NEWS AND VIEWS: Supporters of Ukrainian studies back the Internet Encyclopedia (04/25/04)

NEWS AND VIEWS

Supporters of Ukrainian studies back the Internet Encyclopedia

by Dr. Marko R. Stech

TORONTO - The Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine (IEU) project was launched in 2001 with the aim of providing an unprecedented source of information about Ukraine and Ukrainians - free Internet access to over 20,000 detailed articles and encyclopedia entries on all aspects of Ukraine, its history, culture, people, geography, society, diaspora, and current administration.

The textual content of the IEU will be complemented with thousands of maps, photographs, illustrations and tables, as well as music files and multimedia materials that will allow viewers to see faces of prominent people they are reading about, to find exact locations of cities, towns, mountains and lakes or rivers, to look at architectural monuments and works of art, and to listen to musical compositions mentioned in the entries.

With the completion of the first phase of the project, the Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine will become the most comprehensive web-based resource in English on Ukraine and Ukrainians. Building on the foundation laid by the five-volume Encyclopedia of Ukraine (1984-1993), the IEU will contain information that is objectively presented, carefully researched and well-written. It will stand in marked contrast to the multitudinous Russocentric stereotypes that have long fueled misconceptions about Ukraine in the West.

Much work remains to be done before the project is completed. Nevertheless, through the efforts of a team of specialists working on the project at the CIUS Toronto Office this sophisticated and user-friendly information resource is becoming a reality.

The IEU site is fully operational and accessible at: www.encyclopediaofukraine.com. Entries - now totalling over 1,100 - are posted on the site on a continual basis. Recently, in the addition to the host of already accessible entries such as, "Cossacks," "Ivan Franko," Bohdan Khmelnytsky," "Kyivan Rus'," "Ivan Mazepa," "Taras Shevchenko," "Ukrainians" and "Volodymyr the Great," the IEU team made available to Internet users several important entries dealing with Ukraine in the 20th century such as, "Famine," "World Wars," "Mykhailo Hrushevsky," "Symon Petliura" and "Mykola Khvylovy."

The IEU site is visited daily by over 250 users seeking information about Ukrainian history and culture from countries around the world.

The successful completion of this ambitious and costly project will ultimately be possible only with the financial aid of the Ukrainian community in the diaspora. The CIUS can provide limited core funding for the IEU from its available resources, but this amount is insufficient to move the project forward at its optimum pace. In light of this, the CIUS has recently turned to Ukrainian communities in the diaspora (via The Ukrainian Weekly) with requests for assistance. It is my pleasure to report that numerous individuals and institutions have appreciated the value of this weighty enterprise for all Ukrainians and have responded with substantial support.

The most generous donation toward furthering the IEU's work was made by Daria Mucak-Kowalsky of Toronto with the creation of the Michael Kowalsky and Daria Mucak-Kowalsky Encyclopedia of Ukraine Endowment Fund. Established through a gift of $100,000, this permanent fund will provide annual support from returns on its investment for the research, writing and editing of encyclopedia entries in the field of Ukrainian history. It is precisely through the establishment of endowment funds like this that the future existence of the IEU can be safeguarded.

Mrs. Mucak-Kowalsky is a well-known and longtime benefactor of the CIUS and Ukrainian studies. Over the course of many years, she, together with her late husband Michael Kowalsky, has supported or helped to create important and visionary undertakings through exceptionally generous and well thought-out donations. The largest of these projects is the Michael Kowalsky and Daria-Mucak-Kowalsky Program for the Study of Eastern Ukraine, which supports scholarly activity related to Left-Bank Ukraine. The Kowalskys have also generously supported the English-language translation of Mykhailo Hrushevsky's monumental History of Ukraine- Rus' by sponsoring the publication of two of its volumes.

The late Michael Kowalsky was born near Stanyslaviv (now Ivano-Frankivsk) and obtained a master's degree in law and political science at Lviv University before working as the regional manager of a cooperative dairy and then director of Ukrainbank. In 1949 he emigrated to Canada, where he settled in Toronto and set up his own business. He passed away on May 24, 2000.

Daria Mucak-Kowalsky, born in the town of Burshtyn near Stanyslaviv, graduated from a private teachers' college for women run by the Basilian Sisters in Stanyslaviv, and then taught at a primary school in Burshtyn, where she prepared students for gymnasium exams and gave violin lessons. She was actively involved in Ukrainian cultural and community life.

The activity supported by the Michael Kowalsky and Daria Mucak-Kowalsky Encyclopedia of Ukraine Endowment Fund is dedicated to the memory of Daria's first husband, the Galician lawyer and Ukrainian patriot Andrii Cholii. Andrii Cholii was born on January 5, 1912, to a peasant family in Verkhnia Kalush. Even though faced with difficult personal circumstances and the numerous barriers which stood in the way of Ukrainians in obtaining a higher education in interwar Galicia, Mr. Cholii persisted and through hard work and conscientiousness eventually graduated with a master's degree in law from Lviv's Jan Casimir University in 1935.

Mr. Cholii was a resolute Ukrainian patriot and, while developing his own career, never forgot about helping his people. He was an active member of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, for which he was arrested during the first Soviet occupation of Galicia and then murdered in a Bolshevik prison in Stanyslaviv in June 1941. His mortal remains are located at the Demianiv Laz in the city of Ivano-Frankivsk. However, the memory of his life and service to the Ukrainian people will live on through the Kowalsky Encyclopedia of Ukraine Endowment Fund and the Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine.

Other individuals and community-based financial institutions in Canada, the United States and Australia also have provided valuable financial aid to the CIUS for the Internet Encyclopedia. The geographic distances between the project's sponsors and the offices of the CIUS provide the most revealing testimony to the fact that the IEU is truly a global undertaking with an impact on the life of Ukrainians in every corner of the world. The CIUS is truly grateful to these donors. Their names are listed on the Internet at: www.encyclopediaofukraine.com/donor.asp, and include such generous donors as: Arkadii Mulak-Yatskivski of Los Angeles ($5,000), Teofil Sudomlak of Renown Park, Australia ($5,000), the Ukrainian Selfreliance Federal Credit Union in Philadelphia ($3,000), the Ukrainian National Federal Credit Union in New York City ($500), and the Ukrainian Selfreliance Federal Credit Union in Rochester ($400). Our heartfelt thanks go out to all these friends and benefactors of Ukrainian studies.

The donations supporting the Internet Encyclopedia have been of great assistance in our work and will make it possible for us to write and update numerous new entries about Ukraine and put them up on the Internet. Nevertheless, the ongoing generous support of Ukrainian sponsors is necessary for the Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine project to reach its goal.

Donation checks, made payable to "CIUS - Encyclopedia of Ukraine," should be sent to: CIUS, Encyclopedia of Ukraine, 450 Athabasca Hall, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB/ T6G 2E8, Canada. All Canadian and U.S. donors will receive income-tax receipts.

Every one of us can contribute to the creation of the world's most comprehensive and authoritative English-language electronic information resource about Ukraine and Ukrainians.

Dr. Marko R. Stech is project manager of the Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine.

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