Polish Americans have been part of Minnesota history since before the state's founding. Taking up farms along newly laid rail networks, Polish immigrants fanned across the countryside in small but important concentrations. In cities like Winona and St. Paul, Northeast Minneapolis and Duluth, as well as on the Iron Range, Polish American workers helped drive a growing industrial and agricultural economy.

In this highly readable volume, author John Radzilowski tells the story of the Polish Americans, many of them political refugees, who created and sustained community institutions...