Thehistory of Ukrainians in Baltimore dates back to the mid-19th century.Baltimore,Maryland andWashington, D.C. have the largest Ukrainian-American communities in theMid-Atlantic.[1]
The Ukrainian community in theBaltimore metropolitan area numbered 10,806 as of 2000, making up 0.4% of the area's population.[2] In the same year, Baltimore city's Ukrainian population was 1,567, which is 0.2% of the city's population.[3]
In 1920, 151 foreign-born White people in Baltimore spoke theUkrainian language, then referred to as theRuthenian language.[4]
In 1940, 14,670 immigrants from theSoviet Union lived in Baltimore, many of whom were of Ukrainian descent. These immigrants comprised 24.1% of the city's foreign-born white population.[5]
In 2013, an estimated 808 Ukrainian-Americans resided in Baltimore city, 0.1% of the population.[6]
As of September 2014, immigrants fromUkraine were the twentieth largest foreign-born population in Baltimore.[7]
Ukrainians began settling in Baltimore during the 1880s, mostly in East Baltimore and Southeast Baltimore and especially in theHighlandtown neighborhood.[8] Other Ukrainians settled inWashington Hill andFell's Point, where there was a Ukrainian store.[9] Most of these immigrants came fromWestern Ukraine and were Catholic. By the 1890s, Ukrainian Catholic priests were traveling fromPennsylvania to Baltimore to serve the Ukrainian Catholic community.St. Michael the Archangel Ukrainian Catholic Church was founded as a parish in 1893 and the church was built in 1912.[10]
While many immigrants fromWestern Ukraine identify simply asUkrainian Americans, others identify asRusyn American.Rusyns also sometimes describe themselves as Carpatho-Rusyns, Carpatho-Russians orRuthenians. Some of the Western Ukrainians that establishedSt. Michael the Archangel Ukrainian Catholic Church identified as Rusyns. Rusyns also helped establish Sts. Peter & Paul Ukrainian Catholic Church. Many Rusyn and Western Ukrainians have settled in the neighborhoods ofFell's Point[11] andPatterson Park. Western Ukrainians began immigrating to Baltimore during the 1880s.[12]
During the early 1900s, many Ukrainian immigrants to Baltimore worked for steel- and glass-makers.[13]
From the 1920s to the 1970s, the Ukrainian American Citizen's Club and Ukrainian National Home was the focal point of the Ukrainian-American community in Baltimore. Coalescing as an informal association in the 1920s, the club was legally incorporated in 1931. The club owned a property at 3101 O'Donnell Street, which became the Ukrainian National Home. The home included a school for the Ukrainian language and culture, the Vasile Avramenko School of Ukrainian Dancing, the Ukrainian American Citizen's Club Choir, and a softball team for Ukrainian-Americans. The space was also used by multiple community organizations and after World War II it was used as accommodations for displaced refugees.[14]
By the 1940s, the Ukrainian community in Highlandtown numbered around 1,200.[8]
Many Ukrainians fled to Baltimore from the 1930s to the 1950s in order to escape political persecution, labor camps, theHolodomor famine, or deportation toSiberia. Every year Ukrainian refugees and their children and grandchildren celebrate their good fortune onThanksgiving Day by giving a toast and playing a game of football in Patterson Park.[15] On 29 May 2008, the city of Baltimore held a candlelight commemoration for the Holodomor at theWar Memorial Plaza in front ofCity Hall. This ceremony was part of the larger international journey of the "International Holodomor Remembrance Torch", which began inKyiv and made its way through thirty-three countries. Twenty-two other US cities were also visited during the tour. Then-MayorSheila Dixon presided over the ceremony and declared 29 May to be "Ukrainian Genocide Remembrance Day in Baltimore". She referred to the Holodomor as "among the worst cases of man's inhumanity towards man".[16]
In 1969, the Ukrainian American Citizen's Club granted usage and maintenance of the Ukrainian National Home to the Dnipro Ukrainian Club.[14]
Beginning in the 1970s, large numbers ofUkrainian Jews immigrated to Baltimore in order to escapeantisemitism in the thenSoviet Union. In the early 1980s, about 70% of the Soviet Jews in Baltimore had immigrated from the thenUkrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. One-third came fromOdesa, Baltimore's sister-city at the time.[17]
Ze Mean Bean Café in Fell's Point opened in 1995. It is a restaurant which offersUkrainian cuisine, as well as other Slavic and Eastern European fare.[18] The restaurant was founded by Yvonne Dornic as an ode to Ivan Dornic, herCzechoslovakian-bornCarpatho-Rusyn father.[19]
TheNational Slavic Museum opened in 2012. The museum focuses on the Slavic history of Baltimore, including Baltimore's Ukrainian history.[20]
In light of the2014 Ukrainian revolution and the Russian intervention inCrimea, Ukrainians in Baltimore have mobilized to support the pro-Ukrainian cause.[21][22]
The Lemko House, an apartment complex on South Ann Street, provides housing for Eastern European immigrants. Founded in 1983 by Ivan Dornic, anEastern Rite priest, the complex is named after Dornic's ethnic group, theLemkos. The Lemkos are aRusyn ethnic group inhabitingLemkivshchyna, a part ofTranscarpathia that spans parts of Slovakia, Poland, and Ukraine. Lemko House has opened its doors to low-income residents of any ethnicity, but is still home to many Slavic and Eastern European immigrants.[23]
A corridor of Baltimore'sPatterson Park neighborhood is referred to by locals as "The Little Ukrainian Village in Baltimore" and "Little Ukraine." The village is home to St. Michael the Archangel Ukrainian Catholic Church and Baltimore's Ukrainian-American festival, as well as organizations for Ukrainians, such as the SelfReliance Baltimore Federal Credit Union, the Ukrainian-American Youth Association, and the Dnipro Ukrainian Club, a sports club and cultural organization.[1]
The Ukrainian Festival was founded in 1976 and is organized by the Baltimore Ukrainian Festival Committee, a non-profit affiliated with theUkrainian Congress Committee of America (UCCA). The festival lasts two days and features traditional Ukrainian music, dancing, crafts, and cuisine.[1][24]
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)According to figures from national HIAS, the percentage of Ukrainians in the national population of emigrés is almost exactly the same as in the Baltimore contingent, i.e., about 70%. This fact is of considerable importance because the Ukraine has been (and still is) an area of endemic anti-Semitism with deep roots in the past. In recent years, some of the most vicious examples of blatant anti-Semitic literature--some of it so offensive that it was eventually withdrawn--have been published by Ukrainian authors. As will be seen later, the presence of anti-Semitism is a major factor in the decision to emigrate.
