I was born on December 31, 1962 and raised in Clairton, Pennsylvania, a steel mill town with hundreds of immigrant Croatian families from the early 1900’s. Our Croatian Fraternal Union Lodge, Sv. Juraj, was formed on June 3, 1907, and is one of the oldest Lodges within the Croatian Fraternal Union with a membership today of over 1,000.
My Croatian heritage is 100 percent with my mother’s family (Catherine Ferencic daughter of Jela Martinjak and Josip Ferencic) emigrating from Hrvatsko Zagorje (Burenac and Bisag both from near Sv. Ivan Zelina). Josip immigrated to the US in 1912 and was a coal miner who lived in Coverdale, Pennsylvania. Jela Martinjak arrived in 1922 and married Josip shortly thereafter.
My father’s family is from Lokvicici with the surname PEZO and Vrlika with the surname of Sokolic (Edward Pezo, son of Anka Sokolic and Grgo Pezo). Grgo immigrated to Clairton in 1906 with his eventual bride Anka arriving in 1923. Grgo was employed at Carnegie Steel later to be named USS STEEL.
My father and mother met at a Croatian dance in 1955.
My CV information is as follows:
Graduate of Clairton High School and the University of Pittsburgh with a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering and a Masters in Business Administration. Worked at Westinghouse Electric for 7 ½ years prior to assuming the position of National Secretary/Treasurer of the Croatian Fraternal Union in December 1993.
Worked with National President Bernard Luketich for 23 years and succeeded him as National President in July 2014.
My wife Beth (with Croatian heritage traced to Kastel in Dalmatia) and I have two children, Alexandra Catherine Pazo and Edward W. Pazo, III. Beth, Alex and Eddie all have performed with the St. George Junior Tamburitzans of our sister Lodge 354 in Cokeburg, PA, and continue to perform Croatian Folklore today.
Edward Pazo
