Kenaston, Saskatchewan. A tiny village in the middle of Canada's wind-swept prairie.

Here, grain elevators stand as sentinels against a wide blue sky, railway lines run parallel to the four lane highway that connects this community to so many others, and fields of golden canola and ripening grain are visible from every angle.

It bears no physical resemblance to another tiny village, this one in Croatia, only miles from the Adriatic Sea where hilly and rocky soil, sljiva plum and hazelnut trees surround stone houses and generations of old farmland.

So, why then is Kenaston fondly called "Little Lovinac?" The answer can be found in the local cemetary where the following names are chiseled on gravestones:

These names spell out the history of a community founded by immigration near the turn of the last century - from Lovinac, Croatia to Kenaston, Saskatchewan where it soon became the largest Croatian farming settlement in Canada.

It is here that the deep appreciation for our ancestors is realized through the words given by the children and inscribed on the headstone of their parents, Joe and Matilda Stromotich. The script tells best what is in the hearts of the people who have made Canada their home. The simple but telling words …

This is home to Lynne Yelich, a third-generation Croatian-Canadian and the Member of Parliament for Blackstrap. Yelich was born Lynne Zdunich in 1953, to John Zdunich, son of Nikola and Roza Milic and Olga Pavelich, daughter of homesteader Mike Pavelich and Ika Brkich, all formerly of Lovinac. The second child of nine, she has four sisters and three brothers, their career choices vary from nursing, to banking, to business, the latter being predominately farming.

She was educated in Kenaston and during summers she worked in Calgary and Edmonton in a bank. In 1972 she married Matthew Yelich, a second- generation Croat-Canadian whose parents also had originated from Lovinac. They spent one winter in Inuvik, Lynne working in a financial institution and Matt working for his brother George whom had a company in the north called Kenaston Contractors.

They settled in Kenaston, purchasing farmland on the outskirts of the community on the intersection of the Corridor to the North - Highway 11 and Highway 15, where they still farm. She and her husband Matt have two daughters Elaina and Ivana. Elaina attends the University of Saskatchewan enrolled in the College of Education and Ivana, who is in Grade 6 and goes to Kenaston Elementary School. Their daughters are the last full heritage Croatian-Canadian children with ancestry stemming back to the first wave of settlers to Kenaston district.

Active in St. Andrew's Roman Catholic Church, and various other community groups and associations, Yelich has also maintained close ties with the Croatian Club of Saskatoon where she met and became longtime friends with Joe and Lydia Simicic. It is through these friends that Yelich's daughters were exposed to Croatian culture by learning the game buce (bocce).

Yelich was steeped in a culture that vigorously promoted not only a strong work ethic, but also personal responsibility, and a belief that each individual is in charge of their own destiny. That combined with her personal values of fiscal responsibility, with an eye to protecting the social conscience of Canada, meant political involvement was a natural calling for Yelich.

She doesn't hesitate to acknowledge that she is guided, not so much by political doctrine in party lines as by what she believes is best for Canada. "I voted Liberal in the 70s, worked for the Conservatives in the 80s and in the 90's joined the Reform party. In 2000 I was elected Member of Parliament for the Canadian Alliance, always keeping in mind that I want to ensure this country can continue to offer hope and prosperity for future generations, " Yelich says.

The political winds were changing in the West, and Yelich held one of the first memberships in the newly formed Reform Party, predecessor to the current Canadian Alliance, a political movement which reflected many of her own personal values. She helped Allan Kerpan in his nomination for the Reform Party in 1992, and then on to his successful electoral victory in 1993. She worked for the former Member of Parliament, Kerpan, for seven years in the constituency office as Executive Assistant, until he announced his retirement from the federal political arena in the summer of 2000.

It was at this time she decided to seek the nomination to represent the riding. With an early election call, Yelich secured the nomination one day into the first election campaign of the new millennium. On November 27, 2000, Yelich was elected to represent the riding of Blackstrap by one of the largest margins across Canada.

During the first sitting of the 37th Parliament, Yelich was appointed Deputy Critic for Immigration, a role she cherishes because of the importance immigration has played in her family and community history. It serves as a continual reminder of the courage her ancestors had leaving a country and trusting that a better life would be found for generations to come in this new dominion. In her maiden speech in the House of Commons, the new Member of Parliament spoke passionately about her Croatian ancestry, the community she comes from, and the importance of immigration to both our past and our future as a country.

The ties that bind Kenaston to Croatia are ever present, and Yelich has always been interested in the closeness of the two communities, despite the ocean that separates them. Her husband, Matt, visited family in Smokric, Croatia in 1983 where he met with his aunt, the youngest of the family, who remained in what locals fondly refer to as "the old country." Her brother Grga (Matt's father) had come to Kenaston, as had her sister Mara who married Paul Kerpan, and another brother Matt who settled in Princeton, B.C. Yelich remembers her husband coming home and telling her how his aunt had asked if she looked like her sister - a sister she had never met. He also had the opportunity to visit her mother's brother Peter Sekulich and his wife who lived on a farm near Lovinac, by Svitusa (St. Anthony's).

In 1989, when she was participating in planning a Pavelich family reunion on her mother's side, Yelich was able to go for the first time to Croatia and see for herself, the area where not only her mother's family had immigrated from, but her father's and her husband's as well.

In Lovinac, Yelich was able to visit the church where her ancestors had been baptized, married and put to final rest in the accompanying graveyard. She met many relatives and formed friendships with others who shared family in Canada. She was able to find Matt's maternal aunt in Osijek, and visited the Zdunic families Andrijevci near Djakovo. Yelich also visited with her mother's cousin Ika, a widow who had been married to a Yelich, and visited the Kula where she met Peter Zdunic and family. Here homemade cheese and fresh bread were a treat to the Canadian visitor, reminiscent of her grandmother Roza's kitchen years before, across the ocean. The closeness of the communities like Gospic, Vagan, Sveti Rok and others where the Kenaston Croats had immigrated from were a reminder of the closeness of the Croatian community in the small prairie village she would soon be returning home to. (please insert map)

Before she left Croatia, Yelich made a point of visiting Medjugorje, the site of the visitations by the Blessed Virgin, and where she was able to meet with one of the visionaries, Vicka. It was a profound experience for the Roman Catholic who said her faith was reinforced in an inexplicable way during the visit.

Not long after Yelich returned to Canada, war broke out in the former Yugoslavia, and as the world was forced to watch, the people of Kenaston were mobilizing to do their part to assist those they could who shared a common ancestry. Yelich was one of those people.

When she had been in Croatia, she had met with Zlatan Dautbegovic, a grandson to Kenaston immigrant Ivan Simcic. In September of 1992, Zlatan, wife Mirjana and their son would be the first refugee family that would come to Kenaston and escape the war.

In the months that followed, the people of Kenaston and area would sponsor six families and bring them to the community, these included Zlatan's brother Damir, wife Jadranka and their daughters; parents Dzelil and Zlata; and friends Mladen and Gordana Kisin and their children and Gordana's parents Svetozar and Kata Nikolic, sister Vesna and daughter. They also sponsored Branka and husband Jadran Lokas. Branka's grandmother was the aunt Matt had visited with in Smokric, on his journey to Croatia.

Yelich says it has been a fulfilling experience working with the refugee and immigrant families from Croatia who exhibit the same courage as the first wave of settlers who came here when Sir Clifton was offering the opportunity to settle the West with 160 acres of unbroken prairie soil.

"Each of these families immediately found employment, not necessarily in their particular profession, but in whatever was necessary to provide for their families, and to guarantee them independence. They have become totally integrated in our Canadian society, whether in sports, in education, or in community involvement. They are productive and industrious, and they are so very appreciative," Yelich says.

And, while the decade-long war took much of their history in the ethnic cleansing that left their homes and villages mere rubble, Canada has given them a future, and a link with their past. They, like the early settlers, own the inscription "Croatia gave me the strength, Canada the opportunity."