INDIANS IN CHICAGO: COMMUNITY, CULTURE AND CONTRIBUTION

                                                                        
                                             

                                               

                                                                        

                                                          

INDIANS IN CHICAGO: COMMUNITY, CULTURE AND CONTRIBUTION

 

The Indian presence in Chicago forms an important chapter in the wider history of the Indian diaspora in the United States. What began as a relatively small movement of students, professionals and traders gradually developed into a substantial community whose influence can now be seen in medicine, science, higher education, information technology, commerce, the arts, religion and civic life. Chicago offered Indian immigrants several advantages. It possessed major universities, hospitals, scientific institutions, manufacturing industries and commercial organisations. It was also one of the great transport and trading centres of the United States. These circumstances attracted doctors, engineers, academics, scientists and businesspeople from India, while later migration brought families, entrepreneurs, information technology professionals and service workers. Greater Chicago is home to approximately 230,000 people of Indian origin, making it one of the important centres of the Indian diaspora in the United States.

The development of the Indian community was not confined to the city itself. Over time, a considerable part of the population moved into suburbs such as Naperville, Schaumburg, Oak Brook, Bartlett, Palatine and other parts of the metropolitan region. This suburban expansion encouraged the establishment of temples, gurdwaras, cultural associations, language schools and businesses. The history of Indians in Chicago is therefore not merely a history of immigration. It is also a history of institution building, adaptation, cultural memory and participation in American public life.

Professional Migration

The professional character of early Indian migration to Chicago was significant. Doctors, engineers, university teachers and scientists were among those who found opportunities in the city's hospitals, universities, laboratories and industries. This professional presence continued to expand as immigration laws in the United States changed during the second half of the twentieth century. Highly educated Indians entered medicine, engineering, computing, finance, research and higher education. Chicago's major universities and medical institutions were particularly attractive because they offered opportunities for postgraduate study and specialised employment. Over succeeding decades, Indian Americans also became increasingly visible in information technology, corporate management, accounting, law, finance and entrepreneurship.

It would, however, be misleading to describe the community solely as a highly educated professional diaspora. Indian migration to Chicago has always contained considerable social and economic diversity. Alongside physicians, academics and engineers were small traders, restaurant owners, shopkeepers, taxi drivers, service workers and families who established businesses after years of modest employment.

This combination of professional achievement and small-scale entrepreneurship became one of the defining characteristics of Indian life in Chicago.

 Universities and South Asian Scholarship

Chicago occupies an exceptional place in the American academic study of India and South Asia. The University of Chicago has maintained a distinguished tradition of South Asian scholarship since the earliest years of the institution. Sanskrit has been taught there continuously since classes began in 1892. The University also developed important programmes in South Asian languages, history, religion, literature and civilisation. Its South Asia Collection became one of the major research collections devoted to the region. University sources have recorded holdings exceeding 720,000 volumes and instruction in numerous modern and classical South Asian languages. The Digital South Asia Library, developed with the participation of the University of Chicago, has further strengthened access to dictionaries, bibliographies, reference works, maps and other materials relating to the subcontinent. The University's association with India also has a powerful historical symbolism because Chicago was the city in which Swami Vivekananda addressed the World's Parliament of Religions in 1893. His appearance remains one of the defining moments in the early intellectual encounter between India and the United States.

More than a century later, this connection received institutional recognition when India's Ministry of Culture contributed 1.5 million dollars to establish the Indian Ministry of Culture Vivekananda Visiting Professorship at the University of Chicago. The professorship was designed to bring distinguished scholars in fields related to Indian philosophy, history, politics and social thought to Chicago. The University of Chicago has a strong presence in India through its Centre in Delhi and other South Asian research initiatives, with faculty from India and Indian-trained scholars contributing to its academic and research programmes.

Indian Scholars ,Doctors and Academics

Scholars of Indian origin have played an important part in Chicago's academic life. Dipesh Chakrabarty became internationally known through his work on history, postcolonial thought and South Asian studies at the University of Chicago. Rochona Majumdar has contributed significantly to scholarship on modern South Asian history, cinema and culture. The University's commitment to Sanskrit scholarship was further strengthened through the establishment of the Anupama and Guru Ramakrishnan Professorship in Sanskrit Studies. The endowment reflected both the long tradition of Sanskrit scholarship at Chicago and the growing involvement of Indian American philanthropy in academic institutions. Professor Yamuna Krishnan (born May 25, 1974) is a well-known researcher and teacher in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Chicago, where she has worked since August 2014.                                                                                                                      

                                                                                      (Prof. Yamuna Krishnan)

Dr Nishant Agrawal, MD, is a Professor of Surgery and Professor of Radiation and Cellular Oncology at the University of Chicago. Nishant Agrawal, MD, specialises in the management of patients with benign and malignant tumours of the head and neck.

                                                                      

                                    (  Prof. Nishat Agarwal   )             

  Chicago is enriched by a large and vibrant community of professionals of Indian origin who serve one and all with dedication and distinction. Their contribution spans medicine, technology, education, business, law and public service, touching countless lives every day. In this brief write up I have mentioned a few names only to illustrate the depth of service and talent. Mentioning some does not suggest that others are lesser known or less valued. The complete list would be far too long to include here. We honour every professional whose work strengthens our city and uplifts humanity with compassion and integrity always present

                                                                            

Indian Business and Entrepreneurship

Business enterprise has been another important feature of Indian settlement in Chicago.Some immigrants entered retail trade, hospitality, restaurants, travel services, food distribution and professional services. Others established firms in information technology, consulting, medicine and finance. Gujarati immigrants became particularly visible in retail and hospitality enterprises, although Indian entrepreneurship in Chicago has never been confined to one regional or linguistic group.

The growth of Indian owned businesses also reflected the changing character of immigration. A shop, restaurant, or travel agency could function as both an economic enterprise and a social institution where newly arrived immigrants got information, met acquaintances, and maintained connections to familiar languages and food. Nowhere was this process more visible than on Devon Avenue.

Devon Avenue and the Making of Little India

                                                                  

Devon Avenue in the West Ridge area became the most recognisable centre of Indian and wider South Asian commercial life in Chicago. During the 1970s and 1980s, Indian shops, restaurants, sari stores, groceries and other businesses appeared along the street. Over time, the area developed into one of the best-known South Asian commercial districts in the United States.

The Chicago History Museum identifies India Sari Palace, which opened in 1973, as the first Indian sari shop on Devon Avenue. Before such stores appeared, many South Asian women depended upon mail-order purchases for saris and other clothing. The arrival of a local sari shop therefore represented more than a change in retail convenience. It created a meeting place for immigrant women and families.

Photographer Mukul Roy documented the transformation of Devon Avenue in 1984. Her photographs record grocery stores, clothing shops, restaurants, street life and the emergence of a recognisable South Asian neighbourhood. They are now valuable historical evidence of how immigrant communities created cultural familiarity within an American city.

Patel Brothers

                                                                

One of the most important businesses associated with Devon Avenue is Patel Brothers. Mafat Patel moved to the United States from Gujarat and, together with his brother Tulsi Patel, opened the first Patel Brothers grocery store on Devon Avenue in Chicago in 1974. The founders recognised that Indian immigrants struggled to find spices, grains, flours, and other ingredients that formed part of their everyday food culture. According to the company's own history, the first shop occupied approximately 900 square feet. From that modest beginning, Patel Brothers expanded into a national chain with more than 50 stores across the United States. Its importance extends beyond commercial success. Patel Brothers illustrates a larger feature of diaspora history. Food is one of the most persistent forms of cultural memory. Grocery stores selling familiar rice, flour, lentils, spices, fruits, frozen Chapatis and Parathas, vegetables and sweets enabled immigrant families to maintain culinary practices while adapting to American life. The store therefore became part of a much wider cultural infrastructure created by Indian immigrants. I saw Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, Nepalese, Sri Lankans and Afghans visiting Patel Brothers.

Devon Avenue as Cultural Memory

Devon Avenue eventually acquired Sari shops, jewellery stores, sweet shops, vegetarian restaurants, meat shops, travel agencies, religious goods stores and establishments representing different regions of India and South Asia. The area was never exclusively Indian. Pakistani, Bangladeshi and other South Asian communities also contributed to its development. This mixed character is one reason the street became an important example of South Asian urban life in America.

For first-generation immigrants, Devon could evoke memories of familiar streets, smells, languages and foods. For younger generations born in the United States, it offered access to traditions that might otherwise have survived only within the home. Its importance is therefore historical as well as commercial.

Indian Art and Chicago

Indian artists and artists of Indian origin have also contributed to the cultural life of Chicago.The most famous example is Anish Kapoor, the Mumbai-born British sculptor whose Cloud Gate stands in Millennium Park.

                                                               

Cloud Gate has become one of the defining visual symbols of Chicago. Its polished stainless steel surface reflects the skyline, clouds and spectators, transforming the surrounding city into part of the work itself.

Kapoor's presence in Chicago is particularly significant because the sculpture is not simply an Indian artwork transplanted into America. It is the creation of an internationally recognised artist whose Indian birth, British career and global artistic language illustrate the transnational character of contemporary culture. Cloud Gate therefore represents, in an indirect but powerful manner, the increasingly complex relationship between origin, migration and artistic identity.

Indian Artists and Performers

Chicago has also provided a platform for numerous other Indian artists and performers. Indira Freitas Johnson has worked in sculpture and public art, often engaging questions of peace, gender, social responsibility and cultural memory. Hema Rajagopalan, founder of Natya Dance Theatre, has played an important role in introducing and sustaining Bharatanatyam in Chicago. Through teaching and performance, classical Indian dance has become part of the city's broader artistic landscape.Indian musicians have regularly appeared in Chicago's concert halls and cultural festivals. Artists associated with the sitar, tabla and other Indian classical traditions have helped establish sustained audiences for Indian music.

The city's museums and galleries have likewise exhibited Indian modern and contemporary artists. Such exhibitions have helped move the presentation of Indian art beyond stereotypical notions of the exotic and towards serious engagement with photography, architecture, modernism and contemporary artistic practice.

Kashmiris in Chicago

Kashmiris form a small but identifiable part of the larger South Asian population of the Chicago metropolitan area. The community includes Kashmiri Pandits as well as Kashmiri Muslims. Their migration occurred at different times and for different reasons, including education, professional employment and displacement. Kashmiri Pandits in the Chicago region have maintained community associations and links with organisations elsewhere in the United States. Cultural gatherings, religious observances and commemorative events have helped preserve Kashmiri identity among families living far from their ancestral homeland. A particularly important element in Kashmiri Pandit community life is remembrance of the displacement from Kashmir around 1989 and 1990. Commemorative events in the Chicago area have included public meetings, vigils and cultural programmes. I was told about a  candlelight vigil held in Naperville in January 2020 in connection with the thirtieth anniversary of the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from their homeland. For younger Kashmiris born in the United States, such gatherings serve another purpose. They transmit memory across generations. Kashmir becomes not merely a geographical location but a cultural inheritance expressed through language, ritual, food, literature and family history.

Indian Festivals

Festivals have played an important role in maintaining community identity. Diwali, Holi, Navratri, Durga Puja, Pongal, Onam and Baisakhi are celebrated across the Chicago metropolitan region. Different celebrations reflect the extraordinary regional and religious diversity of India. Gujarati associations organise Garba and Dandiya gatherings during Navratri. Bengali organisations celebrate Durga Puja. Tamil families observe Pongal, while Malayali organisations celebrate Onam. Sikh communities mark Baisakhi with religious services and communal gatherings. Diwali has developed particular visibility because it is observed not only within homes and temples but also through public and community events. These festivals fulfil several purposes simultaneously. They maintain religious practice, allow communities to transmit traditions to children, provide opportunities for social interaction and introduce Indian culture to neighbours from other backgrounds. They demonstrate that diaspora culture survives not through memory alone but through repeated communal practice. The main Hindu temples of Greater Chicago are spread across the city and its suburbs. The most important and widely visited include:

1. Hindu Temple of Greater Chicago, Lemont. This is one of the best-known Hindu institutions in the Midwest. Established in 1986, it has a major Sri Rama Temple as well as a Ganesha, Shiva and Durga Temple. Its architecture draws on Chola and Kalinga traditions.
2. Sri Venkateswara Swami (Balaji) Temple, Aurora. This is a major South Indian temple dedicated principally to Lord Venkateswara and serves a large Telugu, Tamil and broader Hindu population.
3. BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir, Chicago, Bartlett. This is one of the architecturally most impressive Hindu temples in the Chicago region. The complex contains a traditional stone Mandir, a carved wooden haveli and an exhibition explaining Hindu Dharma.
4. Hanuman Mandir of Greater Chicago, Glenview. Dedicated especially to Lord Hanuman, it is an important centre for North Indian Hindu worship, festivals and religious education.
5. CKB Chicago Kali Bari, Glen Ellyn. It is particularly important to Bengali Hindus and devotees of Goddess Kali, while also celebrating major Hindu festivals.
6. Manav Seva Mandir, Bensenville. A Sanatan Hindu temple serving a broad North Indian and Gujarati community.
7. Shree Swaminarayan Hindu Temple ISSO, Itasca. This is another important Swaminarayan temple and community centre.
8. International Society for Krishna Consciousness in Chicago. This is the principal Hare Krishna centre within Chicago itself, with regular kirtan, Bhagavad Gita study and major celebrations such as Janmashtami and Ratha Yatra.
9. ISKCON Temple of Greater Chicago (Naperville), Naperville. It serves the western suburbs and is centred on Radha Krishna devotion and bhakti traditions.
10. Shree Ganesh Temple of Chicago - Regal Foundation, Devon Avenue. This is especially convenient if you are visiting Chicago city rather than the outer suburbs.

Sikhs and Gurdwaras

Sikh communities have established a substantial religious and social presence in the Chicago metropolitan area. The Sikh Religious Society operates Gurdwara Palatine at 1280 Winnetka Street in Palatine. The institution functions not only as a place of worship but as a centre for religious education, Punjabi language instruction and community service. Its Gurmat School teaches Punjabi, Gurmukhi and the study of Gurbani to younger generations. The Gurdwara illustrates an important characteristic of Sikh institutions in the diaspora. Worship is combined with education, service and collective identity. Langar, the tradition of the communal kitchen, brings together people regardless of social background and preserves one of Sikhism's strongest teachings on equality and service. Through such institutions, Sikh families have been able to preserve religious traditions while participating fully in American social and professional life. Greater Chicago is home to an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 Sikhs, although no precise official figure exists because the United States Census does not enumerate religious affiliation. Greater Chicago has approximately six to eight Sikh Gurdwaras.

Chicago offers a good example of Hindu Sikh fraternity within the Indian diaspora. Although the two communities maintain their distinct religious institutions, temples and Gurdwaras, they frequently meet through cultural associations, Indian community organisations, Independence Day and Republic Day functions, charitable activities and interfaith programmes. Families from both communities also participate in one another’s social and cultural celebrations, especially Diwali, Baisakhi, Holi and major community gatherings.

Indian Muslims and Mosques

Indian Muslims form part of the much larger Muslim population of metropolitan Chicago. Their religious lives frequently overlap with those of Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Arab and other Muslim communities. Mosques and Islamic centres therefore often represent multiethnic congregations rather than communities defined by nationality. Indian Muslim families participate in Ramadan, Eid celebrations, charitable activities, educational programmes and interfaith initiatives. This wider Islamic setting demonstrates another characteristic of diaspora life. Identities formed in India may assume new meanings abroad. Regional and national distinctions sometimes remain important, while religious institutions simultaneously bring together people from many countries. Some of the principal institutions in Chicago  are the Muslim Community Centre (MCC Chicago) on Elston Avenue, one of Chicago’s oldest and largest Muslim community institutions, and Makki Masjid on Ainslie Street, a major North Side mosque with a strong South Asian congregation. Around Devon Avenue, important mosques include Masjid-E-Ayesha, a Sunni Hanafi mosque at 2409 W Devon Avenue, Makkah Masjid near Devon Avenue, and Masjid e Noor on Greenview Avenue.

Lakeshore Muslim Community Centre and Dar ul Eimaan Islamic Community Centre are also directly on Devon Avenue. Another significant institution is Faizan e Madinah, which began near Devon Avenue in 2007 and later expanded to Western Avenue.

Cultural Associations

One of the strongest foundations of Indian community life in Chicago has been the voluntary association. Organisations representing Gujarati, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali, Kannada, Odia, Punjabi and Malayali communities have helped preserve languages, festivals, music, dance and regional traditions. Such associations often organise cultural evenings, children's programmes, literary gatherings, religious observances and celebrations of Indian national occasions. The Indian American Centre in Chicago has served as an important secular community institution, providing programmes and assistance for immigrants, families, young people and senior citizens. Universities have also supported Indian and South Asian student associations. These organisations play a somewhat different role from older immigrant associations. They bring together young people who may be recent arrivals, international students or second and third generation Indian Americans. The result is a continually evolving idea of Indian identity.

Indian Journalism in Chicago

The growth of the community also produced its own media. India Tribune was founded in Chicago in 1977 by Prashant Shah and developed into a publication serving Indian readers in the United States. The newspaper has covered Indian affairs, diaspora concerns, community events, politics, festivals and cultural activities. It continues to identify its origins with Chicago and its service to the Indian American community. Community newspapers were particularly important before the development of the internet and social media. They provided information about immigration, religious events, marriages, businesses, visiting performers and political developments in India. They also created a public record of immigrant life that would otherwise have disappeared.

The photographs of Mukul Roy provide another form of journalism and historical documentation. Her images of Devon Avenue preserve everyday scenes that later acquired considerable historical significance.

Indian Americans in Corporate and Professional Life

Indian Americans in the Chicago region are present across medicine, technology, finance, engineering, higher education, management and human resources.It is difficult to quantify their exact representation within particular professions without comprehensive occupational data. It is therefore preferable not to make unsupported claims about dominance within specific industries. What can be stated with confidence is that professional employment has remained an important component of Indian American life in the region. The movement from the first generation of engineers and physicians to later generations of executives, researchers, entrepreneurs and technology specialists demonstrates the social mobility achieved by many Indian American families. At the same time, the history should not be reduced to professional success. Small businesses, restaurants, grocery stores and community institutions were equally important in establishing a durable Indian presence.

 Philanthropy and Institution Building

As the community became more economically established, philanthropy assumed increasing importance. Indian American families have contributed to universities, hospitals, religious institutions, cultural programmes and educational initiatives. The creation of academic chairs, scholarships and cultural programmes reflects a transition frequently seen in immigrant communities. The first generation concentrates upon settlement and economic stability. Later generations begin investing in institutions capable of transmitting knowledge and cultural identity. The endowed Sanskrit professorship at the University of Chicago offers a particularly instructive example. It joined private Indian American philanthropy with an institution possessing a long-established tradition of Sanskrit and South Asian scholarship.

Vivekananda and the Historical Connection with Chicago

No account of India and Chicago is complete without Swami Vivekananda. His appearance at the World's Parliament of Religions in September 1893 brought Hindu philosophical and religious ideas before a large American audience.

                                                                             

                                                                    

                   (Avtar Mota inside the Fullerton Hall, Chicago, where Swami Vivekananda addressed the Parliament of Religions in 1893) 

The importance of Vivekananda lies not only in the fame of his address. His presence established Chicago as one of the earliest American cities associated with a major public presentation of Indian spiritual thought. That historical memory has remained alive through the activities of Vedanta organisations, universities and cultural institutions. The later creation of the Vivekananda Visiting Professorship at the University of Chicago thus possessed both academic and symbolic meaning. It linked contemporary scholarship with an encounter between India and America that had begun in the same city more than a century earlier.

Identity Across Generations

The first generation of Indian immigrants often maintained a direct emotional and linguistic relationship with India. Their children inherited a more complicated identity. They grew up in American schools, spoke English as their dominant language and participated fully in American social life, while continuing to encounter India through family, religion, food, festivals, cinema and occasional travel. The third generation may be still further removed from the original migrant experience. This gradual transformation explains the importance of temples, Gurdwaras, cultural organisations and language schools. Their purpose is not merely to preserve the past unchanged. They reinterpret inherited traditions for people living in a different society. Indian identity in Chicago has consequently become plural. A person may simultaneously identify as American, Indian American, Gujarati, Bengali, Tamil, Punjabi, Kashmiri, Sikh, Hindu, Muslim or Christian.

Diaspora identity does not necessarily require choosing between such affiliations.

Conclusion

The history of Indians in Chicago is ultimately the history of migration transformed into belonging. Doctors, engineers, academics, scientists, traders, shopkeepers, artists, musicians, journalists, religious leaders and entrepreneurs arrived under different circumstances and at different times. Together they gradually produced institutions that made permanent settlement possible. Their contribution should not be measured solely in terms of professional advancement or financial success. Equally important were the grocery stores, temples, Gurdwaras, newspapers, cultural associations, language classes and festivals through which a scattered immigrant population became a community.

Devon Avenue remains one of the most powerful symbols of this history. The sari shops, food stores and restaurants that emerged there during the 1970s and 1980s transformed a commercial street into a cultural landscape. The importance of Devon was not merely that it allowed immigrants to purchase Indian goods. It allowed them to encounter one another.

A bag of lentils, a sari shop, a restaurant or a video cassette could become part of a much larger process through which memory and community were reconstructed in a new country. From the teaching of Sanskrit at the University of Chicago since 1892 to the development of modern South Asian studies, Chicago has been one of the important American centres for serious scholarship on India. The memory of Vivekananda's appearance in 1893 adds another dimension. Chicago was not merely a destination for later Indian immigrants. It had already become a symbolic site in the history of intellectual communication between India and America. Indian classical dance, music, photography, architecture and contemporary art have likewise found audiences in the city. The Indian community of Chicago is no longer simply an immigrant community in the conventional sense. It contains recent migrants, long established families, American born children and grandchildren, professionals, entrepreneurs, artists, religious communities and people whose connections with India vary greatly.

What unites this history is not a single language, religion or region. It is the experience of carrying inherited cultural worlds into a new environment and allowing them to change without disappearing. Chicago changed the Indians who settled there, but Indians also changed Chicago. They contributed new foods, languages, religious traditions, intellectual perspectives, artistic forms and forms of entrepreneurship. They established institutions that now belong permanently to the social landscape of the metropolitan region.

The history of Indians in Chicago is therefore both an Indian story and an American story. It demonstrates that migration need not end in the disappearance of cultural memory. Under favourable conditions, memory can become an institution, an institution can become a community, and community can become an enduring part of the history of a city.

 

( Avtar Mota )

 

CHINAR SHADE by Autarmota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.
Based on a work at http:\\autarmota.blogspot.com\.

KAULS OF GERMANY

                                         

                        ( Barbara and Donald Kaul ) 

Kauls of Germany

I was surprised to read the name Barbara Bluhm Kaul in the list of the donators of 10 million and above to The Art Institute of Chicago. The name stood out immediately because in my mind Kaul has always been a Kashmiri Pandit surname, carried by the families from the Valley of Kashmir who trace their lineage to the ancient Rishis and who for centuries have been regarded as the  scholarly class among the Saraswat Brahmins. To see it listed among the great Chicago patrons in the highest bracket of giving, alongside the Pritzkers and the Duchossois family, made me pause and look closer. On further research, I came to know that Kaul is a popular surname in Germany as well, with a completely separate history and etymology, and that the Kauls of Germany have made their own distinct mark in the fields of law, politics, science, sport and culture.

The German etymology is well documented. In German onomastics , Kaul is classified as a topographic and habitational surname. It derives from Middle High German kule and Middle Low German kule meaning the pit, the hollow, the depression in the ground or the pond. In Westphalia and the Rhineland , there are still hamlets and field names called Kaule, Kaul and Kuhle. A person who lived by such a hollow or who came from a place called Kaule would be called Kaul. A second explanation traces it to Middle High German kugele, contracted to kule, meaning the ball or the sphere, used as a nickname for a round headed or stout person, or to early New High German Kaul meaning the cudgel, a nickname for a rough or coarse man. The Dictionary of American Family Names summarises it as the North German habitational name from any of the three places in the Rhineland so named or the topographic name from Kaul meaning the pit or the pond, while noting the separate Indian entry from Sanskrit Kaula meaning well born from Kula meaning the family. The two names therefore sound identical today but arose on the opposite sides of the world, one from the geography of the Rhineland and one from the Sanskrit cosmology of Kashmir.

Once this is understood, the list of the prominent German Kauls becomes quite extensive and interesting. The name appears continuously from the seventeenth century in the church registers around Nieder Mockstadt and Isenburg Budingen, and in modern Germany,  it is the most common in North Rhine Westphalia, Hesse, Bavaria and Berlin.

In law and public life, the most famous bearer was Friedrich Karl Kaul who lived from 1906 to 1981. He was an East German attorney who became a national figure in the German Democratic Republic. He acted as the co plaintiff counsel for the victims in the West German trials of the Nazi officials, he wrote some sixty screenplays and detective novels, often under pseudonyms, and he hosted the popular television programme Fragen Sie Professor Kaul where he answered the everyday legal questions. He was decorated with the National Prize of the GDR and the Karl Marx Order. In a very different legal tradition, Hans Peter Kaul who lived from 1943 to 2014 was a distinguished German diplomat and the international lawyer, a long serving legal adviser to the Foreign Office and later a judge at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, where he helped shape the early jurisprudence on the war crimes and the crimes against humanity. In politics , Henning Kaul born in 1940 , served for decades as a Christian Social Union member of the Bavarian Landtag, focusing on the environmental policy and water power, receiving the Bavarian Order of Merit and the Bavarian Constitutional Medal in gold. Earlier figures include Georg Kaul who lived from 1873 to 1933, a journalist and the Social Democratic politician in Silesia, and Felix Kaul who lived from 1920 to 2013, a German jurist who served as the Federal Prosecutor at the Federal Court of Justice.

In sport the contemporary face of the name is Niklas Kaul born in 1998 in Mainz, the decathlete and javelin specialist who became the world champion in the decathlon in Doha in 2019, the youngest ever to do so, and who remains one of the most visible Olympic athletes in Germany. His athletic lineage continues a broader German Kaul presence in athletics that includes Michael Kaul the track and field athlete and Emma Kaul the young middle distance runner. Football too has its Michael Kaul born in 1963 who played and coached in the German leagues.

In culture and scholarship the name recurs. August Kaul who lived from 1873 to 1949 was a landscape painter of the Dusseldorf School, known for his Lower Rhine views. Oskar Kaul who lived from 1885 to 1968 was a musicologist at Wurzburg. Matthias Kaul who lived from 1949 to 2020 was a percussionist and composer noted for his experimental music theatre. Anja Beatrice Kaul born in 1965 is a German actress active in television and theatre. Martin Kaul born in 1981 is an investigative journalist with Taz and Die Zeit known for reporting on security and the far right. Inge Kaul who lived from 1944 to 2023 was a political scientist and economist who directed the Human Development Report Office at the United Nations Development Programme and pioneered the concept of the global public goods.                                                    

Returning to Chicago, Barbara Bluhm Kaul belongs to this German American branch. She is part of the Bluhm family, long associated with Chicago real estate and art collecting, and she is listed with her husband Donald Kaul. Her hyphenated name reflects that union. Her family foundation, the Barbara Bluhm Kaul Foundation formerly the Mayfair Foundation, established in 2005, is registered in Chicago and reported assets and distributions that place it among the significant regional philanthropies. Its giving has consistently favoured the arts institutions. The foundation's presence in the Art Institute's donor circles at the ten million and above level is therefore consistent with a pattern of sustained cultural philanthropy rather than a single one off gift. It represents the way the German origin families who settled in the American Midwest in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries have become the pillars of the civic culture in the cities like Chicago.

It is instructive to place her alongside another Indian origin family that has also entered the Art Institute's philanthropy record at a major level. The Sinha family, Anita and Prabha Kant Sinha, appear in the Art Institute's annual reports and the benefactor listings in the donations amounting to more than one million dollars. Their contribution is documented among the gifts of money and objects of art in the museum's published donor rolls. While the Sinhas are more recently associated with the engineering and data science philanthropy in the United States, including the later multi million dollar gifts to the universities in Texas for the departments of data science and the innovation labs, their early support for the Art Institute marks a parallel story of the Indian American families joining the traditional German American and Jewish American patronage that built Chicago's cultural institutions. The presence of both a Kaul and a Sinha in the million plus tiers illustrates how Chicago's museum has been sustained by the successive waves of immigration, each bringing its own surname history and its own understanding of the public duty.

                                             

                     (Anita and Prabha Kant Sinha) 

In the end the surprise that began with seeing Barbara Bluhm Kaul in the ten million and above list resolves into a larger lesson about the surnames and the migration. Kaul in Kashmir means well born from kula, a claim of the spiritual lineage linked to Shiva and to the Kaula tradition of Shaivism. Kaul in Germany means dwelling by the pit or the hollow, a claim of the physical place in the Rhineland landscape. Both meanings speak of belonging, one to a family of learning and one to a piece of land. That the same four letters should come to rest in the donor gallery of the Art Institute of Chicago, carried by a German American philanthropist whose generosity now sits alongside that of the Indian American families like the Sinhas, is a reminder that the American cultural institutions are themselves the archives of such converging histories.

( Avtar Mota )

CHINAR SHADE by Autarmota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.
Based on a work at http:\\autarmota.blogspot.com\.

THOSE WHO TRULY LOVE YOU ,ARE ALWAYS WITH YOU

                                          

Those who truly love you are always with you.

They are with you in the sunshine, quietly feeling proud that you are in the light. Never do they want to see darkness around you. Your joy is their light, your laughter their prayer. When you shine, they do not envy your brightness; they stand a little behind, as if shielding your light from the wind, lest it should flicker.

They are there in the rain, not to scold you for being drenched, but to stand in the storm long before you arrive, waiting at the corner wherefrom you will surely pass. They know the roads you take, the turns you forget, the storms you walk into without looking. They know you forgot to carry your umbrella. You always do. You walk into life as if you are invincible, as if youth and hurry will protect you.You may forget your safety , but they  never forget it  Never.

They stand there with trembling hands, with an old umbrella that has seen many monsoons, holding it not for themselves but for you. And when you finally come ,  late, distracted ,  they tilt the umbrella  completely towards you. Your shoulder stays dry. Theirs gets soaked to the bone. They shiver in the cold, water running down their sleeves, but they smile. That strange, contented smile, because your being dry matters more than their own drenching. They would rather be wet a thousand times than see you catch a cold once.

And they bring you home, not to see what you have brought for them, not to weigh your pockets or your success, but to see what they can serve you. They do not eat. They just sit opposite you and watch you eat to your fill what they prepared with love, with those hands that now ache, that tremble a little while serving. Each morsel you take is their festival. Your appetite is their achievement. They feel full when you are full.

You may not remember their birthday. You may forget the date, forget to call, lost in your own world. But they will be the first to bless you, with tears glistening in their eyes, with a voice that breaks with love: "Jeevem sharadah shatam"  "May you live a hundred autumns". And they mean every word, a hundred times over.

They are designed only to offer: love without a ledger, compassion without condition, shelter when the world is harsh, support when your knees give way, and a warmth that asks for nothing in return. Never, ever shall they demand. They were never made to demand.

If you have one such soul around you, look around. You need no rituals and  no pilgrimages. The divine is already sitting in your room, in that old chair. Just smile and hug them, tightly, while you still can.

For we are not here permanently. Parting is the order. And one day that umbrella will be folded forever, that chair opposite your plate will be empty, the kitchen will not smell of what you loved, and you will realise, with a pain that will tear your chest, that you were loved far, far more than you ever knew.

(Avtar Mota)

CHINAR SHADE by Autarmota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.
Based on a work at http:\\autarmota.blogspot.com\.

A VISIT TO LAKE MICHIGAN, CHICAGO

                                      

                                           

   

A Visit to Lake Michigan , Chicago 

We thought a quick look would be enough after lunch but the lake had other ideas. One moment we were strolling its wide promenades with gulls wheeling overhead and the skyline glittering behind us, the next we were sprawled in the park watching sailboats tilt in the breeze. The scent of fresh popcorn and coffee drew us into Navy Pier where the food halls buzz with locals and visitors alike. Then came the moment that changed the day entirely. We stepped onto a ferry and pushed out into that impossible blue. As the city slipped back, a recorded story began, telling how this vast inland sea gives Chicago its water, its weather, its trade and its soul. Suddenly the lake was not just a view. It was the reason the city exists. Here is the story of the Lake :

Lake Michigan is one of the most remarkable natural features of North America and a defining presence for the city of Chicago and the wider Midwest. It is the only one of the five Great Lakes that lies entirely within the United States, touching four states and shaping weather, economy, culture and daily life for millions of people. To look at it from the shore in Chicago is to see what appears to be an inland sea, vast, blue and often restless, with waves that can rise like those on an ocean. Yet it is also a working lake, a source of drinking water, a highway for trade and a playground for recreation. Its story brings together geology, Indigenous heritage, industrial growth and modern environmental care, and it helps explain why Chicago grew where it did and how it remains connected to the world.

Origin

The origin of Lake Michigan goes back to the Ice Age. During the last glacial period, which ended about twelve thousand years ago, huge sheets of ice more than a kilometre thick advanced and retreated across what is now Canada and the northern United States. These glaciers acted like giant ploughs, carving deep basins into the bedrock and scraping out valleys. When the climate warmed and the ice melted, the meltwater filled those basins, creating the Great Lakes. Lake Michigan occupies a basin cut into ancient sedimentary rocks, including limestone and sandstone that were laid down hundreds of millions of years earlier when the region was covered by warm shallow seas.

Scientists describe the lake’s history in stages. After the main ice sheet withdrew, a series of larger and smaller glacial lakes formed in the same depression, with names like Lake Chicago and Lake Algonquin. Their shorelines were higher and lower at different times depending on where ice still blocked drainage and where new outlets opened. Over thousands of years the water level settled to its present elevation, about one hundred and seventy six metres above sea level. The lake floor still shows traces of this glacial past, with ridges, troughs and deposits of clay, sand and boulders left by the ice. The dunes along the eastern shore in Michigan, some of the largest freshwater dunes in the world, are also a result of wind and waves reworking glacial sand since the ice left.

Connection to Atlantic for Trade

Although Lake Michigan appears landlocked, it is part of a continuous water route to the Atlantic Ocean, and that connection is central to its commercial importance. From Lake Michigan water flows north into Lake Huron through the Straits of Mackinac. In fact the two lakes are technically one hydrological body with the same surface elevation, joined by the straits. From Lake Huron water travels to the St Clair River, to Lake St Clair, then to the Detroit River and into Lake Erie. From Lake Erie it enters Lake Ontario via the Niagara River and the Welland Canal, which bypasses Niagara Falls, and then into the St Lawrence River, which finally reaches the Atlantic.

For trade,  this St Lawrence Seaway system, completed in its modern form in nineteen fifty nine, allows large lake freighters and ocean going vessels to move between the Great Lakes and the world. Iron ore from Minnesota, coal from Appalachia, grain from Illinois and manufactured goods from Chicago and Milwaukee can be carried to Atlantic ports without ever touching a railway. In addition, Lake Michigan is linked southward to the Mississippi River system through the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal and the Illinois River, which was first connected by the Illinois and Michigan Canal in eighteen forty eight. That link created a water route from the Gulf of Mexico to the Atlantic via Chicago, which is why Chicago became the great transhipment centre of the nineteenth century. Today most long distance bulk cargo still moves by lake vessel to and from Atlantic markets, while the southern link carries barges with grain, chemicals and other commodities.

Aquatic Life

Lake Michigan supports a rich and complex web of aquatic life, although it has changed greatly under human influence. As a cold, deep, freshwater lake it naturally favoured cold water species. Native fish include lake trout, which was once the top predator in deep water, lake whitefish, yellow perch, walleye, smallmouth bass and several species of ciscoes, also known as lake herring. In its tributary rivers there were once huge runs of native sturgeon that migrated into the lake.

The food web begins with microscopic algae and phytoplankton that use sunlight to grow, then zooplankton, then small forage fish like emerald shiners and the native bloaters, then larger predators. Around the shore there are wetlands that shelter amphibians, turtles, muskrats and migratory birds, including herons, terns and bald eagles that have returned in recent decades.

In the twentieth century the ecosystem was reshaped by introduced species. Sea lamprey entered through the Welland Canal and devastated native lake trout. Alewife and rainbow smelt were also introduced and became abundant. To control them and to create a sport fishery, fisheries managers introduced Pacific salmon, including coho and chinook, which now support a major recreational fishery alongside steelhead trout. More recently zebra and quagga mussels, carried in ballast water, have colonised the lake bed in huge numbers, filtering water so that it appears clearer but stripping nutrients from the water column and changing the habitat for native species. Management today focuses on balancing native restoration, such as lake trout and sturgeon rehabilitation, with control of invasive species and protection of water quality.

Cities on its Bank

Many important American cities lie on the bank of Lake Michigan, and their growth is tied directly to the lake. Chicago in Illinois is the largest, with almost three million residents in the city itself and more than nine million in the metropolitan region. Its early growth as a port, lumber market, meat packing centre and railway hub was possible only because the lake provided transport and water.

Milwaukee in Wisconsin to the north is the second largest city on the lake, historically a centre for brewing, tanning and manufacturing, all of which used lake water and shipping. Green Bay sits at the mouth of the Fox River on the northwestern arm of the lake known as Green Bay. On the eastern shore, the cities of Muskegon, Grand Rapids near the shore, Holland and Grand Haven in Michigan developed around lumber, furniture and later tourism. Smaller but significant lake cities include Gary and Hammond in Indiana, which grew as steel towns using lake transport for iron ore, Kenosha and Racine in Wisconsin, Waukegan and Evanston in Illinois, and Traverse City and Petoskey in northern Michigan, which serve as gateways to recreation.

Each city has its own harbour or port facilities, beaches and waterfront parks, and together they form a ring of urban and industrial development that depends on the lake for water supply, cooling, transport and quality of life.

Size

Lake Michigan is immense by any standard. It is the second largest of the Great Lakes by volume and the third largest by surface area, and it is the largest lake by area that lies entirely within one country. Its surface area is about fifty eight thousand square kilometres, roughly the size of the country of Croatia. Its length from north to south is about four hundred and ninety four kilometres and its greatest width is about one hundred and ninety kilometres. Its shoreline, including islands, extends for more than two thousand six hundred kilometres.

In terms of volume, it contains about four thousand nine hundred cubic kilometres of water. That is enough water to cover the entire continental United States to a depth of more than a metre. Because it is so large it influences regional climate, moderating winter cold and summer heat along the shore and creating lake effect snow when cold air passes over warmer water in autumn and early winter. It also generates its own wave climate, with storm waves that can exceed five metres during strong northerly gales, which is why it can feel like an ocean.

Name Michigan

The name Michigan comes from Indigenous languages of the region. The most widely accepted origin is from the Ojibwe or Chippewa word mishigami, often written as michi gami, which is generally translated as large water or large lake or great lake. The Ojibwe, Ottawa and Potawatomi peoples, who together form the Three Fires Confederacy, lived around the lake for centuries before European contact and had their own names for its different parts and bays.

French explorers in the seventeenth century were the first Europeans to map the lake and they recorded variations such as Lac Michigan or Lac des Illinois. The English later adopted Michigan, and when the state was organised the name was applied both to the lake and to the state of Michigan, which borders four of the five Great Lakes. The name therefore reflects both the physical vastness of the water and the deep Indigenous heritage that predates the modern cities.

Depth

Lake Michigan is deep, with an average depth of about eighty five metres and a maximum depth of about two hundred and eighty one metres, reached in the northern basin near the middle of the lake. The deepest areas lie north of a line between Milwaukee and Muskegon, where glacial scouring was most intense. The southern basin, which includes Chicago, is shallower, generally less than one hundred metres, but still deep enough for large vessels.

Depth matters for many reasons. Deeper water stays cold year round, generally around four degrees Celsius at the bottom, which provides refuge for cold water fish like lake trout and whitefish. Depth also affects navigation, as channels and harbours must be dredged to maintain depth for freighters. In winter ice forms mainly in shallow bays and near shore, while the deep central portion rarely freezes completely. The depth also means the lake holds heat and releases it slowly, which influences lake breezes and the famous lake effect on Chicago weather.

Drinking Water Supply to City

For Chicago, Lake Michigan is the essential source of drinking water. Almost all of the city’s water and that of many suburbs comes directly from the lake. Water is drawn through large intake cribs located several kilometres offshore, where the water is cleaner and less affected by shoreline pollution. The most famous of these, the two brick water cribs visible from the shore, were built in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

From the cribs water travels through tunnels beneath the lake bed to purification plants on shore, notably the Jardine Water Purification Plant, which is one of the largest water treatment facilities in the world, and the Sawyer plant on the south side. There the water is filtered, disinfected and tested to meet strict safety standards before being pumped into a vast network of mains that serves more than five million people in the Chicago area.

This dependence on the lake explains many aspects of Chicago history, including the decision in nineteen hundred to reverse the flow of the Chicago River so that sewage would no longer flow into the lake. Protecting water quality remains a central concern, with ongoing efforts to reduce runoff, manage storm water and prevent invasive species from affecting treatment.

Tourism

Tourism centred on Lake Michigan is a major economic force for all four states that border it. In Chicago the lakefront is the city’s front garden, with nearly thirty kilometres of public parkland, beaches, harbours and a paved trail for walking and cycling that runs for the length of the city. North Avenue Beach, Oak Street Beach and the beaches of the Indiana Dunes draw millions of visitors each summer for swimming, volleyball and sunbathing.

Beyond Chicago, the lake offers sailing, kayaking, paddle boarding and recreational fishing for salmon and trout. Charter boats operate from almost every harbour town. In Michigan the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, with towering dunes overlooking blue water, is one of the most visited national park sites in the Midwest. The Indiana Dunes National Park preserves another remarkable dune landscape close to Chicago. Ferry services carry passengers across the lake, including the historic ferry between Ludington in Michigan and Manitowoc in Wisconsin.

In winter tourism shifts to ice fishing, snow covered trails and viewing ice formations along the shore. Lakeside towns host festivals, farmers markets and arts events that celebrate maritime heritage, and bed and breakfast inns and resorts along the shore cater to visitors seeking cooler summer temperatures and scenic views.

Navy Pier

Navy Pier is perhaps the most recognisable single landmark on Lake Michigan and a symbol of how the lake has moved from industrial use to leisure. Built in nineteen sixteen as a municipal pier and originally known as Municipal Pier, it extends more than one thousand metres into the lake at the mouth of the Chicago River. Its original purpose was mixed, serving as a freight terminal, a passenger dock for lake steamers and a place for public recreation.

During both World Wars it served as a training centre for the United States Navy, which is how it gained its present name. In the decades after the Second World War it fell into decline as freight traffic moved to other facilities. In the nineteen nineties the city redeveloped it as a major public attraction.

Today Navy Pier welcomes more than eight million visitors each year. It includes a Ferris wheel that offers panoramic views of the lake and the city skyline, an indoor botanical garden known as the Crystal Gardens, a children’s museum, theatres, restaurants and exhibition halls. Boats offering architectural tours of the Chicago River and lake cruises depart from its docks, and its fireworks displays in summer are visible across the lakefront. Navy Pier illustrates the broader transformation of Lake Michigan’s shoreline from a zone of lumber yards and factories to a public space that celebrates the lake as a civic treasure.

Conclusion

Taken together, Lake Michigan is far more than a body of water. It is a product of ancient ice, a living ecosystem that supports fish, birds and people, a highway that links the heart of the continent to the Atlantic Ocean, and a source of drinking water and livelihood. Its name carries Indigenous history, its size and depth create a climate and a landscape of its own, and its shores host great cities and small resort towns alike. For Chicago in particular, the lake is inseparable from the city’s identity, providing water, beauty, recreation and a sense of openness to the world. To protect it is to protect the future of the entire region, ensuring that this great freshwater sea continues to sustain trade, nature and community for generations to come.

That was the story  of Lake Michigan . And by evening , the ferry  that we rode , turned back and the lights of the city began to tremble on the water. We stood quiet, feeling the cool air on our faces and listening to the soft wash against the hull. Lake Michigan had given us more than an afternoon. It had given us calm, wonder and a sense of belonging to something vast and timeless. As we stepped ashore we carried the lake with us, in our memory, in our conversation, in the way Chicago will forever feel like home whenever we think of that blue horizon.

( Avtar Mota )

CHINAR SHADE by Autarmota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.
Based on a work at http:\\autarmota.blogspot.com\.