Bethlen Naptár, 1957 (Ligonier)
Officers and supreme council members of the Hungarian Reformed Federation of America 1957-1961
220 BETHLEN NAPTÁR ZIGMOND PALAGYI, another of our second generation Americans, was bom in Lelesz, County of Zemplen, Hungary, in 1911, of Calvinist parents. He was brought to this country as a youngster and received his education in Elyria, Ohio, where he attended public school and high school. He has been a city fireman since 1942 and has been working for our Federation since 1937. During World War II Mr. Palagyi served in the Armed Forces of the United States in the N.C.B. 25th. Spec. Stevedores, for 27 months. A member of the Magyar Evangelical and Reformed Church of Elyria, he is president of the Ushers’ League. He finds time to be an active member of the American Legion V.F.W., Frank S. Harmon Lodge, and the Masonic Chapter. With an up-and-coming family of four children and an active wife Helen, Mr. Palagyi confesses that his favorite hobby is his family: Zigmond Janos, 17; Susan Elizabeth, 9; Sari Ilona, 6; and Albert Michael, 16 months. He also confesses that his musical knowledge embraces tuning in his TV set and that his favorite sport is football. As a newly-elected member of the Supreme Council of the Federation, we trust that “Zig” will make many “touch-downs” for our beloved fraternal. Zigmond Palagyi, Eliria, Ohio. DR STEPHEN SZABÓ, preacher, lecturer, author, is minister of the First Hungarian Evangelical and Reformed Church of Cleveland, Ohio. He was bom and educated in Hungary but studied extensively in the United States in the Seminary of the Reformed Church in the U.S.A. in Dayton, Ohio, where he was ordained; in the Western Theological Seminary of the Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh, where he obtained a Master of Theology degree; and in the University of Debrecen, Hungary, where he earned his Doctor of Philosophy degree. Dr. Szabó could not return to Hungary after the completion of his mission be‘ cause World War II had broken out. He remained in America. In 1941 he married Margaret Újlaki, daughter of Dr. Francis Újlaki, then pastor of the Toledo Hungarian Reformed Church and became his successor in 1944. After the copletion of his studies in the United States he returned to Hungary and held pastorates in Miskolc, the city of his birth, and in Budapest, from where the General Synod (Conventus) of the Magyar Reformed Church sent him to the United States in 1940 as an envoy in order to strengthen ties between the Hungarian Churches in America and those in Hungary. During this mission he held a lecture and preaching tour throughout the Hungarian Reformed Churches in the United States. Dr. Stephen Szabó, Cleveland, Ohio.
