Martin Wehrmann is considered one of the most prominent experts on the history of Western Pomerania. He was a member of various regional societies, including the Society of Pomeranian History and Antiquity, and the Pomeranian Historic Committee. He is the author of many works, including the two-volume Geschichte von Pommern and Geschichte der Stadt Stettin. In three chapters of the latter work (Stettins Franzosenzeit, Stettin im 19. Jahrhundert bis zur Aufgebung der Festung, Die neueste Zeit seit 1873), Wehrmann described the development of Szczecin in the 19th century. This description is quite exceptional, as the author writes about the city as it was at the moment of writing, pointing to the processes which shaped Szczecin and made it a modern town, such as the reconstruction of the city following the French occupation, the activity of the Trade Corporation, the functioning of the port and maritime transport, the development of industry and transport, modernization of streets, the activity of specific people, including cultural activity, and the disassembly of the fortifications. The article used a definition of a modern town by Krzysztof K. Pawłowski, Maria Nietyksza, and Bohdan Jałowiecki.

The article presents the academic education of Maria Okońska, the closest associate of primate Stefan Wyszyński and the founder of the Stefan Wyszyński Institute. It features a short biography with her most notable achievements, as well as an analysis of her journey towards completing her degree, based on the available archival materials documenting the course of her academic experience. It also includes the description of her education during the period of occupation and shortly after the war.

In 1919, Tadeusz Staniewski was the first Pole to become mayor of Swarzędz, a town just outside of Poznań. He held this position for 9 months with no remuneration. He was re-elected in 1929 and remained the mayor of Swarzędz until 1939. Previous articles on the activity of Tadeusz Staniewski in Swarzędz discuss his life from November 1918. The present article aims at expanding this timespan and includes information about him in earlier periods. Son of a teacher, he graduated from Frederick William College in Poznań. In the early 20th century he settled down in Swarzędz, where he gained recognition as a tradesman and social activist. Regarding the years 1900–1918, when Tadeusz Staniewski entered the public sphere, the best sources are press articles published in Greater Poland journals, especially “Postęp” and “Orędownik” which represented the interests of the lower middle class. The activity of Tadeusz Staniewski was discussed there particularly with regard to two events of major importance for Poles in Swarzędz: the 1909 City Council elections and the construction of the Catholic House.

The article discusses the problem of the attitude of the Tripe Entente states towards the restoration of Poland in the years 1918–1919. Relations between the creators of the Republic of Poland (in particular Roman Dmowski, Józef Piłsudski, and Ignacy Jan Paderewski) and Great Britain, France and the USA — the key partners and political players in the period of the Paris Peace Conference (1919) — were analyzed. Those were greatly affected by the relations between those states and the defeated Germany, as well as “White” and Bolshevik Russia. The Triple Entente cared mainly about maintaining and expanding their influence in Central and Eastern Europe. Also, of major significance were the German interests and Ostpolitik in this region of Europe, consistently implemented from the late 19th century. Therefore, the policy of the world powers towards Poland was indirectly affected by their attitudes towards Russia and Germany. In the early days of Poland’s political existence, it put Poland in an extremely difficult situation, especially when fighting for its borders, in particular in the east. Poland, as a fully independent political entity, did not fit in the European model of the time — even in the minds of politicians, especially British, who were still thinking in co82 Grzegorz Łukomski lonial categories. From their point of view, Poland was a new state, created upon the will of its protectors. Only France and, to some extent, the United States treated Poland as an independent and sovereign political entity. For Germany, Poland could exist only as a buffer, rump, non-sovereign state, which would be easy to invade and exploit.

The article features an analysis of documents stored in the Archive of New Files in Warsaw (fonds: Polish Embassy in Berlin, Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Warsaw, and Polish Scouting and Guiding Association) with regard to Polish–German youth exchange in the years 1936–1937. The exchange occurred as a result of cooperation between Polish youth organizations: YMCA Poland (1936) and the Polish Scouting and Guiding Association (1937), and German Hitler-Jugend (1936–1937). During the analysis, the course of exchange, its origins and its true objectives were reconstructed. It was demonstrated that the exchange did not occur as a result of decisions made by “top” authorities as a consequence of rapprochement of 1934, but as a result of the efforts of one person: dr. Rudolf Reuber — an academic teacher (chemist), Hitler- -Jugend activist from Frankfurt am Main, and admirer of Poland. He grew fond of Poland during his three-week trip there in 1935, which he had organized as part of Frankfurt academics’ and students’ exchange with the Warsaw University. The aim of the exchange was to bring clo- ser young people from the two countries and overcome drastic ideological differences and ne- gative stereotypes. Key words: Polish Embassy in Berlin, Hitler-Jugend, Consulate General in Frankfurt am Main, Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Warsaw, YMCA Poland, youth exchange, Polish Scouting and Guiding Association

Parliamentary elections of January 1947, rigged by communists, began the process of gradual Sovietization of social life in Poland. It aimed at establishing a totalitarian political system, mo- deled after the Soviet Union. The events which took place in the Opole Silesia region in the years 1947–1950 are a great illustration of this process. Progressive Sovietization of the social life became a major obstacle in the process of achieving social integration in the Opole Silesia. Actions such as a fight with the Catholic Church or creating collective farms resulted with stronger pro-German attitudes among native inhabitants. Communist authorities reacted to manifestations of social resistance among various groups with repressions. However, within a few years, faced 110 Zbigniew Bereszyński with events such as the people’s uprising in Poznań in 1956, they were forced to attenuate their policy toward the society and allow for partial liberalization of social life.

Following the events of August 1980, the ruling Polish United Workers’ Party (PUWP) was hit by a crisis. Within the party, two radical groups (the so-called “horizontal structures”) emerged next to the largest and most influential “center”. They tried to introduce deep social-democra- tic reforms in the Party. On the other hand, there were groups that heavily opposed them in the name of communist or even Stalinist doctrine. The latter groups were the smallest and least influential, but they enjoyed support of some PUWP authorities who had lost power. A significant role in this movement was played by the Poznań Communist Forum, along with groups from Katowice and Warsaw. There were some similarities among those groups, but one feature that clearly distinguished the Poznań group from the rest was a smaller emphasis on ideologi- cal dogma. This resulted from the fact this group included more younger party activists, who lost their power in Poznań to the reformers, and who treated the Forum just as a means to regain their influence. 

In the following article, we present the character of Andrzej Wędzki (1927–2017) — a Poznań-based professor, historian, and researcher of the history of Slavic settlements in the area of Central Europe, the editor of the Dictionary of Slavonic Antiquities (Słownik starożytności słowiańskich). Andrzej Wędzki is presented with regard to his very rich and interesting heritage which he himself had meant to will to scientific research institutes, such as the Library of Kórnik or the Archive of the Polish Academy of Sciences. The piece of his heritage that we presented above shows his great passion for collecting as well as preserving — by means of descriptions or photography — all those “elusive moments” such as family relations; memories; notes from the war, exile, or his travels; genealogical charts of his own ancestors or those of his wife. They are an essential, and at the same time very interesting, source for everyone willing to conduct research into the life of Andrzej Wędzki and the history of the Polish society in the last 150 years.

The origin and use of the principle of pertinence in the years 1918–1939 in Polish academic historiography

The article On the origins of the principle of pertinence in the years 1918–1939 in Polish academic historiography describes the emergence and application of one of the fundamental principles of archival science in Poland in the period of its restoration after the First World War. As early as in the Middle Ages, the idea related to the principle of territorial pertinence, which was later described, was intuitively used by document keepers. The emerging international law assumed that archival materials related to a given territory belong to this territory, however until the end of the 19th century, there were no clear criteria according to which the files were to be divided when the state’s borders changed. The problem of pertinence in archival science still sparks heated debates among scientists, though now it applies to a large extent to the distribution of fonds within the state’s borders. Its most interesting, and at the same time most practical, stage was the period of 1918–1939, when it was connected with the recovery of archival materials and cultural property, and the reconstruction of Poland after 123 years of partitions. In the beginnings of the Second Polish Republic, archival science developed and confidently entered the sphere of humanities. In those exceptional political, economic and social circumstances, archival science created its foundations and basic definitions, while Polish historians/archivists of the time made their indisputable and still valid contribution in terms of creating the rules of transferring files and basic rules of managing archival materials. This text presents the work of these exceptional people: J. Paczkowski, J. Siemieński, K. Konarski and many others, who excelled both in archival theory and practice. It also summarizes the current state of research on this problem. Key words: principle of territorial pertinence, principle of provenance, recovery of archival materials, recovery of cultural property, international law, Second Polish Republic

Ownership transformation in the late 1980s/early 1990s led to economic prosperity for private enterprises. However, due to competition, some of them closed down and their non-archival documentation was transferred to be temporarily stored e.g. in national archives. According to the provisions in force, those files are disposed of, and the permission to do so is issued by the national archive for the region where the documents are stored. The national archive for the region where the files were produced only has its say in matters regarding the disposal of documents from state- or local government-owned enterprises. However, since private entities are of major importance for the economic history of Poland after 1989, it seems justified that the voice of archivists, who have the most extensive knowledge on the completeness of sources on the economic history of a given region (i.e. the place where the files had been created), be also required when disposing of files from private enterprises, i.e. ones not owned by the state or local government. 

The article presents the history of a national identification document in Poland in the period after the First World War. Special emphasis is put on the form adopted by the presidential resolution on March 16, 1928 On registration and control of the movement of people, that is, the single national identification document design no. 28. The text discusses differences between various forms in particular regions of Poland in the inter-war period, and provides the examples of how the forms were used by Nazi authorities during the Second World War and by the authorities after the Second World War.

The present article discusses the use of the natural language processing method in digital history, as exemplified by the pre-EU referendum debate on the Facebook portal. Using born digi- tal sources, the author analyzed collocations, n-grams, and word frequency. Computer methods allowed the author to determine the dominant subjects in the referendum debate and the vocabulary used, and subsequently evaluate the methods used in the analysis. Finally, the author discusses the potential for further use of these methods in digital history, pointing out that they must be used cautiously, and also explaining the technical details of using them, which can affect subsequent interpretation of the obtained results.