Jadvyga Damušienė : atsakomybės už šeimą ir tautą liudytoja

Abstract

The purpose of this article, based on published and unpublished sources, is to reconstruct the life and civic contributions of Jadvyga Damušienė (1915-2010), well-known among Lithuanian-Americans as a community activist, longtime leader and counselor of the young Ateitininkai, teacher, and administrator of the Roman Catholic federation Dainava youth camp. I nterviews done during the last years of Damušienė‘s life and cited in this article show that many of the values she espoused emerged already in her early youth. Damušienė‘s narratives contain interesting details of life in interwar Kaunas and the way people interacted then. Her life’s journey is marked by various changes: marriage; loss of loved ones; the first Soviet and the Nazi occupation; her husband‘s underground activities; the dramatic flight from Lithuania in 1944; the search for the imprisoned Adolfas Damušis; the move to the U. S . in 1947; and an active community life that continued even after the 1997 return to Lithuania.