Polish Minister Anna Maria Anders Cleveland Visit

And the Trail of Hope Exhibit

The Republic of Poland’s Secretary of State will visit Cleveland, Ohio to commemorate her father through the traveling Trail of Hope Exhibit and honor a local survivor who served under her father’s fabled Army.  Minister Anna Maria Anders is the daughter of Polish WWII General Wladyslaw Anders, whose Army’s epic journey across three continents is chronicled in Norman Davies best-selling book, The Trail of Hope. The Polish Government has created a mobile exhibit featuring 15 stations, and this exhibit will be on display at the Polish American Cultural Center in Cleveland’s Slavic Village from September 19 – 30.  A reception will be held at the Cultural Center on Saturday evening, September 22.

Cleveland is just the 2nd American city to host the Trail of Hope Exhibit, which was made possible from an invitation that a Cleveland author received to the Polish Embassy in May to commemorate Poland’s Constitution Day. Cuyahoga Community College Professor Andrew Bajda received an invitation after Poland’s Ambassador to the USA, Piotr Wilczek, learned of his book, Captured in Liberation. Bajda’s book colorfully describes his father’s quest to join Anders Army as a teen living in Poland during WWII, a journey which took him across the vast European continent, including capture and escape from a POW camp.  During the reception, Bajda and his father Marian were invited for a private meeting with the Ambassador. Upon learning more of the story and its impact on the local Polish community, Wilczek phoned Minister Anders to connect her with Bajda and plant the seed for the Trail of Hope Exhibit’s Cleveland appearance.

Cleveland Itinerary for Minister Anders

Saturday, September 22:

2:00 PM – Event with Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur

7:00 PM -  An evening reception (125 seating) at the Polish American Cultural Center in Cleveland’s Slavic Village.  The reception will honor the Anders Army and local surviving members of the Second Corps.  Congresswoman Kaptur will join us, but this will be promoted as a celebration, not a political event. Adjoining the Reception Hall is a local Polish museum that will display the Trail of Hope exhibit from September 19 – September 30.

Sunday, September 23:

10 AM – Polish Mass at the Shrine Church of St. Stanislaus in Cleveland’s Slavic Village. I believe this to be Cleveland’s most beautiful church and was visited by Pope John Paul II when he came to Cleveland.

Noon –  Lunch at the Polish American Cultural Center in Cleveland’s Slavic Village.

http://rajdpamieci44.pl/

Join us at 6:00 PM at the Polish American Cultural Center to welcome…

Three heroic Polish veterans, who recovered from their injuries,and  presently are taking on the challenge of cycling

cross country to honor their fallen comrades from the War in Afghanistan. They are meeting up with American veterans and Polish communities across the US along their very long and hard journey.

The US Challenge team of 3 riders and 1 support person arrived in California weeks ago…and TODAY make their way to Cleveland to tell their story !!

Heartwarming tale….and we welcome them approx. 5 pm Thursday 7/19 in and around downtown Cleveland, as they will be arriving on Rt 6.Po wiecej informacji na stronie internetwoej: http://rajdpamieci44.pl/

We cordially invite you to support our Polish Heritage Garden which will be located next to our Polish American Cultural Center.

This is a great opportunity to create a lasting memory for a loved one or your family to be recognized as supporters of the Polish-American Community in Cleveland, OH. For businesses and other organizations, it is a great way to demonstrate support of Polish-American heritage within the Cleveland area.

Thank you for your kind support! For more information please contact: 216-883-2828

Wednesday, March 19, 2014, 2:00 – 4:00 PM
Western Reserve Historical Society

As part of the series of events celebrating the life and work of Julian Stanczak, a panel discussion on Cleveland’s Polish immigrant community will be held at Western Reserve Historical Society on Wednesday, March 19^th, from 2 to 4 pm. Participating in the discussion will be Gene Bak, Mary Erdmans, John Grabowski, and Sean Martin. This panel discussion will examine the long history of Cleveland’s Polish immigrant community, with particular emphasis on the post-war migration of individuals like Julian Stanczak who came to play major roles in art and culture within and outside of that community. This is a free event. For more information on Stanczak, including details of current exhibitions, see http://www.siegallifelonglearning.org/stanczak-programs.html

On Location: Polish Museum in Slavic Village

Last night Channel 3 News featured our wonderful Cultural Center and Polish Museum in their On Location news report.

If you are interested in getting a private tour of the Polish Museum you can schedule an appointment by calling 216-883-2828 or stop by any Sunday from 11 am – 3pm. (more…)

A member of our editorial staff, kind-hearted, reserved, taciturn, patient, reflective, understanding, tolerant, warm, kind… humble, wise, mature, sensitive, helpful and…    I could use many other adjectives describing an exceptional and good person because it so happens that they all fit his personality.

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“Polska jest, prosze pani. Ja jestem Polakem!” Powerful words of a powerful climax of a powerful play. Chances are they don’t mean much to you, but they meant a tremendous amount to the audience who heard me recite them on stage; and to me, whose self-esteem had been faltering because of the disease that plagued my eyes.

“Mooooom, please don’t make me go. I know Polish just fine, I can speak it perfectly, see?” It was my eighth grade year, and I had convinced myself that the saints, demons, and Greek gods of boredom had embodied themselves in the abomination of Polish School. Every Saturday morning, my mom heard the same suppliant request: “Let me stay home from Polish School today.” Every Saturday morning, I experienced the same simple response: “No.” Every Saturday morning, I had to sacrifice the new episodes of Pokemon that I held so dear to my heart. Polish School had always been a part of my life, and only recently had I decided that I was “too cool” for it.
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Twelve months have passed since the moment of my departure from Poland and my heart was filled with warmth as I viewed the exhibition “Discover Poland” at the Cultural Center. It showed the beauty, history, culture, and economic accomplishments of Poland.

We were able to see the cities of Poland. It is important to mention that many Polish cities are older than the country itself. According to Alexandrian geographer Claudius Ptolemy, the town of Calisia existed in the second century, and the country of Poland began to form in the 10th century. In later years, large cities formed at the initiative of powerful magnates, like Zamość shown on the first picture with its renaissance town hall. The next photograph is the Church of Peace in Jaworze. It is hard to believe that this building formed from wood and clay in the gothic style has a baroque interior. From southeast, we move north. We can admire the harbor in Szczecin, the modern business center, as well as remember the past in the ramparts of King Chrobry. It is impossible not to stop in Malbork, the fortified stronghold of the Teutonic knights. The capitals – old Krakow and the present Warsaw, hold a separate chapter in the history of Poland’s cities. Then, there is Lodź which quickly developed in the late 19th and early 20th century with its many examples of Art Nouveau in architecture. Next was Poznań, popular for its inter-national commerce. Then there was Wroclaw, a city of many cultures. A statement made about the royal city of Kraków says that if “the homeland disappeared, in its monuments one can see the kaleidoscope of Polish history, changes, ways of thinking, and human achievements across the centuries”. It is hard to disagree, looking at the Main Square of the Old City, Sukiennice, and Wawel – the royal castle overlooking Vistula River. Additional pieces of Krakow presented in the colorful pictures are Kazimierz quarters, which was the center of activity at the heart of Krakow for seven centuries. The Jews formed spiritual and economical cultures here contributing to the Polish culture. Currently, the Festival of Jewish Culture – Kazimierz brings back its old charm.

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How many of us realize that the Warsaw Uprising stands as one of the biggest battles of World War II?   This unprecedented Battle for Warsaw claimed 18 thousands lives of the Home Army soldiers and about 200,000 civilian lives on the Polish side, and about 17 thousands lives on the German side.  According to Heinrich Himmler, the Battle for Warsaw was “the most fiercely fought battle from the beginning of the war, equally fierce as the Stalingrad Battle.” The Battle for Warsaw engaged German forces comparable in strength to those of General Rommel’s forces in North Africa during the 1940-1942 campaign. Thus, the Battle for Warsaw effectively limited German defensive capabilities on the western front at the time of the Normandy Campaign and facilitated the Soviet passage to Berlin.  And yet for decades this important battle has been effectively marginalized on both sides of the Atlantic due to political reasons. For many Polish people the Warsaw Uprising still represents a very controversial chapter in Polish history.  Soviets labeled this battle as an irresponsible brawl. This interpretation is deeply engraved in the post-war conscience of the Polish people and represents a prevailing view in the English language historiography.

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Because many witnesses to dramatic events of the past often fail to leave any written record behind, a scholar of Polish history is often hampered in his quest to uncover the truth. And so is a lay person simply eager to learn about Poland from a personalized account. Eugene Bak set out to remedy the problem. His Life’s Journey: Autobiography (Boulder, CO. and New York: East European Monographs and Columbia University Press, 2002) is a combination memoir, travelogue, history textbook, and a business school lesson.

Born in Polska Wola, near Podhajce, the Province of Tarnopol, in Poland’s Eastern Borderlands, Bak’s life was regulated by the daily chores of village life and, on a larger plane, by Catholic and partriotic holidays. (…) The nightmare began with the joint Nazi-Soviet invasion of Poland in September 1939.

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