FACES AND PLACES: Ostroh immigration center announced (11/17/02)

FACES AND PLACES

by Myron B. Kuropas

Ostroh immigration center announced

Ihor Pasichnyk and Natalia Lominska, rector and vice-rector, respectively, of the National University of Ostroh Academy are in the United States visiting Ukrainian communities in Minneapolis, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and Washington.

During their visit to Minneapolis, they were delighted to visit the Immigration History Research Center at the University of Minnesota. The center is housed in a new multi-million-dollar edifice that has four temperature-controlled underground floors for storing immigration archives from a number of ethnic groups, especially those from Eastern, Central and Southern Europe.

At IHRC, Dr. Pasichnyk formally announced the establishment of a Ukrainian Immigration History Center at Ostroh University. "We Ukrainians know very little about the life of Ukrainians in North America and this situation needs to change," he said. "Many of us are still under the influence of Soviet disinformation, which consistently portrayed Ukrainians abroad as Nazis, deserters and people who betrayed their homeland. There was very little information available to us. Many of these negative portrayals still linger among some Ukrainians, especially those in eastern Ukraine. The purpose of our institute is to conduct research on Ukrainians in North America, to publish articles and books, and to conduct seminars and conferences of scholars in the field."

An institute library has already begun with the donation of books by Andrew Fedynsky, director of the Ukrainian Museum-Archives of Cleveland.

"Now that Ukraine is an independent nation-state," concluded Dr. Pasichnyk," its history would be incomplete if it did not include the story of Ukrainians abroad.

Heading the institute at Ostroh is Alla Atamanenko, a Ph.D. candidate in history. She recently spent six months reviewing the archives of the Ukrainian Historical Association headed by Dr. Lubomyr Wynar, professor emeritus at Kent State University, and an ethnic history expert. A longtime supporter of Ostroh, Dr. Wynar was the moving force behind the creation of the Immigration Institute there.

The institute has already sent its first book, the Ukrainian version of this writer's "Ukrainian American Citadel: The First Hundred Years of the Ukrainian National Association," to the publisher.

"The immigration archives here at the University of Minnesota," stated Dr. Pasichnyk, "will be an invaluable resource for our history majors interested in the Ukrainian immigration. We will be seeking grants allowing our students with a viable research focus to spend time here."

Founded in 1965 under the leadership of Prof. Rudy Vecoli, the IHRC has become, to quote a 1992 article in The New York Times, "one of the nation's most comprehensive collections of the immigrant past, used by researchers and scholars from around the world who come to study the way European immigrants landed in America and wrought new lives."

The Immigration History Research Center holds the most extensive collection of materials for Ukrainian American history in the world. The foundation of this collection is the personal library and extensive body of personal and professional papers compiled by the world famous entomologist, activist and poet, the late Dr. Alexander Granovsky. Also included are the papers and records of scholars, political and social activists, publishers and writers, and organizations, such as the Ukrainian National Association, the Ukrainian Fraternal Association and the United Ukrainian American Relief Committee.

Headed by the indefatigable Halyna Myroniuk, the IHRC Ukrainian section includes over 4,500 books and pamphlets, and over 700 newspaper and serial titles. Of special interest to UNA'ers is the fact that the first four volumes of the Svoboda Index were published by IHRC.

Both Lesia and I spent many happy hours at IHRC when it was still at its old site in St. Paul. Prof. Vecoli was very helpful to me when I was writing my Ph.D. dissertation, as well as my subsequent book on the Ukrainian Americans. Ms. Myroniuk was of great assistance to me when I was researching the UNAn as well as to Lesia when she was writing her M.S.Ed. thesis on the role of Svoboda in the Ukrainianization of immigrants from Ukraine prior to 1914.

I am delighted that the IHRC and Ostroh have found a common language and that the first step towards future cooperation has been taken. Ukrainian immigration studies are a largely neglected area of research both here and in Ukraine. Though much research has been conducted by Vasyl and Daria Markus, and a handful of others, there is a chasm between what is and what should be.

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