Mykola Francuzenko Papers

Biographical / Historical

Mykola Francuzenko (Mykola Frantsuzhenko, Микола Француженко, literary pseudonym Mykola Virnyi/Микола Вірний, on-air pseudonym Mykola Tereshchenko/Микола Терещенко) was a Ukrainian writer, radio journalist, actor, and social activist. His literary output includes over 400 works, and he was a writer and broadcaster for the Ukrainian services of Radio Liberty and the Voice of America during the Cold War.

Francuzenko was born on November 25, 1923 in the city of Krasnokutsk (Kharkiv oblast', Ukrainian SSR). In 1938, his father was arrested as an "enemy of the people". Mykola completed his secondary education in Zhytomyr in 1940, and began medical school in Kharkiv, but his studies were interrupted by the war.

After two years of military officer training, he was dispatched to the front, but was wounded in combat and taken as a prisoner of war by the Nazis. He joined the 1st Division of the Ukrainian National Army ("Galizia Division") under General Pavlo Shandruk in 1944. From 1945 to 1948 he was an Allied POW in Bellaria and Rimini, Italy, and then in England. While in England, he met Jaroslawa Hubarzhevs'ka, the daughter of Fr. Ihor Hubarzhevs'kyi, the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church Administrator for Great Britain. They were married in August 1958.

He worked for Radio Liberation (later Radio Liberty) in Munich, Germany from 1957 to 1962, then as the head of Radio Liberty's New York Ukrainian bureau from 1962 to 1966. While there, he continued his education, eventually receiving a Master's degree from Norwich University.

In 1966 he joined the Voice of America, eventually becoming the Chief of the Ukrainian branch. He retired in 1990. After retirement, he focused primarily on writing, penning a number of published and unpublished essays, novels, and works on Ukrainian Orthodox church history. He died on October 28, 2007 in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Scope and Contents

This collection consists primarily of scripts, notes, research materials, and audio recordings related to Francuzenko's work at Radio Liberty and the Voice of America. It also contains photographs and drawings from the Rimini POW camp, personal photographs and audio recordings, audio recordings of interviews, correspondence, and writings.

This collection is not fully processed. Therefore, this finding aid is subject to change.

Related Archival Materials

A portion of Mykola Francuzenko's papers reside at the National University of Kyiv Mohyla Academy (Kyiv, Ukraine): https://library.ukma.edu.ua/kolektsii/kolektsii/315-frantsuzhenko-virnoho-mykoly

Legal Status

The Voice of America materials in this collection are records of the U.S. Federal Government. However, the National Archives and Records Administration has deemed them to be "non-permanent", and they are therefore allowed to reside at this repository (ref: email correspondence of NARA Office of General Consul with the Ukrainian History and Education Center, May 2014).