UHEC Audio Collections

Michael Andrec: Okay, very good. Today is May 19th, 2025. I am at the residence... This is Michael Andrec recording on behalf of the Ukrainian History and Education Center, interviewing Valentina Syzonenko at her residence at the Ukrainian Village, 66 Cedar Grove Lane in Somerset. So, let's start with the basics. So you were in your teens when you came to the U.S.?

Valentina Syzonenko: I was 12 years old when I came here, yeah.

MA: Were you born in Germany or in Ukraine?

VS: No, I was born in Ukraine.

MA: Okay, where?

VS: Zaporizhzhia. In that area, not directly in the city, but in a village. Odarivka.

MA: Do you recall, do you remember anything about your... the trip from Ukraine through Germany?

VS: I remember being in a wagon. I remember my mom, when we were crossing the Dnipro, my mom said to me, "Доця, ми переїжджаємо Дніпро. Дивися, може ти його більше не бачитимеш." But I did. Well, quite a few years later, but I did go see it. I remember being in Germany, being in the camps, labor camps in Munich.

MA: DP camp?

VS: This was before DP camp, before. I was in Munich.

MA: So your family left voluntarily? How did they end up in Germany?

VS: All I remember is my father came home. Where he was, I don't know. But he came, I was around four, I would say five, six, that area. I don't know exactly the date. But he said that we have to leave. And I remember Mom packing up and we got on the wagon and we left.

There was another family with us, a husband and wife, and they had a daughter, Tamara, with us. I remember being on a train going into Germany. I remember in Germany we were in some camp, in some building, I don't remember the name. Now I remember they said it was the Hauer, but we didn't stay there too long. We were just– I guess they were screening us or whatever.

And we ended up in Germany, in Munich. We were there– I don't remember how long, but my family, mom and dad, and I and another couple were sent out to another little town. It was called Bad Tölz. It was up in the mountains. And they were working there until the Americans occupied.

And once the Americans occupied, we went back to Munich to DP camps. DP camps, we were, again, in Munich.

MA: Do you remember which ones?

VS: First, it was SS-Kaserne in Munich, and the last one was Schleissheim. Schleissheim was the one.

MA: And that first town, the town before the DP camp, what was the name of that town or village again?

VS: Bad Tölz.

MA: Bad Tölz?

VS: I think it was about 40 kilometers outside of Munich, yeah.

MA: And then what do you remember about the process of getting to the U.S.? Oh, actually, before we get to that, as a child, what were your sort of recollections about life in the DP camps? What was it?

VS: DP camps. I know that we lived in Freimann. We lived in huge buildings. There were schools. I went to school, to second grade, because my mom was a teacher, so she was teaching me at home before I went. So I went into school.

Then we were transferred into Schleissheim, where I had to take a test to get into himnazia. So actually, I started himnazia in Schleissheim. As a child, I was happy.

MA: What was a typical day like?

VS: Well, in school we had good teachers. As a matter of fact, one of my teachers passed away just a few years ago. She was here in New Jersey. I don't know if I was a good... Personally, if I was a good student or not, but I got by. And when I came here to the United States, I went straight into seventh grade.

MA: So you, I mean, you, I'm sure you like played with the other kids.

VS: We had groups, we were singing, we had shows that we performed. I had a good teacher, Panika Bodarova. She was my favorite, and she taught us literature, how to write, things like that, yeah.

MA: So the process of getting to the U.S., what do you remember?

VS: When I was in Bad Tölz, That's where we were when the Americans occupied. And of course, this was 1945, so I remember the bombs. I remember the fear of the whole grounds shaking. We lived at the hospital. There was a hospital, and we lived next to them. And there was a park there.

When the Americans came, a Red Cross outfit settled in that park, which was right outside the building where we lived. And Americans, you know! My mom says, "Don't go outside. Don't go outside. Американці приїхали." Me as a child, I was curious. I went outside and I walked around and there's soldiers. It's a Red Cross medical outfit.

And she was upstairs and I yelled over, "Мамо, вони мене не турбують!" One of the soldiers heard me and he comes over to me and in broken Ukrainian, he said to me, "Ти українка?" And I said, yes. "В тебе є мама, тато?" "Так." "Я хочу їх бачить." So as a child, I grabbed his hand. "Come on." We went upstairs, and that's how we met.

He happened to be a Ukrainian descent. His parents came to the United States way before. He was a soldier in an outfit. My father and mom started talking to him. He left his address for his mom and dad and for his wife. He told us, when you're allowed to write, it's okay. That was in 1945.

In 1948, I guess, my father... We were already in DP camps. My father wrote to his wife and to his father. Never had any answer from his father because he had already passed. But his wife answered, Marusia. They were corresponding for a while, and then one day, We received a letter from her asking us, "Would you like to come to the United States?" Well, of course, yeah. So that's how they processed it.

We came here, and we lived with Stenickys, Stenyts'kyi, up in Bernardsville. As a matter of fact, Marusia and her sister had That china, Ukrainian china. That's where we lived. And my father worked for a gas station for a while. And then finally, his... Pan Lysiuk's sister, Yustyna Hutsul, lived in New Market, which is Piscataway right now on that map.

They got my father a job in New Brunswick. A company where they were making leather briefcases, belts. Right now, the Johnson & Johnson is standing on that. I don't know if it's still there or not, but it was there. Where the Rutgers dormitories are, right by the river. And later on, my father got a job right here in Harris Steel in South Plainfield, and that's how I ended up in South Plainfield.

MA: So the soldier and the wife, what was their last name?

VS: Oh, who?

MA: The soldier that you met.

VS: Oh, soldier.

MA: And then the wife, who knows their names?

VS: Yeah, Mykola and Marusia Havrush. Yeah.

MA: And that's connected to the Marusia of Marusia Pottery?

VS: Marusia was cousin of Marusia Havrush. Yeah. Their mothers were sisters.

MA: So at that point, so it was when your father got the job at the steel...?

VS: When my father received, got the job in New Market, we moved to New Market on Stelton Road. And that was right by the... Pan Lysiuk's house. His house was on a corner of Stelton and New Brunswick, and we lived on Stelton Road. And then a few years later, my parents bought the house on New Brunswick Avenue.

MA: And you were telling me earlier, New Brunswick Avenue between what and what streets?

VS: Stelton Road, which is the main street, and New Brunswick Avenue. Right.

MA: So where along New Brunswick was that, was the house?

VS: It was right on the corner. This is Stelton. Yeah. And New Brunswick going here, there was a house built right on the corner.

MA: Oh, OK.

VS: Right on the corner. There's a gas station there now. There was another gas station there. That's where Pan Lysiuk lived, that I remember.

MA: Ah hah, ah hah! But the property that your family bought...?

VS: My parents, New Brunswick Avenue here. This is Stelton Road. Lysiuk lived here. We were over here. There was another lady there. This is Melania Tuhan-Baranovs'ka.

MA: And the nearest cross streets, you were telling me earlier?

VS: Well, later, when we moved there, those streets were already there. Carpathia, St. Michael's, Shevchenko... Sure.

MA: No, but I'm trying to locate where your property was, where your family's house was.

VS: It was actually on... First it was on Stelton Road, and then it was on New Brunswick Avenue.

MA: Yeah, but where along New Brunswick? What were the nearest streets? What were the nearest others, like cross streets?

VS: This is it, Stelton and New Brunswick.

MA: No, but you were telling me earlier... So was it closer to Carpathia, or was it closer to...

VS: It was right here.

MA: Oh, so basically...

VS: Right here.

MA: Okay. So it was on the... sort of the north...

VS: Between Carpathia and Bohdan.

MA: Between Carpathia and Bohdan on the northwest side of New Brunswick Avenue. Okay. And then Lysiuk would have been?

VS: Lysiuk would have been right here on Stelton Road and New Brunswick Avenue, right here.

MA: Okay, so that would be the, uh, sort of the south...

VS: See, the way it was, the way it is now, this here is South Plainfield.

MA: Right.

VS: This here is Piscataway.

MA: Correct.

VS: And because this was... I lived There we go. First I lived, what is that?

MA: That's Franko [Street].

VS: Franko. There was a house. This is a gas station here right now.

MA: Yes.

VS: My house was right across from Franko. That's where I lived.

MA: Okay.

VS: Pan Lysiuk lived over here.

MA: Which is the corner... Which is right down the street. Right down Stelton Road, right on the corner of the...

VS: New Brunswick Avenue and Stelton Road. That's where he lived, right there. We moved from here to here.

MA: To the New Brunswick Avenue house.

VS: But when I was in high school, I lived here.

MA: Okay, so that would be next to Lysiuk's house.

VS: Yeah, kind of, close to Lysyiuk's, but he didn't know the house, though. I lived here, and because this was South Plainfield, I was right here. I had to go to North Plainfield High School for my high school.

MA: Ah hah. As opposed to Piscataway or New Market...

VS: I was in 7th grade, I had to go to South Plainfield High School. Across the street was New Market. They were going to Metuchen.

MA: Right.

VS: But that's where I ended up.

MA: Yeah, so what did that area look like then?

VS: What did it look like? All fields where I lived. Pan Lysiuk's sister lived right over here.

MA: So that would be roughly... So just past Rohatyn Street on...

VS: Those streets weren't there. Yeah. Yeah, but they lived here. And around the corner there was a big farm here. There was a milk farm here.

MA: On the other side of the railroad tracks.

VS: Yeah. There was a railroad there. It was all... This was wetland here.

MA: Uh-huh. So that's the pink area on the map from the open street maps.

VS: Yeah. Then, when Pani Hutsul, they sold their house here, they sold the farm, and the buildings are there. I don't know what they are now. That's some kind of a commercial stuff. They moved right over here.

MA: So the corner...

VS: The corner of Stelton and Brunswick and Stelton. That was right there. Now, right over here, on their property, there was a fence made out of bricks, about yay big. And it had name Nova Ukraina. And then somebody ran into it, it was all broken down.

MA: Which way did it face? It faced towards Stelton Road?

VS: It was Stelton Road. Yeah, it was Stelton Road. It was as you go into Dunellen.

MA: Right.

VS: New Brunswick into Dunellen. New Brunswick Avenue, Stelton Road here. Pan Lysiuk lived here. Pani Hutsul lived here. And this is where that fence was. It was on this side, the corner now it's uh i don't know...

MA: On the, um, on the the south uh the the south southwest

VS: It would be... yes, so over here, in here, right here, uh-huh right right, so right there's a commercial i think it's a mcdonald's or some kind of a commercial stuff here right now i don't know why i haven't been there for a while yeah that's where they live

MA: So you said that some of the streets weren't there, like if you look at that, we'll talk about the map later, but if you look at that 1920s map, there's plans for streets all over the place. How many of those streets were actually completed or actually existed by the time you got there?

VS: Well, like I said, these streets were here, but not a lot of developments were there. There was a Pani Adash that lived on Franko Avenue right here. There was another, I can't remember.

MA: That's okay.

VS: That lived right across the street from Pan Lysiuk right here. He had a very nice house. As a matter of fact, he was an agent for Metropolitan Insurance Company. That's how I remember. Whatever happened to him, I don't know.

MA: Was Shevchenko Avenue there?

VS: Yes, it was there. Shevchenko Avenue was there, but Stelton Road and Hamilton Street wasn't there where it is now. It was on this side of 287. And then it was 287 cut right through. So they rerouted Hamilton Street.

MA: Did Shevchenko Avenue continue on the other side of Stelton Road? Onto the Piscataway side? Because that's what they were planning, according to the maps.

VS: They were planning. But you know, I don't remember because. When I remember. Stelton Road. Going this way, going this way. Yeah, Stelton Road. Like I said, 287 wasn't there.

Where 287 is now, where the Middlesex Mall is, that was an airport. That was Hadley Airport. And that's where Hamilton Street came in. But then they rerouted it different because the 287 As a matter of fact, Volodia [VS's son] used to ride his bicycle on 287 before it was complete. And he's proud of it.

MA: There you go... So, so kind of the area that's in the pink here on the map kind of really wasn't, there were really no streets.

VS: There was no streets. It was just open between New Brunswick Avenue And Stelt, uh...

MA: Hamilton.

VS: Hamilton. That was all open fields. That was open fields. On the, on the... Then they started building, yeah.

MA: This is on the South Plainfield side.

VS: Right, on the South Plainfield.

MA: Okay. Uh... Yeah, so what do you... What do you remember about Kalanik-Lisyuk?

VS: I remember him. I don't remember much about him because shortly after we moved there, they moved out to California. I remember him talking. [phone rings]

MA: Okay. So actually, what year did you... arrived there in...?

VS: I moved into Piscataw... New Market, in winter of '49-'50. And like I said, shortly after that, I don't remember exactly how short. Like I said, I was, what, 13, 14 years old. I remember that they had moved out to California, and there were times he would come and visit. I don't know. I know that he built a museum there, a library, something like that.

My father was a correspondent. You would have loved to talk to my father. But that's all I remember, that he came to visit several times because, like I said, his sister was here. And then his sister moved out to Florida.

MA: What do you remember about him? What did he look like? What was his demeanor? What was...

VS: Well, to me, he was tall at that time, but he yay big, a little stout, baldish, and with glasses. Pleasant, talked a lot, but he, the way my father and he talked, They knew what they were talking about, the politics, the literature, the whole thing. My father loved to read. But like I said, I remember him, but I really can't say much about him.

MA: Sure. I mean, you were young. I'm sure you probably don't know, but I'll ask it anyway. You don't recall anything about what his political views were or anything?

VS: No, no, no.

MA: So what was life like there, other than going to school and...

VS: Where? Here?

MA: Yeah, in that time period, in Nova Ukraina there.

VS: Well, in Nova Ukraina, me being an immigrant, you know, when I went to school, I had to not only did I have to learn the language, I had to learn the material that was required. I had no problem with arithmetic, but boy, did I have a problem with spelling and reading and all that stuff, and history.

But it was, I was in the middle of nowhere. If I wanted to go to a school activity, I would have to take a bus from... on Stelton Road to Dunellen, from Dunellen to Plainfield, from Plainfield to North Plainfield. And boy, if I should miss one stop... Many times, if I had to stay after school, I would walk from North Plainfield to Plainfield, pick up the bus in Plainfield to Dunellen.

I'm sitting in the bus looking, the bus that should take me down Stelton Road just left. So instead of me waiting for another hour, which it was, I would walk. That was what, three, four miles? No problem. [laughs]

MA: So I guess there really weren't like, kids to play with or people?

VS: I had high school friends while I was in school, but at that time we didn't have a phone. We had no cell phones. We didn't have a regular phone. We didn't have a phone until I think it was '55. '54, '55 when we first got the telephone.

I had friends, but Like I said, if I wanted to go to roller skating, they would have to be going to Plainfield. To the "Y". While I went to roller skate, my father would be sitting in the car waiting for me because there was no other way.

Like I said, I had friends, good friends. As a matter of fact, I'm still in touch with some of them. But I didn't participate in a lot of... School hours, I participated. But after school, it was difficult because of transportation. Until I started driving, which was at the end of my junior year or senior year. Senior year, I went to football games, I went to basketball games because I could drive. But I loved my years. The recollection. [laughs]

MA: Yeah, so you sort of integrated well with the American...

VS: I had no problem with the friends, yeah.

MA: So... So then after high school?

VS: After high school I went to Philadelphia. I started to be an x-ray technician. I met my husband as a blind date. [laughs] I worked for Perth Amboy General Hospital as an x-ray technician until I got married and moved out to Philadelphia. And then we came back here, and that was it. Married life and children.

MA: In your previous interview, you mentioned something that you met your husband here at the Ukrainian Village?

VS: No.

MA: No.

VS: In my backyard.

MA: In your backyard. Oh, okay.

VS: In my backyard. I had a friend, Diana, Elena, and she called me one day and she said, it's a Sunday, she says, there's a picnic at the Ukrainian Village. And she says, "I have two fellows that just came over from Philadelphia." She says, "I don't want to go there by myself with the two guys. Would you like to go?" I said, "Sure, bring them over."

So they came over, and I met him. It was my husband, Hennady, and Yurko Kryvolap. You know Yurko Kryvolap? Well, they were neighbors in Philadelphia. They were friends. So we came here, I met him, and three years into it, 20 days later, I married him.

MA: So you were still living on New Brunswick Avenue?

VS: New Brunswick Avenue, yeah.

MA: So then you came here to the Ukrainian Village to the dance, right?

VS: We came to the dance, right. And then when I went back to, well, I was in Philadelphia in school at that time, and I came home for the weekend. So after that, I dated him.

MA: So, obviously, the Ukrainian village, the Ukrains'ke Selo, was a very different place, I guess, back then than it is now.

VS: Where I'm sitting right now, it was a field, and our car was parked right there outside. There was a big building here that was a hotel here. There was no hall over there. There was just a platform there.

MA: The hall meaning here on the Selo grounds.

VS: Yeah, right over there. That burned down later in the years. All this was open fields. I think they had a couple cabins here that people used to rent for the summer. There was only one driveway. Those trees weren't there. The lake was there. Behind the lake there was all brush, trees, that we used to cross to go in there. And the lake, we used to go swimming in that lake.

MA: So it was sort of like a weekend retreat kind of place?

VS: Yeah, it was great. I met a lot of people from Philadelphia, Trenton, all those people, Newark, New York. I had a girlfriend in New York City. She comes over and she says, "You know, a group of girls and guys are coming over here." Okay, they came here.

"Oh my gosh, all this green stuff around here," you know. "Let's take pictures, let's take pictures." Not knowing that they were sitting in, ah, poison ivy. She calls me the following day from there. She says, Valya, all those people that were taking pictures got poison ivy. That we didn't know, anybody, because I don't know if Europe has poison ivy, do they?

MA: I'm sorry?

VS: Does Europe have poison ivy?

MA: No, I don't think so.

VS: Я знаю що там була кропива. Yes. Yeah, but not poison ivy.

MA: Здається ні. I don't think so.

VS: Yeah, no.

But there was a lot of ... Every weekend there was something going on. Oh. Cedar Grove Lane, there was all chicken farms. Chicken farms and a dirt road. Horrendous. [Telephone call interruption] That's okay, You can wait. They just got back from a cruise. So, what else?

MA: I think this may have been covered in that other, the previous interview, but So when did you start attending St. Andrew Memorial Church or the church here, whatever it was?

VS: The church? I remember there was a church that was established by a priest that was in our camp. And that's where we were going, in New Brunswick. And then, from there, we found out that there's a...

MA: A priest who was in Schleisheim?

VS: That it was in Schleisheim, yeah. But he was an old gentleman, отець Тонкошкур. Then we found out that the church was here. That was already, I think, '57, '58?

That I know that my father visited покійного митрополита. Mstylav, he was here, and he came, and I came with my father. Now with our churches, there was just a свята Марія, I guess it was a Pokrova or whatever it was there. It was made out of wood or whatever it was. That's what I remember.

And then, of course, I got married. I went to school, got married, so I didn't come here. But I did come back in '64 that we actually... I already had Victor and my Pavlo was already in '65, he was baptized here. В тій каплиці що була коло озера.

MA: Yeah. The mill.

VS: So it's in that area.

MA: The one that later burned down.

VS: Yeah, yeah.

MA: Do you remember when it burned down? I'm sure I have this.

VS: That burned down.

MA: I'm sure I can find out.

VS: The kids were already in school, so that was in the '70s. It was in the '70s, because I remember it was a summer day, and we heard fire engines going, and then we found out that they were called out to South Bound Brook because there was a mill at the time they called it.

MA: Do you remember any of the people who were there in the '50s?

VS: The twins, they were my age. I remember their parents.

MA: Their names, just for the recording, their names, the twins?

VS: The twins is Anne and Francis.

MA: Last name? I know I can find it, but I can't think of it.

VS: I'll think of it. And their aunt, Anne Yendick, that's their aunt. I remember that there was a ... Oh, what was his name? He was in New Brunswick. That was very active. I don't remember all the names.

MA: You didn't encounter anybody named Oleksii Balabas, did you?

VS: No, I don't remember.

MA: Because we know that he lived there because we actually have his diaries.

VS: You know, I've seen a lot of people, but like I said, I was, what, 15, 16?

MA: Of course, yeah. Of course. I think that's most of what I wanted to cover. Is there anything related to what we talked about that I didn't ask you?

VS: About the church?

MA: Yeah.

VS: I remember the... як посвячення було...

MA: Uh-huh. [VS walks across the room to fetch a picture postcard] Yes, I've seen this. Yeah.

VS: Yeah. Це є той день коли посвячення... [of St. Andrew Memorial Church] There's a carriage there. That's my Pavlo in there. That was '65.

MA: Yeah, for the recording this is referring to the baby carriage kind of in the towards the right side of the picture in front of what looks like there's a priest in the foreground and then to the right of the priest is a woman in like a beige gold kind of coat and the baby carriage that's being described is visible just to the left of that priest or whoever that is in the dark outfit. I'm just describing it for the recording. And this is the photo, this is the postcard "На пам'ятку 15-и ліття посвячення Церкви-Пам'ятника" Yeah. All good?

VS: That was easy. [laughs]

MA: Yeah.