What's more was a plan to build a home For the elderly named the "Villa Madonna".. and possibly a future museum. George Baudhuin pledged $150,000. This would have been a very good thing as it would have brought jobs to the area. Sadly both of these gentlemen died earlier that they should have, and thus it never took off.
The reason I post this here is because retaining ones heritage is not easy. Though according to Professor Bill Laatsch, we've done a pretty impressive job. However it never hurts to look at where you've been to figure out where you are going. Since then, the museum part has transpired in the form of the Belgian Heritage Center. But again, some jobs in the area would do a lot of good. Perhaps that can still happen as a lot of jobs let one work from home these days.
I've been looking at other places where Belgian's settled and the Carolina's has a large number of more recent immigrants. And that seems to be related to The European American Chamber Of Commerce Carolinas. The odd part is while there are many Belgian business references in those areas, I can't seem to locate any Belgian clubs where they are settling.
Another interesting place is Louisiana. From what I am told, there’s been a constant influx of French speaking Belgians to Louisiana for the last 50 years because of the CoDoFil program.
"CODOFIL is the Council for the Development of French in Louisiana. Our mission as Louisiana's French agency is to support and grow Louisiana's francophone communities through scholarships, French immersion and various other community and language skill-building programs."
Interestingly enough, one resolutions of the early (formed in 1913) Belgian Club's in Green Bay was to have the French language added to the curriculum of the Green Bay schools. Unfortunately, the goal was not achieved in the grade schools, but high schools did give French as a language choice.
Sadly we don't have much lure to Belgian's today. That would go a long way for keeping the heritage nice and strong. Of course the trips with the Wisconsin-Wallonie Club did play a part in Auguste Hayot immigrating when he met and fell in love in Emma who translated for him on his first visit.
