(To conduct in-depth research about the St. Louis Institute and its services to the community, check the archives at the University of Missouri-St. Louis Library.)

Today's programs in St. Louis have their roots in the Institute's very beginnings. Its founders and those who followed them have always been deeply concerned with helping newcomers adjust to life in America while retaining their diverse cultural traditions.

In 1919, Ruth Holliday Watkins and a group of caring St. Louisans founded the International Institute to help large numbers of refugee and displaced women coming here from the war-torn countries of Europe. Working through the local chapter of the Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA) , volunteers established a variety of adjustment services. These services mirrored those being set up in almost 60 other cities nationwide.

Excerpts from the Institute's first annual report give a sense of life in those days. They also highlight resemblances between the Institute in 1919 and today. The report was written by the Institute's first executive director, Letitia Fyffe, in May 1920.

The early International Institute joined with the Red Cross to rent a three-story building at 2338 S. Broadway, in one of the two main "foreign" areas in the city. The building had already had a lively history, having housed a saloon and lodging house with a dance hall on the third floor.

In September 1919, the Institute opened for services. Its formal dedication was held in November with Jane Addams of Chicago's Hull House giving the keynote speech.

By the end of the first year, the Institute's staff consisted of eight people. The executive director and two other Americans worked with five "nationality" (ethnic) workers. Between them, they spoke 15 languages: Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, Czech, Slovak, Croatian, Serbian, Bulgarian, Armenian, Turkish, Italian, Spanish, Romanian, French and German.

Many of the early Institute's resources were dedicated to casework, "the protecting of foreign women and girls from exploitation."  Clearly, Institute staff and volunteers were helping an underserved population. Of the first year's cases, 61% had never been reached by any other agency.

About half the first year services were medical. "The other [half]," Miss Fyffe notes, "were general welfare cases, which included the placing of children in homes, finding of employment, bringing in touch with schools and classes, legal advice, and most important of all the general friendly counsel so essential in helping solve the unaccustomed problems found in America."

In immigrant neighborhoods, the Institute's efforts were unexpected and much appreciated: "In the clinic where our Polish interpreter first began her work," says Miss Fyffe, "a little Polish woman, who came with a small boy to translate for her, on hearing her own tongue spoken, looked up and said with surprise, 'Has God sent someone to work among the Polish women?'"

There were special problems in working with the Mexicans, the newest of the local immigrant groups. The men worked on the railroads. Their families were housed in boxcars, which frequently changed location. A box car/home where an English class was held one week might be switched somewhere else the next. "They are literally a floating population!" Miss Fyffe exclaims.

In the first year, the Institute organized 24 English classes. They reached Armenian, Serbian, Polish, Mexican, Italian, Bohemian, Romanian and French women.

Clubs for women and girls were an important activity. By the end of the first year, six had been formed – three for women and three for girls. "A club of little girls, calling themselves the Sunshine Club was formed at the request of its two original members, who came to the Institute one afternoon asking, 'If this was the place where you learn something.'"

Today's Festival of Nations has its origins in the International May Festival, first held in 1920. Organized by the International Institute, the May Festival was one of the earliest multicultural celebrations in the nation. It took place eight years before the National Folk Festival, which was also held in St. Louis.

Miss Fyffe proudly describes the crafts and performances featured in the 1920 international festival. "The exhibit of foreign handicraft was collected from among our own women. All were intensely interested in contributing their share, delighted at our appreciation of their cherished belongings."

By that evening, "[there was] a foreign atmosphere to the scene," she writes. An estimated 2,000 people attended. "Pennants representing most of the Nationalities in St. Louis were stretched across the street with an American flag in the center."

After a program of music and dance, the ceremony concluded with "a tableau representing the Institute welcoming foreign-born women at the hands of Uncle Sam."

"The future of the International Institute is limitless," concludes the first annual report.

And, so it has proven to be.

In 1923, the Institute became a member of the United Way's predecessor, the Community Chest. The next year, its services expanded to include men as well as women.

In 1934, the Institute organized our first "Festival of Nations" for the formal dedication of the Municipal Auditorium (Kiel).

During World War II, agency staff and volunteers helped relocate Japanese Americans from internment camps on the West Coast.

After 1945, the Institute developed programs for war brides. In the beginning most were European. Later, services were expanded to Japanese war brides.

Since 1980, the Institute has become nationally known for its innovative programs for refugees. Today, the tides of refugees seen at the Institute are continually shifting, from Southeast Asia, to Eastern Europe, to Africa and the Caribbean.

Institute staff and volunteers have responded creatively to each group of newcomers in turn. They encourage refugees to become self-sufficient members of the community while preserving cultural traditions. Thus, the wheel has turned full circle, from the earliest programs developed by Ruth Holliday Watkins and Letitia Fyffe to the Board, staff and volunteers of the Institute today.