Highlights from the UNA's 110-year history (08/01/04)

Highlights from the UNA's 110-year history

A special yearlong feature focusing on the history of the Ukrainian National Association.

For the first time ever, Chicago was the venue for a convention of the Ukrainian National Association. The weeklong deliberations of the 26th UNA Convention, with two extra night sessions, took place in the Windy City on May 15-20, 1966. Four hundred seventeen delegates attended.

Convention delegates re-elected Joseph Lesawyer as president. They also approved an amendment to the UNA By-Laws creating a third vice-presidential post designated for a representative from Canada, and adding the post of member-at-large to the UNA Supreme Executive Committee, thus increasing the committee from a five-member to a seven-member body. (On July 6, at the first meeting of the newly elected Executive Committee, the member-at-large position was transformed into the post of fourth vice-president and head of the Recording Department.)

Delegates also approved donations totaling $15,000 to various cultural, educational and charitable causes.

Special awards were given to UNA organizers for their success in the pre-convention membership drive, which surpassed the designated quota of 2,000 new members by 700. In the last two weeks before the convention branch secretaries, delegates and other organizers had managed to enroll 741 new members.

It was at the 26th Convention that the UNA named its first honorary member of the Supreme Assembly as Treasurer Roman Slobodian decided not to run for re-election. On the proposal of President Lesawyer, Mr. Slobodian, who served as UNA supreme treasurer for 46 years, was named a lifetime honorary member with advisory powers.

Among those personally greeting the convention was Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley. Ukrainian American actors Jack Palance and Mike Mazurki made a special appearance at the dance held after the convention banquet, and then formally addressed the UNA delegates during the next day's convention session.

Also notable was the fact that convention delegates adjourned early on the day President Lyndon B. Johnson was to be in Chicago for a fund-raising dinner. They decided to march en masse to the Conrad Hilton Hotel to greet the president.

Source: "Joseph Lesawyer re-elected supreme president of UNA. Stephen Kuropas, Mary Dushnyck, Bohdan Zorych chosen for vice-presidential posts; Dr. Jaroslaw Padoch re-elected supreme secretary; John Kokolski becomes new treasurer after Roman Slobodian steps down; ex-treasurer named life-time honorary member of Supreme Assembly; Walter Sochan elected new Executive Committee member; $15,000 voted for cultural, educational causes," The Ukrainian Weekly, May 26, 1966. The border used for this special feature is reproduced from a UNA membership certificate dating to 1919.

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