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Slovene-American writer Louis Adamič (1898-1951), who sailed to the American shores in his boyhood (14) and later befriended Upton Sinclair, wrote a number of novels, short stories in English. He was particularly interested in the problem of American immigrants of all nations and the problem of "second generation" Americans. Once he was invited to dine with the president Roosevelt ("Dinner at the White House", 1946 ).

ADAMIČ, LOUIS (1898-1951) - Born in Blato near Grosuplje, left at fourteen for the United States where he started as a manual laborer and then became a soldier, a journalist, and finally professional writer who received numerous awards.

In his well-known 1932 essay, "Adamič in slovenstvo " (Adamič and the Slovene Identity), another well-known writer wrote, "America gave him broadness and Slovenia gave him depth". In his autobiographical essay collections Smeh v džungli (Laughing in the Jungle), Vrnitev v rodni kraj (The Native's Return) and Orel in korenine (The Eagle and the Roots), Adamič senses a jungle-like growth and texture of a materialistic American society which must accept the injection of the cultures of its immigrants to become more human. In 1934 he became one of the leaders of an organization for the protection of immigrant groups, and during World War II he worked to support the resistance against the occupation in his homeland. He was an initiator of links between Slovene immigrant organizations regardless of their political orientations. His mysterious death has not been explained yet.

The Native's Return (1934) brought him fame. The book was chosen as the best book of the month (Book-of-the-Month Club selection). Over 50,000 copies were sold in the first month and it was the bestseller for the following two years. It was one of the 200 books selected from 40.000 published titles from that time, chosen by the special committee of the most prominent American authors, which were given as special gift to the president's library of the White House.

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