EARLY TEXAS SETTLERS
In 1896 a large group of Ukrainians were on their way to Canada, where they expected to take up homesteads. The steamship agents, however, persuaded them to change their plans and shipped them to Texas instead. On reaching Texas the poor immigrants faced immediate disillusionment. There was no free land available. As they had to do something at once, they turned to the cotton plantations, the railroads, and the coal mines. While looking for work, they discovered Polish communities and settled near them. Since they had no ready cash to buy farms, they rented abandoned plantation land on a share basis. Many Ukrainians still live on and work this land. The largest Ukrainian farm settlements in Texas are near Bremond, Anderson, Marlin, New Waverly, Schulenburg, and Dundee. In most of these communities they raise tobacco, cotton, and grain. As there are no Ukrainian churches or organizations among these people, they are losing their ethnic identity. When Oklahoma was opened to settlement (the Oklahoma Land Rush) they, in company with thousands of native Americans, rushed there, and Oklahoma now has several hundred Ukrainian farmers. (excerpted from Ukrainians in the United States by W. Halytch, University of Chicago Press.)
FROM THE STEPPES TO THE PRAIRIES
From the Ukrainian Frontier of the 12th Century to the American frontier of the 19th Century, the Ukrainian name of Petrushewych stands out in recorded chronicles. They are known as a pioneering, adventurous family, never losing their ethnic identity, even on terrains distant from their homeland.
In the 1830s brothers Adolph and Fran Petrushewych, fleeing Czarist Russian injustices, came to the territory of present-day Texas. Known military experts, they soon became actively involved in the Texas struggle for independence from Mexican rule. Frank, Artillery Commander, died in the Battle of Goliad, as legendary as the Alamo and equally as vital in the Texas struggle. His brother Adolph died in a prison massacre by the Mexican Army. The name of Francis Petrushewych may be seen today in Goliad, Texas, carved on a granite memorial in honor of fallen heroes of the Battle of Goliad. (From The Ukrainian Times, October 1975)
Ukrainian American Society of Texas (UAST)
UAST Members at Independence Celebration
1999
UAST Members at Independence Celebration 2000
UAST is a non-profit organization. UAST was found 1985 to provide people of
Ukrainian background a place to socialize and remember their common heritage.
UAST also serves to support other local Ukrainian activities, such as, the
Ukrainian dance group Zorya. And it also serves as a resources providing the
local Dallas/Fort Worth community with information about Ukraine's history,
people and customs.
TERRITORY & POPULATION:
A vast territory of 232,000 square miles (about the size of France), Ukraine is bordered by the Black Sea on the south, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Romania on the west and southwest, and by Byelorussia and Russia on the north and northeast.
The topography of Ukraine consists primarily of vast plains and plateaus. The highest elevation occurs in the Carpathian Mountain range in Western Ukraine.
While Ukraine, often called the "breadbasket of Europe", is known for its agricultural (especially wheat) production, it is also rich in other natural resources such as coal, iron, natural gas, manganese, titanium, mercury, magnesium, and other metals. 13.6% of the world's iron reserves, 25-30% of the world's manganese ore, and 8% of the world mercury are found in Ukraine.
The longest and most important river in Ukraine is the Dnipro, the third largest river in Europe. Other major rivers include the Dniester, the Prut, the Donetske, and the Boh.
According to the 1990 census, the population of Ukraine is 52 million people. About 75% of the population is ethnic Ukrainian with Russian, Jewish, and Polish minorities. In addition, there are about 7 million Ukrainians in other nations of the former Soviet Union and about 2.5 million Ukrainians living in the West primarily in the United States, Canada, and South America.
CITIES:
The capital of Ukraine is Kyiv, located on the Dnieper and one of the oldest cities in Eastern Europe. Kiev has a population of about 2 million. Other major cities include Kharkiv, the industrial capital of northeastern Ukraine; Odesa, the major port on the Black Sea; Dnipropetrovske and Zaporizhia, industrial and electric power centers on the lower Dnipro; and Lviv, the most important urban center in Western Ukraine.
NATIONAL SYMBOLS:
The trident, derived from the three-pronged spear of the sea god Poseidon, is the national symbol of Ukraine. The flag of Ukraine is made up of two horizontal stripes, the upper one light blue (symbolizing the open sky) and the lower yellow (symbolizing the wheat fields of Ukraine).
LANGUAGE:
The language of Ukraine is Ukrainian, an independent language in the Eastern Slavic Branch of Indo-European languages. While all Slavic languages possess certain common features, they are just as distinct from each other as German is from Swedish or Dutch, and each has unique grammatical and vocabulary differences.
RELIGIONS:
Ukraine was Christianized by St. Volodymyr in 988. The major Churches in Ukraine are the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church, the Ukrainian Catholic Church, the Ukrainian Baptist Church, and the Ukrainian Evangelical Alliance. The Orthodox and Catholic Churches were outlawed and forcibly incorporated into the Russian Orthodox Church by Soviet authorities. They were reestablished in 1990.
The first period of Ukrainian statehood lasted from the ninth through the thirteenth centuries, when Ukraine was known as Rus' or Kievan Rus'. During this era of vigorous activity, Ukraine accepted Christianity (in 988) and developed close ties with the rest of Europe. Kievan Rus', the leading power in Eastern Europe, was weakened by internal strife during the 12th century. The Mongol invasion in the thirteenth century ultimately destroyed Kievan Rus' as a major power. Halych-Volhynia in Western Ukraine, however, became the new political center for Ukraine until it fell under Polish-Lithuanian rule in the 14th century.
In the 16th century, the Ukrainian Kozaks created their own state. In a series of wars with Poland, the Kozaks succeeded in freeing much of Ukraine from Polish rule. A peace treaty with Poland in 1649, which provided for a Polish-Ukrainian Commonwealth, was short-lived and war broke out again in the early 1650's. Seeking assistance from Russia in its war with Poland, Ukraine conduded the Treaty of Pereyaslav in 1654. The war between Russia and Poland resulted in the partition of Ukraine between the two powers.
The Kozaks still continued to struggle for an independent Ukraine and, in the early 18th century, joined with the Swedes in an ill-fated war with Russia. With the partitions of Poland in the late 18th century, most of Ukraine was incorporated into the Russian Empire with the exception of Western Ukraine which was absorbed by the Austrian Empire.
During the nineteenth century, the Ukrainian national movement in the Russian Empire and Austria-Hungary (Galicia, Bukovyna, and Transcarpathia) stimulated a Ukrainian cultural and political revival. The idea of Ukrainian nationhood began a phenomenal revival. Under the intluence of the Romantic and Liberal ideas which were penetrating the Russian Empire, young Ukrainians began to show a great deal of interest in the history and traditions of their people. Out of their numbers emerged the intellectuals, writers, artists, and teachers who led the Ukrainian national movement throughout the 19th century. The most outstanding of these was the ex-serf, Taras Shevchenko, who became a poet, playwright, painter, social critic, and patriot, and exercised an immense intluence on his contemporaries in the development of a Ukrainian national consciousness.
With the Russian Revolution in 1917 and the collapse of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire, Ukrainians were presented with a new opportunity. In April 1917, a National Ukrainian Assembly met in Kiev, and in November, it proclaimed the establishment of the Ukrainian People's Republic to be federated with the other republics in Russia. When the Bolsheviks seized power in Russia and formed a rival Ukrainian, communist government, the National Assembly, meeting in Kiev on January 22, 1918, proclaimed the independence of Ukraine.
As the Austrian Empire disintegrated, Western Ukrainians, on November 1, 1918, proclaimed the independent Republic of Western Ukraine. In January 1919, a union was established between Western and Eastern Ukraine. Immediately the new government was besieged by the Red and White Russian forces as well as Polish and German forces. By the early 1920's the communists finally took over Eastern Ukraine creating the Ukrainian S.S.R. and the Poles occupied most of Western Ukraine.
After a short period of concessions to Ukrainian sentiments, the communists persecuted Ukrainian patriots, culminating in 1933, when Stalin engineered a famine which caused the death of seven to ten million Ukrainian men, women, and children. While conditions in Western Ukraine were not as severe, Ukrainians were denied the autonomy that the Polish government had agreed to in the post-World War I settlements and were excluded from all administrative positions.
With the signing of the "Non-Aggression Pact", in September 1939, German troops invaded Poland from the west and the Red Army entered Poland from the east. In the process, Polish-occupied Ukraine fell under Soviet occupation. When Germany attacked the Soviet Union in 1941, Ukrainians were once again presented with an opportunity for independence. In June of that year, shortly before the German troops occupied Lviv, the capital of Western Ukraine, Ukrainian Nationalists there proclaimed the restoration of the Ukrainian state. The Germans arrested the Nationalist leaders, turned Ukraine into a German colony, and deported a million Ukrainians to work in German war industries.
As the Second World War was coming to a close, Ukraine once again found itself occupied by Soviet troops. Most of Western Ukraine was incorporated into the Ukrainian S.S.R.. Organized underground resistance to communist rule continued into the 1950's.
Despite almost seventy years of Soviet Russian domination of Ukraine, nationalistic feeling and the yearning for freedom and independence were not extinguished in Ukraine. In the sixties, again in the seventies, and most recently, many Ukrainians, especially young people, have risked imprisonment and even their lives to oppose Russian domination of Ukraine and the russification programs of the Kremlin. The Ukrainian Helsinki Monitoring Group was one of the strongest human rights organizations in the Soviet Union despite the fact that all its members have spent time in Soviet prisons, asylums, and concentration camps.
On August 24, 1991, the Parliament of Ukraine proclaimed the independence of Ukraine and declared that only the Constitution and laws of Ukraine are valid on the territory of Ukraine. On December 1, 1991 the citizens of Ukraine overwhelmingly supported the independence proclamation with 90.3% voting in favor of independence. On December 25, 1991, the United States recognized Ukraine as an independent nation. Ukraine is also a founding member of the United Nations.
(Prepared by the Washington Office of The Ukrainia)