Our History

On an unusually warm day in March 1854, 29 Czech immigrant men met in the back room of Jacob Mottl’s tavern in St. Louis, Missouri. They felt a need for mutual support in times of sickness and a way to provide for widows and children. They also wanted some suitable social activity and a gathering place to discuss their problems.

These men formed a mutual benefit society to gain security and to make sure that if one of them died, the funeral would be paid for by the society, and the wife and children would be helped by the members in their immediate needs. This organization, the Czecho-Slovak Protective Society (CSPS), laid the groundwork for a modern fraternal in this country, which served as a model for many other fraternal benefit societies in America organized in later years.

In 1861, the Society had 96 members, twenty-three of whom volunteered to defend the Union in the Civil War.

By 1932, there were many Czech fraternals across the country. On January 1, 1933, the parent body of the CSPS was joined by four others: the Society of Taborites; the Bohemian-Slavonic Fraternal Benefit Union; the Bohemian-Slavonic Union; and the Bohemian American Foresters. This new society, called the Czechoslovak Society of America, adopted the Charter of the CSPS, and retained the March 4, 1854, date of organization, continuing as the oldest fraternal benefit society in the United States.

The Czechoslovak Society of America moved into a new building in Berwyn, Illinois, in 1974 and established the Czechoslovak Heritage Museum, Library, and Archives in the building.

The Museum focuses on the culture, heritage, artifacts, and history of what became the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

In 1982, the Czechoslovak Society of America adopted a new name, CSA Fraternal Life. CSA moved into its current headquarters in Oak Brook, Illinois, in 1995.

CSA Fraternal Life is proud of the legacy left to us by the pioneers of mid-western America and proud of our work to carry our inheritance into the 21st century,