Daily News Tribune, MA
April 23 2004
Armenian-Americans celebrate, live on
By Mark Benson / Tribune Correspondent
Friday, April 23, 2004
WALTHAM — In her 70s, Alice Der Parseghian created the first of
hundreds of high-quality, hand-crafted dolls dressed in clothing
native to the Armenian villages she fled in 1913 to escape a Turkish
campaign to exterminate her race.
This year, Rebecca Boujicanian, 93, penned more than 50 pages of
a memoir celebrating her 43 years with her husband, a musician who
likewise emigrated from his native Armenia to avoid annihilation by
Turkish authorities.
Today, state representatives Peter Koutoujian, D-Waltham, and
Rachel Kaprelian, D-Watertown, are honoring Der Parseghian,
Boujicanian, and Waltham residents Zabel Assadoorian and Paul
Jelanian at a State House ceremony for survivors of the Armenian
genocide.
Each year, April 24 is a solemn day of mourning in the world
community. On that day in 1915, the Turkish government systematically
killed 300 leading Armenians, then slaughtered another 5,000 in the
streets and homes in Constantinople, the prelude to the murder of 1.5
million Armenians from 1915-1921.
This year, Koutoujian successfully sponsored legislation to
designate April 2004 as Armenian-American Heritage month, and, the
ceremony for Der Parseghian, Boujicanian and all Armenians will add
to our understanding of the history of this race.
“Making April in Massachusetts Armenian-American Heritage month
was very important, because this April, we are not just mourning
losses from the genocide, we are celebrating the contributions of
Armenians,” said Koutoujian, actively involved in archival,
historical and legal efforts connected with the Armenian genocide at
the Armenian Assembly and National Committee.
“My grandparents, Abraham and Zarouhi, fled Armenia but they
were split up — my grandfather went to the United States, my
grandmother to an orphanage in Syria. The American Red Cross helped
my grandfather find my grandmother — he sent for her, and they
created a life in America,” said Kotoujian, whose grandfather and
Uncle Jack co-owned a Moody Street store, near where the Jack
Koutoujian Memorial Playground is today.
“I have fond memories of that store, and my grandfather giving
us candies and raisins when I was about five years old,” Koutoujian
added.
A swatch of stitchery is prominently displayed in Koutoujian’s
Boston office — it is a pattern unique to the Armenian village of
Marash, home to Koutoujian’s grandparents.
Those are the types of authentic Armenian stitches Der
Parseghian replicated in the hems of the dresses and other garments
she created for her homemade dolls.
“There I was in my mid-70s, living in Florida, lonely, and I got
an idea — why don’t I leave a legacy to my family. I loved making
paper dolls when I was young, so, I decided to make a doll for every
region in Armenia,” Der Parseghian said yesterday from her apartment
at Waltham Crossings.
“The bride doll here — I made that based on my Armenian
granddaughter’s wedding dress,” said Der Parseghian. “Then I made all
the dolls for an authentic wedding.
“After that, my husband asked me to make a Vartan doll, part of
blessing the sword and dagger before going to war to fight for our
people,” Der Parseghian said. “The hair for Vartan, we couldn’t get
that right, so I asked my daughter to send me a lock of her black
hair — we used that for Vartan’s hair.”
Der Parseghian’s granddaughter lives in Washington, where most
of Der Parseghian’s dolls are in a home display. In 1983, Der
Parseghian held an exhibit of her dolls in Washington, and, in the
mid-1990s, conservators at the Smithsonian Institute asked if they
could have her dolls for keeps.
Watching Der Parseghian look at her favorite Cinderella doll in
her Waltham apartment, it is clear that the dolls bring her great joy
right where they are.
“In the 1930s, I staged Cinderella, the play, in Armenian, and
added an Armenian prayer to the scene where Cinderella prays to her
fairy godmother for a prince to take her to the ball,” Der Parseghian
said. “That is my favorite scene — the fairy godmother’s wand brings
a prince and Cinderella’s clothes transform to a silver gown.”
Favorite memories fill the 50-plus pages of Boujicanian’s
memoir.
“Many people in my husband’s family were musical,” said
Boujicanian, who also received a letter from Koutoujian and Kaprelian
about today’s ceremony.
“My husband was 16 when he left — he was self-taught,
well-read, a violinist. Our children had those same talents in music.
“I went to a girl’s high school in Boston — I was at the top of
my class of 500 students,” Boujicanian added. “I decided recently,
why not write, why not write about my Armenian husband and our life
together? Many happy memories came back, thank goodness.”
And Boujicanian has created many more — with help from
Koutoujian and Kaprelian, there are more positive examples of
Armenian culture to commemorate.
For those interested in reading more about Armenians, Koutoujian
recommends “The Road to Home,” the 2003 autobiography of Vartan
Gregorian, president of the Carnegie Foundation, who describes his
childhood in a poor Armenian Christian enclave in Iraq.
For details about the Armenian genocide, Koutoujian cites two
books by Peter Balakian — “The Black Dog of Fate” and “The Burning
Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America’s Response.”
Another local resource is in Kaprelian’s hometown of Watertown
— The Armenian Library and Museum of America, 65 Main St.,
Watertown.