Personal Dedications

PART ONE - I dedicate to my maternal grandparents. They spent all their lives trying to improve the lot of the Lemkos they served.
Rev. Vasyl Smolynskyj was born in 1868 into a peasant family in the village of Korenitsya, Yaroslav district. Upon completing high school in Peremyshl, he studied theology in Lviv and Peremyshl. Being blessed with a magnificent bass-baritone voice, he was offered a full government scholarship to study singing abroad. However, he felt that his vocation lay in the priesthood and rejected this proposition.
In 1897 Vasyl married Izabella Bendzinska of Peremyshl and a year later, he was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop K. Chekhovych. After several years of fulfilling an assistant's duties, he was appointed parish priest of Roztoka Velyka, near Krynitsya, Noviy Sanch district. In 1917, he was transferred to the neighboring parish of Nova Ves, where he remained until his death in 1945.
Rev. Smolynskiy's wife Izabella died in 1953 after enduring the tragic death of her only son Ivan, a doctor, as a consequence of the post-war state of lawlessness.
Both Rev. Vasyl and Izabella are buried beside the Nova Ves' kostel, the tserkva having burned down due to "unknown causes".
The Smolynskiy's family numbered four children, the youngest of whom, daughter Ivanna, lives in Canada.

PART TWO
I dedicate to my parental grandparents. They worked to improve the lot of their Boyko neighbors.Rev. Mykola Iwanusiw was born in 1873 into a peasant family in Horutsko, near Medynychi Drohobych district. His father wished that one of his sons become a priest, and so he took Mykola to Drohobych and enrolled him in high school. Mykola completed high school while tutoring to earn his livelihood Alter studying theology for three years in Lviv, he completed these studies with the fourth year at Peremyshl.In 1899, he married Maria, daughter of Rev. Yulian Shykh, parish priest of Dovhe, by Skhidnytsya, Drohobych district. Later that year, Bishop K. Ohekhovych ordained him to the priesthood and appointed him administrator of Lopyanka, by Balyhorod, Lisko district. Lopyanka had two auxiliary churches in Buk and in Tyskova.In 1911, he was appointed parish priest of Vatsewychi (now Zaluzhany) by Drohobych. Here, he lived through the troubled times of unrest as well as through the horrors of both World Wars.The marriage of Rev. Mykola and Maria was blessed with seven children, two of whom died in childhood. Maria died in 1919, while Rev. Mykola lived until 1963. They are buried side by side in the Zaluzhany cemetery.

PART THREE -PART THREE I dedicate to my in-laws Prof. Dr. Evhen Ivan Wertyporoch, and his wife Leonida Iwanna (nee Chromowska). Both spent much timeworking in the Ukrainian community.
Evhen, son of Ivan and Leontyna (nee Balbozynska), was born on April 17, 1898 in Lyashky Korolivski, Peremyshlany district, Western Ukraine. During W.W.I, he served as an officer in the Austrian and Ukrainian Galician armies. He completed chemical engineering (1926) and a doctorate in chemistry (1929) in Danzig. In 1934 he became a fellow of the Shevchenko Scientific Society (SSS). He worked in the Klawe pharmaceutical firm on vitamin research and insulin production. In 1942 he headed the Dept. of Chemistry at the Medical Institute in Lviv. Before the end of Will, Evhen moved to Krakiv, Vienna, and then Munich. In 1948 he emigrated to Canada where he worked for the Shuttleworth Chemical Company and later at Ryerson Polytechnic Institute.
In Canada he organized the Shevchenko Scientific Society and the Ukrainian Technical Society. In 1963 Evhen became the general secretary and in 1970 the president of the Supreme Council of the SSS.Dr. Wertyporoch died on January 10, 1972, leaving his widow Leonida and two daughters, Chrystyna and Bozhena with husbands.