Mariya Orlyk

Mariya Andriivna Orlyk (; 15 May 1930 – 2 December 2022) was a Ukrainian teacher and Communist Party of the Soviet Union politician. She began teaching in the village called Zolotnyky in the Ternopil Oblast following her graduation from the Faculty of History of the . in 1953. Orlyk taught history and was headmaster of the rural Zolotnikovskaya Secondary School. She served as a Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR between 1975 and 1989 and was deputy chair of the Council of Ministers of the Ukrainian SSR from April 1978 to 1990.

Orlyk was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine from 1981 and was an elected deputy of the Congress of People's Deputies of the Soviet Union from women's councils united by the Committee of Soviet Women between 1989 and 1991. She has been decorated with the Order of the Badge of Honour, the Order of the Red Banner of Labour, the Honored Worker of Culture of the Ukrainian SSR, all three classes of the Order of Princess Olga and the Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 5th class.

Early life Orlyk was born in the village of Kosishchevo in the Monastyrshchinsky District, She was the daughter of Russian working-class parents Andrii Mykytovych Isakov and Yevgenia Trifonovna, Both her parents found employment in their new place of residence of Kirovograd where they settled in 1935. She completed three classes at the school ZOSH No. 3 named after Olena Zhurliva prior to the Great Patrotic War. From 1949 to 1953, she attended the Faculty of History of the .

Career Following her graduation in 1953, From 1975 to 1989, Orlyk served as a Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR, serving three four-term terms in its ninth to eleventh convocations after being selected to stand by the CPU. She was the elected chair of the Presidium of Ukrainian Friendship and Cultures between 1975 and 1978, which worked in cooperation with other friendship societies in more than 100 countries. Her duties entailed the activities of the education ministries, culture, health care, social security, all humanitarian state committees, creative unions and multiple organisational committees. She served on the USSR Supreme Soviet Committee for Women, Family Protection, Motherhood and Childhood.

Orlyk accompanied Pat Nixon, the First Lady of the United States, when she and her husband, Richard Nixon, the President of the United States, visited Kyiv in 1972.

Personal life For 37 years, On 16 January 2009, Orlyk became a recipient of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 5th class.