Cadillacs to Kiev: The American Relief Administration in Poland 1919-1922

At the end of World War, the Herbert Hoover led American Relief Administration (ARA) gave the Polish people relief needed for the continuance of Polish statehood. The ARA staff fed hungry men, women, and children; they helped restart Polish industries; they supported the rebuilding of commerce; and they provided clothing and care for children. The ARA food aid, technical advice in industry, and guidance in administration played an important role in bringing about stability in newly independent Poland. "Cadillacs to Kiev," the story of the ARA in Poland, involves compassion and adventure, love and hate, and, of course, death. It is the history of the greatest humanitarian effort of its time, whose participants encompassed politicians from the highest political offices in Europe and America to the Polish-American working class, who sent not only money but also their children to assist their homeland in a time of urgent need. In "Cadillacs to Kiev" American witnesses tell the history of the relief operations and the Polish-Soviet War.