Saulė Society
The society organized local primary schools, evening courses for adults, libraries and reading rooms, kindergartens.
The society was fully liquidated after the Soviet occupation of Lithuania in 1940 After the failed Uprising of 1863, the Tsarist regime enacted strict Russification policies: the Lithuanian press was prohibited, all non-government schools were closed, and government schools prohibited the use of the Lithuanian language.
[7] This caused issues with the Tsarist authorities in 1910 when they closed Saulė and ten other Lithuanian societies because they were deemed to be religious.
Konstantinas Olšauskas, Maironis, and Aleksander Meysztowicz visited Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin and were able to reinstate Saulė Society.
[11] These chapters then organized local primary schools, evening courses for adults, libraries and reading rooms, kindergartens.
During the German occupation, the society was able to organize Lithuanian gymnasiums in Kaunas [lt] (due to the efforts of Saliamonas Banaitis) and Panevėžys in 1915.
[16] Later, Saulė established gymnasiums and progymnasiums in Biržai, Jurbarkas, Kražiai, Ramygala, Rokiškis, Švėkšna, Utena, Telšiai, Žagarė.
[19] Schools maintained by Saulė supported and promoted the ideology of the Roman Catholic Church and the Lithuanian national identity.
[22] In 1910, Tsarist authorities attempted to close the school because they found out that its alumni Matas Šalčius delivered a speech criticizing Russification at a teacher's conference in Saint Petersburg.
[22] Pre-war curriculum included religion, languages (Russian, Lithuanian, French, Latin), math (arithmetic, algebra, geometry), nature, hygiene, history, geography, penmanship, drawing, singing, pedagogy.
[31] In interwar Lithuania, students were active in Ateitis, Union for the Liberation of Vilnius, girl scouts.
[33] Notable alumni of the courses included Matas Šalčius, Kazys Šimonis, Adelė Nezabitauskaitė-Galaunienė [lt], and others.
[3] In the early 20th century, Lithuanians started a number of credit and trade cooperatives, but they lacked educated workers.
[38] In spring 1911, priest Konstantinas Olšauskas invited Juozas Tumas-Vaižgantas to visit Lithuanian American communities and collect donations for the construction of the headquarters of the Saulė Society.
[3] The building had modern conveniences: central heating, local water supply and sewage, electricity, telephone.
At the same time, reliefs of Simonas Daukantas and Motiejus Valančius by sculptor Vincas Grybas were incorporated into the façade.
[41] Many school of Saulė Society were nationalized after the December 1926 coup d'état that brought President Antanas Smetona to power.
[3] It was an intentional effort by the authoritarian regime of Smetona to reduce the influence of the Catholic Church and, by extension, of his main political opponent the Lithuanian Christian Democratic Party.
