The present discussion is a part of research on the history of the royal archive and treasury in Kraków in the Old Polish period. The author focuses on the inventory actions undertaken in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, drawing particular attention to the commissions delegated to conduct the audit of the treasury and the archive. The method of appointing members of the commission and their number (both on paper and in reality), presented over the period of 300 years, show how initiatives of an archival character (concerning the most important institution of this type back then) were undertaken, and how effective their application was in practice.

The article describes the first years of operation of the Polish Theater in Poznań after regaining independence. This was the time when the directors were Bolesław and Nuna Szczurkiewicz, who organized the stage in Poznań as early as April 1918. The article describes how in the years 1918–1924, the Szczurkiewicz couple solved formal problems of the Theater’s operation, chose actors and prepared for the new season openings, based on the documents and information found in the Poznań press. In 1920, Roman Żelazowski joined the couple. Owing to their joint effort, the years 1920–1924 became one of the most interesting periods in the history of the Polish Theater in Poznań.

The subject of the article is the operation of counterintelligence in Poznań and its role in raising awareness of the danger of espionage among civilians in the Poznań region, as well as the role of Poznań press in fulfilling this task. The subject of espionage was undoubtedly one of the most frequently discussed in the Greater Poland press in the period of the Second Polish Republic. The reasons for its popularity lay not only in avid interest it aroused among the readers. The expanding press market and growing competition meant that newspapers had to draw readers’ attentions by concentrating on those subjects which the public found interesting. No matter how short the pieces information about the arrests or the suspicion of espionage were, their sensational character meant they were published. The cooperation between the press and the Poznań counterintelligence which, by allowing the press to publish articles on spies and espionage, raised awareness among the citizens on the possible dangers, is a whole separate issue. The collaboration between the press and special services was mutually beneficial. The press printed articles that were interesting from the point of view of the public, which was then reflected in the number of readers and circulation, as well as financial profit. Special services achieved their own goals. Educating the society was only one of them. From the point of view of their operations, drawing attention away from the activity of counterintelligence and towards the operation of foreign services remained more important.

The articles presents the character and the life of Władysław Kowalenko, a researcher in Slavic studies connected to Poznań, who died 50 years ago and is now almost entirely forgotten. The article presents primarily the archive materials which had not been used so far, and includes the scarce pieces of literature concerning Kowalenko. The subsequent part of the article presents his early interest in the town settlements in Greater Poland and his activity during the occupation in an underground University of the Western Lands. The times in which he lived after the Second Wold War and the political situation of socialist Poland significantly influenced the direction of his academic work later on. It can be noticed that in the final years of his life, despite the circumstances and despite his advanced age, a significant development of his research interests related to the marine history of the western and southern parts of the Slavic area can be observed, which was expressed in numerous publications. Kowalenko also supervised the editorial work on the only multi-volume encyclopedia concerning the early Slavic history – the “Dictionary of Ancient Slavic History”. At present, the academic legacy of Kowalenko is still used by researchers and quoted in their works. 

The article presents the organization and the activity of the Democratic Professors’ Club in Poznań in the years 1950–1953. The functioning of the Club was a part of the communist authorities’ plan. After their rise to power in Poland after the Second World War, they aimed at subordinating universities and academic staff not only through administrative decisions, but also through the activity of various clubs, organizations and associations, which were supposed to gather lecturers and academics and educate them in the socialist spirit. Those clubs and associations were supposed to encourage the academic environment to support changes which were being introduced in the country. The author discusses the creation of the Democratic Professors’ Club in Poznań, the establishment of its Board, as well as various forms of the society’s activity: lectures, talks, seminars, workshops, meetings and discussions (usually concerning the academic achievements of the USSR, and Marxist and Leninist methodology) and the social activity of Club members in the period when it was headed by Stefan Błachowski and Zdzisław Kaczmarczyk, professors at Poznań University.

The war brings infinite suffering, death and destruction. Those who survive it have to deal with diseases that follow. In the 1940s and 1950s, county doctors wrote reports on infectious disease incidence for the Department of Health of the Regional Government in Poznań. The article comprises the presentation and comparison of parallel reports from the years 1946 and 1953. Based on that, it makes an attempt to explain the higher incidence rate of infectious diseases in some parts of Greater Poland based on the historical context of this period. For the year 1946, the data describe 23 counties. Data for the year 1953 include 26 counties. Due to the comparability of information, the article includes data only for rural counties. Typical diseases of the period were typhoid, tuberculosis and diphtheria, but the high mortality rate can also be explained by exhaustion, poor hygiene and malnutrition among the migrating masses of people. The analyses conducted indicate that the strongest relationship can be observed between infectious diseases and the location of prisoners’ and work camps and the migration of people going through the stage points of the National Repatriates Office.

The text is an attempt to organize knowledge about the inclusion of the Poznań protests of June 1956 in the broadly understood culture and historiography. It describes the presence of the event in literature, poetry, fictional and documentary films, but also discusses publications and conferences concerning the protests. The article also provides information on the Museum of the Poznań June, as well as on events related to culture, theater and multimedia.

The combat against the Church and religion was an essential element of the communist ideology. The totalitarian state disapproved of any and all fragments of the social life escaping its control. Upon suppression of the underground independence movement, the Roman Catholic Church accepted the role of the most vigorous opponent, and hence the main enemy of the one and only political authority in the country – the Polish United Workers’ Party – and its ideological principles. Furthermore, Mackiewiczas one of few people who openly talked about a crisis of values in the oldest institution within the frames of the Western civilisation.

The text describes Wincenty Raczyński, a little known member of the Raczyński family who lived in the 18th and 19th centuries, the founder of the “Courland line” of the family, and the commander of the Order of Malta. The subject of the article is a long letter, written by the Commander upon the request of his cousin, Atanazy Raczyński (and later published by him), which was a La Confession d’un enfant du siècle of sorts. The author of the letter participated in some historical events and met a number of historical characters owing to which his epistolary biography is both interesting and of cognitive value. The letter, which does not exist anymore in its original French form, was translated into Polish, with added commentary and a number of annotations putting the people and events described in a historical context.

The aim of the paper is to describe patterns of concluding marriages and various factors affecting them in Poznań in the second half of the 19th century. In order to do so, registrar’s marriage books from the Piotrowo district for the years 1874–1899 were used. In the area covered by the Piotrowo Registrar Office, first marriages dominated, i.e. ones concluded between bachelors and maidens. They comprised over 73% of all marriages concluded. Another group were marriages between bachelors and widows and widowers and maidens – 6% and 5% of all marriages, respectively. In the Piotrowo Registrar Office, on the day of marriage, maidens marrying bachelors were 23 years old on average, while those marrying widowers were 27. Bachelors married maidens at the age of 25.5 on average, while those who married widows were slightly above 27. Widowers who married maidens were on average 38 years old, while those marrying widows – 48. Widows who married bachelors were slightly above 27 years old on the day of marriage. In the Piotrowo district of Poznań, the factors that influenced the choice of the spouse included age, education and social position.

The text includes a reprint of letters exchanged in 1936 between composer Feliks Nowowiejski, and professor Adam Wrzosek and his wife, Maria, included in the collection of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, Poznań branch. The letters discuss “The song to Our Lady of Dębki by the sea”, a little-known work of the composer. It was composed in honor of the miraculous painting of Our Lady, Queen of the Crown of Poland. The painting can be admired in the chapel in Dębki (Puck county), and Feliks Nowowiejski had probably seen it while spending his holidays in this particular resort.

The text presents the recollection of the occupational period in the life of a leading Polish prehistorian and a co-founder of the Poznań University, professor Józef Kostrzewski. The author of the work quoted is professor count Alfred Wielkopolski, a political scientist, economist and economic and law historian. The manuscript found in the library of the National Ossoliński Institute in Wrocław provides the account of Kostrzewski’s life in the period between December 1940 and February 1944, when he remained in hiding in the Klemensówka estate, near Nisko.

At present, banking documentation is a subject of interest for many parties. The practical value of this documentation has always been of prime importance, both for the bank and for its clients. With time, it also became a subject of interest for historians, particularly those specialized in economy. It turns out, though, that materials created by banks and their administrative bodies can also be of value for other researchers. Researchers interested in the final period of the Second World War and battles for Poznań will find this document informative, as it not only sheds new light on the situation in the city, but will also enable them to feel the atmosphere of those days. The document also shows the problems related to reconstructing the banking system and introducing the new currency, the Polish złoty (which replaced the German mark used until that point), in the capital of Greater Poland.

The text presents information about the introduction of a social campaign concerning family archives and about the creation of information points in national archives. Its aim is to draw attention to the issue of collecting documents in family archives. It also discusses the competition for family archivists on the following subject: “The oldest document in my family”, organized by the National Archive in Poznań to celebrate the International Archives Day in 2015.

A notarial act from the year 1893 kept in the family archive was the starting point for a detailed description of the life of the author’s great-great-grandmother. However, the author not only provides information on the life of his resourceful ancestor, but also presents the history of the peasant family and its genealogy.

In an article concerning a family archive, the author focuses primarily on how long certain documents and bills, which are most frequently used in every household, are kept. These include tax return forms or documents related to education or employment. Furthermore an example of how to build a simple archive is presented. The article was inspired by the event titled Become your family’s archivist, which was organized three years ago upon the initiative of the national archives and promoted in the Polish Radio Program 1.

In December 2014 the Polish Parliament adopted the resolution to commemorate Jan Długosz by making the year 2015 “The year of Jan Długosz”. This was to celebrate the chronicler’s 600th birthday. This event was particularly stimulating for historians and regionalists from Wieluń, a town near which the Długosz family estate was located. What is more, Jan Długosz senior, the father of the chronicler, fought in the Battle of Grunwald in the Wieluń unit. Furthermore, the parents of the chronicler are buried in the crypt of the Wieluń collegiate church. In 2015, Wieluń hosted exhibitions, an academic conference and a competition. A themed installation was constructed near the remnants of the Wieluń parish church. The organizers of the events also commemorated the Year of Jan Długosz by minting a commemorative medal: “The Year of Jan Długosz in the Wieluń Region (2015)”. The article describes the medal and the circumstances surrounding its creation in detail.