Gypsies in Whiting Anthony Borgo October 2019

Gypsies known as the Rom arrived in the United States from Serbia, Russia and Austria-Hungary beginning in the 1880's.  Many people in this group specialized in coppersmith work, mainly the repair of industrial equipment used in bakeries, laundries, confectioneries, and other businesses. The Rom, also, delved into the fortune-telling business in urban areas. I first discovered that there was a connection with gypsies in Whiting, when I came across a poem written by James Hazzard, in his book New Year’s Eve in Whiting, Indiana.  Excerpts from the poem appears below:

Spring was when they came, every year.  Every year we were surprised. Why would a gypsy live here, of all places, and in a storefront? “They must know something we don’t” we agreed. That made us hate them, and be afraid of them.

We assumed they came for their usual – magic and crime. Personally, we didn’t admit to much of either in Whiting.  What’s worse they came at a time of year we started sleeping with the windows open again.  Now, under the traffic and weather and railroad and factory noises of our usual night, their presence was like a new sound.  Pain, abandon, lonesomeness, sex, joy, magic – all together outside our windows now, darkness was what the gypsies sounded like at night in Whiting, Indiana. A gypsy woman could drop her skirt over your child and take it up into her. 

They made us more confused about our bodies than even the Negroes. In fact, they were darker than the Negroes: they could know our minds.  Their women would take you in her mouth and draw every thought you’d ever had – that is, kept, as a secret possession.  And she knew, the day you’d die. 

It came and left town by rules of its own, rules we did not want to know, or so we said.  “They aren’t breaking any law,” the Police Chief told us.  But no one really trusts a cop.  He’s half a gypsy himself, knowing so many of our secrets, prowling the town all night. 

In 1931 Marshall Maslin romanticized about the gypsies in an article titled “When the Gypsies Came to Town.”   “Around the town, up and down Main street, in and out of the houses, through every disciplined school room, the word would fly.  And every small boy in my home town would hear it and every one of them would brighten up and his eyes would sparkle . . . the gypsies had come to town.  Maslin goes on to say that you weren’t supposed to have anything to do with the gypsies, but they were fascinating.  “The gypsies weren’t nice people.  They were dark and they dressed differently and their eyes flashed and they were dirty and they stole when they could and they trespassed on other folk’s land and they talked an outlandish lingo.  But they were color and romance and strange beings from unknown trails and they brought wilderness into little settled hearts.  Maslin goes on to state that as a boy you were warned about the gypsies, they might kidnap or even stab you, but the danger only wanted you to experience them more.  “And sooner or later we’d find ourselves trawling out the road that lead to where the gypsies camped."

In 1913 Pauline Lawalana, a five year old girl, disappeared mysteriously in East Chicago.  “It was at first thought that the child had been kidnapped by gypsies, who have a camp at Whiting, but a thorough search of the camp by the East Chicago officers, has convinced them that Pauline is not there.”  Like Maslin, children in Northwest Indiana could not keep away from the gypsies.  "The fact that many East Chicago children had gone to the gypsies' camp at Whiting to see the bears and monkeys which are adjunct of the outfit encamped there, led to the belief at first that Pauline had visited these people and had been concealed there by them." 

However, children weren't the only people enamored with the gypsies.  On July 9, 1923 two gypsy women were arrested for telling fortunes without a license.  The women held by police were Karambuta Pohatu and Mary Pulita of 719 Schrage avenue.  With them at the time was John Pulav who was arrested for disorderly contact.  When police arrived on the scene, "They found the man, with the women in a bedroom, evidently having his fortune told." 

In 1925 The Times went on a crusade to shine a spotlight on the gypsies residing in Indiana Harbor.  After the story ran in the newspaper, "One band of gypsies living in squalor and filth in a tent pitched on a lot on Guthrie street, two doors away from the Indiana Harbor police station, picked up their meager trappings sometime last night and headed for parts west."  When the gypsies' fortune telling business ceased to be profitable, the nomads' encampment quickly became unsanitary.  Citizens had been trying to oust this "undesirable element" from their city, but they were protected by a city ordinance. 

In June 1926 two Whiting residents were swindled by the mysterious gypsies in the area.  According to Joe Duhan a gypsy woman offered to restore the sight of his wife, who had been blind for some time.  She claimed to be able to accomplish this miracle for only $70 by using occult science known only to gypsies.  Joe produced the $70 and was told by the gypsy woman to turn around while she recited a mysterious charm over the money roll.  "When Joe turned around again, the Gypsy gave him his money, tied in a bright colored handkerchief, which she placed in a money box."  The woman locked the box, put the key in her pocket, and gave the container to Duhan.  She then claimed to return the following day to finish her magic spell after which Mrs. Duhan would regain her vision.  "Joe soon began to feel uneasy about the whole affair.  Using a knife to pry open the box, he unwrapped the handkerchief, and instead of finding his $70, he found a roll of dirty newspaper clippings."   

The day before four gypsy women, Mary Sanko, Minnie Nickles, Mary Galio, and Minnie Stanley, walked into Martha Saxon's candy store located at 879 Indianapolis boulevard.  The women began to interrogate Saxon about how much money she made a day and where she kept it.  They went on to state that they could increase her financial profits by means only known to gypsies.  Saxon became uneasy and went across the street to a drug store to call the police.  "Sergeant Nizlolkiewicz answered the call, but he arrived at the store a few minutes too late, for the gypsies, becoming suspicious of Mrs. Saxon's visit to the drug store across the street had hurriedly left."  The police later found the gypsy women on Fred and New York avenue. 

According to the Elkhart Truth, in 1930 there were approximately 100,000 gypsies living in the United States.  However, the advent of the automobile has allowed tribes to grow in numbers.  "The wandering gypsies who were formerly seen so often on our roads riding in gaily-colored horse-drawn wagons and camping by the roadside are rapidly disappearing." According to the Frankfort Times, Henry Arno, king of a gypsy band, said that this modernization is a bad thing.  "There will be no more flickering campfires, no more gypsy songs about the glowing embers, no more stews cooked over beds of red coals."  The only consolation was that now gypsy parents would be able to keep their young folks with them.  "The youngsters it seems, have been falling away of late, protesting that the old gypsy way of life is too slow." 

In the book One Minute After Sunrise, Tom Marcinak remembers a gypsy fortune teller with a storefront shop on Indianapolis boulevard directly across from the Standard Oil refinery.  The storefront belonged to Sam Evans, a gypsy king, one of the most influential gypsies in the Midwest.  When Evans was 59 years old, he suffered from a ruptured appendix.  He was rushed to Saint Margaret's Hospital and later transferred to Michael Reese.  While at the Michael Reese Hospital, as many as 60 of Evans' tribe members paid him a visit.  He spoke kindly of his visitors saying, "That's nothing unusual among gypsies.  It's an old tribal custom to visit the king when he is ill."  Gypsies came to see Evans from all over - Chicago, Trenton, Philadelphia and even New York.   

Sam Evans claimed to have over 500 subjects in his band.  He was born in America.  Evans succeeded his father as king.  He claimed to have roamed the country until about 10 years before his illness, when he settled down in Whiting to work as a coppersmith.  Evans initially had a distrust of medical science.  But it was the latest "miracle" drug streptomycin that saved his life. 

There are over one million gypsies living in America today, and most people don't know anything about them.  The majority of the Romani population in the United States has assimilated into American society.  However, the U.S. Census does not distinguish Romani as a group since it is neither a nationality nor a religion.