OBITUARIES (09/28/97)

OBITUARIES

Harriett Dusanenko of Clarkstown, N.Y., activist in the Republican Party, 78

NEW CITY, N.Y. - Harriet T. Dusanenko, a Clarkstown, N.Y., Republican Party activist, died of ovarian cancer in Nyack Hospital on June 17. She was 78.

In March 1994 Mrs. Dusanenko traveled to Kyiv and Lviv with the International Republican Institute to monitor elections to Ukraine's Parliament. She was recommended to the post by Rep. Benjamin Gilman (R-N.Y.).

Mrs. Dusanenko was born on February 26, 1919, in Manhattan to Steve and Katherine Yalowega. She grew up on Sixth Street and attended St. Cecilia's School. In 1940 she married Teddy B. Dusanenko at St. George Ukrainian Catholic Church.

She became active in Clarkstown Republican politics in 1956 and served as a party poll watcher and election inspector. She was Republican committeewoman of District 13 for 30 years as well as secretary of the town committee.

Mrs. Dusanenko also was president of the New City I Senior Citizens Club for 14 years, a member of the Rockland County Embroidery Guild, president of the PTA for Clarkstown elementary, junior and high schools, and a member of the Clarkstown Schools Building Program.

She was well known for instructing young people in the art of pysanka-making.

Mrs. Dusanenko is survived by her husband, Teddy; two sons, Clarkstown Legislator Theodore Dusanenko and Gerald Dusanenko; a daughter, Andrea Hartwick; three sisters, Joan Hamilla, Julia Huzzar and Ann Gibson III; three grandchildren and two step-grandchildren.

Funeral services were offered at St. Augustine Church in New City on June 19; interment followed at Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, N.Y.

Peter Pucak Sr., 76, founder of Trident printing in Amherst, N.Y.

AMHERST, N.Y. - Peter Pucak Sr., founder of the Trident Associates printing business and a leader in the Ukrainian American community of western New York, died of a heart attack in Millard Fillmore Suburban Hospital here on June 8. He was 76.

In addition to founding Trident Associates, a foreign-language printing business, Mr. Pucak worked as a printer for the newspaper Courier-Express, served in the Army Air Corps during World War II, and taught printing at Burgard and McKinley vocational high schools.

Mr. Pucak, whose parents both came from Ternopil Oblast, was born in Niagara Falls, N.Y., and graduated from the former Trott Vocational School there.

He enlisted in the Army Air Corps in 1941 and served in the South Pacific. He joined the first American aid group sent to Australia and New Guinea in 1942.

An Air Force cadet school graduate, Mr. Pucak was assigned to the 19th Squadron, 22nd Bomb Group, Fifth Air Force. He was a sergeant at his discharge from the military in 1945. After the war Mr. Pucak sponsored many Ukrainian families in the United States.

He founded Trident Associates in 1945 and began an apprenticeship with Baker-Jones-Hausauer, printers of yearbooks and journals for the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y., and the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. He joined the Courier-Express in the late 1950s and retired in the early 1980s as a master tradesman in charge of the monotype room.

Mr. Pucak earned a bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of Buffalo in 1965 and began teaching printing in the late 1960s. He retired from teaching in the early 1990s. In 1987 he turned Trident Associates over to his sons, Peter Jr. and Oris Michael.

Mr. Pucak was a life member and past commander of Joseph Hriczko Post 6245, Veterans of Foreign Wars, and a member of Ukrainian American Veterans Post 23. He also was a member of the Ukrainian Senior Citizens of Buffalo, the Typographical Union, the Retired Buffalo Teachers Association and Branch 127 of the Ukrainian National Association.

An Amherst resident for the past 47 years, he was a longtime member of St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church, where he served as Friday night bingo coordinator for 18 years.

In 1995 Mr. Pucak and his wife, the former Sophia Ciopyk, celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in Ukraine.

A funeral service was offered at St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church on June 12; interment followed at Mount Calvary Cemetery in Cheektowaga, N.Y.

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