Michael M. Petrovich

Michael Milan Petrovich (Serbian Cyrillic: Михаило Миланов Петровић; born 1945) is a retired Serbian Canadian journalist, publicist, translator, activist and philanthropist.

Early life

Michael Petrovich was born in Montreal on 9 March 1945 to Danica (née Sablich) of Srpski Sveti Petar (Serbian St. Peter), a World War II Red Cross volunteer, and lieutenant Milan Petrović of the Royal Yugoslav Merchant Marine, and the grandson of Very Rev. Mihailo Petrović of Raška.

Career

Michael Petrovich began his career in the 1960s as a reporter for The Montreal Star.

Two years before the 1976 Summer Olympics, CBC retained Petrovich when he was seconded to the newly-organized ORTO (Olympics Radio and Television Organization). There he wrote articles and press releases for newspapers such as the The Montreal Gazette, LaPresse) and magazines (TV Guide, TV Hebdo), and edited ORTO Courier, a bilingual quarterly magazine over a two-year period with a worldwide circulation tasked to inform foreign radio and television broadcasters of the forthcoming Olympic Games in Montreal and the progress of each venue.

While at the CBC-ORTO, Petrovich wrote several technical press releases, periodicals, and chapters for an engineering manual, published internally and distributed among broadcasters. He also researched and compiled an encyclopedia of the ever-changing and evolving electronic media. Petrovich received a citation for his special contribution, signed personally by A. W. Johnson, president of the then Canadian Broadcasting Corporation; Roger Rousseau, Commissioner General of the Games of the XXI Olympiad; and Harold M. Wright, president of the Canadian Olympic Association.

During that period, he had a "teaching stint" at Montreal's Berlitz School of Languages, where he taught Serbian to students about to embark on a youth exchange program in Yugoslavia, sponsored by Canada World Youth.

In 1980, Petrovich moved to Ontario, where he worked as a Benefits Auditor for the Ministry of Revenue (Ontario) in Toronto. Petrovich was one of the earliest co-founding members of the Serbian Heritage Academy (SHA), led by Sofija Skorić. Today that property serves as the Serbian Orthodox Eparchy of Canada with the Holy Transfiguration Monastery and bishop's residence are there with the Saint Nicholas Serbian Orthodox Cathedral nearby in Hamilton, Ontario serving as the cathedral church.

In 1985, Petrovich learned that the construction of the Church of Saint Sava, interrupted by the Second World War, received permission to proceed after a 40-year communist government ban. The Petrovich family responded to that early international fundraiser with a substantial bequest and was named Ktetor (Founder) of the Temple of Saint Sava by Patriarch German of Serbia. They also donated to the building fund of Saint Sava's Seminary in Belgrade.

In 1988, Petrovich moved to Windsor where he responded to a government call for affordable housing for seniors and low-income families. Upon receiving a positive reply, he commissioned an architectural firm to design the building and grounds and managed the entire lifecycle of the project, from conception to completion. The community housing project was built near Tecumseh Road and Joe St. Louis in Windsor. The 99-unit apartment building, carrying the name of General Mihailovich Place became a reality on 26 July 1992, when Ptrovich was presented with a certificate signed by Elmer MacKay, Minister responsible for Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation and given personally to Petrovich by a CMHC representative along with other municipal, provincial and federal dignitaries attending the opening ceremony.

Later, Petrovich worked for a private business publication (now defunct) as its editor and writer. In 2000-2001, the late Paul Chauvin of the Centre Communautaire Francophone hired him to write the history of New France ("Who Speaks for New France?", still in manuscript form) on the occasion of the Tercentenary of both Windsor and Detroit in 1701. The following year (2002), Petrovich received bitter news from his cousin Dragan Milenković, son of Vida and Svetozar Milenković, who lives in Switzerland, that their uncle Alexander Petrovich, who had been missing since World War II was [...] in a gas chamber at Hartheim in 1944.

In 2005, Petrovich translated "The Ray of the Microcosm" by Petar II Petrović-Njegoš. The book was printed by Prometej Publishers of Novi Sad in 2007. Petrovich was among the leading founders of Saint Petka Serbian Orthodox Church-Parish of Lakeshore, Ontario.

In his spare time, Petrovich translates Serbian poets.

Works

• Petrovich, Michael M., 'Luigi von Kunits: The Man Who Made Pittsburgh and Toronto Musical', Serbs in Ontario: A Socio-Cultural Description, ed. Sofija Škorić and George Vid Tomashevich (Toronto: Serbian Heritage Academy, 1987): 183–190 Google Scholar, here 185. The article first appeared in the Toronto newspaper The Voice of Canadian Serbs on 27 November 1986.
• Petrovich, Michael M. 'Luigi von Kunits: the man who made Pittsburg [sic] and Toronto musical,' Voice of Canadian Serbs, 27 Nov 1986
• Translator Michael M. Petrovich, "The Ray of the Microcosm" by Petar II Petroviċ-Njegoš. Publisher: Prometej, Novi Sad, 2007.