Latvians have been immigrating to Brazil since the early 1890’s. They were people who hoped to find land for farming, as well as a more prosperous and freer life in the country. Economist Kārlis Balodis (1864-1932) and philosopher Pēteris Zālīte (1864-1939) encouraged Latvian emigration to Brazil. Read more>

Starting from the late 19th century, hundreds of Latvian families voluntarily moved to the Russian provinces to get their own plot of land, which at that time in Latvia could only be bought or leased for a disproportionately high and unaffordable price for the majority of country people. One of the emigrants’ destinations was the Ufa Province about 2,500 km away, where there was a lot of available land at the time. Read more>

The first significant wave of Latvian migration to Australia was after the 1905 revolution, when Latvians, fleeing from deportation and the Tsarist terror, sought refuge in Australia. In 1913, Latvians in Sydney established their association and library, and later smaller associations regularly held Latvian Independence Day celebrations and Jāņi [Midsummer Solstice]. Read more>

In late 1914, during the First World War, the government of Tsarist Russia and its military leadership gave the order for the evacuation of inhabitants from Kurzeme, and later from other areas, to Russia’s territories. Read more>

Reprisals, arrests and deportations during the first Soviet occupation of Latvia from 1940 to 1941 deeply shocked many Latvian inhabitants. Read more>

In the period from 1949 to 1951, about 40,000 Second World War Latvian refugees arrived in America from DP camps in Germany, settling mainly in the largest northern cities Read more>

Sustained Latvian emigration to the American continent began in the last 20 years of the 19th century. Along with this, the first organizations and congregations were established, firstly on the east coast of the USA (in Boston, New York and Philadelphia), later in the midlands and in the west (in Cleveland, Chicago and San Francisco etc.), as well as in western Canada – in the “prairie provinces” in Manitoba and Alberta. Read more>

At the end of the Second World War, fleeing from the occupation by the Soviet army, many Latvians were ferried across the sea to Sweden in small fishing boats. These dangerous and secret voyages ensured that more than 3,000 Latvians ended up in Sweden. Read more>