History

The history of Polish Texans is not very well known. Very few people among the Polish diaspora realize that Texas was the first landing place for Polish refugees escaping the hardships after the November Uprising of 1830; also the site of the first Polish settlement in America; the first home for a Polish Catholic church and parishes on the continent; and the location of the first Polish-language school.

The celebration of Independence forces us all to reflect. It forces us to analyze the facts: what has been done to fix Poland and what has not. Many activities after 1989 are still in doubt.

In 1936, on the 100th anniversary of the Texas Declaration of Independence, the January 1936 Texas Centennial Exposition Bulletin stated: "In the Hall of Heroes of this Texas Hall of State, at the opening of the Centennial Exposition in Dallas on June 6, Felix Wardziński's name will be inscribed along with with the name of Sam Houston, the liberator, and Stephen F. Austin, the colonizer and father of the Lone Star Empire. "

At first, travelers thought that the train stopped in the middle of nowhere. Before them was a flat space covered with a slippery layer of mud. At dawn, they waited for the outlines of houses to appear on the horizon — in vain.

For many years, Polish governments were not interested in properly nurturing the Polish history. Even now, the history taught in schools contains many understatements and fake "facts". Therefore, the historical awareness of many Poles today is limited to the symbolic commemoration of monuments and memorial sites, while the rest of the world has no idea what the terrible fate of the Polish nation was during the Second World War, and the crimes committed against the Poles remain in the shadow of the Holocaust.

Poland and Germany have always been bordering each other, ever since the Middle Ages, ever since the times of shaping their individuality and identity. At a time when the borders between the states had not yet been firmly established, the inhabitants moved freely across the territories of both communities. In later periods, the waves of emigration were caused by economic and political reasons. About 8 million people have moved to Germany from Poland in the last 200 years.

"On the pan-European map of resistance, it is the Polish resistance movement that is leading and exemplary in many areas." The above quotes are not taken from a paean to Poland and Poles written by a Polish author or some polonophile. These are excerpts from a secret report by Major General Reinhard Gehlen, a longtime chief of German military intelligence in the East, prepared in April 1945 for the then Minister of the Interior of the Third Reich, head of the SS and Gestapo, Heinrich Himmler.

A small wooden church was finally erected on the corner of Brady and Humboldt in 1871 at the cost of $11,000. The Milwaukee Sentinel at the time reported that these St. Hedwig families were among the poorest of the poor, with the men being engaged in sewer construction and public works.

St. Cyril and Methodius, commonly known as the Polish Seminary, was founded in 1885 in Detroit, Michigan. In 1909, due to better housing conditions, it was moved to the nearby Orchard Lake, where it exists today. The creation of this seminary is connected with the mass economic emigration of Poles to the United States.

On August 1, sirens will sound at 5 p.m. Warsaw time, the buzz of conversations will be silent, and the traffic will freeze for a minute. Poles will pay tribute to the heroes of the Warsaw Uprising.

Chicago’s Edward J. Moskal was born May 21, 1924, the son of immigrants. High school educated and a World War II veteran, he was the proprietor of a successful business at the time of his election in 1967 to serve as treasurer of the Polish National Alliance. At that convention Charles Rozmarek was defeated by Aloysius Mazewski for the PNA presidency. Moskal went on to win election six times before becoming president in October 1988 in a special election following Mazewski’s death. That November he was elected president of the Polish American Congress, an office he held until his death on March 20th, 2005.