Dave Slanina, left, and his brother, John, both Youngstown natives, share an appreciation for their Slovak roots, which led them to help organize the annual Simply Slavic Heritage Festival in downtown Youngstown, which took place last month and drew its largest crowd ever.

YOUNGSTOWN — Dave and John Slanina both share a great appreciation for their family’s roots in the Spis region of eastern Slovakia and across eastern Europe.

The brothers originally are from Youngstown. John still lives here, while Dave moved to Cleveland in 2011. Through their appreciation of their heritage over the years, the brothers became involved heavily in organizing the Simply Slavic Heritage Festival.

It started in 2010, when Dave was talking with Ken Shirilla (the festival’s original chairman) at a Polish Youngstown event about the importance of developing a festival that includes multiple ethnicities of eastern Europe.

“We kept running into each other at local Slovak, Serbian, Polish and Croatian events in town and were lamenting the lack of turnout at some of these events or that they were primarily supported by the parishioners of the churches or members of the clubs,” Dave said.

“We discussed the idea of creating a larger pan-Slavic event that celebrated the culture of these countries collectively while highlighting the things they share as well as what makes them different.

“This was also around the time that the downtown was starting to see reinvestment, and Youngstown officials had hired a downtown events director who was offering seed money for new downtown events to attract people to the city.

“We discussed the idea with co-founder Aundrea Cika Heschmeyer of Polish Youngstown, and she was instrumental in helping us develop the idea, come up with the branding / name of the festival, and getting other local Slavic groups involved.”

John originally was a volunteer for the Simply Slavic Heritage Festival and was the first president of the Simply Slavic Heritage Festival when the event became a nonprofit. He still serves in that capacity.

John works in the financial technology industry, enjoying a career at FactSet in downtown Youngstown. Dave is an operations manager with a health care financial services company called TREND Health Partners.

“I have lived in Cleveland since 2011. Some of the primary organizations I have volunteered with over my years here are the Central Tremont Block Club, Bike Cleveland and the Polish American Cultural Center,” Dave said.

“However, the majority of my yearly volunteer hours are spent as the treasurer of Simply Slavic and the planning of the annual festival.”

In addition to Simply Slavic, John sits on the boards of the Rocky Ridge Neighborhood Association, the Mahoning Valley Historical Society and Youngstown Sister Cities.

“I also am a band member of the Od Srca Adult Tamburitzans and belong to the Rotary Club of Youngstown. I was educated as an engineer,” John said.

“I’ve been fortunate that my schooling took me to France and the Netherlands, so then I would visit family in Slovakia during vacations, which was a quick bus or train ride away. I have formed deep friendships with family and citizens with various backgrounds all over Slovakia.”

FAMILY HISTORY

Dave said that like many Slovaks who live in the Mahoning Valley, their grandfather, John Slanina, on their father’s side, was from Spis county, specifically from the town of Spissky Stvrtok in Slovakia. John Slanina is the eighth John Slanina in the family as their grandfather’s great-grandfather’s name also was John Slanina.

Dave said their grandfather and his siblings still spoke Slovak in the Spis dialect. Dave also said their grandfather’s brother, Steve Bacon (name changed from Slanina, which means “bacon” in Slovak), was involved heavily in the Youngstown Slovak community.

“He was the founder of the organization Youngstown Sister Cities and facilitated yearly bus tours of Slovakia. Our parents gifted my brother a seat on one of these tours for his high school graduation present,” Dave said.

“I think this is where my brother’s interest in traveling and exploring his ethnic heritage was born. As his younger brother, I naturally looked up to my brother, John, and saw the growth, cross-cultural friendships, and richness that this exploration brought to his life and I wanted to have similar experiences.

“My brother and I are Slovak, Croatian, Polish and Lithuanian. I have visited all four countries at various times over the past 20 years with Slovakia being the most frequently visited. We still have cousins we are close with who now live outside of Poprad.”

John Slanina said the first Slavic relative in their family who arrived in Youngstown was Franjo Mordus, their great-grandfather from Croatia. He said all of their great-grandparents were born in central or eastern Europe, and all of their grandparents were born in the United States. John said he always is curious about who their relatives were as people, not just their important life events and occupations. He said that while they passed before his birth, he will hear stories from festival volunteers about his great-grandparents leading organizations, delivering food, their personalities, etc.

“It’s so weird. I am from a long line of John Slaninas that go back to 1772. Our Polish great-grandparents settled in Campbell. Our Slovak great-grandparents settled in the Lansingville neighborhood on the South Side of Youngstown, and their construction company built several buildings that still exist today,” John said.

“While I have been to our family’s village in Slovakia to see the graves of my great-great-grandparents, I hope one day to travel to all of the other villages across all of the countries to get a sense of what they left behind.”

EDUCATION

The brothers are graduates of St. Christine Elementary School and Ursuline High School. Dave has a bachelor’s degree in finance and a minor in marketing from Youngstown State University. Dave said because his day job is specific to the health care finance industry, the Simply Slavic Heritage Festival allows him to utilize a lot of the other business management skills he has learned in college such as budgeting, marketing, operations management and accounting.

“Some of my favorite electives at YSU were also related to the human behavior in organizations. These concepts have been particularly helpful when working with Simply Slavic since most of the individuals involved are volunteers and you can’t utilize money as a motivational tool,” Dave said.

“Instead, we have to convince our volunteers, our event sponsors and the local leaders of Slavic groups that their participation in this event also elevates their goals while we pursue Simply Slavic’s mission of educating the general public on the rich traditions of the food, music, dance and customs of the various Slavic ethnicities, which are represented in Youngstown and the Mahoning Valley.”

For Dave, the most rewarding aspect of putting together Simply Slavic is the number of relationships he has developed with people of all ages, backgrounds and ethnicities.

When looking at future developments of the Simply Slavic Heritage Festival, John said that he would like to host more educational and art events over the entire year, not just the main festival weekend.

Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Chicago have large Slavic populations. Dave remarked that as some of the local Slavic cultural institutions and churches have closed, Simply Slavic has to look further afield to Cleveland, Pittsburgh and even Chicago this upcoming festival year to complete their lineup of food vendors, marketplace vendors and entertainment options.

“I would like to continue to see Simply Slavic evolve into a regional event that attracts the best representation of the Slavic nations for the people of Youngstown and also the residents of northeast Ohio and western Pa., to enjoy,” Dave said.

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