History

Penal camps have a centuries-old "tradition". Many of them were established in isolated and unhealthy places of the world, where it was not possible to encourage free emigrants to settle. These were places where labor was needed to build roads and fortifications, to work on plantations, fell trees and extract natural resources.

Do Poles today remember about the huge sacrifice and participation of the American Polonia to make Poland appear again on the world map as a sovereign and independent state? It is difficult to answer this question today. The rapidly changing geopolitical reality brings many new and unfavorable circumstances for our homeland, which make us reconsider the fate of Poland.

In 1917, Jan Ignacy Paderewski composed and wrote the words of the song Hej, Orle Biały! The song was to be the battle anthem of the Polish Army in France, known as the Blue Army. On the New York first edition of the song from 1918, the composer ordered a note reading: "all proceeds from the sale of this anthem are intended for national purposes".

After inflicting unprecedented death and destruction on Poland and its people during World War II, Germany arrogantly spurns Poland’s demand for reparations.

Despite the threat of loss of life and the destruction of their works, over two thousand nuns during the German occupation of Poland became involved in saving Jewish fellow citizens. The sisters gave them food, medicines, and sheltered them. They risked it because the Gospel and the sense of universal solidarity dictated it.

This work appeared in connection with the centennial of Poland’s rebirth as an independent state in 2018. Its focus is Poland-United States diplomatic relations. Several highly respected individuals contributed to it.

Poland was devastated during WWI (1914-1918). Poles living in America initiated the Polish White Cross and Polish Gray Samaritans of YWCA, which recruited nurses to support Polish soldiers and families. These actions were critical to Poland's postwar rebuilding efforts. Sadly, their stories have been forgotten.

There were at that time in our country, in Poland, people who had extraordinary courage; who deeply in their hearts had the ideals of humanity, respect for life, for other people, love of neighbor - yes, the Christian one - of the great ethos of the Commonwealth of many nations, which together for years after regaining independence in 1918 they co-created as a free, independent, sovereign Poland, imbued with these ideals so deeply that they were not afraid.

He was an extremely active political activist, the author of many books, hundreds of articles, he was involved in many open and less open political actions. Without the involvement of people such as Jerzy Giedrojć and the creators of the Parisian Culture, as well as Jan Nowak-Jeziorański and RFE, Poland's full independence would not have come so quickly.

Jerzy Giedrojć is a man who is completely unknown to the young generation. And yet, despite the fact that he remained in exile after World War II, he had a huge impact on the thinking of Polish intellectual elites and, through them, also on the thinking of Poles. He never returned to Poland, but many of his ideas were used to build the foundations of the Third Polish Republic.

Were the fears of a large part of the Polish community, mainly from the East Coast, justified? The announcements of changes at Exchange Place were very radical. Polonia had a bad experience with the authorities of Jersey City a few years ago, when the monument was in danger of being moved...