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reprint from the Chicago Tribune, Saturday, June 2, 2007 edition.
Omelan Pleszkewycz: 1908 - 2007
Architect of credit union
Ukranian-American built local endeavor into financial giant
By Patricia Trebe
Special to the Tribune
June 2, 2007
Omelan Pleszkewycz co-founded the Selfreliance Ukrainian American Credit Union in Chicago with just $500 in assets garnered from his fellow refugees in the early 1950s.
Today, the credit union -- the seventh largest in the state -- holds assets of more than $450 million. "He came from the cooperative movement of the Ukraine," said Bohdan Watral, president and chief executive officer of the credit union. "He saw the real need to provide financial services to people who didn't know the language, the customs and the laws and to provide them with financial services. And he focused on providing the best services to the members who were the owners of the institution."
Mr. Pleszkewycz, 99, of Park Ridge, died Wednesday, May 30, in Resurrection Rehabilitation Nursing Home in Park Ridge.
From 1951 to 1978, Mr. Pleszkewycz was the treasurer and chief executive officer of the credit union and became an unofficial leader in his community.
"He had 100 percent name recognition in this community," Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas, who named Mr. Pleszkewycz honorary deputy treasurer in 2003. "There is no one who doesn't know him in the [Ukrainian] community. And he was proud of his heritage, so what he wanted to do was to preserve it and to give everyone the right to being a success in America and to make sure they had the means to do that."
Born, raised and educated in Ukraine, Mr. Pleszkewycz worked as an accountant and auditor for the government and a cooperative.
He married his childhood sweetheart, Emilia, in 1937 and the couple had one son, Alexander. Shortly after World War II the family fled to Austria, then Munich. In 1946 he served as director of a refugee camp run by a United Nations relief agency outside Munich.
Another son, Bohdan, was born in Germany before the family left for the United States. They settled in Chicago in 1949.
Despite Mr. Pleszkewycz's education and knowledge of English, German, Russian, Polish and Ukrainian, his first job in the U.S. was as a laborer for Ryerson Steel.
He and others began the credit union at a Ukrainian social club on Western Avenue. He deposited the money in a local bank but soon the organization grew to the point where it built its own building at Chicago and Western Avenues, said his son Alexander.
"He saw a need for it because he came from that background," said his daughter-in-law Irene, an administrative assistant at the credit union. "He was a very humble man. He did not look to make money. He wanted to help people."
Mr. Pleszkewycz's knowledge and success helped other credit unions as well. He helped found and served as president of Ukrainian American credit unions from 1966 to 1977 and went on to become president of the World Council of Ukrainian Credit Unions from 1977 to 1987.
After he retired from administrative duties at the credit union, he remained on the staff and worked five days a week until about three years ago, when he cut back to three days a week, Watral said.
Through the years, the credit union also has supported hundreds of events and causes for the Ukrainian community based on Mr. Pleszkewycz's example.
"They do so much for the community," said Pat Michalski, assistant Cook County treasurer. "They really are an exceptional organization. And he was a really sharp, amazing man. He always had on a white shirt and tie and always looked like a million dollars. And I know the community just reveres him."
Mr. Pleszkewycz's wife died Feb. 10.
Other survivors include six grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
http://www.sokal.lviv.ua/history-seredni_shkoly.html
Гімназійний хор у Сокалі складався з багатьох учнів-співаків, а солістом у ньому був мій найкращий друг Омелян Плешкевич, син о. Івана Плешкевича, довголітнього пароха с. Боратина. Всі сини о. Плешкевича були дуже музикальні, а було їх чотири: Маріян, Юрій, Омелян і Володимир. Репертуар нашого хору обіймав пісні українських композиторів старшої генерації, з-перед першої світової війни, напр. Ізидора Воробкевича і інших. В програмі академії на честь Т. Шевченка, крім хорових точок, був звичайно виступ дириґента нашого хору Ярослава Кнейчука із скрипковим сольо. Учасником наших академій бував ще один українець — учень чоловічої семінарії в Сокалі, вихованець учителя С. Рейманського, Євген Курочка, родом з Нисмич. Весною 1927 року він помер на діябет у молодому віці.
http://www.iculeague.org/leagueservices/hall_of_fame/hall_pleszkewycz.htm
