Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Ukrainian Family Portrait


The baby is my grandmother, Rose Grogoza. The location is Volodymyrets', in northern Ukraine. The year is probably 1886.

I don't know, but based on this portrait, I'd guess I have some second or third cousins in Ukraine right now. Hope they are OK.

4 comments:

  1. Knowing that your ancestors were Ukraineian tells me NOTHING about your politics, not even your politics with regard to the Ukraine. This is the WONDERFUL thing about America! We have a diversity of ethnic groups, and they used to be tied to politics, but this is getting to be less and less true. And it practically vanishes on the Prez level--- While Mormons voted for Romney it was NOT because he would have policies that were good FOR MORMONS. And it certainly wasn't because of the fear that that non-mormon Obama would persecute them. This may sound silly to even bring it up, but in other countries, its the norm.

    USA! USA! USA!

    NOTE- YES there are things wrong with the USA, but violent ethnic warfare is not one of them.

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    Replies
    1. And of course it doesn't even tell you very much about my ethnicity to say that one of my grandparents was Ukrainian! In truth two were -- baby Rose wound up marrying in Ukraine before emigrating to the US -- but the other side of the family tree is much shadier, with a mixture of Germans and Russians, Jews and Christians all mixed up together. The one thing there doesn't seem to be is any Anglos -- I proudly style myself as one of the Ellis Island Lewises. In fact my paternal grandfather arrived with two brothers, and one picked Lewis, while the other two picked Wilson and Sanders. USA! USA! USA!

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    2. AH- we have here both a global and local phenomena.
      America has lots of different ethnic groups (Global), and
      AmericanS (like Harry) often have lots of different ethnic groups inside of them (local). Both help to NOT have ethnic conflicts since, say in Harry's case, he wouldn't know what side to be on!.

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    3. Exactly. My father, the son of a Russian Jew and a German Lutheran, served in the European theatre during WWII. He never talked about it much, but I always imagined him wondering who was on the other side of the battle lines.

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