Ukrainian exodus to North America

Ever since the first Ukrainian soldier left for America in 1608 on an English ship to establish the first permanent English settlement in Jamestown, Virginia, immigration has loomed large in the Ukrainian consciousness. Hundreds of thousands of migrants have left their homeland over the centuries in search of better lives, particularly from the territory that comprises today's western Ukraine. Some ventured for short periods of time and returned home with a bit of wealth; others departed for good.

Those who left permanently established new Ukrainian communities in their adopted homelands.

Canada and the United States, with their vast agricultural lands and mining towns, proved to be magnets for Ukrainian migrants. Today each country can boast fourth- and fifth-generation Ukrainians. Canada, which this year celebrated 120 years of Ukrainian immigration to its shores, is home to 1.2 million Ukrainians. The US has about 1 million Ukrainian-Americans.

Toronto

Although other people had traveled to Canada before him, Iwan Pylypiw from the village of Nebiliv in Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast became one of the first officially recorded migrants in 1891.

He played a critical role in the mass migration of Ukrainians to Canada by practicing the best advertisement possible in his era – getting in trouble with the law.

After an arduous journey to the new land, Pylypiw returned to his home village a year later and eagerly touted a Canadian land giveaway, as well as individual freedoms enjoyed by residents. Urging others to settle in Canada, his glowing reports reached neighboring villages. As many families gave in to his tales about fairy lands, Pylypiw was arrested by police in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, wliich then included western Ukraine.

Pylypiw was arrested "for agitation among the country folk to leave the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which meant the loss of cheap labor and young men for service in the military force," the late Paul Yuzyk, a senator in Canada's Manitoba province, wrote in a 1952 article describing the early years of Ukrainian migration to Canada. "The trial turned out to be a public advertisement by which news of the wonderful opportunities in Canada spread to all corners of the Ukrainian lands under Austria."

While North America was the primary destination for Ukrainian migrants, Canada and the U.S. offered them two very different types of lives. It was those early years that set the stage for not only how the Ukrainian communities would develop in each country, but the impact they would have on their respective societies. The politics of each country also played an important role in shaping the settlers' life.

Almost from the very beginning, Ukrainians maintained a larger pres­ence in Canada than in the U.S. In the last 120 years, Canada has experienced four great waves of Ukrainian immigration - 1896-1914. 1922-1939, 1946- 1954 and 1991 onward.

Agriculture was the main carrot the country dangled before potential immigrants. Desperate for people who would farm its vast agricultural lands. Canada in its early years parceled out free 160-acre homesteads to anyone willing to work it. It was more property than many Ukrainians, confined to small land plots sometimes divided by growing families at home, could ever imagine owning.

When Mykhailo Zubrytskyi, a priest and a renowned ethnographer, wrote in 1906 about the business of immigration that was taking place in the Starosambir region, he was describing a scene that was duplicated in countless other towns and villages throughout western Ukraine.

"Money for the trip they borrow from other gazdiv [owners of village homes]... He who has money does not travel across the ocean, because he himself needs workers." Zubrytskyi wrote. "They take 150 zrinskies [the regional currency] and promise to send within the year, and they borrow it at 15 percent a year. The first monies made they send to pay off the money borrowed. At first they take money only to get to the water (ocean) to Hamburg, and then, arriving there, call to have more money sent to them for the further journey".

By the time Zubrytsky’s article was published in Dilo, the region's most renowned Ukrainian newspaper, emigration by Ukrainians to Canada and the U.S. was well under way. For nearly two decades, migrants had boarded ships bound for North America, lured by the promise of a better future. Many of these migrants were country folk escaping crushing poverty rampant in the villages of Halychyna, which today encompasses part of western Ukraine. Throngs eagerly responded to the advertisements regularly placed in Dilo by major European shipping companies, as well as word of mouth.

Ukrainian leaders also helped spur the migration process. In 1895, ostensibly concerned about the growing exodus to Canada and the fate of the Ukrainians there, the educational Prosvita Society commissioned Josef Oleskiw, a professor of agriculture at a teachers' seminary in Lviv, to embark on a fact-finding mission. His report from the trip commended the benefits of life in Canada which Pylypiw had voiced.

"Everything points to the fact that in a few years our farmer will build himself a good livelihood, although at present in the hardships of pioneering, he does not resemble the image of God-ragged and pitiful, his appearance does not harmonize with the free lands where he has settled." he wrote.

Establishing farms was not an easy endeavor. To make ends meet, many men were forced to lay railroad tracks across the prairies while their wives and children worked the land.

"It does not seem that fine ploughed lands and pastures could belong to such poverty-stricken people. If some of our intelligentsia were to take to heart the fate of our people and go to Canada, they could serve as their leaders, and prevent them from being swindled. I shall be happy to show them on the map where our people have settled, and will tell them many practical things which could help them," Oleskiw noted.

By 1914, around 170,000 Ukrainians had settled in Canada, comprising as a group between 10 and 12 percent of all immigrating Europeans to the country.

The second wave of migrants was more educated and politically-oriented then those who had arrived before them. All had lived through the break-up of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and subsequent struggle to win Ukrainian independence. The bulk of these migrants also headed west to work the land, but others stayed in the east to work as farmers and in industry.

It is this group of immigrants that laid the foundation for Ukrainians to take part in business and politics and become professionals. Their children began to enter Canadian universities, formed Ukrainian organizations and were more active in all spheres of Canadian life.

The wave of immigrants who entered Canada after World War II beginning in 1946 were the most politically-conscious and active. More than others, they were the ones who solidified the place of Ukrainians in Canada. Political rather than economic refugees, many had fled the Soviet occupation of their homeland, while others had been forced laborers in Germany.

"Very quickly they entered the Canadian life by renewing their professions, establishing businesses and educating their young," noted Zorianna Sokolsky, who has been studying the history of Ukrainians in Canada for many years. "The influx of some 40,000 Ukrainians greatly strengthened the Ukrainian urban center where a whole new string of cultural, educational, financial, commercial, religious and political institutions mushroomed."

It is within this post-World War II migration that the Ukrainian communities in Canada and the U.S. found their greatest commonality.

Kyiv Post. November 25, 2011, p. 1; p.14.

Make-two-way translation of the following text:

THE DOBBS REPORT	РЕПОРТАЖ ДОББСА
Last night in my commentary here, I suggested to the Augusta National Golf Club that they end their exclusion of women for membership. And I tried to do it with some humor and some perspective. But even that didn't satisfy some women in our audience, who, believe it or not, in rather angry terms said 1 should have, effectively, ranted and railed against Augusta's head man, Hootie Johnson. Johnson, for some inexplicable reason, has tried to man the barricades of the Augusta male bastion against female assault.	У моєму вчорашньому коментарі я звернувся до керівництва Націона-льного гольф-клубу «Огаста» з пропозицією припинити практику обмеження можливостей вступу до нього жінок. Я намагався це зробити з відомою вам всім часткою гумору, пропонуючи вла-сне бачення. Проте навіть це не сподобалось деяким представни-цям нашої глядацької аудиторії, які – хочте вірте, хочте ні – у доволі різких формах заявили, що я, власне, мав би красномовно об-лаяти президента клубу «Огаста» Гуті Джонсона. Пан Джонсон із незрозумілих нікому причин продовжує спроби оголосити мо-білізацію оборонців «Огасти» для захисту цього чоловічого бастіону проти наступу жінок.
Now, those angry women viewers just might consider following the example of the woman who first asked Augusta to allow women to be members. Dr. Martha Burk. The National Council of Women's Organi­zation should be proud of her leadership. Dr. Burk has presented her case with reason, with principle, humanity and humor. Mr. Johnson has, by all account, been an exemplary businessman and leader of his community, as well as Augusta. In this case, quite simply, he's made a mistake. But if he's as bright and honorable as his life achievements demonstrate, he'll fix his mistake very soon. He'll have some help. The members of Augusta make up a sizable portion of the political and financial power structure in this country. Now, they may be stubborn, but they're not stupid. We've all come too far, baby. They may be insular, but they are not insulated. Most of them, in fact, arc married, have daughters and granddaughters, and 1 can't imagine that those women haven't already exerted some significant influence on the membership. The members' collective conscience must also already have become a force for change. And surely, the members' innate good judgment has already captured the simple truth about Augusta – that if Augusta is to remain one of the world's most prestigious and exclusive clubs, it must disavow exclusion of any kind.	А втім, цим невдоволеним гля-дачкам можна порадити насліду-вати приклад жінки, яка колись першою звернулася до керівниц-тва «Огасти» з проханням дозво-лити жінкам набувати членства клубу. Це була доктор Марта Берк. Національній раді жіночих організацій варто пишатися своєю лідеркою. Аргументи доктора Берк були обґрунтованими, принциповими, гуманними та до-тепними. А пан Джонсон, як відомо, завжди був не тільки обдарованим керівником «Огас-ти», але й зразковим бізнесменом та громадським діячем. Але от цього разу він припус-тився помилки – просто на рівно-му місці. Втім, якщо він настільки яскрава й поважна особистість, як про це свідчать його життєві до-сягнення, помилку цю він швидко виправить. Не без сторонньої до-помоги. Чимала частка представ-ників політичних і фінансових владних структур нашої країни є членами клубу «Огаста». Ці люди, можливо, і вперті, ну але ж не дурні! Це вже занадто! Можливо, ці люди претендують на винятко-вість, але ж вони не затворники. Більшість із них, звичайно, одру-жені, мають дочок і онучок, і мені важко повірити, що ці жінки хоч якимось чином не намагалися вплинути на позитивне вирішення питання членства жінок у клубі. Колективна свідомість членів клубу також, напевне, стала ру­шійною силою змін. І, безперечно, їхній вроджений здоровий глузд відкрив їм очі на такий факт стосовно долі «Огасти»: якщо вона прагне й надалі залишатися одним із найбільш престижних та ексклюзивних клубів світу, їй необхідно відмовитися від будь-яких обмежень на вступ.