“MY NAME IS THOMPSON AND RUKUS”

RUKAVINA CLAN: My name is Garrie Thompson and I'm Croatian by birthright. I know my name doesn't sound Croatian and it isn't, my father changed his name legally for reasons which I will explain later. Both my father and mother are dead. As I understand it my father was born in Petrinja, Croatia in the year of 1905. His fathers name was Antun Rukavina and his mothers name was Ana Altic. He was the second child and had older sister named Mary Rukavina. My fathers father left Croatia around 1913 and came to United States with promise that he would earn his fortune and send for his family. He went to Gary, Indiana to work in the steel mills. For some reason that steel mill had gone to the part of Croatia (Petrinja) and recruited men for the steel mill. After approximately one year passed and my grandfather had not sent the money for his family to go to the United States. My grandmother got tired of waiting, and so she gathered her children together and got enough money some how to go on her own. She went by ship to the United States and arrived in New York. Friends form the old country in New York helped her get to Gary, Indiana to find my grandfather. It so happened that while she and the children were crossing the Atlantic my grandfather started back to Croatia to get his family. My grandmother, aunt and my father arrived in Gary, Indiana only to find that my grandfather has returned to Croatia. My grandfather who had been a policeman in his home land finally got back together with his family in Gary, Indiana and went to work in the steel mills with all his countryman. He raised my aunt, Mary, my father and two more sons and two more daughters in this area. My father, as did many boys in that area, went to work in the steel mills at the age of 13. The hours were long and work was very hard and the pay just supported existence. As a result my father became a professional fighter as soon as he was old enough to try to reach the big money of the Promised Land. He changed his name from Ivan Rukavina to Tommy Thompson which was a common type thing to do when you had a long complex Slavic name. He was quite successful as he had forty seven professional fights and was never defeated. He met my mother and wanted to marry her but she refused to marry a fighter. As a result, my father quit fighting but retained his name of Thompson. That is how I have a Croatian father and name of Thompson. I believe he some how took the name of Garrie from his home town but changed the spelling. The rest of his family still retained the name Rukavina. One exception is my Uncle George who became a very good jockey in the eastern part of the United States. He also changed his name by shortening it to Rukus. He was later killed over Germany as a gunner in a bomber during World War II. As much as I would like to know it seems impossible to fill in the many open holes in my families background. I might mention that even though I was born Garrie Thompson (on my birth certificate) my parents baptized me as John Rukavina. I guess in the eyes of God they felt this was necessary. My father then became a steeple jack and structural iron worker and settled in San Francisco Bay area. During World War II, he worked in the Richmond shipyards as a Hull Superintended and developed and patented many time saving inventions. He received several commendations for his efforts including one from President of United States. He was a super athlete and at the age of sixty five he was still climbing structural iron works for a living.