The first time Luba Hlutkowsky danced at the Pittsburgh Folk Festival, she was just two months away from having her first child.

She hadn't expected to perform. Her assignment was to teach Ukrainian dance steps to another woman, but her student didn't dance well.

"Can you imagine?" Mrs. Hlutkowsky said. "I was then seven months pregnant and had to play the part of a girl who wants to charm a guy." She laughed aloud at her 49-year-old memory.

The folk festival is celebrating its 50th anniversary, and Mrs. Hlutkowsky, 68, has taken part in all of them. For many years she has been director of the Ukrainian dance troupe Poltava. A resident of Carnegie, she also serves as vice president of the festival's board of directors.

Born in western Ukraine, she fled with her parents to Austria at the end of World War II. After living for several years in a Displaced Persons camp, her family came to Pittsburgh in 1949. She was 11 and spoke no English.

"My father chose the U.S., because he knew that he had an uncle there," she recalled.

The trip across the Atlantic Ocean was rough, and she was seasick. The first English word she learned was "grapefruit."

"It was the only food I could keep down," she recalled.

The day after the family arrived in Pittsburgh, her father went in search of work. Her father, Michael Baran, had been a barber in Ukraine, and he soon found a barbershop.

Since he did not know a word of English, he first spoke to the owner in German, according to family history.

"Can you speak German?"

"Yes," the owner replied.

"Can you speak Ukrainian?" her father continued.

"Yes," he said, in Ukrainian.

The shop owner also was Ukrainian, and her father had found a job.

Her mother, Gisela, had been a teacher in Europe, but because of her unfamiliarity with English, she worked as a cleaning woman and dish washer.

As a child, Mrs. Hlutkowsky learned many Ukrainian dances. Starting as a young woman, she both performed and taught those folk dance steps.

"My parents always taught me to love Ukraine," Mrs. Hlutkowsky said. She has passed on that love to many others, including her children and grandchildren.

The annual folk festival, she said, is a good place for people to learn about other cultures and other traditions and to show pride in their own nationalities.

"Children need to be proud of the legacy of their homeland," she said.

One of the all-time highlights of her folk festival experiences came in 1980. "My children and I danced, and my parents sang," she said.

Her daughter, Sonya, and son, Roman, learned to dance at an early age and were performing at the festival by the time they were 5 and 3, respectively.

Family connections with the festival have continued. Her daughter, now Sonya Soutus, is a vice president for Coca-Cola International. Her company is this year's main festival sponsor.

Her son, Roman, a vice president of FedEx Ground, soon will take over as director of the Ukrainian dance company.

A fourth generation of her family -- granddaughters, Chrystyna, 13, and Oriana, 11 -- will dance at the festival this year, demonstrating some of the many steps they learned from their grandmother.

Mrs. Hlutkowsky likes to quote the Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko, who once wrote: "Learn, my brother! Think, read. Study the unfamiliar, but do not shun your own."

Those dual goals are what the Pittsburgh Folk Festival is all about, she said.