‘Christmas Around the World’ opens Sunday at NSS Heritage Museum, McMurray
Holly Tonini/Observer-Reporter
A straw ornament hangs from a tree being decorated with traditional Lithuanian ornaments at the National Slovak Society Heritage Museum. The use of paper and plastic straw ornaments in Lithuanian culture became tradition in the United States in the 1930s to represent the ornaments Lithuanians would make for their homes out of real straw.
Traditional Hungarian Christmas tree ornaments made and donated by Earl Jones of Hazelwood hang on display inside the National Slovak Society Heritage Museum at 351 Valley Brook Road in McMurray.
Larry Kozlowski of Monroeville, a board member of the National Slovak Society Heritage Museum in Peters Township, hangs ornaments on a traditional Polish-style Christmas tree. Polish peasants would hang inverted fir tree tops from the ceiling of their homes and over the top of the Christmas Eve table.
Holly Tonini/Observer-Reporter
Ondrejana Zatek-Hill holds her niece, Josie Nicklow, 2, after she and her mother, Connie Zatek, helped Josie place a star on top of the traditional Lithuanian Christmas tree inside the National Slovak Society Heritage Museum in preparation for “Christmas Around The World.”
Holly Tonini/Observer-Reporter
Sue Ondrejco, curator of the National Slovak Society Heritage Museum, hangs ornaments made and sent by Klub Forresta Gumpa, an organization in Slovakia for people with special needs.
The NSS Heritage Museum, McMurray, begins its annual pre-Christmas celebration in September, but this year, it has added a new reason to visit closer to the actual holiday.
“Septemberfest started as ‘Christmas in September,'” said Sue Ondrejco, museum curator.
“As that grew in popularity, it became difficult to contain the mini-festival indoors and having a Christmas theme limited our opportunities to include other interesting ideas.
“I have had this idea in the back of my mind for several years, and since we are celebrating the 10th anniversary of the museum this year, I thought this would be the perfect time to give it a try.”
“Christmas Around the World,” broadens its scope from its Slovakian roots with trees decorated according to the traditions of Poland, Hungary and Lithuania.
The display opens at 1 p.m. Sunday with a visit from St. Nicholas, who will pose for photographs until 5 p.m.
Because Christmas Eve in Slovakia is accompanied by a feast, NSS cooks and bakers will be sharing their culinary talents, serving specialties such as oplatky, unleavened wafers that are dipped in honey and shared by members of the family, and bobalky, small sweet balls of bread which are mixed with either sauerkraut or poppy seed. Frozen potato or sauerkraut pyrohi will be for sale. Visitors will have the opportunity to make their own oplatek, purchase some small gifts and craft a few simple decorations.
The museum at 351 Valley Brook Road, McMurray, home of an animated woodcarving of Slovakian folk life, does not charge admission. The room-sized carving features more than 50 scenes with 82 moving figures.
This year also marks the 100-year anniversary of the founding of Czecholslovakia under what is known as the Pittsburgh Agreement, but the National Slovak Society is even older.
It was founded Feb. 16, 1890, at a meeting on Pittsburgh’s North Side, making NSS the oldest Slovak fraternal benefit society in the United States.
After Sunday, the trees will remain on display on Mondays through Thursday from 10 a.m to 3 p.m. through Jan. 3, near the date of the Feast of the Epiphany, through which Slovaks retain decorated trees.