Part two of a two-part series
They wanted to relocate their family in the United States, but maybe only the three children of Stephen and Katherine Masenko might be able to make it. Fearing Stephen might not pass the necessary physical examination, they intended to send their children to America alone if that was the only way to get them there. The couple so hated and feared communism, they felt there was no viable future for their family in Europe.
Stephen, as a Ukrainian, had first survived fighting during the Russian Revolution of 1917 and later as a slave laborer in Nazi Germany. His young family had survived bombing during World War II (1939-1945). In the later 1940s, the family was living in the cramped quarters in one of the post-war camps in Germany for displaced persons.
In the camp caring for the Masenkos, children were warned to be wary around any Russian authorities. They visited the camp and attempted to entice children into their big black cars. Those entering those vehicles were never seen again.
It was a relief when Stephen was deemed healthy enough to enter the United States. The family would not be separated and would be resettled in the United States in 1950. They may have ended up in Houston County with a Methodist family, Carl and Hazel Hartman, because their application said they were Methodists. Many years later, the Hartmans discovered the Ukrainian family, back in Europe, had actually been Eastern Orthodox. Evidently, it was easier to get to the United States as Methodists. “We did not blame them,” wrote Hartman daughter Anita Hartman Lee Palmquist. “They were desperate to get to America.”
In Houston County, the Masenkos attended the Hokah Methodist Church along with the Hartmans. The children participated in Sunday school and Youth Fellowship. Son Orest and oldest daughter Larissa were confirmed and joined the church.
The community readily welcomed their new European neighbors. “Larissa’s classmates loved her,” recalled Palmquist. “They shared their clothes with her until she was the best dressed girl in school.”
At age 14, Larissa was “wise beyond her years … She could be objective about a situation and could make her parents understand when my father could not. She often made decisions for the family and they trusted her to do so.”
When the Hartman family prepared the old abandoned, five-room farmhouse for the refugees, they knew it would be adequate although not as spacious as might be best for a family of five. There was a bedroom for Orest and a bedroom for the two girls as well as one for the parents. A pantry adjoined a large kitchen. But to the Masenkos, it evidently seemed like a spacious palace. After two weeks, the family was living in only two rooms. “They had lived in crowded conditions for so long” concluded Palmquist, “they could not stand to rattle around in all that space.”
Carl, wanting the Masenkos to feel they had paid their own way and to establish a work ethic, insisted they work off the cost of their passage to America. Each week, he took a small portion of their wages to apply to that repayment. Palmquist added, “It cost my parents much more to maintain the family than they ever received in work in return.”
Katherine and the two girls helped Hazel Hartman by cleaning, ironing clothes and helping clean eggs. At Easter, the Masenkos shared their beautiful Ukrainian Easter eggs. Their first Christmas gift to Hazel Hartman was a piece of Ukrainian embroidery from their few possessions. Palmquist termed it a “gift of love.”
Katherine was the “mainstay,” always cheerful and loving. However, she persevered while not receiving any news from her relatives back in postwar Communist Czechoslovakia. But she did not dare to write them, fearing she might endanger their lives. “We could only show her kindness and empathize with her sorrow,” lamented Palmquist.
Stephen Masenko was described as kindly man but one who seldom smiled. “He appeared to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders,” wrote Palmquist. “He, of all the family, had suffered the most.” Stephen did his best to help Carl Hartman on the farm, but he was awkward and unaccustomed to physical work.
Christmas came early after their arrival that autumn, and the Hartman’s invited the Masenkos to Christmas dinner. When Stephen did not show up for dinner, Carl went out to find him. Stephen came reluctantly, maintaining someone must be in the stable to care for the animals, and took that responsibility upon himself. He ate quickly and returned to the barn.
At first, youngest daughter Yaraslava had difficulty adjusting, extremely shy with “a certain haunting sadness about her,” recalled Palmquist. Her family was part of the decision to place her, about age seven, in first grade. She picked up English quickly, made quick academic progress and became a happy, smiling child.
Orest was less ambitious than his two sisters and could be sullen at times. Believing in American prosperity, he expected the family to soon own a camera and an automobile. Carl Hartman patiently explained that even Americans may have to work a lifetime before enjoying such luxuries.
The Masenkos, longing to reconnect with their countrymen, eventually moved to a Ukrainian community in Milwaukee. Stephen worked for a company as an accountant; Katherine found a job in a bakery. The children attended college. Larissa married a Ukrainian social worker and sent photos of her son.
Yaraslava became a librarian and made a couple trips back to Houston County to visit the Hartmans before Stephen died. After her parents had passed away, Anita Hartman Palmquist kept in touch with Katherine.
Palmquist closed, “They were an important part of our family and our community. No other American citizens could be more loyal … they were not leeches on society. They earned their way. In spite of a lifetime of suffering, they carried a high set of values important to our democracy.”
Source: “The Masenkos,” a memoir by Anita Hartman Lee Palmquist, 1995
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