New York City block named for Aleichem (11/10/96)

New York City block named for Aleichem

NEW YORK - Two streets in Manhattan now carry the names of writers born in Ukraine. The first block is located off Sixth and Seventh streets between Second and Third avenues in the East Village, and is named after beloved poet and writer Taras Shevchenko. The second, a block on East 33rd between Park and Madison, was dedicated on September 29 in honor of Yiddish author Sholom Aleichem. Born near Pereyaslav-Khmelnytskyi, the author of "Tevye, Molochnyk" - or as it is more popularly known in the United States as the musical "Fiddler on the Roof" - lived in numerous towns and cities in Ukraine, including Odesa and Kyiv, and died in 1916 in New York.

The street naming was organized by the Sholom Aleichem Foundation, and the assembled audience of approximately 200 people heard greetings from Belle Kaufman, granddaughter of Sholom Aleichem, who unveiled a bas-relief of the author completed by Kyiv sculptor Petro Shapiro and introduced the author's great-great and great-grandchildren. Former Miss America and film star Bess Myerson, who currently lives in the building where Sholom Aleichem lived in the Bronx, greeted the audience, as did numerous appointed and elected city officials. Stephania Charchenko brought greetings from the Society of Ukrainian-Jewish Relations, as did SUJR Vice-President Alexander Burakovsky, co-founder of the Sholom Aleichem Cultural Society in Kyiv.

- Irene Jarosewich