VIVA Bavaria was incorporated in 2012 with the express purpose of perpetuating the German, Bavarian and Tyrolean culture. The five founding directors have each been involved in the German community in Ohio, the United States, Canada, and Germany. The directors have a combined 250 years of involvement and approximately 125 years of combined leadership roles in the German community. While all 5 directors are active with the Bavarian folkdancing group in Cleveland, the mission of that organization was not broad enough to provide programming and education for the larger German community. There are more German cultures than just Bavarian (for example, Saxon, Donauschwaben, Gottscheer)
Since our founding, we have been documenting the history of older immigrant members of the German community in the Greater Cleveland area, called The Forgotten Story. Many older Germans, including 8 of the directors’ parents, were either refugees or lived in Germany before, during and after World War II. Unless we begin capturing these stories, they will be lost forever. The video documentation of these stories is a critical component of our mission. Another achievement is German Day Cleveland, the local celebration of national German-American Day, a day set aside at the national level to recognize German heritage. When the Stadtverband (umbrella German organization) stopped celebrating German American Day after 2016, VIVA Bavaria stepped in. Given our mission, we were compelled to act. When there was no celebration in 2017 or 2018. On October 6, 2019, VIVA Bavaria proudly hosted German Day Cleveland. The pandemic prevented us from celebrating in 2020, although plans are underway to for October 3, 2021.
