English in the home. Kolaches are also a town staple and there are many fundraisers for Schools/Churches that include baking obscene amounts of them.

My dad and his cousin got their deer processed at the Spillville Locker a couple times. Went to see the Bily clocks one time with my grandma. Good times. Small world.

Definitely a small world. I worked at the locker in highschool and was sad to see it close down a couple years back.

What? The Bily clock museum closed down? That's a tragedy.

My bad. It was the meat locker that closed down. I worked there in highschool. The Bily Clocks Museum is still open.

Nit: s/ancestors/descendants.

Also, I had some friends from Cedar Rapids who made Kolaches. I never knew how to spell the word. I’m guessing it’s a Czech thing given how many Czech people are in CR.

Proper Czech spelling is "Koláč" and it is universal word for round type of pastry with some filling in it. There are hundreds of variants depending on area and even familly.

And "koláče" is already plural, no need for the "s" at the end :)

That's not why they put the e there. It's just formed the same way as couch -> couches. And English e represents i anyway, not e.

I guess it is an anglicisation of the word, czech spelling and grammar are not so widely known outside Czech Republic.

I have seen similar quirks going from English into Czech. Like how there is "sendvič" for sandwich, and "sendviče" for sandwiches ... I've seen some places here advertising "sandwiche" (applying the Czech plural to the English stem).

Or even non-pastries - mrkvový koláč

Oh, that's interesting. In austria, basically all pastry comes from Czech. The “Topfengulatsche“ is a box shaped pastry filled with curd, now I know what “Gulatsche“ actually means.

Hello from Kendallville.

And from Dubuque!

Whoa, the author of Caddy is from Dubuque? That's so cool!

Tom Preston-Werner (of GitHub fame) was born and raised here (Dubuque) as well.

Really? I did not know that!

Small world.

New Hampton, checking in.

Jesup here

Billy Brothers clocks, as a child in northeast Iowa that place felt world-famous.

I was introduced to Dvorak and the New World Symphony through the anime Shin Sekai Yori (From the New World).

My favorite part of the New World Symphony is the largo, and found some of the background in this article interesting.

> Dvořák was also moved by the tale of Hiawatha, a founder of the Iroquois Confederacy. The largo is, in part, meant to describe the end of Hiawatha’s life. The old chief, weary from a life of labor, loss, and ardent service to his people, sits on the shores of the Great Sea Water and faces his own final homegoing.

Looking at title I thought it was something along the lines of state Iowa opting in for Dvorak keyboard layout as default or something... Lol.

That's funny - I always think "maybe we'll talk about the composer instead of that dang keyboard layout this time!"

Don't get me wrong. I highly appreciate the article and am glad for it. The fact is I'm from Czech Republic and I was pretty sceptical Antonín Dvořák is actually known somewhere else in the world. It was a pleasant surprise as Novosvětská (From the New World) is a real masterpiece.

What? In Europe he certainly belongs to the better known composers. And the Largo from the New World symphony is one of the most popular classical pieces. Here in Austria it has even been made into a Christmas song called “Weihnachtsstern“ (Christmas star).

As I said, my point of view is strongly skewed by living in here. Nearly everyone here knows who Dvořák was, but I was unable to tell if he's somehow known elsewhere also. Good to know he is.

Why can't we have both?

Dvorak's time in the US is not often mentioned. He spent 1892-95 in NYC as the director of the (defunct) National Conservatory of Music of America. The 'New World' was written at that time. (Victor Herbert also taught there.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National%20Conservatory%20of%20...

Here are a couple more quality articles:

Timeline: https://www.dvoraknyc.org/dvorak-in-america

More details on US travels: https://www.americanheritage.com/dvorak-america

Reading this brought me to tears. Tears of nostalgia.

nostalgia, sad and hopeful all at once, when the familiar and the alien mingle, as when we revisit the childhood streets where our friends are no more, or when we return all alone to the site of some joyful memory.

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