The Ukrainian Cultural Garden is located on the west side of the lower boulevard, opposite the Greek Garden level. Brick and stone courts are connected by paved walks to produce a richly formal effect in a background setting of varying shades of green. The entrance is to the left court through a stone and iron gateway bearing bronze plaques and portrait reliefs by Frank L. Jirouch, representing Bohdan Khmelnitsky (1593-1657), leader of a revolt against the Poles in 1614, and Mikhail Hrushevsky (1866-1934), historian, teacher, and author. Main interest centers around three bronze busts of famous Ukrainians�Ivan Franko (1856-1916), poet, patriot, and folklorist Volodimir the Great (956-1015), first Christian ruler of the Ukraine and Taras G. Shevchenko (1814-1861), poet, teacher, reformer, liberator of Serfs in Russia whose popular poems have won him the name of the Father of Ukrainian Literature. These three busts are the work of Alexander Archipenko, world-famous master of modern art and one of the founders of cubism, who was born in Kiev, the ancient capital of Ukraine. These sculptures thus greatly enrich the art treasures of Cleveland.
The Ukrainian Garden was completed in 1939. By a City Proclamation, Mayor Harold H. Burton designated June 2, 1940, for the formal dedication of the Ukrainian Cultural Garden. " Whereas the Ukrainian Cultural Gardens form a strong and important link in the chain of the Cultural Gardens," the Proclamation read in part, " and whereas these Ukrainian Gardens are symbols of the contribution of the Ukraine to the cultural and spiritual development of the world�as mayor of Cleveland, I designate Sunday, June 2, 1940 as the day for the formal dedication of the Ukrainian Cultural Garden in Rockefeller Park, and I invite all who can do so to participate in the dedicatory exercises."
On June 1, 1940, an impressive and well-attended pre-dedication concert was given in the Music Hall of Public Auditorium. The famous National Chorus " Dumka" of Detroit, the Ukrainian Dancing Guild, and guest soloists, Maria Sokil, Olga Lepkovs, and Antin Rudnitsky, were featured. Mrs. Harold H. Burton extended greetings on behalf of her husband, the mayor.
The dedication ceremonies on June 2, 1940, were attended by over 8,000 persons, including many out-of-town guests. Professor Clarence A. Manning, head of the department of East European languages at Columbia University of New York City, delivered the principal address. Mayor Burton accepted the new garden on behalf of the city. Other speakers included Dr. Luke Myshuha, editor of the Ukraini-
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Volodimir the Great
an daily " Svoboda,"of New York, Archbishop Ivan Theodorovich of Philadelphia, and Charles Wolfram, then president of the Cultural Gardens Federation. Omer E. Miles, attorney, and president of the United Ukrainian Organizations, was chairman and master of ceremonies.
Governor John W. Bricker sent a message congratulating the United Ukrainian Organizations on their Cultural Garden undertaking, and expressing his conviction that the Ukrainian Garden would do much to acquaint citizens generally with Ukrainian history and with the achievements of Ukrainian scholars, writers, and poets.
The Ukrainian Cultural Garden was developed, with the aid of Federal and City grants, principally by the United Ukrainian Organizations of Cleveland a central council, composed of clubs, societies, and associations for the purpose of directing and encouraging cultural, educational, and welfare work among the 25,000 Ukrainians of Cleveland. This organization is affiliated with the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America, which strives to assist morally, politically, and financially, the liberation of Ukraine, and to attain its sovereignty. Its generous and tireless members and its enterprising executive board, composed of Omer E. Miles, John Spodar, Harry Stepanek, Cmytro Szmagala, William Wolansky, Theodore Haycey and Walter Woycitsky, have been largely instrumental in enriching Cleveland with this magnificent garden.
The home of the Ukrainian people is the vast and fertile prairie stretching from the Carpathian Mountains eastward to the Sea of Azov. Several rivers, of which the Dnieper is the largest, cross the country in the same general direction from north to south, running into the Black Sea or into the Sea of
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Shevchenko
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Azov. In the north the Ukrainians have expanded from the steppes to the forest zone, especially on the right bank of the Dnieper River, so there is no natural northern boundary to their country.
Nature has showered her gifts lavishly on Ukraine. The famous " black earth" (chornozem) is among the riches in the world, and since the end of the eighteenth century Ukraine has been known as the "granary of Europe" .
Here the aboriginal Slavic tribes from which the Ukrainians descend lived from time immemorial. But while God favored the land with His gifts, man was not left to live there is peace and abundance. From prehistoric times, Ukraine has been a battlefield between east and west, north and south.
The Ukrainians have sometimes been termed " the Irish of the Slavonic World", and the epithet is not infelicitous. In both cases there is a tradition of ancient, almost legendary glory, followed by long centuries of stifled independence, in which the stream of national life disappeared underground almost completely�only to emerge in turbid and eager flood in modern times.
The Ukrainian language is an East Slavonic tongue which is closely akin to Russian but which differs from it very sharply in many important grammatical and phonetic ways. The language is spoken by a people of some forty millions in number who are almost wholly included in what is known as the Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic. Before the Second World War, the country was divided between the Soviet Union, Poland, Rumania and Czechoslovakia. Before the First World War, it was divided between Russia and Austria-Hungary.
The individuality of the Ukrainians as a people stands out clearly, despite conquerors' efforts to assume their past, deny their present, and alter their future.
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Franko
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The Cleveland Cultural Garden Federation
FOUNDED in 1926
FOR THE PROMOTION OF
BROTHERHOOD and INTERCULTURAL UNDERSTANDING
President
LEO WEIDENTHAL
Vice Presidents
JUDGE LOUIS PETRASH JUDGE JOS. SAWICKI NORMA WULFF
Executive Secretary Corresponding Secretary
MRS. LEWIS W. PHILLIPS MRS. FRANK MERVAR
Treasurer Financial Secretary
ANTON GRDINA MRS. GEORGE W. MERCER
Executive Committee Members
MRS. MARY K. DUFFY PHILIP GARBO GEORGE N. KALKAS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The Cleveland Cultural Garden Federation is grateful to the many Clevelanders who responded to the public appeal for funds to aid in the publication of " Their Paths Are Peace."
Grateful acknowledgement for generous cooperation in the collecting and compiling of material for this book is made to the Executive Committee of the Cleveland Cultural Garden Federation composed of Leo Weidenthal, Mrs. Norma Wulff, Judge Louis Petrash, Judge Joseph F. Sawicki, Anton Grdina, Mrs. Lewis W. Phillips, Mrs. Frank Mervar, Mrs. Mary K. Duffy, Philip Garbo, George N. Kalkas to Mr. and Mrs. Peter Mokris for access to their complete files on the history of the Cultural Gardens to Frank Jirouch, Ivan Zorman, James C. Mylonas, Omer E. Miles, Lieutenant-Colonel Jack Persky, Judge Julius M. Kovachy, Stephen Gobozy, the Reverend Joseph Hanulya, S. T. Brinsky, Mary Ellen Murphy, Judge John V. Corrigan, Dr. Joseph Remenyi, Mrs. William Engelmann, Mrs. Mary Skowronski, Mrs. John L. Mihelich, Mrs. Marie Rosinski and many other active workers for the Cultural Gardens.
The Federation also desires to express its appreciation of the cooperation on the part of the City of Cleveland, through Parks Director John J. Locuoco and Commissioner of Parks Harold J. Lausche in supplying a large proportion of the pictures used in this work.
By authorization of the Cleveland Cultural Garden Federation, compilation and publication of " Their Paths Are Peace" were directed by the Executive Committee of the Federation. A special sub-committee in active charge consisted of Judge Louis Petrash, George N. Kalkas, Anton Grdina and Leo Weidenthal.
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Printed in Cleveland, Ohio by
Western Newspaper Printing and Matrix Company
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