Mark Mironovich Golverk
What is your profession?
My civilian specialty is related to the installation and testing of electrical, radio, aeronautical and location equipment for aircraft. In Kyiv, I held the position of Deputy Head of the Assembly and Testing department at an aircraft plant. I was involved in the construction of all aircraft designed by General Designer Antonov, starting in1956, including such famous models as AN-2, AN-24, AN-26, as well as the larger Antey, Mriya and Ruslan.
My military specialty is related to on-board equipment of missile systems. Having started my service in Sevastopol, I worked at a radar station, servicing and repairing electrical and radio equipment for air defense artillery systems. I was sent to study at the Missile Forces Center of the USSR Ministry of Defense in Kubinka, where I received an excellent education. Then I was sent to the Cosmodrome, where I witnessed a UFO, both in the hangar and in flight, which turned out to be an incredible and exciting phenomenon for me. I also had the opportunity to attend a closed meeting of the Committee under the USSR Government on UFOs and Extraterrestrial Civilizations, which included photographs, videos and physical evidence of recognized UFOs. By order of the Minister of Aviation Industry of the USSR, I completed my studies in Moscow under the guidance of American instructors, after which I was appointed head of the Center for the Development of Foreign Technologies at the Kiev Aircraft Plant. For my services, I was awarded a medal and a memorial badge of the USSR Aviation Industry. Tell us about your roots, please.
My grandparents, Kalman Fayvelevich and Anna Solomonovna Volchanetsky, were born
and lived in Pereyaslavl-Khmelnitsky, where my mother, Polina, was born in 1919. Our
family spoke Yiddish, and my mother, having received a Jewish education at a local
school, was also fluent in Yiddish. My father, Miron Moiseevich Golverk, was born in 1910
in Dnepropetrovsk, and later moved to Kyiv, where he began to study at the Aviation
Institute.
In June 1941, being a military man, my father managed to evacuate us from Kyiv to Volsk
on the Volga. He was an aviation engineer and spent the entire war in aviation units.
Were Jewish traditions observed in your family?
You know, over time, many details began to be forgotten. But I remember that we always
celebrated the major Jewish holidays and greeted guests with joy. My mother would
prepare traditional dishes: chicken broth with kneidelach, stuffed fish, stuffed chicken
neck, mincemeat, duck with prunes, tzimmes, pate, eisik fleisch, kreplach, kugel. For
Passover, we would acquire matzah from the synagogue.
Our family was very friendly, and it so happened that we all worked at an aircraft factory.
In 1977, my sister’s family and our mother left for Canada. My sister Margarita worked at
IBM, and her husband, Yura Trakhtenberg, worked at an aircraft factory and, in addition,
was involved in business. It was a success, but in order to achieve it, many difficulties and
trials had to be overcome.
In 1991, my sister and her husband Yura Trakhtenberg helped us move to Canada. I
immediately found a job in a company where I worked until my retirement, starting as a
product quality inspector and moving up to the position of production manager.
What do you like to do in your free time? Do you have any hobbies?
For many years I was fond of mountaineering and even headed a tourist and
mountaineering club, becoming its president. After completing training at the instructor
school, I became a mine rescuer. I managed to conquer many peaks of the Caucasus.
In addition, I really love poetry and even write poetry myself. Some of my poems were
published in newspapers and magazines. I published a collection of poems “Memory of
the Heart” and prepared two other collections for publication.
It’s interesting that I had the chance to meet Vladimir Vysotsky in 1966 in the Elbrus
region of the Caucasus on the set of the film “Vertical.” The fact is that I usually came to
mountaineering camps every year to climb the peaks of the Central Caucasus. Vysotsky
was wildly popular and performed songs and stories. When he died on July 25, 1980, I
came to Moscow and was present at the Taganka Theater at the farewell to the great
poet. I also knew A. Dementiev when he was editor of the magazine “Youth.” And I met
V. Shenderovich during his visit to Toronto.
I wrote the poem “Babi Yar,” an excerpt of which I would like to share here with the
readers of Exodus:
