BUKOVYNIAN DIASPORA MUSEUM
Year established: 1992
Location: J.Hlavka st. 1-a
In August 1992 the first Ukrainian Diaspora museum was founded in Chernivtsi. Now its funds have more than 4000 exhibits. In 2003 the museum was reorganized and based on Chernivtsi Local Lore museum.
The exhibition starts from the materials telling us about the emigration movement on the territory of Bukovyna in the end XIX – first half of the XX century. During the times of Austro-Hungarian Empire more than 50 000 Bukovynians went overseas, mostly to Canada and the U.S. The exhibits describe the hard social and economic position of the territory, reasons for the first (so-called economic) emigration wave, the scale of people outflow.
"Bukovynian Diaspora”, the following hall, describes the activities of Bukovynian communities in the countries which accepted the greatest numbers of Bukovynians – USA, Canada, South America, Australia, European countries.
According to some unofficial data, at the time the Ukrainian ethnic group of the U.S. numbers 2 million people. An interesting exhibit is the photo showing the meeting of Ukrainian World War I veterans with the U.S. President Harding on 7th June 1922 at the White House in Washington.
Lots of unique exhibits were given to the museum by Paul Sembaliuk, the designer of the largest monument to pysanka in Vegreville. The Canadian part of the exhibition ends with materials on celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Ukrainian immigration to this country including periodicals and printed media of Ukrainian societies in Canada and souvenirs.
The Ukrainian population of South America is also fairly large, first of all in Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay. Guests can become familiar with the activities of Ukrainian communities in these countries, documents and passports of our compatriots, photographs, printed media of Ukrainian societies.
The Diaspora museum hosts business and creative meetings during which the problems of political and cultural life are discussed.
GALLERY (click photos to enlarge)
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