Talk:List of Ukrainian-Americans

Andy Warhol
Ghirla asked elsewhere whether Andy Warhol should be added here. I'm not sure: was he born in the USA or Europe? Were his parents from the territory of modern Ukraine or Slovakia? (I presume they were Austro-Hungarian Ruthenian immigrants to the USA) Do any Ukrainians or Ukrainian groups claim him as their own?

Andy Warhol was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania - in the US.

If it is a debatable fact, then I would include him, along with a note indicating his Rusyn background, and leave the question of whether Rusyn is Ukrainian for discussion elsewhere. —Michael Z. 2006-02-28 00:21 Z 


 * Quoting from "Andy Warhol 1928-1987: Commerce into Art (Basic Art)" :

JackO&#39;Lantern 00:25, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
 * "Forest City, Pennsylvania, the son of miner and construction worker Ondrej Warhola and his wife Julia. In 1912 his father had emigrated from Czechoslovakia to the United States, his wife following nine years later."


 * Funny thing to read in a book revised in 2001. There was no Czechoslovakia before 1918, nor after 1993—I suspect they came from the Austro-Hungarian province of Carpathian Ruthenia, which is currently divided between Slovakia and Ukraine.


 * If Ondrej was an uneducated labourer, he would may have referred to himself as a Rusyn, and not had much political awareness, including issues of what is Rusyn vs. Ukrainian. Andy Warhol may not have cared much either.  —Michael Z. 2006-02-28 02:19 Z 


 * Come to think of it, any Ukrainian immigrant from Austro-Hungary would have had "Ruthenian" on his passport. I say include AW on this list, pending any evidence that he doesn't belong.  —Michael Z. 2006-02-28 02:57 Z 


 * Here is that evidence:(especially the last part)

JackO&#39;Lantern 03:10, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
 * "coal mines, so I never saw him very much. My mother would read to me in her thick Czechoslovakian accent as best she could... all I can remember, really, are the long walks to school, through the Czech ghetto with the babushkas and overalls on the clotheslines, in McKeesport, Pennsylvania"
 * "And I guess maybe I'm not really Czech, because I didn't understand it when they were talking. "
 * But here's something more in depth: "It was in such a village of wooden cottages and dirt streets, hidden in the heavily forested mountain slopes, called Mikova, that Andy's parents were born: his father, Ondrej (Andrew) Warhola, on November 28, 1886; his mother, Julia Zavacky, on November 17, 1892. Like 90 percent of the Ruthenians, the Warholas and Zavackys were farmers and shepherds, working the ... Indeed, the Ruthenians were obsessed with eggs... According to several members of the Zavacky family, one of Julia's grandmothers was Jewish. This was highly unusual in a part of the world where anti-Semitism was almost built into the social structure. Every village had its one Jewish family, who collected the landlord's share of the peasants' produce... When Odrej was eighteen or nineteen, he left for America, probably walking across Europe to a port like Hamburg or Amsterdam, like tens of thousands of other Ruthenian boys. In fact, by the turn of the century, The Ruthenian emigration was so over-whelming that the sagging Austro-Hungarian empire was worried about the dangerous depopulation of this border province. Two or three years later, in 1909, Ondrej was back in Mikova, rich by Ruthenian standards, from woking in the coal mines of Pennsylvania. Blond, muscular, and handsome, he proposed to Julia. Years later, in a 1966 Esquire interview she did behind Andy's back....Most Ruthenian-americans seem to define their nationality in engatives: "We're not Polish. We're not Hungarian. We're not Slovak. We're not Ukrainian." When I asked the Warhola brothers what nationality they considered themselves when they were growing up, John without hesitation said, "Always Slovak."

Ethnicity lists discussion
Please see discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) for current discussion of a potential policy to apply to all ethnicity lists on Wikipedia, including this one. JackO&#39;Lantern 20:50, 11 April 2006 (UTC)