1996: THE YEAR IN REVIEW
The noteworthy: people and events
Some notable events and people defy classification in any of our yearend
categories. For that reason we have this section.
So, here goes: the noteworthy of 1996.
- Two Ukrainians were among the 68 persons awarded the Order of Canada,
the country's highest civilian honors system which recognizes outstanding
achievements in diverse fields. Dr. Walter Curlook, a metallurgist, is
the inventor of several patented process innovations in mining and metallurgy;
he pioneered bulk mining concepts and automation, and helped improve the
industry's efficiency and safety. Walter Podiluk served as superintendent
of schools for the Saskatoon Catholic Board of Education, where he helped
develop French-English and Ukrainian-English schools; he served as deputy
minister of health for Saskatchewan, as deputy chairman and executive director
of the Saskatchewan Commission on Directions in Health Care and as a special
consultant to the provincial Ministry of Health. The citations were presented
in February by Governor General Romeo LeBlanc.
- Nestor Burtnyk, 67, the "father of computer animation technology
in Canada," and his longtime associate, Dr. Marcelo Wein, were hailed
on February 9 as pioneers at the Festival of Computer Animation at the
Ontario Science Center. Then, in November, our Ottawa correspondent, Chris
Guly, reported that Mr. Burtnyk and Dr. Wein are among the 22 scientific
and technical achievements nominees for the 1997 Oscar awards (scheduled
for March 1). Mr. Burtnyk headed the team, which included Dr. Wein, that
developed the technique of key frame animation. The team used that technique
in a 1974 National Film Board of Canada animated film called "Hunger"
- the first computer-animated movie to be nominated for an Oscar. It won
a jury prize at that year's Cannes Film Festival.
- During 1996 the North American TV program "Kontakt" seemed
to be expanding into new markets all the time. On February 28 the Ukrainian
community show's Metropolitan New York producers traveled to Washington
along with other members of the Coalition of Ethnic Broadcasters to protest
the sale of city-owned station WNYC-TV (Channel 31) to ITT-Dow Jones. The
sale, they argued, would leave ethnic broadcasters homeless and the cable
TV station would reach only 20 percent of the current audience, thus ignoring
the needs of ethnic communities. "Kontakt" premiered in the New
York City area on WNYC in September 1992 and can now be seen on Channel
63 (WMBC) in New York/New Jersey and Channel 73 (Crosswalks) in New York
City. In addition, it is broadcast in Ottawa, Toronto, Edmonton, Vancouver,
Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Thunder Bay, Sacramento and Chicago, and is soon scheduled
to be shown in Montreal, Washington, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Detroit
and Florida.
- Our former Weekly staffer Natalia (Dmytrijuk) Warren reported from
Florida that the idea of the Ukrainian pavilion at Walt Disney World's
EPCOT Center had advanced as Jason Harper, president of the Ukrainian Project
Fund, had met on March 4 with the executive VP of EPCOT, George Kalogridis.
As a result, Ukraine was added to the list that includes two other countries
vying for a site between the Chinese and German pavilions. Mr. Harper was
also given the go-ahead to discuss the Ukrainian pavilion project with
other Disney officials.
- A seminar called "Examining New Realities in Ukraine" was
held on March 24 in Washington under the joint sponsorship of the American
Jewish Committee, as part of its Project Ukraine, and the Embassy of Ukraine.
The all-day event brought together 50 experts representing the governments
of Ukraine, Israel and the United States, as well as representatives of
non-governmental organizations, and community and religious leaders from
Ukraine and the United States. Topics covered included the blossoming of
Jewish life in Ukraine, emigration, Ukraine's proposed new Constitution,
inter-ethnic relations and foreign relations.
- In April it was reported that the U.S. Court of Appeals would hear
the case of two Ukrainian Americans who had petitioned the Federal Communications
Commission in a move against CBS for its broadcast on "60 Minutes"
of the segment called "The Ugly Face of Freedom." Alexander Serafyn
of Troy, Mich., and Oleg Nikolyszyn of Providence, R.I., had filed petitions
with the FCC to block transfer of CBS licenses in their hometowns because,
they argued, CBS had failed to meet its public interest obligations. The
court was scheduled to hear oral arguments in October of this year, but
the case was postponed due to an unrelated matter (a challenge to CBS in
Detroit which was awaiting an FCC decision). It now appears, according
to attorney Arthur Belendiuk, that 1997 will be the year in which the Ukrainian
Americans' case against CBS will be resolved. Mr. Belendiuk told The Weekly
that the court will issue a new briefing schedule and that he expects oral
arguments could be heard as early as spring, or perhaps in the fall. "We're
still in this," he advised.
- Julian Kulas and Dr. Myron B. Kuropas were among the 11 ethnic leaders
presented the first annual David Roth Community Relations Award on May
22 by the Illinois Ethnic Coalition (formerly the Illinois Consultation
on Ethnicity in Education). The two Ukrainians received the award as "goodwill
ambassadors" in relations among ethnic groups.
- Frances Swyripa, director of the Ukrainian-Canadian Program at the
Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, University of Alberta, was the
co-recipient on June 20 of the City of Edmonton Book Prize, inaugurated
in 1995 to mark the 200th anniversary of Fort Edmonton. Dr. Swyripa and
Bob Hesketh were honored as editors of "Edmonton: The Life of A City"
(NeWest Press), a collection of more than 30 articles, poems and photos
highlighting people and events from Edmonton's fur trade past to its professional
hockey present.
- Yoram Sheftel, the courageous Israeli lawyer who defended John Demjanjuk
and secured his acquittal by the Supreme Court of Israel on charges that
he was the notorious "Ivan the Terrible" of Treblinka, was honored
on June 30 by the Ukrainian American Justice Committee with its Humanitarian
Award. Also in 1996, Mr. Sheftel's inside account of the strange case of
Mr. Demjanjuk, "Defending 'Ivan the Terrible': the Conspiracy to Convict
John Demjanjuk" was published in the U.S. by Regnery Publishing. The
book had previously been published in 1993 in Israel and in 1994 in Great
Britain as "The Demjanjuk Affair: The Rise and Fall of a Show Trial."
- The Arkan Dance Company of Toronto took the art of Ukrainian folk dance
to Taiwan in July, performing at the International Folklore Festival on
that distant island. The group's artistic director, Danovia Stechishin-Stefura,
commented: "We were told to expect that [the Taiwanese] would be restrained."
But, the group took the extra effort of learning how to sing "It's
a Small World" in Mandarin, and the audience loved it. "People
sang with us. They went nuts. We were one of the few groups who were always
asked back for encores." The dancers also endeared themselves to the
local audience because in one number they carried the Taiwanese national
flag.
- During fifth anniversary celebrations of Ukraine's proclamation of
independence, a special awards ceremony was held at Kyiv's Mariyinsky Palace
on August 23. On the eve of Ukrainian Independence Day, President Leonid
Kuchma presented special state medals to activists in various fields, ranging
from politics to the arts and humanitarian endeavors. Thus, the Order of
Yaroslav the Wise was awarded to National Deputies Leonid Kravchuk (the
first president of independent Ukraine) and Ivan Pliushch (former chairman
of the Verkhovna Rada) and academicians Yurii Myropolskyi and Volodymyr
Frolkis. The Order of Bohdan Khmelnytsky was presented to Col. Gen. Viktor
Bannykh, chairman of the state committee on borders; Lt. Gen. Mykola Yoltukhovskyi,
commander of the northwest border troops; and Lt. Gen. Volodymyr Ostapenko,
first deputy to the general inspector of the President's General Military
Inspection. The Medal of Courage was presented to soldiers and workers
of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Volodymyr Hryshyn and Lidiya Kondrashevska
of the State Opera were named national artists of Ukraine; Iryna Dats and
Tetiana Kuzmyn, also of the opera, were cited as merited artists of Ukaine.
A highlight of the program was the presentation of Presidential Medals
of Honor to several foreigners for their contributions to Ukraine: Erast
Huculak of Canada, Zenon and Nadia Matkiwsky of the United States and Yaroslav
Shurkalo of Slovakia. A special posthumous Presidential Medal of Honor
was awarded to Zina Botte of Australia, Ukraine's honorary consul in Australia,
whose husband was present at the ceremony.
- In September, at a meeting at the State Capitol in New Jersey, Dr.
Paul Winkler, executive director of the State of New Jersey Commission
on Holocaust Education, advised officers of the Ukrainian American Professionals
and Businesspersons Association of New York and New Jersey that the commission
had adopted the study guide on the Great Famine of 1932-1933 that had been
developed in New York state. He noted that the guide is available to any
school district in New Jersey upon request, adding that about 30 districts
had already requested them. Furthermore, Dr. Winkler promised that if persons
or organizations in the Ukrainian community were to provide the commission
with 30 copies of a film or other audio-visual materials relating to the
famine, which killed between 7 million and 10 million in Ukraine, his commission
would have these distributed to the state's 30 regional source centers
on the study of the Nazi Holocaust and genocide.
- "Malarek writes again" was the headline for a book review
written by Marta Dyczok. It referred to the newly published book by Ukrainian
Canadian journalist Victor Malarek, co-host of the CBS's "Fifth Estate,"
an investigative TV news program. Titled "Gut Instinct: The Making
of an Investigative Journalist," the book attracted much attention
and, in fact, was published on a best-seller run by Macmillan Canada. The
book was released in the fall, and a book launch was held on October 22
in Toronto at the Ukrainian-owned Future Bakery Cafe.
- In November, The Weekly carried a story by Dr. Michael J. Kozak of
Minneapolis focusing on Lt. Cmdr. Heidi Stefanyshyn-Piper of the U.S. Navy,
who had just been chosen for the astronaut training program of NASA. She
told a Navy publication that she had joined the space program for the same
reason she became a diver: "I was looking for something challenging
that would broaden my horizons." She said her work as a diver gave
her a chance to work in a foreign environment, adding that "space
is the ultimate foreign environment, and it really is the final frontier."
The new member of the NASA Space Training Program is a member of the Ukrainian
community in the Twin Cities.
- To our knowledge, there were two Ukrainian of the Year awards presented
in 1996 - both in November. One, presented by the Ukrainian Graduates of
Detroit and Windsor (Ontario, that is) went to Rep. David Bonior for his
support of Ukrainian issues and causes in the U.S. Congress. The other
was awarded to Nickolas G. Kotow by the Ukrainian Technological Society
in recognition of his work as a chronicler of Pittsburgh Ukrainian community
life and his longtime involvement in many of that community's organizations.
- At year's end (December 8 issue), it was reported that the Petro Jacyk
Educational Foundation had initiated a campaign for the nomination of President
Leonid Kuchma of Ukraine for the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize in recognition
of his active support of global nuclear non-proliferation and his prominent
role in combating and reducing the threat of global nuclear catastrophe.
The foundation's nominating letter to the Norwegian Nobel Committee was
co-signed by seven prominent professors representing prestigious universities
in North America, Great Britain and Japan. The scholars agree that President
Kuchma had played a pivotal role in the process of Ukraine's ratification
of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Verkhovna Rada's decision
to surrender and destroy Ukraine's nuclear arsenal.
Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, December
29, 1996, No. 52, Vol. LXIV
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