On the very date of this issue of The Ukrainian Weekly, we mark the 86th anniversary of its establishment – a significant milestone in the life of our community.
This newspaper was born thanks to the initiative of Svoboda’s visionary Editor-in-Chief Luke Myshuha, which was based on his concept of “two homelands,” whereby Ukrainians could at once be true patriots of Ukraine and loyal citizens of the countries where they resided. And it was born with the mission of keeping new generations of Ukrainians born in America involved in our community life.
The Ukrainian National Association’s 18th Convention in May 1933 adopted a recommendation that the organization’s Supreme Assembly (today known as the General Assembly) look into publishing an English-language periodical geared toward the younger generations. Thus, at the special meeting of the Supreme Assembly that year in July, it was decided to begin publication of an English-language supplement to the daily newspaper Svoboda that would be called The Ukrainian Weekly.
The new newspaper was part of the youth outreach program developed by the UNA’s leaders. UNA Supreme President Nicholas Murashko wrote on the front page of The Weekly’s premiere issue: “For the past 39 years Ukrainian immigrants in America have been building up the Ukrainian National Association, together with its organ, Svoboda – the first newspaper edited in the Ukrainian language in America. From a humble beginning, the Ukrainian National Association has grown during these years into a nationwide $3 million fraternal organization with 35,000 members; and the Svoboda, from a weekly issue to the largest Ukrainian daily in America. Coincident with this growth of the Ukrainian National Association and its Svoboda has been the growth of the younger generation of American-Ukrainians.” Thus, President Murashko continued, “The time has come when this youth must begin to take over the reins of the association from its builders,” and a pivotal role in engaging the youth would be played by The Ukrainian Weekly.
The Weekly’s first editor was 25-year-old Stephen Shumeyko, who fervently believed the new newspaper had a most important role: to instill in its young readers “the idea that as Americans of Ukrainian descent they are duty-bound to help their kinsmen in foreign-occupied and oppressed Ukraine to win the national freedom for which they have been fighting and sacrificing for so many years.”
And therein lay another founding mission of The Ukrainian Weekly: to inform the English-speaking public about the Holodomor then decimating the population of Ukraine. It was a crucial time in history, and Ukraine’s story needed to be told. Indeed, as news trickled out of Ukraine, Svoboda had published English-language articles confirming the horrors of the forced starvation. In its very first issue, The Weekly reported that mass meetings were being held by Ukrainians throughout America and Canada “protesting against the barbaric attempts of the Bolshevik regime to deliberately starve out and depopulate the Ukrainian people in Ukraine.”
The newspaper explained: “The purpose of this intentional starvation by the Bolsheviks is to forever quell the Ukrainian struggle for freedom. Since the overthrow of the Ukrainian National Republic by the Bolsheviks 15 years ago, the latter have used every conceivable terroristic weapon to stamp out the Ukrainian attempts to free themselves. Thousands of Ukrainians have been summarily shot for the slightest political offense; other thousands were sent to certain death to Siberia and the notorious Solovetsky prison islands. …” Over 5 million have died during the past year from the deliberately imposed starvation, The Weekly wrote.
Thus began the history of The Ukrainian Weekly, which alongside Svoboda promoted the independence of Ukraine, discussed the plight of refugees and displaced persons after World War II, and spearheaded campaigns to erect a monument in Washington to Taras Shevchenko and to establish Ukrainian studies chairs at Harvard. It was The Weekly that led the charge in advocating the establishment of the U.S. Commission on the Ukraine Famine. The Weekly’s Ukrainian American journalists were on the ground in Ukraine already in January 1991 – even before the declaration of the independence of Ukraine on August 24 of that year. And, The Weekly was the first to publish an English-language translation of that historic document. Since then, we’ve had the opportunity – and the duty – to report on historic developments in Ukraine, as well as the evolution of our diaspora community.
Which brings us to today.
Оne of the points in the UNA’s Mission Statement is: “The Ukrainian National Association exists: to preserve the Ukrainian, Ukrainian American and Ukrainian Canadian heritage and culture.” A key role in fulfilling that mission continues to be played by the UNA’s two newspapers. Long may they serve our community.