Latvian Americans

Latvian Americans are Americans who are of Latvian ancestry. According to the 2008 American Community Survey, there are 93,498 Americans of full or partial Latvian descent.

History
The first significant wave of Latvian settlers who immigrated to the United States came in 1888 to Boston. By the end of century, those Latvians immigrants settled primarily in other East Coast and Midwest cities, such as New York City, Philadelphia, Cleveland, and Chicago, as well as coastal cities on the West Coast, such as Seattle, Portland, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Some immigrants also established themselves in rural areas, but they were few and usually did not form long-lasting communities. Although most Latvians settled in cities, in most of these (with the exception of the Roxbury district of Boston) they lived dispersed and did not form ethnic neighborhoods. The first Lutheran church built by Latvians in the United States was erected in 1906 in Lincoln County, where an agricultural colony had been established in 1897.

A new wave of Latvian immigration began around 1906, after the failure of the 1905 Russian Revolution. Many of these immigrants were political leaders and rank-and-file revolutionaries who could be killed by Russian soldiers if they were discovered, so they decided to emigrate and continue the revolutionary movement in other countries. Most of the Latvian revolutionaries were more politically radical than the earlier immigrants to the United States, which increased friction in a number of communities.

In 1917, many Latvian revolutionaries went back to their homeland to work for the creation of a Bolshevik government, and in 1918, when Latvia declared its independence, some nationalists also returned.

After the First World War, the promise of economic improvements in the newly independent nation, immigration quotas established in 1924 by the United States, and the Great Depression all contributed to slow emigration from Latvia.

Toward the end of World War II, tens of thousands Latvians fled from advancing Soviet troops to Western Europe and moved into Displaced Persons camps. About half were eventually repatriated to Latvia, but the rest resettled to Germany, England, Australia, Canada, the United States and other countries. From 1949 to 1951, 40,000 Latvians immigrated to the United States with the help of the U.S. government and various social service and religious organizations. Although many of these refugees had been professionals in their country, in the United States they often had jobs as farmhands, custodians, or builders until they could find better paying jobs.

Most Latvians settled in cities, such as New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago. As with the earlier Latvian immigrants, most did not create ethnic neighborhoods and relied on social events and the press for a sense of community. Within a few years, Latvian organizations managed to create schools, credit unions, choirs, dance groups, theater troupes, publishers and book sellers, churches, veterans' groups, and political organizations.

From 1980 to 1990, 1,006 Latvians arrived in the United States.

Latvia reestablished its independence in 1991; however, few of the immigrants or their descendants have returned.

Demography
According to the 2000 census, a total of 87,564 people of Latvian descent lived in the United States. There are larger populations in the states of California, New York, Illinois, Florida and Massachusetts. Many Latvian Americans (about 9,000) have dual citizenship, which became available to Latvians who emigrated after the reestablishment of independence. Also, many often travel to Latvia and provide financial support and give material to various organizations. Some Latvian Americans have been elected to the Saeima, or Parliament, in Latvia.

The states with the largest Latvian-American populations are:

Latvian-born population
Latvian-born population in the US since 2010:

Education
The majority of Latvians immigrants to the United States after World War II were university graduates. Many were academics or belonged to intelligentsia.

Languages and religions
Most Latvian Americans speak English, while Latvian (also known as Lettish) is basically the language spoken by American Latvians of the first generation due to intermarriage. As for religion, although most Latvians Americans are Lutherans, there are also small Catholic communities, represented by the American Latvian Catholic Association, as well Baptist communities.

Notable people

 * Rutanya Alda (Rūta Skrastiņa, born 1942), actress (Mommy Dearest, The Deer Hunter)
 * Jessie Andrews (born 1992), pornographic actress, model, and club DJ
 * Aldis Berzins (born 1956), member of the United States men's national volleyball team that won the gold medal at the 1984 Summer Olympics.
 * Gunnar Birkerts (Gunārs Birkerts, born 1925), architect (Corning Museum of Glass, Marquette Plaza in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, the U.S. Embassy in Caracas, Venezuela, National Library of Latvia, Riga)
 * Sven Birkerts (born 1951), essayist and literary critic
 * Aris Brimanis (Āris Brīmanis, born 1972), ice hockey player
 * Chase Budinger (Čeiss Badingers, born 1988), NBA basketball player
 * Eric Cantor (born 1963), Republican Representative of Virginia's 7th congressional district from 2001 to 2014, and Majority Leader from 2011 to 2014, until his historic primary defeat by Dave Brat.
 * Vija Celmins (Vija Celmiņš, born 1938), painter; won a Fellow Award in the Visual Arts from United States Artists in 2009
 * Jacob Davis (Jēkabs Jufess, 1831–1908), tailor, inventor of denim
 * Buddy Ebsen (1908–2003), actor and dancer; known for his role as Jed Clampett in the popular television series The Beverly Hillbillies
 * Andrievs Ezergailis (born 1930), historian of the Holocaust
 * Paul Grasmanis (Pols Grasmanis, born 1974), former NFL American football player
 * Dave Grusin (born 1934), jazz musician; known for his musical score in the movies such as Tootsie and Heaven Can Wait
 * Natalie Gulbis (born 1983), LPGA golfer
 * Moriss Halle (born 1923), linguist
 * Philippe Halsman (Filips Halsmans, 1906–1979), photographer
 * Juris Hartmanis (born 1928), computer scientist, Turing Award winner (1993)
 * Rashida Jones (born 1976), actress
 * Mike Knuble (Maiks Knuble, born 1972), NHL ice hockey player
 * Mārtiņš Krūmiņš (1900–1992), Impressionist painter
 * Ed Leedskalnin (Edvards Liedskalniņš, 1887–1951), amateur sculpto;, builder of Coral Castle in Florida; claimed to have discovered the ancient magnetic levitation secrets used to construct the Egyptian pyramids
 * DJ Lethal (Leors Dimants, born 1972), DJ for rap-rock band Limp Bizkit, of Jewish descent
 * Peggy Lipton (born 1946), actress
 * Juris Luzins (born 1947), 1971 US National Championship winner in the men's 800-meter run
 * Cynthia Lynn (Zinta Valda Zimilis, born 1936), actress
 * Leo Mihelsons (1887–1978), artist
 * J. George Mikelsons (born 1938), airline executive
 * Nils Muižnieks (born 1964), human rights activist and political scientist
 * Peters Munters, musician with the bands Over it and Runner Runner
 * Fred Norris (Fred Leo Nukis, born 1955), Howard Stern show personality
 * Lucia Peka (Lūcija Pēka, 1912–1991), artist, painter of "Flowers", "Riga", and "The Well"
 * Brita Petersons (Brita Pētersone, born 1979), model
 * Gundaris Pone (1932–1994), composer and conductor
 * Eugene Revitch (1909–1996), psychiatrist
 * Lolita Ritmanis (born 1962), orchestrator, composer
 * Laila Robins (Laila Robiņa, born 1959), stage, film and television actress
 * Henry Rollins (born 1961), musician, performance artist
 * Mark Rothko (Markus Rotkovičs, 1903–1970), painter
 * Raimonds Staprans (Raimonds Staprāns, born 1926), Latvian/American painter and playwright (The Freezing, 1979; Four Days in June, 1989)
 * Harold Snepsts (Haralds Šnepsts, born 1954), NHL ice hockey player
 * Esther Sans Takeuchi (Estere Sāns-Takeuči, born 1953), Greatbatch Professor of Advanced Power Sources at University of Buffalo; recipient of the National Medal of Technology and Innovation, 2009
 * Peter Tillers (Pēteris Tillers, 1943–2015), legal scholar
 * Juris Upatnieks (born 1936), physicist; co-inventor of three-dimensional holography; created the first working hologram in 1962
 * Makss Veinreihs (1893–1969), linguist
 * DeAndre Yedlin (born 1993), soccer player for the Seattle Sounders and the United States National Soccer team
 * Markus Zusevics (Markuss Zuševics, born 1989), NFL football player