IN MEMORIAM: Zenon Snylyk, well-known editor with unique sports biography
by Orest Popovych
Special to The Ukrainian Weekly
HOWELL, N.J. - Zenon Snylyk, who passed away on January 21 at the age of 68, is known to readers of UNA publications as former editor of The Ukrainian Weekly and former editor-in-chief of the Svoboda daily. However, his sports biography also earned him renown, and a place in history, as Mr. Snylyk played on U.S. National Teams that competed in the Pan-American Games, the World Cup and at the Olympic Games in the years between 1956 and 1964.
The son of Mykhailo and Eustachia Snylyk (née Klodzinska), Zenon Snylyk was born on November 14, 1933, in Putiatynsi, Rohatyn county of what today is the Ivan-Frankivsk region of western Ukraine. Soon thereafter, his family moved to Lviv, where he spent his childhood.
After World War II the Snylyk family, as refugees from communism, wound up at the Ukrainian displaced persons camp in Mittenwald, West Germany. There young Zenon attended a Ukrainian secondary school, where he was a very good student, particularly well-versed in foreign languages - German, English and French.
His schoolmates, however, are more likely to remember Zenko, as we called him, as a universal athlete, who could be spotted from a distance by his flaming head of red hair. Indeed, Zenko had shown early promise in several sports that demand quickness and coordination rather than brawn. He excelled as a junior in soccer - the sport that would define his future - but at that time his top sport was table tennis, in which he was one of the best among Ukrainian men in Germany.
In 1949 the Snylyk family emigrated to the United States and settled in Rochester, N.Y. After finishing high school, Mr. Snylyk studied political science, first at the University of Rochester (B.A., 1955) and then at the University of Chicago (M.A., 1958). While studying in Chicago, Mr. Snylyk taught advanced courses in Ukrainian geography and history at the local school of Ukrainian studies. In the years 1959-1960 he taught political science at McGill University in Montreal.
After settling in the U.S., Mr. Snylyk, in terms of sport, began to focus exclusively on soccer. In 1950 he assisted his father in founding the Ukrainian American Sports Association in Rochester, and it was on its team that Mr. Snylyk started his soccer career. Although he played for Rochester continuously until 1955, this did not prevent him from staging successful forays across the border unto Canada. There he competed on the Ukraina Montreal team, winning first the vice-championship (1955) and then the championship (1957) of Canada in its ranks. Later he wore the colors of the Ukraina Toronto team as well.
During his M.A. study in Chicago Mr. Snylyk spent five seasons with the local Ukrainian club Levy, except for the year 1957, when he returned to his home club in Rochester and helped it reach the final of the U.S. Amateur Cup. It was possible to play simultaneously in the U.S. and in Canada in a given season because the soccer schedules in the two countries generally did not coincide. At the time of his residence in Montreal, Mr. Snylyk, incredibly, managed to play for the Ukrainian Sports Club (USC) in New York, commuting to his matches by plane.
In 1962 Mr. Snylyk settled permanently in New Jersey, where he joined the Chornomorska Sitch soccer team of Newark, in the ranks of which he competed until the end of his soccer career in the 1969-1970 season. In 1963 Mr. Snylyk won the prestigious Lewis Cup of the American Soccer League as a member of the Sitch team.
Mr. Snylyk's greatest recognition and renown, however, came from his achievement as a player and captain of U.S. National Soccer Teams. He played on three U.S. Olympic Teams - in 1956, 1960 and 1966 - and was captain of the first two. At the time Mr. Snylyk was the only American player in history to make three Olympic teams. Twice he played on U.S. National Teams in the Pan-American Games - in 1959, when he was team captain, and in 1963. He was a perennial member of U.S. World Cup Teams in the 1956-1964 period, serving as captain of several of them.
On the three type of U.S. National Teams, Mr. Snylyk represented America in a combined total of 92 international matches - or to put it in soccer parlance, he had 92 caps.
With the U.S. National Teams, Mr. Snylyk traveled all over the world, competing on all five continents. To him a particularly memorable event was the preliminary match for the World Cup on November 13, 1960, in Mexico City. He cherished the historic photograph immortalizing this event, which shows him standing in the middle of the field, the stadium brimming with 115,000 spectators, and, as captain of the U.S. World Cup Team, presenting a pennant to the captain of the Mexican squad.
Ukrainians in North America were proud of the fact that in his interviews with foreign journalists Mr. Snylyk used to stress his Ukrainian origin. No wonder that the Mexican press would refer to him as "El Ucraniano."
At times Mr. Snylyk found it tricky to coordinate soccer with his personal life. While in Chicago he met his future wife, Yara Matura. Their wedding was scheduled for 3:30 p.m. on August 29, 1959 - on the same afternoon the U.S. National Team was to play Brazil in the Pan-American Games. As captain and star player of the U.S. team, Mr. Snylyk could not excuse himself. Fortunately, the match was to start at 1 p.m. in Chicago.
According to his coach, Mr. Snylyk played the game of his life that day and the U.S. team recorded a rare victory over Brazil. Straight from the stadium, Mr. Snylyk sped off to his wedding ceremony, with the whole U.S. soccer squad in tow. After the reception, however, the U.S. team was required to report back to the Pan-American village, with no exception allowed for the bridegroom. Thus, the honeymoon had to wait, but the U.S. soccer team did win its only medal in history - a bronze.
With a remarkable soccer career behind him, Mr. Snylyk became active as player, organizer and director of tennis tournaments within the framework of the Ukrainian Sports Federation of the U.S.A. and Canada (USCAK) and USCAK-East. Twice he won the USCAK senior crown - in 1974 in the over-age-35 category and in 1985 in the over-age-45 group. Every summer since 1969 he ran tennis camps for boys and girls at the UNA resort, Soyuzivka.
In 1962 Mr. Snylyk was hired by the Ukrainian National Association as editor of The Ukrainian Weekly, a position in which he served until 1980, when he was appointed editor-in-chief of the Ukrainian-language daily Svoboda. He retired from that post in June 1998. During his tenure with the UNA's newspapers, Mr. Snylyk was editor-in-chief of UNA Almanacs. In addition, in the years 1963-1971, Mr. Snylyk worked as translator and translation editor of Ukraine: A Concise Encyclopedia.
Above all, Mr. Snylyk was a Ukrainian patriot and that outlook informed his editorial policy. As top editor of UNA publications for a period of over 36 years, he made sure they reflected the views and values of the Ukrainian community in America. He was a passionate defender of the purity of the Ukrainian literary language, vehemently opposing the Russification of Ukrainian language and orthography so evident in Soviet and post-Soviet Ukraine.
His emphasis on serving Ukrainian causes extended to sports, which he viewed as an educational tool. Mr. Snylyk outlined the principles that should guide our organizations, including sports clubs in America: preservation of our spiritual values, contributions to the development of the country we live in; and aid to our brothers and sisters in Ukraine.
Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, February 10, 2002, No. 6, Vol. LXX
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