Діяльність Степана Гайдучка в Карпатському лещетарському клубі (1924–1939)

For the first time, on the basis of documents from the Central State Historical Archives of Ukraine in Lviv, the State Archives of Lviv Oblast, private archives of Stepan Haiduchok and Volodymyr Pankiv (Lviv), and the periodical journal «Dilo» (Bussiness) (Lviv), the article examines the participation of the teacher and public figure in the formation and development of the Carpathian Leshchetar Club (CLC). Using a wide range of sources, its activities in 1924–1939 are reconstructed. The lower boundary is 1924 – Stepan Haiduchok’s efforts to establish the CLC in Lviv, and the upper boundary is the beginning of the Second World War. It is established that it was Stepan Haiduchok who, together with other enthusiasts of leshchetar (skiing) sport, created the CLC and he became an active member of this sports organisation for 15 years. His important work in the context of preparing and delivering lectures on sports topics for both members of the CLC and all winter sports enthusiasts, as well as publications for Lviv journals, in which he popularised various sports, including leshchetarstvo(skiing), covered the history of the CLC, and a healthy lifestyle, is emphasised.

The article highlights the activities of Stepan Haiduchok in the 1920s and 1930s as a leshchetar(skiing) trainer and a hiking instructor. His work as a judge of the leshchetar(skiing) competitions held in Lviv, its environs, and in Slavsk is analysed. It is noted that Stepan Haiduchok was elected an honorary member of the CLC on 20 May 1929 at the General Meeting of the CLC for his great services to the organisation and the sports community of Ukrainian Lviv.

The author emphasises the important activity of Stepan Haiduchok as one of the founders, an active and honorary member of the CLC, who did much for the development and popularisation of sports and national-patriotic education of Ukrainian youth in Galicia in the interwar twentieth century.