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Elizabeth Holinaty was born on a farm three miles from Wakaw, Saskatchewan to parents who were born in Canada. Her grandparents immigrated from western Ukraine. Her maternal ancestors came from Horodenka. Her grandfather Gabriel Holinaty came from Zalishchyky and worked as a tanner (kushnir) for the landlord. He made a kozhukh for a lady in Wakaw. Her mother Mary Kotelko Holinaty embroidered a great deal, and also sewed, crocheted and knitted. She was a collector and organizer.

Elizabeth went to Zalishchyky school near Wakaw. She remembers not knowing to speak English when she started school, crying for several days. Elizabeth studied Home Economics and Education at the University of Saskatchewan. She was a grade 1-4 teacher for several decades, moving from Saskatchewan to Alberta in the 1970s. She has a post-graduate diploma from 1970-71, specializing in reading diagnosis and reading remedial work, but she missed classroom contact, and returned to regular teaching. Before and after she retired in 1991, she tried painting, drawing, pottery, pysanky. She loves to sing and also to bake breads, but found her true calling and inspiration in weaving. In the 1980s and later, she attended many bread making classes, embroidery classes, weaving classes, pysanky workshops, etc. She participated in the Ukrainian fashion activities in the Edmonton area.

Elizabeth’s first weaving lessons were from the Cyril Flour Mill Company, near Wakaw. She bought her first 1950s loom from the Burkhailo family near Wakaw in the 1980s. Elizabeth didn’t attend the first 2-3 weaving workshops in Banff, but went to nearly all of them thereafter. Chester and Luba Kuc asked her to make Hutsul fabric, requesting she reproduce it as accurately as possible. Elizabeth prefered natural fibres then, and still does. Calmar Zirka dancers ordered some costume pieces thereafter, and her work weaving Ukrainian dance costumes snowballed after that. She did this work on weekends as a teacher at first, and continued after she retired. Elizabeth has woven many Ukrainian dance costumes for groups in Saskatchewan, and other places. Many different organizations commission weavings, sometimes based on very traditional models, sometimes adapted and contemporized. She has also reproduced historical sashes for the Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Village, etc.

Elizabeth has attended many textile and weaving conferences across North America. Her first weaving conference and first exhibition was at “Convergence 86” in Toronto. The Ukrainian community participated in the conference, and asked her for 5 pieces for display.

Elizabeth, Kay Chernyavsky and Pauline Lysak organized a number of projects to provide interesting towels and cloths with Ukrainian themes.

Elizabeth embroiders small towels for pallbearers in the Wakaw area, now mostly for family. Sometimes she embroiders seven, because the cross bearer also receives one. She also embroiders or weaves wedding rushnyky.

Elizabeth has donated numerous family records to the Ukrainian Catholic Museum in Saskatoon (including her father’s careful accounting books and planting records, mother’s records), and some materials to the Bohdan Medwidsky Ukrainian Folklore Archives.

Mariya Lesiv was born in Horodenka, Ivano-Frankivs'k region, Ukraine. Her father is a TV journalist, and her mother is a visual artist who teaches at an art college in Ivano-Frankivs'k. Mariya did her undergraduate studies at the Lviv National Academy of Arts, and graduated with a specialist degree in Fine, Applied and Decorative Arts in 2001. In 2001-2003, she did her post-graduate studies in History and Theory of Art, at the Lviv National Academy of Arts.

Mariya came to the University of Alberta to study Ukrainian folklore in 2003 where she received her MA (2005) and PhD (2011). Her doctoral dissertation is devoted to Ukrainian Paganism, a new religious and political movement that strives to revive old rural folklore while creating an alternative vision of a present-day Ukrainian nation in both Ukraine and the diaspora.

Mariya worked for the Kule Centre for Ukrainian and Canadian Folklore, University of Alberta, where she taught and was actively engaged in fieldwork and publication projects dealing with various aspects of Ukrainian diaspora culture. She married Brian Anthony Cherwick in 2008.

Mariya received a job as an assistant professor of folklore at the Memorial University, Newfoundland in 2011, and moved to St. John's with her family. Her research interests include diaspora studies; folklore and national/ethnic identity building; material culture; folk religion; new religious movements; ritual, belief, and spiritual culture; as well as modern Paganisms (Western and East European). Her first book The Return of Ancestral Gods: Modern Ukrainian Paganism As an Alernative Vision for a Nation was published by McGill-Queen's University Press in 2013.

Mariya's new research project focuses on new diaspora communities established by recent immigrants to Newfoundland from the former Socialist block.

Leanne Buzak is a singer in Viter Ukrainian Folk Choir, and an active member in the Edmonton Ukrainian Community.

Stephania Nahachewsky was born in a farming family in the Cudworth-Alvena area of Saskatchewan. Her father John Olynyk had emigrated from Mushkativka near Borshchiv in the Austro-Hungary (today in Ternopil' region of Ukraine) as a young man prior to WW1. She moved to Saskatoon as a young adult and finished high school at Bedford Road School. She married Ostap Nahachewsky in 1956.

Stephania has been an active member of St. George’s Ukrainian Catholic church ever since she moved to Saskatoon. She was active in drama productions as a young woman, and in the parish choir for many decades. She raised six sons, Thomas, Andriy, David, Ivan, Taras, Bohdan. She and her sisters assisted Ostap at the O&O Drive Inn in Saskatoon for several decades. The O&O Drive Inn was a Drive In restaurant on 20th Street and Avenue L in Saskatoon from approx 1961 to 1992. Inspired by A&W, the restaurant sold hamburgers and hot dogs and pop, as well as pyrohy, holubtsi and borshch.

Stephania has been very active in numerous organizations related to the church, and has contributed much to organizing their records.

Brian Cherwick (B. Mus. – Brandon; M.A. – Alberta; PhD. - Alberta) is a specialist in east European traditional music, diaspora cultures, ethnic identity, music industry, material culture and oral history. He was born in Winnipeg into a family that had settled in Canada a couple of generations earlier. Three of his four grandparents were born in the western Ukrainian province of Galicia, from two villages, Chornokonetska Volya and Burdiakivtsi, near the city of Ternopil. Brian’s father’s family were early settlers from the first wave, immigrating to Saskatchewan in 1903, while his mother’s family came to Manitoba during the interwar immigration in the 1920s.

Brian had music on both sides of his family. His father’s father, John Cherewyk, left the farm to become a harness maker and later a meat cutter in the town of Yorkton, Saskatchewan. But on the side, John played fiddle in a trio with his two brothers — one playing tsymbaly and the other adding a second violin. John was additionally trained as a cantor in the Ukrainian Catholic church. Brian learned the cantorial art from his grandfather (as well as other cantors) during church services each Sunday and would come back with him and hear him fiddling at home. Brian holds a position today as a cantor in his church and is active in teaching liturgical singing to fellow congregants. On his mother's side, Brian's great-grandfather was a fiddler and his grandmother even played the small bubon in the band until she was old enough to marry (it was not respectable then for mature women to play music). Brian's uncle Mike Klym played drum kit with the D-Drifters, one of the most famous Western Canadian Ukrainian bands. The D-Drifters were especially known for providing backup to Mickey and Bunny, a famous singing married couple, and for recording country western music with English and Ukrainian lyrics. Their biggest hit was a Ukrainian translation of Woody Guthrie's "This Land is Your Land," and the disc sold hundreds of thousands of copies. Uncle Mike was only fifteen years older than Brian, and so Brian grew up going to practices of the D-Drifters.

Brian formed his first band with friends at age 14, and began playing violin at weddings at age 15. Instrumentation has changed with the tastes of the community, and modern bands often feature accordions, keyboards, saxes, electric guitars, basses and drum kits (such adaptation is not a new phenomena — grandfather John Cherewyk also performed on the Hawaiian-style lap steel guitar which was a rage in the 20s and 30s). At age 16, Brian acquired a tsymbaly from his brother who had gotten it from a church group. As a young musician with an entrepreneurial flair, Brian saw tsymbaly as a way to differentiate his band and their advertisements would promote the fact that they played the old tunes on traditional instruments as well as in more modern arrangements. Brian learned tsymbaly from watching the old-timers play at weddings (with over 100 first-cousins, there were plenty of family celebrations throughout the year). He also listened to regional Canadian-Ukrainian commercial recordings featuring tsymbaly-- bands such as those of the Alberta fiddlers Metro Radomsky, Bill Boychuk, and Manitoba fiddlers Jim Gregorash, Tommy Buick and Peter Lamb, as well as the Interlake Polka Kings.

Brian entered Brandon University (about 100 km west of Winnipeg) to study in its well regarded music program. Though tsymbaly was not offered, he enrolled as a pianist and percussionist. After graduating, Brian spent four years teaching music and conducting choirs at a seminary in Roblin, Manitoba, a tenure that was interrupted mid-way by an opportunity to study music for a year in Ukraine. Brian had received an invitation from the Society for Relations with Ukrainians Abroad. Based at the Kyiv Conservatory, Brian took classes in cimbalom, the piano-sized concert version of the tsymbaly that had developed in Hungary at the end of the 19th century and was taught in conservatories in Hungary, Ukraine, Czechoslovakia, Romania and Moldova. Adapting from tsymbaly to cimbalom requires learning a completely different tuning system, sticking technique and use of the cimbalom’s damper pedal, which is similar to that of a piano. Though his assigned teacher was Gyorgi Ahratina, who played cimbalom with the national folk orchestra, Brian learned more from Vasyl Palaniuk, an ethnic Hutsul from the Carpathians who was the senior cimbalom student at the conservatory and is today recognized as one of Ukraine's leading players. While Palaniuk played cimbalom in the conservatory ensemble, Brian would play percussion alongside of him as they accompanied highly choreographed folkloric dance presentations.

From Roblin, Brian moved to Edmonton to enroll in the University of Alberta's graduate programs in Ukrainian folklore and ethnomusicology. His doctoral dissertation focused on the influences of social conditions and popular music on the development of Ukrainian traditional music in western Canada. He is currently researching the ethnic commercial recording industry in Canada. Dr. Cherwick is Adjunct Professor of Folklore at Memorial University of Newfoundland, has taught at the University of Alberta and Athabasca University. He has worked as a researcher for the Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Village in Alberta and for the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. He is also active as a performer, composer and music educator and has appeared in performances and conducted seminars and workshops throughout North America and Europe.

Roman Onufrijchuk was born June 6, 1950 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, where he lived until he was 6 years old. The family then moved to Yorkton, Saskatchewan, where he spent his early youth. Over the course of his life, Roman lived and worked variously in Saskatoon, SK and Edmonton, AB, where he worked at the University of Alberta radio station, and was the first radio host of the Ukrainian program on WorldFM. Following over 10 years in print, TV and radio, he arrived in Vancouver in 1982 to attend graduate school at SFU’s School of Communication, where he taught from 1985 to 2011. He then taught at the university in Izmir, Turkey. Roman passed away June 23, 2015.

Gloria Rutherford was born and raised in Edmonton, Alberta. She went to Parkdale School and then the newly built Strathcona Composite High School. Then she entered nursing at the University Hospital, earning her BSc and then teaching O.R. nursing to subsequent students. Following her marriage and 'fledging' two daughters, she moved to California, where she continued her nursing career in the O.R. After retiring, she returned to Canada and now lives in Vancouver, BC.

Nicholas Kostyniuk was born December 9, 1921 in Plain Lake, AB. His parents were Joseph and Annie Kostyniuk (Predyk). They married in 1917 in the old Plain Lake church and settled on a farm. They had four children: Mary, Nick, John and Tillie. Joseph died in 1938 at the age 44. Nick's older sister Mary married Peter Stepushyn in the fall of 1938. In 1946 Tillie married Alex Werbitsky of Innisfree. In 1949 John married Mary Chmilar of Two Hills and moved to farm in that area.

Nick contributed a great deal to running the household. He hurt his hip in an accident as a young man, causing a permanent limp. For this reason, he did not participate in the war. Nicholas taught at Plain Lake school for one year. He wrote and published poetry. He was active in the youth activities of his parish and was active in the Ukrainian Catholic church his whole life. In 1950, Annie and Nick moved to Edmonton. Two years later in 1952, Nick married Olga Soldan of Two Hills and settled in Edmonton. For a little while he owned a hat store on Whyte Ave close to 99 St. He worked at "Inland Cement" for over 25 years. Nick and Olga had two sons: Brent and Alan.

Annie lived in her home and kept boarders until early 1981, at which time she moved to the St. Basil's Senior Citizens' Residence in Edmonton. She passed away in March of 1975.

Patricia Pelech Carrow lived her childhood years in Bellis, Alberta. Pat was 11 when her father died, and her mother, Fiona Pelech, moved the family to Edmonton where Pat attended high school and university. During those years, Pat was very involved in the Ukrainian community. She was a founding member and President of the Shumka Ukrainian Dance Group which over the years has gone on to achieve national and international recognition.

She graduated from the University of Alberta in 1965 with a B.Sc. degree and went on to work as a Research Technician in microbiology with the Canadian Forest Service in Victoria. During these years Pat developed her creative skills in pysanky (Ukrainian Easter eggs), painting and Ukrainian weaving, which she taught at the Banff Centre for several summers. In 1978, Pat changed careers in 1978 and attended the Ontario College of Art, graduating in 1981 with a Diploma in Textile Design. She focused for several years on the use of colour and experimental design in ethnic weaving; many of her pieces are in the Ukrainian Museum in Saskatoon. Eventually Pat found the medium too restrictive, and while she was teaching at the New Brunswick Craft School from 1982 to 1985, she moved into a new medium – collage. For the next 20 years, Pat developed her creative abilities in collage, using a surprising range of materials and becoming renowned for her use of colour. Her choice of collage materials astounded many of her friends – porcupine quills, tree bark, fungus, rust and anything else that one might find in a recycling container. Pat's works were exhibited in galleries across Canada, from Fredericton to Victoria.

Pat's other creative outlet was the kitchen. She was famous for being able to come up with a tasty meal when there didn't appear to be anything in the fridge, and her 'diagonally through the fridge' soups, though delicious, were never reproducible. For almost 30 years Pat and Rod lived in Dufferin County, looking west over the beautiful Hockley Valley. She enjoyed the drama provided by the seasons and the landscape as they provided inspiration for her art. When not in the studio, Pat was an avid gardener, and a ruthless weeder and pruner, as some of her friends discovered when they let her free on their properties. Rod and Pat enjoyed travelling. In 1995 they bought an RV and did an 18,000 km trip through less travelled parts of Canada to Alaska, followed by a trip to the US Southwest. In 2001, Pat and Rod purchased a cabin on Hornby Island in B.C.'s Strait of Georgia, where they spent many relaxing summer vacations with their children and grandchildren. In 2007, they took a cruise through the Baltic Sea – the best and the last they would do together. In 2008, they moved to the Victoria area to retire in a beautiful part of the world and be close to their family.

Theodore Nemirsky, 1869-1946, was born in the Ukraine and came to Canada in 1896. He settled in the Wostok area of Alberta. In 1986 he married Katherine Mariancz and they had six children. The next year he was appointed postmaster and also served as guide to help settlers locate their land. He helped establish the Wostok school and acted as interpreter for many local citizens.

Natalie Kononenko was born in a displaced persons camp in Germany in 1946. She came to the United States in 1951. She grew up in New Jersey and attended University at Cornell, moving on to Radcliffe College and then on to Harvard University for graduate work. She received her PhD from Harvard University in Slavic and Near Eastern Languages, Literatures, and Folklore. She performed her PhD research in Eastern Turkey. She taught Russian Language and Slavic Folklore, and served as Assistant Dean and Chair of the Slavic Department at the University of Virginia. She led some of the first student groups to the USSR in the 1970-1980s. In 1987 she was one of the first US scholars to be allowed outside of Moscow. She lived three months in a hotel room in Kyiv doing archival research at the University and at the Academy of Sciences. This research lead to the publication of "Ukrainian Minstrels: And the Blind Shall Sing," Armonk, New York and London, England: M.E. Sharpe, 1998. After the break-up of the USSR Natalie started to do folklore research in rural Ukraine. From 1998 she visited many villages in Central Ukraine and recorded over 200 hours of interviews. This research lead to a soundfile database (see http://www.artsrn.ualberta.ca/UkraineAudio/). It has also produced many articles and will be used in a book on Ukrainian ritual.

In 2004 she was recruited as Professor and Kule Chair in Ukrainian Ethnography, Modern Languages and Cultural Studies, University of Alberta. In 2007 she published "Slavic Folklore: A Handbook," Westport and London: Greenwood Press. She served as editor of Folklorica, the Journal of the Slavic and East European Folklore Association for 5 years. This journal was internationally recognized and was instrumental in re-establishing the dialogue between folklore scholars in the former Soviet Union and their colleagues in the West.

Dr. Kononenko teaches folklore and applied folklore classes at the Department of Modern Languages and Cultural Studies at the University of Alberta, for example, Folklore and Internet, Folklore and Film, Folklore and Animation, as well as research seminar where advanced students work in their communities to produce big documentation projects such as videos of important festivals. She is involved in two big research projects. The Sanctuary project, where Natalie works together with John-Paul Himka and Frances Swyripa, documents Byzantine rite sacral heritage on the Canadian prairies. The second project is broadly based on the use of technology in education.

Lawrence was a dancer in Cheremosh Ukrainian Dance Ensemble from the group’s inception in 1969 to 1984. He served as President of Ukrainian Cheremosh Society from 1979 to 1980 and was awarded the distinction of Honourary Lifetime Member of our Society. His contributions included choreography, dance instruction, and organization of productions and tours; he served as Assistant Director of Cheremosh during the early 1980s. Lawrence was a brilliant and gifted educator, artist, dancer, director, horticulturist, gourmet cook and mentor to countless individuals at home and abroad.

Nadia Korpus was born in Regina, Saskatchewan on the 18th of August 1929. Her father, Peter Korpus (Korpesio) was born in Malniv, Ukraine in 1897 and followed his older brother, John Korpesio to Canada in the early 1920s. Nadia’s mother, Olga Wawruck, was born in Hubbard, Saskatchewan in 1903. Her parents had arrived in Canada in 1899 from Koshlyakeh, Ternopil Oblast, Halychyna, Ukraine. Peter and Olga were married in Hubbard in 1926, and settled in Regina where they soon started a family. Their oldest son, Roman (Raymond), was born in 1927 followed by Nadia in ’29. Nadia’s younger brother Donald (Donny) was born in 1930, and her younger sister Patricia (Pat Sembaliuk) was born later in 1935.

She was active in the Ukrainian National Federation and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada. Her passion for Ukrainian Culture was further encouraged through participation in the summer school “Kursy” which she attended in 1946-48. Nadia is noted for establishing the Rusalka Dance Ensemble in Calgary (1961-67), and having inspired many Ukrainian dancers, both male and female, to continue dancing and teaching across the prairies.

Gordon Gordey (Master of Fine Arts, Master of Arts, Bachelor of Education) was a key builder in the evolution of the Ukrainian Shumka Dancers of Canada. In his forty years with Shumka, Gordey transitioned from a dancer, to a librettist/writer, and to a stage director, conceiving twenty-five original dance works for Shumka from 1992 to 2012. His works set a benchmark for Ukrainian dance in Canada and have toured across Canada, Ukraine, and over 20 cities in China. Gordey also served as Shumka's Artistic Director and Chief Executive Officer for 12 years. Gordey is privileged to be a Honourary Lifetime Member of the Ukrainian Shumka Dancers.

In his creative career outside of Shumka, Gordey studied ballet with Ruth Carse, founder of Alberta Ballet, spent 20 years as an Arts Consultant with the Department of Culture in Alberta, and worked for 13 years as a Human Rights Officer with the Alberta Human Rights Commission. He has been teaching Drama for 37 years at Grant MacEwan University in Edmonton. For Alberta's Centennial in 2005, he conceived and produced Celebrate Alberta as part of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II's official welcome to Alberta's Centennial event, which included 1500 performers. In the same year, Gordey was recognized as one of the most influential people in the development of theatre in Alberta in the publication: Theatre 100. In 2006 he received the Hetman Award for Outstanding Contributions and Dedicated Service in Promoting Ukrainian Heritage and Culture in Alberta. He continues to serve the Ukrainian Canadian community as a National Board Member of the Ukrainian Canadian Foundation of Taras Shevchenko.

Below is an autobiography provided by Gordon Gordey.

"I was born in 1948 into the farming community of Innisfree, in northeast central Alberta. My great-grandparents, George and Magdalena Gordey arrived in Canada on June 2, 1900 emigrating from Borivsti, Bukovyna in present day Ukraine. Unlike the predominantly Ukrainian settlement prairie villages in northeast central Alberta, Innisfree was ethnically diverse. In general, everyone who lived north and west of Innisfree was of Ukrainian heritage and everyone who lived south and east of Innisfree was of British heritage. The village was a hub of Canadian diversity of the era, even though no-one was aware of this at the time.

Growing up my parents, John and Emily Gordey, hammered home over and over again to me: “Bud' kul’turna l’udyna– Be a cultured person”. There was no caveat that being “cultured” meant that part of me that was Ukrainian. It was an inclusive guidepost for life. This phrase stirred my imagination. From a young age it made me reach for a higher ground. I read everything I could from Canadian war stories, to every classic of British and American literature and to Dostoyevsky, when I was only 14 years old. I stood as close to the stage as I could at Ukrainian weddings and learned to sing the wedding songs. I listened to dance bands of Metro Radomsky and Jimmy Watsko stir my emotion for Ukrainian music with their wonderful singing violins. Church services filled my imagination with myth, magic and mystery. Folk superstitions kept me awake at nights after visits to Baba K. who poured wax onto the water, whispered incantations, and cured me of my fear of roosters.

Grade school whizzed by with academics, participation in all school sports, and singing in the rock band, The Rivals, in the 60’s. In 1965 I experienced a pivotal event that would lead me into the world of Ukrainian dance. I attended a summer cultural program, Osvita, at St. John’s Institute where I was instructed in Ukrainian dance by a fiery young Shumka dancer named Gerald Metrunec. Like me, he was from rural Alberta, the town of Myrnam, and had come to Edmonton to join the Ukrainian Shumka Dancers and go to University. Within 10 days he used my background in athletics to drill into me the basics of Ukrainian dance. That fall, upon my return to Innisfree, I knew more about Ukrainian dance than anyone in my community, and was tagged to teach Ukrainian dancing in the town of Vegreville. My survival as a dance teacher with limited pedagogy depended on my creativity, my knowledge of music, and the drive to excel in dance that Gerald Metrunec had instilled. In 1966 my family moved into Edmonton and I joined the Ukrainian Shumka Dancers. Edmonton became my cultural oasis. I also immersed myself in ballet, jazz, theatre studies, choirs, musicals, and operatic singing lessons. Like-minded friends like the musically gifted, Gene Zwozdesky and the top male ballet and Ukrainian dancer of the day, Orest Semchuk inspired me to adhere to the guidepost of “Be a cultured person.” The Drama Department at the University of Alberta was at a high point of fine art at the time and filled my thirst for learning and practicing world theatre and art.

It is from this well-spring, “Dzerelo”, of experiences that my 40-year journey of creating original Ukrainian dance in Canada took flight." (Gordon Gordey, March 7, 2017)