Friday 5 November 2021

Business For Sale:
Family Pastimes Co-operative Games

Retiring Doukhobor seeks new owner to continue his family business of crafting cooperative board games about peace, health and ecology

Jim and Ruth Deacove

‘It’s time to retire’, says Jim Deacove. ‘’We haven’t widely advertised that Ruth and I are stepping down after 50 years of the co-operative game business, but word is getting round and a variety of offers are coming our way. The Sales Prospectus summarizes our offer. Some folks just want the portfolio of Intellectual Property.

‘Some want to move the business to another city. Some want to buy everything: the 100 acre farm, our house, the business. In the meantime it is a joy to come to the shop every day, read and answer the mail, fill the orders, make some more games in small batches. Just like the meaningful hobby that was started long ago, a social mission disguised as a business. Maybe 'Small is Beautiful' after all. Could be a perfect fit for a retired couple for a meaningful hobby.’

For details download the Family Pastimes Sale Prospectus. (PDF)

Contact: Familypastimes.com — Phone: 613-267- 4819.
               Family Pastimes, RR 4, Station Main, 796 Brooke Valley Road,
               Perth, Ontario, Canada K7H 3C6


Sale Prospectus summary:
  1. Registered trademark for next 12 years.
  2. No debt.
  3. Equipment — $222,000
  4. Finished goods — $95,000.
  5. Materials — $150,000.
  6. Intellectual property of every game, the artwork for labels, game faces, card parts, available at 10% royalty to Jim Deacove, annually on Gross Revenue.
  7. Books, like Co-operative Parlor Games (30 games, 36 pages)
  8. Rental use of all buildings: main shop, woodwork cottage, storage cottage, two 53-foot trailers for storage.
  9. Customer base from 50 years in business grew to $500,000 before the depression of 2008; since then, averaging $125,000 annually. Except during the Covid-19 period.
  10. Affiliates in the USA, Australia, and Europe.

More
  1. Jim Passing the Family Pastimes Torch: an interview with Jim and Ruth Deacove’, The Humm (Arts, Entertainment & Ideas in the Ottawa Valley), October 19, 2021.
  2. ‘Vaccine’ for a ‘Competitive Virus’, by Jim Deacove. Spirit Wrestlers, April 20, 2021.
  3. Cooperative games? Are you serious? A remarkable Canadian success story.’ By Jim Deacove, as retold to Koozma J. Tarasoff. In 150 Canadian Stories of Peace. An Anthology (2017), compiled by Gordon Breedyk, Mony Dojeiji, Koozma J. Tarasoff and Evelyn Voigt. Pages 265-266.
  4. Why I Wrote My Book on Spirit Wrestlers / Doukhobors?’, October 31, 2014. — Includes an illustrated feature on Jim Deacove.
  5. Film review: Krishnamurti’s Search for Truth.’ Film hosted by Jim Deacove, Cooperative Family Pastimes, Spirit Wrestlers website August 30, 2011.
  6. A Remarkable Evening With Cooperative Pioneers, Jim and Ruth Deacove’, Spirit Wrestlers January 22, 2011.
  7. Co-operative Games and the Inventor Jim Deacove’, August 6, 2008. — A full biography.
  8. Deacove farm (Perth, Ontario) Ploughshares board game.’ Hodge-Podge section of Spirit Wrestlers website July 23, 2006.
  9. Spirit of Co-operation in a Competitive Society’ (PDF), Spirit Wrestlers: Doukhobor Pioneers’ Strategies for Living, by Koozma J. Tarasoff (2002): pages 236-241.
  10. Spirit of Co-operation in a Competitive Society’ (PDF, 5.6 Mb), by Jim Deacove, in Spirit Wrestlers' Voices: Honouring Doukhobors on the Centenary of their migration to Canada, compiled and edited by Koozma J. Tarasoff (1999): pages 183-197.
  11. Jim Deacove, Board Game Designer, Board Game Geek.
  12. A Valley Gamemaker, by Mary Cooke, 2009, Seniors Young At Heart, Ever Learning.
  13. Jim Deacove, Author, Titles, Amazon.com.
  14. 5 Questions with Board Game Designer Jim Deacove, PuzzleNation, July 17, 2014.
  15. Family Pastimes - Jim Deacove, The Games Journal, November 2000.
  16. Does Your Family Play Cooperative Games? Cooperative Games Family Pastimes, by Melissa Taylor.
  17. Meet Jim and Ruth Deacove in Canada, Facebook, February 3, 2012.
  18. Buddy the frog goes to Family Pastimes cooperative games!, video by Juan Uribe, Sep 14, 2009.
  19. Co-operative Games, podcast interview by Sandy Goldman, Each for All, September 11, 2018.
  20. Hope, Peace and Play: An Interview With Jim Deacove of Family Pastimes, Fair Play Games.
  21. Jim Deacove (Family Pastimes Cooperative Games), Friday Special Blend, with Chris White, CKCU FM 93.1 Radio, August 14, 2020.
  22. Local Cooperative Game Company Goes Digital, The Humm, March 2015 (PDF, 22MB), page 8.


Passing the Family Pastimes Torch: an interview with Jim and Ruth Deacove 
by Kris Riendeau, Editor & Publisher, The Humm, October 19, 2021.

When the world seems to be changing incredibly quickly, it’s good to know that some things are made to last. In the case of Family Pastimes, those things come in colourful boxes and contain imaginative and cooperative games! Owners Jim and Ruth Deacove have been running this delightful business in Brooke Valley for 50 years and are now well into their eighties. I have fond memories of playing such games as “Sleeping Grump” and “Max the Cat” with my own kids (who are now aged 27 and 30), so when I heard that the Deacoves were getting ready to sell this established business, I contacted them for more details. 

theHumm: Congratulations on 50 years in business! What first inspired you to create cooperative games, and how did you turn that passion into a business? 

When our girls first started playing games, they were always squabbling and first we questioned our parenting methods until we realized that the structure of the games caused the conflicts. After all, the point of the game was to beat each other. We looked around Ottawa game stores and couldn’t find any games that nurtured the family values we promoted, share toys, help one another, be kind to pets, find peaceful ways to settle problems, aso. Nada. So, necessity being the mother of invention, we started inventing them. Played our creations at birthday parties. Folks asked where they could buy them. Ergo, a cottage industry was born. 

Although the world has changed rather significantly over the past half-century, Family Pastimes has stayed true to the cooperative game model. What have been some of the biggest changes in your games and the way you market and sell them? 

With new equipment, we made our handcrafted versions look more professional. The basic rule of thumb for my designs has always remained, Play Together. That is, I don’t have people against people. What has evolved is that early on, I marketed the games as Everyone Wins or Everyone Loses. My thinking has evolved away from this rather competitive Win/Lose paradigm to How well did we all do? Now we measure the degree of success and there is no losing involved. Didn’t get all of our carrots harvested before winter arrived? How many did we get in? We started out selling at craft sales, then to retail stores, and now we sell on our website www.familypastimes.com 

Why do you think it’s still important to offer kids (of all ages) cooperative, hands-on games to play?

What skills are fostered by playing Family Pastimes games that perhaps aren’t addressed by electronic toys and video games? The list is long from conducive to better health and liking one another; teamwork, shared decision making, openness, trust and safety, self worth and personal power, less aggressive behaviour, emotional maturity…all the myths about competition are dispelled. Cultural conditioning trains us to confuse success with trying to beat others. All games require overcoming some obstacle, but nowhere is it written that the obstacle must be other people. 

I understand that you are hoping to sell the business to someone new who can run it for the next 50 years. What kind of abilities and expertise would make someone a good match for this business?

Having a kind heart is essential. Family Pastimes is very much a social mission disguised as a business. As the business grew internationally, took on a fair-sized work force, the help of local business experts were necessary. Currently, Covid has made us small again and, to be honest, while we have been big and whoever takes on Family Pastimes again may choose to go big, they may realize what we are feeling now and that is that small is beautiful. 

Ruth and I are keeping the business almost at the level it was when we began 50 years ago, as a meaningful hobby. Digital printing, cutting and assembling parts, gluing game boards and boxes and so on are easily learned. It is a little more complicated preparing invoices and labeling cartons, because this is done by internet these days, but that also is easily learned. There are two, if not more, ways the hand-over could take place. A young couple with the technical skills in place could take over. But, also I picture a recently retired couple who are looking for a meaningful hobby would also be a perfect fit. In any case, interested folks can contact me at info@familypastimes.com and I will send them a detailed Sales Prospectus.

Monday 25 October 2021

Jim D. Kolesnikoff (1936–2021)

Jim D. Kolesnikoff, a stalwart of the Doukhobor Movement, died in Hamilton, Ontario on June 29, 2021, remarkably on the exact date of the Doukhobor Arms Burning in Russia 126 years ago. 

Three important historical occasions brought Jim and myself together.

  1. 1957 — December. At the all-Doukhobor youth conference: ‘Building bridges of understanding’. Jim was one of the hosts. The Saskatoon Doukhobor Students’ Group initiated meetings with Community Doukhobor students in British Columbia to jointly discuss ‘Where do we go from here?’ Jim is seated on the right end in this group photo. (See: ‘Young Adult Tour of Western Canada’, The Inquirer, December 1957, pages 8-12.)

  2. 1982 — June 25-28. During the International Intergroup Symposium that brought together over 1,000 Doukhobors, Mennonites, Quakers, and American Spiritual Christians from Russia, to Castlegar, BC. Jim served as Secretary of the Convening Committee of four (Jim Kolesnikoff, John J. Verigin Sr., Jim E. Popoff, and me Koozma J. Tarasoff as Coordinator) and signed a letter to the United Nations.

  3. 1999 — October 22-24. At the Doukhobor Centenary in Canada conference held at Ottawa University, Jim presented: ‘Understanding violent behaviour: the “Sons of Freedom” case’, published in Doukhobor Centenary in Canada (edited by Andrew Donskov, John Woodsworth and Chad Gaffield), 2000, pages 114-128.

These events brought Canadian Doukhobors together to focus on examining our identity in the new world today.

  • ‘Who are we?’
  • ‘What contribution can we make to world society?’ 

That’s how I knew Jim.

Jim was born in Watson, Saskatchewan. His family moved to British Columbia where he graduated from high school in 1954. For several years he worked for the Sunshine Valley Co-op and the Grand Forks Credit Union and was an active member of the USCC Union of Youth in a program of singing, the Russian language evening school program and Iskra.  

In the 1960s, Jim attended Moscow State University where he received his MA in Russian language and literature, returned to Canada, and in 1978 obtained his PhD in Slavic Linguistics at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver.

A big event in Jim’s life was meeting Nina, a Polish student on scholarship in Moscow. They married in 1968 and moved to Canada the same year. They lived in Edmonton, Alberta where Nina completed her PhD studies in the Department of Comparative Literature. The couple moved to Hamiliton, Ontario where Nina became a professor of Slavic Studies at McMaster University. Jim commuted to Toronto where he worked with a company (dissolved in 2002) importing precious and semi-precious metals, and jewelry from Russia to Canada.

In 2002 I published a short biography of Jim and his wife: ‘Slavic Scholars Broaden International Boundaries’, Spirit Wrestlers: Doukhobor Pioneers’ Strategies for Living (2002), pages 232-233. (PDF, 1.3 Mb)

Jim was interviewed by Gregory James Cran for his doctoral thesis: 'A Narrative Inquiry into the Discourse of Conflict among the Doukhobors and Between the Doukhobors and Government', University of Victoria, 2003, pages 105, 128, and 200. (PDF, 5 Mb). The thesis was modified into a book published in 2011 titled: Negotiating Buck Naked: Doukhobors, Public Policy, and Conflict Resolution, where Jim is quoted on page 81. (See my book review.)

Published Obituaries for James (Jim) Kolesnikoff

  • Iskra, No. 2166, September 2021, pages 35-38. Bilingual Russian and English.
  • Grand Forks Gazette, (photo) June 12, 2021. Photo 
  • Today in BC, Black Press Media (Surrey, B.C.) June 12, 2021

Joan Kazakoff Parker (1934–2021)

 Joan Parker (née Kazakoff) of Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, died June 10, 2021 of stage 4 lung cancer. 

She phoned me a few days earlier saying that she was alive and in good humour. 

Joan was born in the Kamsack area of Saskatchewan to Doukhobor parents.

Her son Jeff was looking after her in the home where he was raised and where her husband George, a professional engineer, died May 5, 2018

Surviving are two children Jeff and Wendy, and Wendy’s son Aaron who is а professional chef in London, England.

Her father George Kazakoff miraculously survived the as-yet-unsolved train explosion near Farron, British Columbia in October 1924 which took the lives of Peter V. Verigin and eight others. 

Joan lived in central California where she attended college. She learned of a cousin, Allan Zolnekoff (1953–), adopted by a Dukh-i-zhiznik family near Los Angeles. His mother was her aunt Dunya "Doe" Samoyloff. And, Allan is an adopted cousin of Koozma's webmaster, Andrei Conovaloff, who shared the same step-grandmother. Small world.

In 1984 she toured the Soviet Union with a group that included my mother Anastasia. Smaller world.

Joan was an interesting personality that I have known for many years by email. Though we never met, I interviewed her and published five stories (below). 

Joan did watercolour and acrylic painting, she made jewelry, and became interested in the culinary arts. At the age of 76, Joan Parker published Joan’s Favourites, a cookbook of 350 recipes from around the world including a section from her Russian Doukhobor heritage. The book is liberally embellished with 28 colourful wisdom proverbs I liked so much that I gathered them into a list posted in 2011.

Items I published about Joan:

Monday 5 July 2021

Artist Bill Perehudoff (1919–2013)

Sketch of Bill Perehudoff
by Russian artist Vladimir Gubanov
Originally posted on 2 March 2013.

William (Bill) Perehudoff was a farmer, designer and artist whom I have known since the 1950s. He died in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan on February 26th at the ripe age of 94.

The Saskatoon Doukhobor choir will sing at the funeral at Saskatoon Funeral Home at 10:30 a.m., Monday, March 4. Burial at Bogdanovka (Cee-Pee) Cemetery, 6 miles west of Langham.

For me, Bill was a Doukhobor legend. He illustrated several of my books. In 2002, I wrote:

'One prominent artist in a family of five is an honour. But when the wife [Dorothy Knowles] is also a prominent artist and the children [Rebecca, Catherine, and Carol] are equally promising, that is something outstanding. All were born in Saskatchewan where the landscape and the spirit of the Canadian prairies had affect. William (Bill) Perehudoff (1919- ), the head of the family, comes from a Doukhobor background and has been painting for over fifty years. His passion for form and colours have led him to experiment in his farm studio on the North Saskatchewan River. His perseverance and tenacity appear to stem deeply from his Russian roots.' ('A Family of Artists Reveals Its Prarie Roots', Spirit Wrestlers: Doukhobor Pioneers' Strategies for Living (2002), pp.117-119.)

Little is published about Bill's opposition to militarism and war. During World War II, he was one of 92 Doukhobor absolutist conscientious objectors who chose to go to jail for four months in Prince Albert, Saskatchwan. While many of his contemporaries in the 'English' (other Canadians) world were avid patriots, Bill in his true Doukhobor spirit of plakun trava (meaning, flowing against the current) bravely went against the prevailing military propaganda of the day.

In Saskatoon in 1948, Bill was first known for murals he painted in the Intercontinental Packers Limited cafeteria. In 1952, he began a 25 year career as art director at Modern Press, a company owned by the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool, and publisher of the weekly Western Producer.

I began to know Bill in 1955 when he contributed Mother and Child, the first of his 5 abstract covers for The Inquirer, the first Doukhobor publication in the English language, which I edited. The original was soon purchased by the Saskatchewan Arts Board (page 10). By 1958, we published four articles about Bill's art career.

Pen and ink work by Bill Perehudoff
of the Arms Burning by Russian Doukhobors in 1895

For my first book, Pictorial History of the Doukhobors, published in 1969, Bill laid out the text and did 16 pen and ink drawings of arms burnings and other historic views. I worked closely with Bill as he greatly enhanced this first pictorial book about the Doukhobors. His images filled in a missing visual texture of our Russian Doukhobor heritage. Coming from a Russian Doukhobor background, Bill had a creative feel for his Slavic roots, and admired the Doukhobor movement.

I vividly remember examining the finished book for the first time at the Doukhobor Historical Village Museum in Verigin, Saskatchewan. It was July 6, 1969, the celebration of the 70th anniversary of Canadians of Russian descent. Bill arrived in his station wagon filled full of books and 16 framed pen and ink drawings. We stacked the books for sale on a table at the meeting site. I sat for hours selling and autographing copies, talking and watching people admire the new pictorial volume. I also bought all his drawings, some of which have been on display in my living room for decades.

In 1980, the Doukhobor land and buildings Verigin was renamed the National Doukhobor Heritage Village. For a while my first book become a rare collector's item which sold for up to $700 a copy. Now you can find lower prices online.

Click to ENLARGE
Doukhobor Dress
In 1977 Bill retired from Modern Press, but continued to paint until 2001 when poor health restricted his work.

When I was co-curating the exhibit The Doukhobors: 'Spirit-Wrestlers' at the Canadian Museum of Civlization in 1995-1997, Bill generously donated a large abstract painting of a Doukhobor sash, acrylic on canvas (Tarasoff, 2002: 118) to the Museum. In 1995 he donated a painting ('Doukhobor Dress', right) to the Doukhobor Discovery Centre in Castlegar, BC. To the National Doukhobor Village Museum in Verigin, Saskatchewan, he donated an artistic depiction in colour of the 1895 arms burning which was then used in the Centennial quilt design (ibid.).

In 1994 was awarded the Saskatchewan Order of Merit, and in 1999 was named a member of the Order of Canada. He also received the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Medal.

CBC Interview
At the end of the 1990s the CBC videotaped A Conversation with Bill Perehudoff on resistence to abstract art at his rural home and studio overlooking the North Saskatchewan River. This video was aired again by CBC on February 8, 2013. Bill asserts the need to simplify confusion to allow art to last and 'let colour come alive'.

I feel that Bill Perehudoff is not fully recognized as an abstract modern artist, nor is his Doukhobor heritage well known. A Google search for the name Perehudoff finds 100s of pages about Bill's art career, and images of him and his paintings, even a Wikipedia page. After his death, some of his paintings are being sold for more than $80,000.

In sum, Bill Perehudoff's legacy will carry on not just as a creative artist who experimented with the abstract form as a way to discover something new so as to attract public attention, but also his deep roots in the prairie soil, and in the Russian Tolstoyan Doukhobor tradition of the Spirit Within, including its important nonkilling universal ethic.

We will miss you, Bill, but we will remember the beauty that you have given to the world, as well as the wisdom to work towards a world without wars.

Bravo, my dear friend. Bravo!

Update: 21 May 2018 — Since 2013, Bill's works have been shown and sold in 4 solo shows, 10 group shows, and included in 13 gallery shows.
William Perehudoff (1918-2013), Curriculum Vitae, Artsy. Accessed 21 May 2018.

Update: 5 July 2021 — Since this article was posted on 2 March 2013, it has been targeted with excessive comment spamming. For that reason, the original URL was deleted and reposted here, with the 2 original comments. On 21 July more links and 'Doukhobor Dress' were added.

Thursday 1 July 2021

Tribute to Peter Rezansoff (1939–2021)

People’s Builder and Cultural Mover

Peter P. Rezansoff, age 81, Vancouver, British Columbia, died May 16th, 2021. He is survived by his wife Elsie, his three daughters with spouces, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and many friends across Canada and the world.

Click picture to ENLARGE.

As a biographer of interesting Doukhobors around the world, I have found Peter Resansoff to be one of the most memorable. We first met in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan in 1959 during a farewell visit with zealots, when some of them stopped at our place for the night. Peter told me that he was impressed by the Doukhobor university students who organized the Saskatoon Doukhobor student group, published The Inquirer, yet maintained an active interest in their ancestry.

At that time Peter had only seven grades of schooling which he received in the Hilliers, BC experimental community. However, when he decided to become a builder, he did a crash course in getting his high school certificate before going to the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT) where within two years he completed the Construction Management Program and became a skilled carpenter. Peter was known for his outstanding memory, for being a perfectionist, for ‘thinking outside the box’, and for being ‘a people person’. At BCIT, he was so liked and so knowledgeable that he taught Saturday classes in carpentry.

He was hired in 1971 as a Superintendent of the first company he pursued, Stanzl Construction. In 1981 he moved to Narod Construction where he was recognized for his business skills and promoted to Vice-President. When the company went bankrupt during Canada’s recession, Peter and a colleague Tony McGill formed their own construction company Intertech Construction Group (later rebranded as Intertech Construction: ITC) and became one of the 50 best managed companies in Canada building high rise residential buildings in Western Canada.

(Left to right) Gordon and Vi Bonderoff, and Peter Rezansoff,
USCC Union of Youth Festival 2013, Brilliant Cultural Centre.

For me as for many others, Peter Rezansoff was larger than life. In spite of his humble beginnings, he was not only successful in business, but he found time to sing, to play the accordion, to nurture his Doukhobor roots, and to support his family. He was truly a bridge-builder for understanding across cultures in his philanthropic work with Whatshan Lake Retreat, the Doukhobor Friends of Tolstoy Bakery Café project at Yasnaya Polyana in Russia, in supporting the Mir Centre for Peace in Selkirk College, the Lower Mainland Doukhobor Benevolent Society, and the USCC Community Doukhobors.

In response to one of the stories about outstanding work by his company, on Feb. 15, 2010 Peter replied in an email:

Thank you Koozma in finding interest in the Vancouver Sun Story and for including this article on your Web Site. I am pleased to have received most positive comments from many friends and associates and you are one of these friends. Just as you, I am proud of my Doukhobor heritage and humble upbringing and am not the least ashamed to share this with everyone I meet. Many in the business community refer to me as ‘The Doukhobor Builder’, ‘one must appreciate his past in order to be able to recognize the future.’

One friend wrote me: ‘I lost a great confident and friend. The world lost a true Doukhobor.’ I fully agree! Peter Rezansoff was an honest exemplary Renaissance man plus, and an outstanding example for others. He will be missed.

More About Peter Rezansoff

Nonkilling Message at Global Colloquium

On June 28th, 2021, I was one of 13 people honored to address a 3-hour online international conference titled: ‘Creating an affirmative nonkilling world’. This was my presentation text, which you can watch me read on this video at time 2:24:00.

My presentation begins at time 02:24:00

Nonkilling Message at Global Colloqium June 28, 2021

Hello dear colleagues around the world in commemorating the birth anniversary of the Late Professor Glenn D. Paige — one of the wisdom people of the world — a prophet of nonkilling.

It is very appropriate that Dr. Paige’s birthday on June 28th has been designated as International Nonkilling Day. This date always reminds me also about the historical event of my Doukhobor ancestors. It was on midnight of June 28, 1895 that 7,000 of my Russian Spirit Wrestlers / Doukhobor ancestors burnt their guns in the first mass protest in history against militarism and wars. They reasoned that the spark of God and Love resides in everyone, therefore it is wrong to kill another human being.

Russian writer and philosopher Lev N. Tolstoy pioneered this idea in his book The Kingdom of God is Within You (1894); his message of getting rid of wars inspired the Doukhobors to drop their guns and then get rid of them. When persecution followed, Tolstoy, his intellectual friends and Quakers helped with the migration of one-third of the most persecuted (7,500) to Western Canada in 1899. My grandparents were part of this group.

 At the First Global Nonkilling Leadership Forum in Hawaii in 2007, I was honoured to add Tolstoy as one of the pioneers of Nonkilling to that of Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. and other world leaders and humanists. (Proceedings, page 207) Tolstoy absolutely condemned all wars and looked forward to a new vision of humanity. This vision in modern times came forth from Dr. Glenn D. Paige with the Nonkilling paradigm and hope for a new world order. 

Historically, Tolstoy and the Doukhobors both used the word ‘nonviolence’, but their real meaning, I discovered, was nonkilling. I am honoured that Glenn Paige gifted this insight to me which I have since adopted because nonkilling encompasses the broader notions of love including compassion, universal humanity, and world citizenship.

As a peace activist in many organizations such as the Canadian Peace Initiative and the World Beyond War Inc, I have often used the word ‘Nonkilling’ to describe what I consider to be one of the urgent needs of the day to save us from the scourge of war, terrorism and abuse  and preserve our civilization. Routinely, I end my emails with the words: ‘In search of truth and a nonkilling society.’ Let’s hope the new generation will embrace these important values that Glenn Paige pioneered for the sake of our children, our grandchildren, and the society of human beings.

With the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists at 100 seconds to midnight, we must urgently work together to stop the slaughter of humanity. Nonkilling is the hope and the way to the future.

Sunday 27 June 2021

Doukhobor Arms Burning is Relevant Today

126 years ago tomorrow, June 28, 2021, one-third of the Doukbohors in the Russian Caucasus joined in a daring protest of burning guns — all their killing weapons.

The significance of the Burning of Arms event for the Spirit Wrestlers / Doukhobors is enormous then and now.  Why?

This concrete act catapulted the Russian group into the international arena. Civilization was presented with a nonkilling alternative strategy of living instead of the use of violence from the gun, the bomb and other weapons of mass destruction.

'Arms Burning by Russian Doukhobors in 1895
by William Perehudoff, 1969. Click picture to enlarge.


This first ever event took place June 28-29 (Old Calendar, New Calendar July 12-13), 1895 in three places of Transcaucasia in southern Russia, with 7,000 people involved. It was inspired by Russian writer and philosopher Lev N. Tolstoy by way of Doukhobor leader Peter V. Verigin. 

Today the precarious international relations with world nations demands the same serious attention that Doukhobors applied to guns 126 years ago.  No more killing! No more wars! It's time for the leaders of the world to make war illegal as a crime. 

More

Friday 23 April 2021

Bill Kalmakoff Awarded by Governor General

Update 18 October 2021


'Lieutenant Governor Russ Mirasty presented the Sovereign’s Medal for Volunteers to 19 individuals on behalf of Her Excellency the Governor General at a ceremony at Government House in Regina on Sunday, October 17, 2021 at 2:00 pm.'

'Bill Kalmakoff, Saskatoon 

'For more than two decades, Bill Kalmakoff [91] has served as a community representative at province-wide culture meetings of the Saskatoon Doukhobor Society [sic] and the Doukhobor Cultural Society of Saskatchewan. He has promoted public awareness of and fostered a greater appreciation for the contributions of Canadian Doukhobors.'

Original photos left and right.

The Lt. Gov. staff posted a galley of 61 photos, 3 showing Bill (2 cropped above). Bill's daughter Sandy also took photos and posted 3 on her Facebook page.


Original post:
 
Click on photo to enlarge.


Bill has served as Elder for the Doukhobor Society of Saskatoon (DSS), in 2018-19, and 2014-15.

In 2012, Bill was interviewed for Doukhobor bread making — 60 volunteers bake and sell the 5,000 loaves produced at Saskatoon Exhibition. Interviewed: named: Bill Kalmakoff, John Tarasoff, Peter Holoboff, and Doreen Konkin. ('Doukhobor tradition carries on one loaf at a time', The StarPhoenix, Saskatoon SK, August 12, 2012) 

In 2000, Bill was one of 'Eight volunteers to be honoured by Provincial Medal, Government of Saskatchewan.' 'Saskatchewan’s Lieutenant Governor, Lynda Haverstock, today announced the names of eight citizens who will receive the Saskatchewan Volunteer Medal for 1999. The recipients include William Kalmakoff of Saskatoon, a well-known educator and promoter of multiculturalism, has given his time and energy to:
  • Saskatoon Doukhobor Society,
  • Doukhobor Cultural Society of Saskatchewan,
  • Saskatchewan Intercultural Society,
  • Saskatchewan Organization for Heritage Languages,
  • Multi Faith Saskatoon,
  • Saskatoon Doukhobor Society Newsletter,
  • Saskatoon Doukhobor Choral group and the barbershop singing group Chimo Chordsmen,
  • Doukhobor pavilions at the Saskatoon Exhibition and Folkfest,
  • University of Saskatchewan College of Education Leadership Unit, where after retirement as a consultant he wrote an Education Act for Indian Band Schools.
Sources

Thursday 22 April 2021

Review: Our Backs Warmed by the Sun

Book: Vera Maloff. Our Backs Warmed by the Sun: Memories of a Doukhobor Life (Halfmoon Bay, BC: Caitlin Press, 2020), 263 pp. ISBN 9781773860398.

Peter N. Maloff, 1939; and book cover.

The main hero, Peter Nikolaevich Maloff (1900-1971), was a Canadian Independent Doukhobor, a free thinker, an enthralling emotional speaker, a devout vegetarian, and one who was deeply concerned with humanity’s problems of exploitation, militarism and wars. He shared the Doukhobor historic mission of stopping wars and working to create a good society.

The author Vera Maloff (left) of Shoreacres, British Columbia, Canada, is Peter’s granddaughter. After retiring from a career in teaching, Vera began to record family stories passed down from generation to generation. Through Peter’s self-published book, interviews with her mother Elizabeth (daughter of Peter), historic photos, and news clippings, Vera recreates some of the life of her grandfather Peter whom she adores.

Peter Maloff was born in Saskatchewan to parents who witnessed the 1895 Arms Burning event in Tsarist Russia, which marked the Doukhobor community for life as a group that proclaimed to the world that humanity needs to get rid of militarism and wars once and for all.

In 1913, young Peter moved with his parents to establish the communal koloniya svobody (sovereign, or freedom colony) near Peoria, Oregon,* USA for three years. (Kolony svobody,* The Doukhboor Gazetteer). There he entered high school and developed a keen interest in working towards a war-less world where equality reigns, behaviour would be nonviolent, and caring for neighbours would be the Golden Rule that was taught by Jesus Christ and other religious figures in history.

The commune dissolved in 3 years and the Maloff family went to San Francisco, California, for 9 months where they mingled with Molokane and other sectarians from Russia. Peter learned journalism and Russian grammar by assisting Russian publisher Anton P. Cherbak (Щербаков), and meeting many educated Orthodox Russian immigrants in the city.

In 1919 Maloff returned to Canada and settled among like-minded pacifist relatives in the Thrums area of British Columbia along the Kootenay River north of Castlegar. The community was independent in thinking with a few zealot Freedomite families living nearby that did not easily fit into the orthodoxy of the Community Doukhobors, who were known up to 1938 as the Christian Community of Universal Brotherhood (C.C.U.B.).

The book title describes their field work in the hot sun tending to their vegetables and fruit trees. They sold their produce at markets in Nelson and Trail. They also had a horse or two, a cow, a goat and chickens. Most were vegetarians.

In the 1920s Peter became very sympathetic to the zealot cause of striving for equality, in being against private property and some public education. He joined the cause and was arrested in 1929, 1932 and 1937. However, when the zealots began to burn and bomb homes and public property and used nudity as a way to gain public attention, Peter opposed this terrorism. His own home was threatened with arson and some of his books were burnt. By 1940 he abandoned the zealot movement. [Paragraph edited July 27, 2023.]

The biggest impact on Peter’s life as well as on the livelihood of the Doukhobor community was during World War II when Peter spoke out against militarism and wars. He refused to register for the Draft and was arrested, jailed, tortured, and threatened to be sent to a mental asylum and exiled in Canada in the early 1940s to an isolated two-room primitive isolated cottage near Blewett, about 23 km northeast of Thrums. His health was broken and it took several years to regain his strength.

In 1948, Peter published a collection of Russian articles some he wrote, many he collected that he thought would be of interest to Doukhobors. The 600+ page book, often cited in literature about Doukhobors, was never published in English, except for three articles listed below, bottom.

Author Vera wrote about this neglected eyesore in Canadian history through the voice of Peter’s daughter Elizabeth (Vera's mother) who was given the task of periodically visiting her father in exile bringing him essential food for his survival. The book reads well. Vera acknowledges the professional help of editor Anne DeGrace, who generously and skillfully prepared the manuscript for the final publishing form. Teamwork worked!

The book provides a good view of life among a close community group of pacifists with perspectives on values for survival, a passion for truth and justice, peace activism, conscientious objections, upbringing in the family, marriage traditions, land ownership, market gardening, visits to Dr. Bernard Jensen’s ranch in Escondido, California, and more. Vera’s mother Elizabeth (or Leeza) is a centenarian who with probing by Vera reveals the many facets of life of a struggling family showing what it means to be an active Doukhobor in the 20th century and beyond.

I was annoyed by the folksy English spelling of several Russian words, two of which were repeated by book reviewer Ron Verzuh. In my opinion these Russian words should have been properly transliterated according to the Library of Congress, or Oxford University Press standards — borshch (soup : not borsh, or borscht), pirogi (pierogi, filled tarts, turnovers, knish : not peerahee), and lekharka (female healer : not lyeekarka). (See more examples in: New Doukhobor Song Book, with CDs, May 28, 2013.)

Overall, this is a good read on the Doukhobors illustrated by excellent historic images, with special attention to Peter N. Maloff, the brave soul who has suffered for the cause of humanity. His truth was welcomed, but long overlooked by the general public. His granddaughter Vera has done a good turn by giving a voice to a nonkilling hero. Bolshoe spasibo, Vera. Many thanks!

If Peter Maloff was alive today, he would no doubt extend his anti-militarism call to include climate change, universal health care and drug programs for all, as well as urging all of us to make war a crime against humanity. Bolshoe spasibo (A big thank you), Peter! You were a visionary.

Fun fact: Maloff Spring*, Thrums, B.C. was named after Peter N. Malloff who first filed for a permit to use the water in 1956.

* 3 links to the Doukhobor Heritage website by Jonathan Kalmakoff.

More

Tuesday 20 April 2021

YouTube misspelled "Doukhobor" 68 times

The word Doukhobor was misspelled 35 ways and 68 times in the YouTube closed captions for the USCC Union of Youth video: Peace and Sustainability: How Doukhobor history, culture, and community connects to the Sustainable Development Goals, (22 minutes, March 5, 2021).

NOTE (June 13, 2021) This video was recently taken offline, and is not now listed on the USSC Union of Youth video channel.    

22 other captioned words were also misspelled, and 2 historical mistakes were stated, totaling 92 errors.

For example, in this screenshot from minute 1:30 of the video, Doukhobor is misspelled twice in one sentence.

Correct caption: "I personally identify
as a Doukhobor, and to my knowledge, I'm
a fifth generation Doukhobor Canadian."

Closed captioning “fails” are misspellings of spoken words created by automatic voice-to-text software. These are different errors than the more than 50 ways Doukhobor was misspelled in print by people.

A total of 23 words were misspelled in the online Closed Captioning, and the time-stamped Transcript. The most obvious was how Doukhobor was misspelled 68 times, 35 different ways, never correctly. This means that disabled people probably will not understand the CC text, and anyone searching the closed caption text for the word Doukhobor will not find it.

22 other words also failed to caption correctly. Many are amusing, some phonetically spelled like Dukhoborese. 

To project a serious public image, the captions must be corrected. See links at bottom.

2 Factual Errors Appeared

These corrections were posted in the video Comments, without the links below to the references, because YouTube forbids outside links.

Count 35 different spellings of Doukhobor 68 times in YouTube “Closed Captions”.

Multiple Times (count 49)      Once Each (count 19)
 7  dukabor(s)
 6  duke aboard(s)
 4  dukabours
 4  dukeboard(s)
 4  dukeboro(s)
 3  duke of war(s)
 3  dukeboys
 2  dukabur
 2  duke abroad
 2  duca boys
 2  duke boys
dubois
duca boards
duca boars
ducaborgs
ducavores
duchaboretz     
dukabourg
duke bars
duke boards
duke boars
duke boris
duke of
duke of our
dukeborg
dukeborism
dukelbores
drugs
duplicator
jukeboards

Update: In May 2023 I watched "A Friend at the Door", National Film Board of Canada, 1950, in which Doukhobor was misspelled in Closed Caption as: "dab boards" and "dbo". 

In the 22 minute narration, words were slightly slurred differently, especially Doukhobor. Most of the captions recognized the d, u, k, b, o, r, and s, but scrambled other letters and inserted spaces. As the clarity of voice varied, 6 repeated words (*) were captioned correctly and incorrectly.

22 Other Words
  Spoken   
    alike
    Castlegar*
    Castlegar's
    college*
    Covid-19*
    doms
    Ewashen
    ferries
    Kalmakoff
    Kootenay(s)
    Ktunaxa
    Mir*
    Perehudoff
    Selkirk*
    Sinixt
    spasibo
    Tsar
    Tsilhqot'in (Chilcotin)
    USCC*
    Uteshenaya (Ootischenia)   
Captioned
  a lake
  kasugar
  kassagar's
  call illegal
  kovid 19
  dorms
  awashin
  fairies
  kamikov
  kootenai(s)
  tanaha
  mere
  Pero-hudoff
  soccer
  silks
  spaceba
  sarah
  chiquetmic
  ufcc
  udeshenya
* 6 words spelled correct and incorrect, depending on voice clarity.

The only solution is to edit your own YouTube video captions.

Wednesday 24 March 2021

'Guns to butter' for a Better Future

There are many ideas towards a plan for world peace and development. See 'More' below.

I summarized two proposals posted in March 2021 which I believe are fresh, feasible and authentic regarding converting 'guns to butter' for a better future.

1.  Close all USA military bases


The Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft (QI), has been brave enough to tell the world that some 750 US military bases around the world appear to have little or no usefulness in keeping the country safe and prosperous. 

In a one-hour webinar 'Taps for America's Empire of Bases?', QI president Andrew Bacevich moderated David Vine, Christine Ahn, and John Glaser.

These 3 experts agreed:
  • There are NO exaggerated threats to the USA from the Middle East and elsewhere.
  • The greatest threat to peace is the military-industrial complex.
  • All bases abroad should be closed and the troops sent home. Open Letter to President Biden, March 4, 2021.
  • Funding for peace diplomacy and domestic infrastructure (health care, transportation, education, clean water, housing, etc.) should be greatly increased.
The Quincy Institute is a new US 'think tank' founded in December 2019. It is 'the most truthful and daring of the dozens of these entities that exist in the Washington DC area', according to Sharon Tennison, Founder and Director of Center for Citizen Initiatives, in a March 11th letter to its members.

2.  Putin's 'open system'

Matthew Ehret, Senior Fellow at the American University in Moscow and editor-in-chief of the Canadian Patriot Review explains global 'win-win cooperation' for the future in 'Putin's Vision for an Anti-Fascist/ Open System Future and You' (The Canadian Patriot, March 10, 2021).

Ehret reports that President Putin speaks about an 'open system' of international behaviour that would avoid wars and instead would focus on cooperative efforts of multi world nations for joint security and development, such as the following:
  • Space diplomacy among Russia, USA, and China. Increase working together to explore space.
  • Asteroid defense. Implement a proposal by the Chief of Roscosmos Dmitry Rogozin, nick named the 'Strategic Defense of Earth'. by aiming US President Reagan's 'Star Wars' Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) away from targets on earth to aim for incoming meteors and asteroids.
  • Arctic and Far East Development. By further expanding the 'Silk Road' on rails as proposed 150 years ago, but from South America, north across the Bering Strait, to Europe. Ships are now crossing the thawed Arctic Circle. Development of new cities, mining, transport corridors and energy benefits all nations connected.
  • 'Guns to butter' in an 'open system' world. If all nations cooperate to divert military spending to social needs, poverty can end and global warming stopped.
Ehret concludes: 'If Russia, America, China and other nations of the UN Security Council and BRICS were to apply their best minds to solving these problems rather than fall into a new arms race, then not only would either country benefit immensely, but so too would humanity more broadly.' Agreed! Let's hope it becomes a reality.

This means that we all need to look inward and have the moral courage to make this happen. Peace starts with us. Yes, 'Guns to butter' for a better future!

More

Peace Quest, Rideau Institute, World Federalists. Webinar: 'Peace Prospects in the Biden Era (Thursday, April 1, 2021, 6:30 PM ET). — Free webinar on Zoom. Featuring Douglas Roche.

Canadian Foreign Policy Institute and World Beyond War Canada. Free webinar on Zoom: 'Why Canada Should Leave NATO'. Saturday, April 3, 2021, 3 PM ET. — Free webinar on Zoom.

New Hampshire Peace Action. 'Peace & Justice Conversations:Is Russia truly our enemy? Should we risk nuclear war?' April 12, 2021, 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm ET. — Free webinar on Zoom.

Escobar, Pepe. Welcome to shocked & awed 21st century geopolitics. In Information Clearing House, March 23, 2021.

Fry, Stephen. The Terrifying $1.2 Trillion Plan That Could Kill 90% of Humanity, March 16, 2021. YouTube, 11.16 minutes.

O’Connor, Taylor. 10 Global Peacebuilding Networks. In Transcend Media Service, March 15, 2021. [We can add to this list many others, such as: Center for Global Nonkilling, World Beyond War, Project Ploughshares, Center for Citizen Initiatives, Coalition to Oppose Arms Trade, Voice of Women for Peace, and PeaceQuest. For alternative news sources see Honest World News.]

Zuesse, Eric. Why It’s Especially Necessary to End NATO Now. In Modern Diplomacy, March 15, 2021.

Benjamin, Medea and Nicolas J.S. Davies. Biden’s Foreign Policy — Ten Problems, One Solution. In The Progressive, March 13, 2021.

Healy, Hazel. 10 Steps to World Peace. In New Internationalist, September 18, 2018.

Glaser, John. 'Withdrawing from Overseas Bases: Why a Forward ‐ Deployed Military Posture Is Unnecessary, Outdated, and Dangerous'. Cato Institute, Policy Analysis No. 816, July 18, 2017.

United Nations. Dept. of Economic and Social Affairs. Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Adopted September 25, 2015. Preamble: This Agenda is a plan of action for people, planet and prosperity. It also seeks to strengthen universal peace in larger freedom….The 17 Sustainable Development Goals and 169 targets which we are announcing today demonstrate the scale and ambition of this new universal Agenda….'

World Beyond War.org. A global movement to end all wars.

Center for Global Nonkilling. Promoting change toward the measurable goal of a killing-free world.

Updates

Sahiounie,  Steven.  US-NATO provocation in Ukraine to stop Russian pipeline.  The Duran, April 7, 2021.

Paul, Ron. Why Is the Biden Administration Pushing Ukraine to Attack Russia? OpEdNews Op Eds, April 5, 2021. 

Lavelle, Peter, CrossTalk, RT, April 2021. The End of Ukraine? YouTube, 25 minutes. — Lavelle hosts three panelists: Mary Dejevsky,  Independent columnist, London; Earl Rasmussen, Executive Vice-President, The Eurasia Centre, Washington, DC; and Gabriel Gavin, journalist, policy consultant, Moscow, Russia.

Baldwin, Natylie. The Situation in the Donbass, In Natylie's Place: Understanding Russia, April 3, 2021. — The situation in the Ukraine is extremely dangerous. Heavily armed Ukrainian soldiers with USA weapons are threatening the Russian Republic, as Russian soldiers stand by ready to respond if attacked.