Immigrants from the area encompassed by the former Soviet Union have long been part of Chicago`s ethnic mosaic. Most came from the Baltic region or from the republics of Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia and Armenia. Distinct Lithuanian and Ukrainian neighborhoods still exist, but other groups are far more scattered. Of these, the Russian Orthodox, Armenian and Soviet Jewish communities are among the most visible.
Holy Trinity Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Cathedral on the North Side is the city`s oldest Russian Orthodox church. According to Dr. Anatoly Bezkorovainy, editor of The Chicago Russian-American, the parish was originally founded in 1892 with funds provided, at least in part, by the Czarist government. The current church, designed by Louis Sullivan, dates from 1903; landmark status was granted by the City of Chicago in 1979.
Dr. Bezkorovainy explains: ”The earliest immigrants came from the area of the Carpathian Mountains, a region that was-at that time-officially a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. But the immigrants considered themselves Russians, both religiously and ethnically.”
Additional immigrants from areas just east of the Carpathians came in the years leading up to World War I. After Holy Trinity moved to its current site, a small Russian neighborhood did develop in the surrounding area. But even then, the Russian Orthodox community-which currently numbers between two and three thousand-tended to be more dispersed than concentrated.
A disagreement over the funding of the community`s self-help societies led to the founding of St. George Russian Orthodox Cathedral in 1912. Both parishes are today members of the Orthodox Church in America, a group whose independence was officially recognized in 1970 by the Russian church headquartered in Moscow.
Holy Virgin Protection Cathedral in Des Plaines is not a member of the Orthodox Church in America. It belongs, instead, to the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, a synod established by emigres fleeing the Revolution of 1917. Determined to maintain Orthodoxy as it existed in pre-Revolutionary Russia, churches belonging to this synod conduct virtually all of their services in Slavonic, the traditional liturgical language of the Russian Orthodox Church. Like the churches, stores selling traditional Russian products and imports are both scarce and scattered. Maison Russe Russian Curios in Lisle and Dolgich Imported Food & Gift Co. on the city`s North Side carry a variety of items, including icons (religious images, primarily painted on wood), nesting dolls (matryoshka), embroidered clothing, jewelry, collectibles and painted lacquer boxes.
The Russian stores on Devon Avenue cater to the Chicago area`s growing community of Jews from the former Soviet Union. Walk into Globus Deli, Three Sisters Delicatessen or Kashtan Deli and you`re just as likely to hear conversations in Russian as in English.
Michael Soll, director of the Russian Jewish Cultural Center at Chicago`s Bernard Horwich Jewish Community Center, observes: ”West Rogers Park is the usual `port of entry` for Soviet Jews, and most of the agencies that work with the immigrants are concentrated there. Even so, the immigrants tend to move to the suburbs as soon as they`re on their feet financially. This mobility makes it unlikely that a true Soviet Jewish `neighborhood` will ever develop.”
Soviet Jewish refugees began trickling into the Chicago area in the late
`70s. The number of arrivals escalated sharply as exit restrictions eased, and Soll indicates that most of the current population of approximately 15,000 arrived after 1987.
Shalom Sunday, a three-year-old program sponsored by the Partnership for Jewish Education and funded by the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago, currently provides religious education for 300 Soviet Jewish children. Given the former Communist government`s attitude toward religion, few of the newcomers have more than a rudimentary knowledge of Judaism, and Shalom Sunday helps to fill the void.
Weekly classes are held at both the Horwich JCC and the Mayer Kaplan Jewish Community Center in Skokie. Russian-speaking aides such as Katya Kantor, 15, and Dimitry Pyatetsky, 17, assist the classroom teachers.
Dressed in blue jeans and sweaters, Kantor and Pyatetsky look like typical American teenagers. Their English is fluent, although Pyatetsky has been in the United States for less than four years and Kantor arrived only last May. Both believe the Shalom Sunday program provides a much-needed service.
”It`s important for the children to learn something about their heritage,” Pyatetsky says.
Kantor continues, ”Learning about Jewish culture is as important as learning about the religion itself.”
Reflecting on the Soviet Jewish community as a whole, Irwin Weil, professor of Russian language and literature at Northwestern University, adds: ”Soviet Jews share common psychological characteristics. Growing up in a repressed society has made them wary of authority. And because they had to conceal their real selves in public for protective reasons, they also have a deep cynicism. Balancing these negatives is a real knowledge of world culture, lots of energy and a tendency to be self-starters. On balance, most of them handle the transition remarkably well.”
Like the Jews from the former Soviet Union, the Armenians came to the United States to escape religious and cultural persecution. Most of the estimated 5,000 to 6,000 Armenians in the immediate Chicago area belong to Eastern-rite, Armenian Apostolic churches, although the Armenian
Congregational Church on Sheridan Road is the community`s oldest house of worship.
Rev. Barkev Darakjian, the church`s pastor, explains that Armenians first settled on the city`s South Side around the turn of the century. Darakjian`s congregation was established in 1901 and consecrated 15 years later.
Armenian immigration to the United States escalated after World War I. Even so, the Chicago community remains relatively small but cohesive, bound together by its churches, cultural centers, restaurants and interest in Armenian causes.
