This summary cannot possibly cover the full scope of community and cultural life of Ukrainians in New Jersey, but only provides some selected highlights. For a detailed list of community organizations as they existed in 1977, please see Dora Rak’s excellent article “*Ukrainians in New Jersey from the First Settlement to the Centennial Anniversary”, which was written for the U.S. Bicentennial celebration and published in a book sponsored by the New Jersey American Revolution Bicentennial Celebration Commission.
Arts
By the 1920’s and into the 1930’s, New Jersey Ukrainians had developed a wide range of cultural offerings. Choirs, dance groups and drama troupes were common.
Announcements of public cultural performances were found in the local press and reports about them were complimentary.
Ukrainian cultural centers were an important hub of community activity and continue to be. Jersey City had established a Ukrainian National Home in the Heights section in 1932 and it became a beehive of activity as the third wave of immigrants arrived. There were other popular Ukrainian centers in Bayonne, Passaic, Irvington, Carteret, Elizabeth, Millville, Perth Amboy, Trenton and Bound Brook-Somerset. Today, the Ukrainian American Cultural Center in Whippany, N.J., is an important hub for Ukrainians in Morris County.
Festivals
From 1974 to 1997, the Garden State Arts Center (later the PNC Bank Arts Center) in Holmdel hosted a major annual Ukrainian festival as part of a series of ethnic festivals sponsored by the Garden State Arts Foundation.The Star-Ledger (Newark, NJ) “Ukrainian culture calls the tune at Holmdel exposition”, June 11, 1974, p.37. Drawing on music and dance performers from around the US and Canada, it attracted thousands of attendees at its height. In addition to entertainment, it included exhibits, vendors selling Ukrainian-themed wares, and even associated sporting events. In the 1980s, it was re-branded as the “Ukrainian Festival USA”, but its scale reduced in the 1990s.
Programs from the Holmdel Ukrainian Festival
View digitized film footage from the Holmdel Ukrainian Festival
Smaller-scale Ukrainian festivals, usually associated with churches, were (and still are) a way to bring the community together. Among the more prominent of this is the annual festival at the Ukrainian American Cultural Center in Whippany. Although it is strictly speaking not a festival, the annual “Provody” pilgrimage at St. Andrew Cemetery and the UOC of USA Metropolia Center also provides a similar opportunity for community gathering, including vendors, cultural events, and Ukrainian foods.
Financial institutions
Two Ukrainian savings and loan associations were chartered in Newark in 1920s: the American-Ukrainian Building and Loan Association and the Trident Savings and Loan Association. The former had assets of $750,000 by 1931 — equal to almost $14 million in today’s dollars. The latter survived the Great Depression to reach assets of almost $18 million in the 1960’s.Encyclopedia of Ukraine. University of Toronto Press, 1993. Vol. 3., p. 594.
The major force in Ukrainian American financial life in New Jersey and beyond, however, has been the growth of Ukrainian community credit unions, which began in a big way after World War II. In 1947, the Selfreliance Association of Ukrainian Americans was founded in New York City as a social services organization to help new immigrants from Ukraine. Branches of the association were established in most major U.S. cities. These branches then established federal credit unions to assist recent arrivals the newcomers with their financial needs. For example, in 1959 Self Reliance (Passaic, NJ) Federal Credit Union was chartered and later became Nova UA Federal Credit Union in 2016. Nova UA credit union web site. It started out in a rented room inside the Ukrainian National Home on Hope Avenue in Passaic. Today Nova UA has more than $118 million in assets and 3,800 members with its own, newly constructed building in Clifton. Other Ukrainian credit unions were established in Newark, Jersey City, Trenton, Perth Amboy, Whippany and South Bound Brook.
Ukrainian credit unions in New Jersey have not only provided financial services, but have also promoted Ukrainian heritage and culture in the Garden State by plowing a portion of their profits back into the community in the form of financial support for community institutions.