The history of our ancestors, variously called Rusins, Rusnaks, Rusyns or Ruthenians, peasant members of a micro-ethnic group who populated 1400 small villages on the slopes of the Carpathians Mountains, is well-described in the books, newsletters and websites cited in Resources on this site. The authors and editors of these works have done much to educate readers about the geography and history of the Carpatho-Rusyn homeland as well as the ethnicity, religion and background of its people.

These works describe a village-centric people who entered the United States from the Galician province of the Austro-Hungarian Empire--a people who shared an eastern faith, language and culture that differentiated them significantly from their neighbors.

The ethnicity and history of the Rusyn people are both complicated and disputed. While we include maps and Reference Points to place our ancestors in a comprehensive geographical and ethnographic range, the emphasis of our website will be on four small villages in the former Jaslo povita (district) of Galicia and our Rusyn-Lemko ancestors who emigrated from these villages to America.