Before I came here to Western Pennsylvania in 2017, I visited St. Mary Orthodox Church in Benld, Illinois. I believe that church was founded by Rusyns (as are many of our churches here in PA). I chose to come to Western Pennsylvania instead. I serve St. John the Baptist Church here in Black Lick. The late Archbishop Job is buried behind the altar. He had hoped to retire here, where he had been rector before becoming a bishop. Sadly, he died before his sixty-fifth birthday, when he had planned on retiring.

Donna:  Hreblia is in Zakarpattya Oblast, Ukraine, 10 miles SE of Dorobratovo where my maternal grandfather Charles William BIDZILYA was born in 1892.

I've taken Ancestry autosomal (non-gender) DNA test, Y paternal and MT maternal DNA tests.  Subscribe to Ancestry, My Heritage, Family Tree and GEDmatch.com.  Have you or relatives taken a DNA test that I could compare?

Hi Charlie,

Both of my mother's parents are buried in the churchyard of St Marys Russian Orthodox church in Royalton IL.

Her father migrated to the U.S. in 1907 from the village of Felso Karaslo in Austria-Hungary, a place now called Hreblja in western Ukraine. His name on the passenger list of the Slavonia was Vaszily Bilak, his nationality was given as 'Hungary' but his Race or People was 'Ruthenian'. He later anglicised his name to Charles Belik but I've seen lots of variation on the spelling of the surname. Young Vaszily/Charles was on his way to join his father, who arrived 2 years earlier, and I understand Charles had a brother, Nick, who also emigrated.

According to family stories, they came to the U.S. for a couple of reasons: for better working conditions and to escape the draft. They were farm laborers and (again according to family stories) were not treated well on the estate where they were employed, and decided to try their luck elsewhere. In the U.S. they took jobs in the coal mines, first in Pennsylvania, later in Oklahoma, before Charles and Nick came to southern Illinois, to Royalton. In Royalton Charles met Marta Molnar Popovich, a young widow, and married her in 1919. My mother was born later that year. Marta was also from Felso Karaslo and came to the U.S. in 1911 with her older sister Anna; they joined their brother Janos in St Louis MO. Anna also married a coal miner and she also lived in Royalton.

As to why Rusyn families went to southern Illinois, I've recently read a history of Williamson County (Bloody Williamson by Paul M. Angle) which mentioned that coal mines were being opened in Franklin County just north of Williamson during the period our families came into the area. They were following the jobs, most certainly. It was dirty and dangerous work but as migrants who probably didn't have much English, they had to take what they could get.

Hope this helps your research.

Donna