History, Wonder Tales, Fairy Tales, Myths and Legends The Flemish | Page 236

The 1951-52 season brought the maestro to Brazil and Argentina. In Buenos Aires he
gave fourteen concerts with three orchestras of this renowned musical city. On July
25, 1960 in Gary, IN, Desire Defauw died of pneumonia. He was 74 years old, and
had retired as director of the Gary Symphony Orchestra.

Father Pieter Jan DeSmet, Jesuit missionary among the American Indians, was born
January 30, 1801, in Dendermonde, East Flanders, Belgium and died at St. Louis,
MO. May 23, 1873. Pieter Jan emigrated to the United States at the age of twenty and
entered the Society of Jesus. Ordained in 1827 at Florissant, MO, he was appointed
treasurer of St. Louis College. After six years he went to Belgium because of ill
health, but returned to Missouri in 1837. He became the greatest missionary among
the Northwest Indians, a peacemaker between the U.S. Government and hostile
tribes, and a writer of missionary literature which made his name a household word on
two continents. Many colorful accounts of his life have been written.
He explored the Great Salt Lake Valley about 1841 and described the area to the
Mormons approximately five years later. He wrote, "These people asked me a
thousand questions about the regions I had explored, and the valley I have just
described pleased them greatly..."
During the 1850s and 1860s, he visited the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains
seven times as an agent of the Federal government. In 1864 he alone could enter the
camp of Sitting Bull; and his last journey West (1870) was to establish a mission
among the Sioux. In the interest of the missions he made repeated journeys to the
mountains and crossed the Atlantic Ocean 16 times, visiting popes, kings and
presidents. His writings are numerous and vivid in description.
"The Great Blackrobe", as the Indians called him, was made a Knight of the Order of
Leopold by the king of Belgium. Towns in Montana and South Dakota, as well as a
lake in Wyoming were named after him, while statues were erected in his honor in his
native town, in Ogden and Salt Lake City, Utah, and in De Smet, South Dakota.

Born in Ieper, W. Flanders, Oct. 9, 1753, Peter Malou, son of a textile industrialist
married Marie -Louise Riga and had two sons. Alderman of Ieper, known as MalouRiga, he played a leading role in West Flanders' participation in the Patriots'
Revolution against Austria. The short-lived independence of the United States of
Belgium (Jan.-Dec. 1790), was ended by the Austrians' return. Malou-Riga welcomed
the French invaders in 1792, as they promised to restore Belgium's independence.

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