“Books: Our Pathway to Knowledge” Fund

Amount: $50,000
Donor: Dmytro Bycyk

Designation: The fund supports Ukrainian books for children and youth published on a historic theme or as popular literature written by authors from Canada, Ukraine, and the diaspora.

Background: Dmytro (Wasyl) Bycyk was born in 1924 in the Brody township of Ukraine’s Lviv region. In the early 1940’s, he joined the forces struggling for Ukraine’s independence. In 1944, he was conscripted into the Red Army. As the war between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany raged, Dmytro Bycyk was caught and imprisoned by the advancing Germans. To his great fortune, he managed to escape the German POW camp and flee westward to freedom.

In 1950, as a post-war refugee, he arrived in Canada and settled in the town of Guelph, Ontario. Dmytro Bycyk’s life was not always easy. Like so many immigrants who came to this country with no family and little money, circumstances forced him to take jobs that were often physically gruelling. But his love for his new country and his community never wavered. He was an avid supporter of the League of Ukrainian Canadians and Ukrainian Youth Association, demonstrating a life-long dedication to the latter organization and its summer camp in Acton, Ontario. Mr. Bycyk’s donation to BCU Foundation is a symbolic gesture of thanks to the community that served as his surrogate family throughout his life in Canada. It fulfills his life-long desire to educate young generations about the history of their ancestral homeland.