Education Poland Project #34365

Kresy-Siberia "Keep Their Memory Alive"

by Fundacja Kresy-Syberia

Project Report | May 17, 2022
Bringing Special Exhibitions to the new Museum

By Anna Pacewicz | Chair of the Kresy-Siberia Foundation

Landing Page for Galleries and Special Exhibitions

Thoughts for Ukraine

Firstly, we must acknowledge the shock and heartache since our last report of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Forever a faultline between East and West, we once again bear witness to death and destruction in what was for many of us our family homelands. We have watched powerlessly as bombs have rained down on the historical Polish city of Lwów and Russian forces have encircled Kiev - the city where 3,345 Polish prisoners were shot and buried in the mass grave of Bykownia as part of the Katyn Massacres - the 'so-called' Ukraine List. This has produced a lot of emotional generational trauma for our members as evidenced by the many posts in our Facebook group. In addition to being a museum, we are also a family whose mission is to support each other in navigating not only the past, but the present.

Kresy-Siberia Virtual Museum

Work has continued on the re-build of the Kresy-Siberia Virtual Museum on the new platform. In addition to the enormous data content transferred across to the new site, our wonderful administrator Shelley has also graphically re-built the Museum Galleries and the Special Exhibitions in addition to creating new interconnected links between them and the Wall of Tribute, Hall of Memories and Survivor Testimonies. We thank our donors for their generosity. There is still work to be done in maintaining the virtual museum and we kindly ask for your ongoing support.

The Museum Galleries

In the Museum Galleries, each of the 29 Gallery Rooms now link to all of the thematically related Hall of Images. For example, in Gallery 4 'Freed to Fight', Room 4c. Polish 2nd Corps (1943-47) (see picture) the 'View the Gallery' link now takes the visitor to every single piece of content uploaded into the Hall of Images for the Polish 2nd Corps (see picture). The wonderful inter-connectedness that Shelley has created allows the vistor to also click on the related Wall of Tribute or Survivor Testimony links for the images and/or documents. Every Gallery, every image, every document, every survivor are all intricately connected from the individual story to the broader thematic Gallery.

The administrators (Anna and Irena) are now data testing every single Gallery Room links to the Hall of Images to check that every item is correctly attributed to the correct thematic Room.

Special Exhibitions

In addition to the Galleries, we have also re-created several of the Special Exhibitions (see picture) including the exhibition that I created several years ago "Polish Naval Memories of WW2" (see picture). This multi-media special exhibition explores the contribution of the elite Polish Navy to the Allied war effort during the six years of the war at sea 1939-1945 and until 1947 with the PRC in G.B. Whilst many of the details of the Polish Navy during WW2 are well known, the stories of the veterans are not. This exhibition tells the story of the Polish Navy in WW2 through the witness testimonies, memories, photographs and stories of the brave men who served in her (see pictures).

You will also find the following flip-book special exhibitions, Berling's Army, The Polish First Armoured Division and People of the Polish 2nd Corps.

UK News

Our Board members in the UK, Mark and Iwona Krason, had a busy April 2022 representing the Kresy-Siberia Foundation at the Katyn Memorial in Gunnersbury, London and also at an Easter Lunch organising by the Polish Airmen's Association UK.

Virtual and Physical Painting Exhibition - Alicja Edwards (nee Moskaluk)

At our 2017 Kresy-Siberia conference in Warsaw I presented a virtual exhibition showcasing the paintings of Sybirak Alicja Edwards (nee Moskaluk). Alicja was a child in Bóbrka, Chodorow when the Soviets deported her and her mother to Kazakahstan in April 1940. A talented artist now living in Montana, USA, Alicja has documented her memories of the deportation through evocative paintings that really do tell a thousand words. You can see several of her paintings which have now been migrated to the new virtual museum, 'Paintings of Life in Kresy and Siberia'. The painting shown below of a family burial is titled "Death in the Steppes". Whilst we are a 'virtual' museum, we have been liaising closely with the new Sybirak Museum in Biaystok, Poland and they were delighted to accept the shipment of all of Alicja's original artworks so that the world can now see them in person. You can see the details of the exhibition launch on the Facebook page of Muzeum Pamieci Sybiru.

Conference News

Although the war in Ukraine is giving us pause in 2022, we are planning once more a 2023 "Generstions Remember" Conference in Biaystok at the Museum of Siberian Memory, our partner who has done a grand opening this year. We anticipate our Conference to take place on the weekend of the annual March of Living Memory, September 8-10 on the Saturday. The following week will mark our National Day of the Siberian, with our collective memorial at the Monument to the Dead and Departed in Warsaw, on Sunday 17 September.

Gallery 4c Polish 2nd Corps 1943-45

Link to Gallery Images Polish 2nd Corps

Landing Page for Special Exhibitions

Landing Page for Polish Naval Memories of WW2

Exhibit from Polish Naval Memories of WW2

Alicja Edwards 'Death on the Steppes'

Alicja Edwards Exhibition Muzeum Pamieci Sybiru

Links:

Discussion group

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Jan 25, 2022
Connecting our family stories in the new museum

By Anna Pacewicz | Kresy-Siberia Foundation Chair

Wall of Tribute Biography

Connecting our family stories in the new museum
By Anna Pacewicz - Chair of the Kresy-Siberia Foundation

CONNECTING OUR FAMILY STORIES

Since the 17 September 2021 "go live" on the new and improved Kresy-Siberia Virtual Museum, we have been working hard to iron out annoying bugs and issues, as well as continuing to add further content. The three main data holding areas are complete – the Wall of Tribute, the Hall of Images and Survivor Testimonies. One area of development that was particularly complex was the connectivity between a Wall of Tribute entry and related content. The bespoke coding for this element has now been completed and is up and running, whilst some finishing touches to the results pages is in progress.

For example, if I go to my grandfather's profile in the Wall of Tribute - Jan Pacewicz - I can click on the red hyper-link for "Related Images" and this takes me to all of the Images uploaded for my grandfather in the Hall of Images (all screen-shots attached). I can also click on the red hyper-links for "Related Galleries" which will take me to, for example, the Katyn Gallery in the Museum Galleries. And if I were to start in the Hall of Images for Jan Pacewicz, I can click on the red hyper-link for his Wall of Tribute ID and this will take me to his Wall of Tribute profile. Thank you Shelley Upton for successfully designing and coding this complex inter-connecdness between our three main data holding areas. Please take some time to explore, or add, your family details in the museum.

The majority of the Virtual Museum area of the site is complete and work has begun on the Special Exhibitions, which will include specially themed areas of the website as well as virtual flipbooks to read. As well as completing the previous exhibitions, we will be adding a brand new exhibition in due course which has been provided on the "A Trip to Nowhere" - by one of our KSVM members, Grazyna Balut Ostrom.

At the same time, we have been providing technical support for our members who are getting used to contributing their photos and memories to the new platform.

SOURCES

Lastly please do check out the many lists of sources in the Wall of Tribute. A new upcoming addition is ROPWiM's Iran Archive 1942-1945 which has been lovingly and painstakingly digitized in a searchable format (previously it was just images of the original lists) in which the handwritten names were transcribed by Christina Zehaluk (she has a talent for deciphering hand script) and Chris Wroblewski did the editing and MS Word format.

Also transcribed and searchable digitally for the first time are going to be the KOL 138_296 A-E and KOL 138_297 F-M, List of Polish families (civilians) evacuated from the USSR in August 1942. Thanks go to: Chris Wroblewski (transcriber and editor); Anita Cwynar (corrections and spelling); (Transcribers:) Anita Watson, Barbara Gdowski, Eve-Marie Galka, Gabriela Teresa Firkowska, Izabela Spero, Liz O'Sullivan, Marcin Kawala, Michael Lester, Natalie Schmidt, Tamara Bulmer, Vanessa Shaw.

EVENTS

Whilst all of this work could go on remotely during the covid pandemic, some of our on-the-ground activities have been restricted. In the UK, our annual event in February to mark the anniversary of the first of the deportations by Soviets to Siberia in 1940 was not able to go ahead due to the lockdown.

Many other events which we would usually support in the UK were similarly cancelled during the year. With the ease on restrictions a few events planned by other groups in November managed to go ahead and Kresy-Siberia was represented at the Independence Day Celebrations at the Polish Embassy in London, and at the Commemoration Ceremony at the Polish Social and Cultural Centre (POSK) in London. Members of the Group also attended a meeting of the Koa Lwówian (Friends of Lwów), the commemorative meal for the Carpathian Association for the 80^th anniversary of the siege of Tobruk and attended a commemorative event at the grave of General Kopanski, the commander of the Polish Carpathian Brigade, that helped defend Tobruk.

UK BACKGROUND WORK

Background work and planning did continue by the UK based team. We helped with preparing an application for the Siberian Cross medal and submitting it officially. The medal is granted by the President of Poland to survivors commemorating their suffering and survival during their deportation to Siberia. This award was finally presented in December 2021 at a ceremony held at the survivor’s home, by the Polish Consul General Mateusz Stasiek and the 2nd Vice Consul Tomasz Balcerowski. More information can be found here: Wolverhampton woman, 97, who survived gulag horrors recognised with medal from the Polish Government | Express & Star (expressandstar.com)

It was uncertain for most of 2021 whether the Kresy-Siberia Annual Conference, usually held in September in Warsaw, would be able to take place. A team of volunteers was put together to try and plan a Virtual conference and we had many speakers lined up and films ready to be shown. For technical reasons the conference could not go ahead, however we were able to make the seminal documentary film ‘The Forgotten Odyssey’:
A FORGOTTEN ODYSSEY English - YouTube and A FORGOTTEN ODYSSEY Polish - YouTube available on the Kresy–Siberia You Tube Channel.

FORTHCOMING

Covid-depending, we are hoping for a Kresy-Siberia "Generations Remember" annual conference and members' get together at the new Sybirak Museum in Biaystok in the weekend of 16-17 September 2022, so keep an eye out for more news!

Finally, leaving on a positive note, the expansion of our social media reach continued. Our Twitter account, which is managed by Tim Bucknall, reached 10,400 followers!

Thank you for all of our donors and volunteers for keeping their Survivor Memories alive.

Hyperlink to related Hall of Images

Hyperlink to related Museum Galleries

Hyperlink to related Wall of Tribute Profile ID

Links:

UPDATED Kresy-Siberia Virtual Museum

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Sep 15, 2021
Official Reopening of Kresy Siberia Virtual Museum

By Anna Pacewicz | Chair of the Kresy-Siberia Foundation

The new home page

Kresy-Siberia was started on 17 September 2001 by Stefan Wisniowski, the Australia-based, Polish-Canadian son of a Siberian deportee. It started as as an internet discussion forum concerned with research, remembrance, and recognition of the Polish Citizens of all faiths and ethnicities that were persecuted by the Soviet Union during the Second World War.

By 2008, our collection of websites began to reach capacity and a decision was made to create the Kresy-Siberia Foundation, headquartered in Warsaw. The Kresy-Siberia Virtual Museum was officially opened in the Senate of the Republic of Poland on 17 September 2009, on the 70th Anniversary of the Soviet invasion.

The Kresy-Siberia Virtual Museum serves not only to preserve the group’s member collections, but also includes the collections and scholarly works of many individual historians, active research institutes and archives around the world. It provides an accessible window into this poorly known history and a base from which educational programs are being developed.

As you know we have been working extremely hard for over a year now on a full up-grade to our virtual museum to improve online visitor interactions and bring the computer programming up-to-date to ensure the preservation of the platform into the future. One of the last tasks was working on the site translations.

That work is now completed and - on the 20th Anniversary of the creation of Kresy-Siberia - we are thrilled to unveil the newly re-built virtual museum at www.kresy-siberia.org in time for the commemorations on the 17 September 2021.

We welcome you to the new and improved platform and we invite you to visit. For existing users we would really appreciate your feedback - please take the time to review your family testimonies, photographs, biographies and documents. Please send any comments to admin@kresy-siberia.org

A special thanks to our wonderful Shelley Upton for her tireless work and dedication, to Artur Golicz in Poland who looks after the server and to Irena Lowe in New Zealand for her own tireless work in testing the new site.

We need and welcome your support and your contributions, your time, your talents, and your financial support in order to maintain this work that has become our passion – to honour the Polish citizens who so heroically struggled for freedom and for life itself in the eastern Borderlands and in exile outside their beloved Poland during the Second World War.

The new Galleries

The new Wall of Tribute landing page

The new Wall of Tribute biography page

The new Hall of Images

Links:

Attachments:

Kresy-Siberia Testimonies (PDF)

6 Attachments

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