EDITORIAL: A grateful American (04/09/06)

EDITORIAL

A grateful American

This week we learned of the passing of one of our readers, whom we were proud to call a friend though we'd never met him in person. Andrew Demus of Cornelia, Ga. (we can still hear his distinctive voice on the other end of the telephone line...) died on March 24 after a long, productive - and hard - life that spanned two continents.

An appreciation of his life by Bob Justus, who writes for The Northeast Georgian, appears under the heading "In Memoriam" on page 4. It was Mr. Justus who notified us that "Andy" had died, and he wanted to share with our readers the story of his dear friend, whom he described as, first and foremost, an American patriot.

Mr. Demus was extremely active in civic affairs in Cornelia and Habersham County, giving talks to school classes and various civic groups about the horrors of both Communism and Nazism. Mr. Demus, you see, had survived Stalin's genocide of the Ukrainian nation and Hitler's Holocaust. He was a slave laborer in Germany during the second world war and was eternally grateful to the American soldiers who liberated him.

The Weekly discovered Andrew Demus in 2003 (or was it that he discovered us?) when we received a news clipping about this master woodcarver who spoke so eloquently about the meaning of freedom. One of the highlights of his civic activism came in 2004 when he was invited, in recognition of his extensive contributions to his community, to participate in a ceremony in the state capital to commemorate the Holocaust.

From our first contact with Mr. Demus came many phone conversations and more articles, plus his recollection of the Famine-Genocide that we printed in our paper.

It was clear from what we learned about our new friend that he loved to make others happy. Mr. Demus was constantly fashioning little wooden marvels - airplanes, cars, lighthouses, etc. He'd present these as gifts to people from various walks of life whose paths crossed his. The Weekly, too, was a beneficiary of his generosity. One of his miniature lighthouses, constructed out of 110 pieces of various types of wood, with a working light, stands proudly in our office; one of our summer interns received a replica of an airplane.

In January we learned that Mr. Demus had fulfilled a long-held dream: he found the American soldier who'd befriended him in Bruck, Germany, 57 years ago, offering help when he needed it most. Unfortunately, Troyce Gilstrap had already passed on. But that did not stop Mr. Demus from expressing his appreciation. He found Mr. Gilstrap's grave in Alto, Ga., cleaned the tombstone and planted two American flags near it. It was fate, he said, that led him, a Ukrainian immigrant, to ultimately settle in Georgia, not far from where his old friend lived.

Now Andy, the most grateful of Americans, has joined Troyce in heaven. "Vichnaya pamiat" - may his memory be eternal.

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