Rebuilding Poland Between World Wars

The boundaries of the country of Poland have undergone tremendous changes in the past 100 years!  Formerly located between Germany and Russia before World War I, Poland was totally absorbed by Germany in the reign of the Nazis up until the early 1940's.  Now Poland has a smaller Germany to its west and the independent (for now!) country of Belarus to its east.  An author familiar to me as a writer for the National Geographic Magazine, Mr. Maynard Owen Williams, Litt. D., wrote The Poland of the Present, March, 1933.

Poland in 1933 had made great strides toward rebuilding its destroyed and obliterated country after the first world war.  We can refer to World War I as that, but in 1933, it was simply, "The World War."  The United States greatly helped Poland by large monetary loans which enabled the country to rebuild railroads to then-modern standards and to build the port city of Gdynia, on the Baltic Sea coast.  What efforts they made!  What progress they made! - only to have it bombed out too soon in the future and taken over by Communist Russia!  What suffering the Polish people have endured!

The Amber Bracelet I bought in a shopping center in Vilnius, Lithuania, September, 2006.  Amber is petrified resin found in the Baltic Sea, north of Poland.

Mr. Williams reported of the North-South "Polish Corridor," a route by railroad to the port of Gdynia for efficient export of Polish products (coal, lumber, zinc, bacon, eggs, sugar and butter) and importing of what they needed (foodstuffs, cotton, metal and machines).  Eugene Kwiatkawski, the builder of the port was quoted, "Our ancestors did not come to this Polish shore either as guests or immigrants; they did not here establish themselves by the grace or through the protection of anyone; here we stand on our own soil, rooted in our own past, ofttimes heroic and victorious, sometimes cruel and bitter.  Here we will remain and achieve our destiny," (p. 324).  Such wonderful nationalism and patriotism has served Poland well through its various crises.

While the author appreciated the modern efficiency of the great cities, he went often to the countryside to photograph the scenery and colorful garb of the peasants, particularly on Sunday-go-to-church times.  Lowicz and Popow were his favorite villages.  Mr. Williams summarized the unity of the peoples in Poland in 1933: "Although Poles form nearly three-fourths of the newly united republic's 32 million population, there is a wide variety of types, costumes, architecture, and traditions," (photo caption, p. 331).  The eight-page section of color photographs show these features to full advantage.

Regarding the capital city of Warsaw, Mr. Williams agreed with the French Napoleon's comment, "Warsaw is always amusing," (p. 337).

There is a long history of Americans and Poles working together going back to our Revolutionary War.  Woodrow Wilson, our president before, during, and after World War I, was largely instrumental in the modernizing of Poland.  There is a statue of President Wilson forming a monument at Poznan.  "Unveiled on the Fourth of July, 1931. . . this statue. . . is a memorial to a powerful friend of Polish freedom.  One of President Wilson's famous "Fourteen Points" urged restoration of Poland's sovereignty and stipulated that the nation have an outlet to the sea," (p. 327).

My conclusion: This article is precisely why I originally planned, one year ago, the ambitious project of reading every National Geographic Magazine article from my own, my parents' and my grandparents' collections, dating back to 1926.  I wanted to discover how the countries of the world now have emerged from their past.  Poland certainly has changed in many ways, except for the wonderful, patriotic soul of its people!