Jurate Kazickas, President of the Kazickas Family Foundation, wants to create a better world for Lithuanians
By Ann Charles, Baltic Review
Jurate Kazickas, an author and former journalist who covered the Vietnam War, is now the President of the largest private foundation in Lithuania, the Kazickas Family Foundation.
&#;Motivated by the wish to create a better world for both current and future generations of Lithuanians,&#; Jurate, who has offices in Vilnius and New York, is on a roll and there&#;s no stopping her now.
Born in Lithuania, she arrived in the USA on February 18, as a four year-old child with her parents, Joseph and Alexandra Kazickas, aboard the S.S. Ernie Pyle. Following fifty years of Soviet occupation, the Baltic flags of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia finally flew over the United Nations for the very first time on September 17,
As noted in the book, &#;Odyssey of Hope&#; by Joseph Kazickas with Valdas Bartasevicius, which was edited by Jurate Kazickas, it tells &#;The Story of a Lithuanian Immigrant&#;s Escape from Communism to Freedom in America and the Return to his Beloved Homeland.’
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THE VFA PIONEER HISTORIES PROJECT
Jurate Kazickas
“I Became A Feminist in Vietnam When The Officers Invited Me to Dinner &#; But Not To The Front Line”
Interviewed by Penny Stoil, September ; Dave Sperling, Videographer
PS: 70 years ago, when you were just a little girl you and your parents became refugees when the Soviet army began to move toward your home in Lithuania. You wound up in Germany and you spent three frightening and chaotic years in a displacement camp before you finally arrived in America. How has this family history, which is your history, shaped your life, your thinking and ultimately your work?
JK: Oh my goodness.
Well You&#;re Always An Immigrant.
You&#;re always not quite percent American even though I feel totally American. The history of the World War II &#; and what my family went through &#; has really been an enormous part of my life because my homeland Lithuania was under communist Soviet occupation for more than 50 years. And my father was very active in the Independence Movement to try to get independence back.
My whole childhood was really framed around &#; we’re Lithuanian &#; we have to get our homeland back &#; one day we wi
She had quit her former job at Look magazine when supervisors refused to send her to the war-torn jungle as a correspondent.
“It was the biggest story, it was the only story, it was on all the front pages,” she said. “It was my generation and it touched everybody.”
Kazickas talked about the laxity of press regulations and lack of restrictions in Vietnam. She claimed that once someone got a press pass Vietnam, they were free to roam the country.
This freedom led to the war’s end, as reporters saw the inaccuracies and falsities U.S. officials reported to a worried American public, she said.
Kazickas wrote several stories, including those about the brokenhearted soldiers who received “Dear John” letters and some “hometown” articles that profiled specific soldiers and their remarkable experiences.
“The entire country was available to write about,” Kazickas said.
As a woman during war time, Kazi
In this interview, she reflected on her journey as a philanthropist, journalist, and war correspondent. Jurate spoke about her experiences in Vietnam, where she became one of the first female war correspondents, her lifelong commitment to Lithuania, and the legacy of her parents, Juozas and Alexandra Kazickas.
Jurate also shared how she used her connections to help arrange a meeting between Lithuania’s first Prime Minister, Kazimiera Prunskiene, and U.S. President George Bush after Lithuania reinstated independence. She discussed her deep-rooted Lithuanian heritage, why family traditions matter, and the Kazickas family’s enduring faith and resilience.
You can watch this special interview for an inspiring look into the life of Jurate Kazickas and her ongoing work to support Lithuania’s future by following this link:
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