“On the threshold of upcoming year we greet you, people of Carpathian Ukraine, with a joyful news: Carpathian Ukraine entering its new life stage. By the Lord`s will the old year brought us liberation from the eternal bonds which are contrary to all Lord`s and human laws deprived us of the most natural of peoples` rights — to live free life on own lands…” The words printed on pages of the “New Time” newspaper 80 years ago are still painfully close to us.
The exemplars of this newspaper dated first months of 1939 were transferred to our collection relatively recently. In 2018, Maecenas Dmytro Pirkl donated them to the museum. However, the phenomenon of Carpathian Ukraine came in the Museum use in early 2000s during the search of the Ukrainian Second World War exhibition. On the state level in 2002, the President of this state, father Avhustyn Voloshyn was awarded a title of Hero of Ukraine. However, the most impressive for the Museum workers was near-death photograph of physically exhausted man, who was a prisoner of the Butyrka prison in Moscow. At the same time they understood that Ukrainians were not only powerless participants of historical events — vice versa, they strived to make their own history.
The “New Time” was popular independent daily newspaper, sponsored by Ukrainian diaspora in USA and Canada, published in Lviv city since 1923. Zenon Pelenskyi, Dmytro Paliiv and others were its editors. In 1926, the "New Time” came into property of Lviv entrepreneur Ivan Tyktor, who created on its base powerful publishing group “Ukrainian Press”. The editors seen their mission in distributing periodicals accessible for everybody. The newspaper had the biggest circulation among all printed editions of Western Ukraine. Artistic compositions and worldwide news (particularly about ethnic Ukrainian lands divided between other countries) were printed on its pages.
The newspaper exemplars donated to the Museum are dedicated to development and declaration of independence of Carpathian Ukraine. A terrible spirit of the pre-war epoch reflected in the newspaper articles dedicated to international relations and informational reports from the leading European countries` capitals. They enhanced dramatic anticipations in Ukrainian Transcarpathia. Articles on the newspaper pages in the most part telling right about Transcarpathian problematics. Development of local legal proceedings, social care, reforming of school system, improvement of the gardening system, role of women in state`s life, railroads system reorganization — these are main topics of articles, written by ministers, scientists and leading publicists of Carpathian Ukraine.
Such articles are convincing evidences that Ukrainians were not outside observers of the XXth century fateful whirlpool. They sacrificially created their own sovereign future with their own hands.