THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE OIL INDUSTRY FOR THE POPULATION OF BORISLAV IN THE CONTEXT OF STEFAN KOVALIV՚S CREATIVE HERITAGE

Abstract

On the basis of Stefan Kovaliv՚s creative heritage, the article describes the key problems and consequences for the local population during the development of the oil industry in Boryslav during the second half of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.It was found that S. Kovaliv՚s active interest in the history of his native land, namely, Boryslav and his suburbs began, apparently, from the time when on January 27, 1879 Drohobych District School Council appointed him as the temporary head of a four-year Boryslav school. It was at that time that Borislav turned into a large oil industrial centre, which gave its owners millions of revenues. However, the process had a number of disadvantages: the massive plundering of peasant farms, which led to the complete impoverishment of the local population. The article emphasizes that while working in Borislav S. Kovaliv had the opportunity to be a direct witness to those negative phenomena that were the result of the so-called oil boom in Borislav: the transformation of local peasants into poor rabbit workers, the loss of their elementary resources or material means of livelihood, mass drunkenness, begging, emigration, and the most painful problem – the mass of fatalities due to the neglect of elementary safety rules at oil factories.In the course of the study we found that S. Kovaliv paid a lot of attention to highlighting the most pressing and painful problems during the development of the oil and ozokerite industries in Boryslav. It is also emphasized that S. Kovaliv՚s creative heritage of Borislav՚s oil industry is rich, first of all his personal observations and vivid descriptions. The approach, in turn, makes it possible to truly ascertain the problems of living conditions and life of the population, which was burdensome during the upsurge of the oil boom in Boryslav during the lifetime and creative activity of the Borislav writer.The scenes outlined in the article are just an attempt to show those questions that were the subject of close attention of the Boryslav writer during the last quarter of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, to which he drew attention and singled out in his writings.