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About Us

MISSION

The Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture’s mission is to preserve, perpetuate, showcase, and celebrate the history, culture, and achievements of the Lithuanian nation and people worldwide.  

The Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture is an Illinois-based, non-profit, tax-exempt, educational institution established under IRS 501(c)3.
EIN# 36-640176

'Your Home Away From the Homeland'

Founded on the belief that one learns best about oneself by learning about others, the Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture strives to preserve, perpetuate, and showcase Lithuanian culture and traditions; to celebrate the achievements of the Lithuanian nation and its people worldwide; and to share with and learn from other cultures. As a distinctly Chicago, Illinois-based institution, the Balzekas Museum seeks to serve its local West Lawn neighborhood, the City of Chicago at large, the State of Illinois, and the United States, by telling the story of waves of Lithuanian immigrants who settled here and gave their best to shape this city, state, and nation, while never forgetting their love for their ancestral land. 

Lithuanian immigrants have settled in Chicago since the latter half of the 19th century. Today, Chicago is home to the largest Lithuania community outside Lithuania and is sister-cities to Vilnius, Lithuania’s capital. The Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture was founded in 1966 during the height of the Cold War when Lithuania was subsumed into the Soviet Union and cut off from the rest of the world. Concerned about the plight of their ancestral land, leaders of Chicago’s Lithuanian community established the Museum to serve as a cultural ‘home away from the homeland’ for Chicago Lithuanians and a gateway to Lithuania, its language, history, culture, and traditions for all Chicagoans. 

Spearheaded by Stanley Balzekas, Jr., the Museum was originally housed in a two-flat building at 4012 S. Archer Avenue, next to the former Balzekas Motor Sales automobile dealership in Chicago’s Brighton Park neighborhood. The original basis for the Museum was the Balzekas family’s collection of rare books, maps, armor, and art. Other major gifts and purchases followed. With the good fortune of being located in a diverse and culturally welcoming city, the help of an active core of volunteers, and the support of an ever-growing number of members and donors, the Museum’s exhibitions and programs developed and flourished. In 20 years, its collections outgrew the original facility.

The Women’s Guild of the Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture was created by women active in social, educational and charitable work in 1969Every institution, whether educational, cultural or scholarly, has a dire need for volunteer members who stimulate interest and promote projects and programs for the organization they serveMembership in the Women’s Guild is open to all women whose interests center around the Fine Arts and Humanities. You are cordially invited to participate in this groupThe various programs of the Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture will be both motivated and enhanced by this organization.

In 1986, the Museum purchased and moved to the building it currently occupies, the former Von Solbrig Hospital in Chicago’s West Lawn neighborhood, just minutes from Midway Airport. After extensive remodeling, the building was transformed into a modern museum with a permanent exhibition hall, art galleries, research library, children’s Museum, ballroom and performance space, theater, workshops, and offices. Today the Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture is the largest Museum in the United States dedicated to Lithuanian culture and history. It is supported by a few thousand active members. In addition, it maintains partnerships with a broad network of ethnic museums and cultural institutions in Chicago, the State of Illinois, and throughout the United States, as well as museums and universities in the Baltic republics and diasporic communities worldwide.