Andy Fedynsky was born in 1947 in Innsbruck, Austria to Ukrainian refugee parents who had fled communist tyranny. He was eight months old when his family immigrated to the United States and soon after settled in Cleveland where he became immersed in the Ukrainian community as a scout and leader in Plast the Ukrainian Scouting Organization, a student at Ukrainian Saturday school, and a regular attendee of Ukrainian events.
After graduating from the University of Notre Dame where he spent a year abroad at the University of Innsbruck in the city of his birth, he became a public school teacher and coach at West Junior High. On Saturdays, he returned to the Ukrainian school of his youth and taught Ukrainian history keeping lessons interesting and relevant by contextualizing Ukrainian history with US and world history. Simultaneously, he spent his summers as an activist with Smoloskyp, an organization devoted to the cultural and political rights of Ukraine and Ukrainians under Soviet occupation. This involved writing articles and press releases, participating in conferences abroad, lecturing at universities and civic organizations, lobbying officials, and even smuggling printing equipment to underground political movements in communist countries. In 1977, he was arrested by Yugoslav secret police for staging a press conference in Belgrade during an international conference.
This activism led him to work on Capitol Hill in 1978 as foreign policy advisor to Senator Bob Dole. Following completion of a Masters Degree at John Carroll University in 1980, he joined the Washington staff of Congresswoman Mary Rose Oakar working on Cleveland development and interfacing with a myriad of ethnic and other community groups. He eventually rose to be her chief of staff. In 1987, he returned to Cleveland, still working for Congresswoman Oakar, to organize the Ukrainian Museum-Archives in Tremont after the passing of his father, the Museum’s director. The Museum became a life-long passion for him. In the process, he met his wife Christine, his life partner and mother to their son Michael and daughter Alexa.
Over the past 30 plus years, Andy has taken the Museum to a new chapter-from a worn-out wood frame building to a campus, establishing partnerships with academic and cultural institutions in the US and abroad, and a robust internship program. The Museum welcomes visitors and scholars from institutions like the University of Notre Dame, The Ohio State University, John Carroll University, Cleveland State, the Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv, Ukraine among many others.
Andy was a long-time columnist for the Ukrainian Weekly newspaper, taught courses on Ukrainian history at The Ohio State University and frequently gives presentations to students visiting the Ukrainian Museum. As Ukraine grows on the American political agenda with Russia’s invasion of Crimea in 2014 and the full-scale invasion in 2022, he has appeared on local and national news as an expert both on regional history and on local efforts to support Ukraine. Federal, state and local officials regularly reach out for his advice on Ukraine and U.S. policy.
Andy recognizes the US as a nation of immigrants, with Ukrainians constituting a significant part of the ethnic diversity in Cleveland and beyond. He sees supporting the Ukrainian community and supporting other immigrant groups as part of the same mission. He has devoted his life to the Ukrainian community, to ethnic communities in the US, and to Cleveland.
Andy will be inducted by United Ukrainian Organizations of Ohio President George E. Jaskiw, M.D.