NOTES ON PEOPLE (09/29/96)

NOTES ON PEOPLE

Camillus, N.Y., woman named "top mom"

CAMILLUS, N.Y. - "Wanted: Someone who is available seven days a week, 24 hours a day. Must be skilled as a chauffeur, nurse, chef, psychologist and money loaner. Pay is minimal."

These words, written by Orysia Duplak, won her mother, Helen, the title of national top mom in the 1996 Mom USA contest. The contest chose Mrs. Duplak as one of the 16 best moms in the U.S. More than 10,000 children wrote essays about their mothers to enter the contest.

Mrs. Duplak and her husband, Nicholas, raised three daughters; Orysia is the youngest. "Time with family has to be the most important thing in your life, especially when the children are growing up," said Mrs. Duplak.

Orysia agrees: "My friends kid me about having a Brady Bunch family... but taking time out for your family is so important, and my mother has always done that for us." The Duplaks are members of UNA Branch 39.

Completes credit union school

NEWINGTON, Conn. - Myron Paul Kolinsky recently completed the Credit Union National Association Management School held at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. He studied on a scholarship from the Connecticut Credit Union League.

Mr. Kolinsky is currently the assistant manager of the Meridan School Employees Federal Credit Union in Connecticut.

He is active in the Ukrainian community as well, as president of the Hartford branch of the Ukrainian American Youth Association (SUMA), and organizational director of the Ukrainian National Home of Hartford. Mr. Kolinsky is president of UNA Branch 277 in Hartford.

Honored for World War II service

DEPEW, N.Y. - A member of UNA Branch 127 since 1934, Michael Kinal was recently honored by the legislature of Erie County for his military service during World War II.

A veteran of the attack on Pearl Harbor, Mr. Kinal enlisted in 1940 and was discharged in 1945. He was awarded the Good Conduct Medal, American Service Defense Medal with foreign service clasp, Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, World War II Victory Medal and the Philippine Liberation Ribbon.

In 1991 he returned to Hawaii for the 50th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, and in 1992 he received the Pearl Harbor Commemorative Medal.

Mr. Kinal said that he learned from Pearl Harbor that Americans must always be vigilant, quoting the motto of that battle's survivors: "Remember Pearl Harbor - Keep Alert."

Couples ties the knot in Erie, Pa.

Oil City, Pa. - Anastasia M. Staruch was married to James J. Gahr on May 4 at St. George Catholic Church in Erie, Pa.

Mrs. Gahr graduated from Mary Washington College in Fredricksburg, Va., with a B.A. in Russian studies in 1988 and went on to work as a press assistant at the American Embassy in Moscow. She met Mr. Gahr while he was stationed as a Marine Security Guard at the Embassy.

The couple currently lives in Oil City, Pa., where Mrs. Gahr is studying speech pathology at Clarion University and Mr. Gahr works at OMG (Mooney Chemicals).

Mrs. Gahr and her parents, Theophil and Aristida Staruch, are members of UNA Branch 172.