Galician Trails: The Forgotten Story of One Family

by Zalewski, Andrew

  17. Kurjer Lwowski December 3, 1900; and January 13, 1909.

  18. Kurjer Stanislawowski April 2, 1905, described a heated debate in the city council. Nimhin’s commission found that a real Catholic priest had been passing through the streets, and the gossip had been propagated by those claiming that the man had a beard, which was not true. Hasty conclusions had been reached by the Catholic leaders who made the unsubstantiated charges.

  19. Kurjer Stanislawowski November 7, 1909, reported on the verdict of the case. In response to the petition by a lawyer from Czerniowce in Bukovina, the court ruled that Jews in Western and Eastern Europe used different languages. Hence, Yiddish, used only in the east, could not be considered a language of the minority. Subsequent to this decision, Dr. Nimhin and Edmund Rauch, a Jewish parliamentarian from Stanislawow, appealed to the Jewish population in a public letter on the occasion of the upcoming census (Kurjer Stanislawowski January 1, 1911).

  Kurjer Stanislawowski April 9, 1911, celebrated the 25th anniversary of the paper. The front page included recollections of Arthur Nimhin. Others provided glimpses of his inclusiveness.

  20. Kurjer Stanislawowski January 20 and March 17, 1901, provided somewhat inflated numbers, as they included military personnel stationed in the city. It was estimated that with inclusion of the municipality called Knihin, home to many employed in the city who took advantage of affordable housing there, the population of “greater” Stanislawow would rise to 54,000. A few years later, this was one of the major criticisms of Arthur Nimhin by the opposition weekly, Rewera, which would blast the mayor for failing to push through this change.

  Kurjer Stanislawowski February 19, 1911, provided census data broken down by religious affiliation from 1870 through 1910.

  21. Kurjer Stanislawowski March 10, 1901; and November 20 and 27, 1910; listed phone statistics and subscribers.

  22. Kurjer Stanislawowski March 17, 1901; and October 6 and 13, 1901. Despite many plans, electrical trams did not start operating until after World War I. This was one of the later criticisms of Mayor Nimhin.

  23. Kurjer Lwowski June 30, 1901, reported on the protest of the pharmacists trying unsuccessfully to thwart competition.

  24. Kurjer Lwowski, March 6 and 14, 1893, described city commitments to attract the Third Railway Directorate to Stanislawow. They included guarantee of suitable housing for the staff (15 buildings, with each providing 10 apartments) and guaranteed rent control for the next 10 years. In addition, the city was to build future administrative offices.

  25. Kurjer Stanislawowski June 9, 1901.

  26. Kurjer Lwowski January 17, 1901; and Kurjer Stanislawowski January 20, 1901.

  27. Gazeta Stanislawowska July 22, 1893, announced the opening of the women’s teachers’ school. The article mentioned that there were only three similar schools in all of Galicia. Originally, it was located on Halicka Street, off the central city square. Kurjer Stanislawowski August 9, 1903; and July 10, 1904; continued the topic of women’s education. Another high school for girls opened in 1904; it would not be until 1912 that the first female student would receive her high school diploma in a local school for girls, as opposed to passing the required exit examination in one of the schools for boys, as my grandmother had done (Kurjer Stanislawowski June 9, 1912). The current value of school tuition was calculated based on the Consumer Price Index.

  28. Kurjer Stanislawowski November 17, 1901.

  29. Kurjer Stanislawowski July 3, 1904; July 2, 1905; and July 15, 1906.

  30. M. Orlowicz. Ilustrowany Przewodnik po Galicyi. Lwów 1919; pp. 134–135.

  31. Kurjer Stanislawowski January 1, 1905; and July 3, 1910.

  32. Kurjer Stanislawowski July 31, 1910.

  33. Yearbooks of civil administration indicated Joseph’s positions as adjunct, commissioner, and then superintendent in the departments of accounting and revenue between 1901 and April 1913. The building housing his office was designed by Ernest Baudisch in 1893, and the construction was carried out by the company of Ludwik Radwanski. The directorate remained on Karpinski Street from 1894 until 1914, when the offices of the railway administration moved to a newly completed building, with a richly decorated interior, on Grunwaldzka Street.

  34. Kurjer Stanislawowski October 26, 1902. It is unclear which member of the Strauss family conducted, though it was certainly not Johann Strauss Jr., the most famous waltz composer, who had died a few years before.

  35. Kurjer Stanislawowski October 25, 1908; and January 24, 1909.

  36. Kurjer Stanislawowski August 18, 1901; January 11, 1903; and November 27, 1904. The ads for new shows were published weekly until 1910, when they started to disappear.

  37. Kurjer Stanislawowski April 17, 1904. The first performances were in a theater for dramatic arts. Kurjer Stanislawowski July 30, 1905, had a short announcement of the summer outdoor performances.

  38. In the United States, the first movie theater was Vitascope Hall in New Orleans, which opened in 1896. By 1910, there were three movie theaters in Stanislawow: the Urania, the Olympia, and the Apollo. Kurjer Stanislawowski March 31, 1912, announced that the first movie produced in Galicia was to begin distribution in April of that year.

  39. Kurjer Lwowski December 1, 1911.

  40. Kurjer Lwowski January 11, 1901.

  41. Kurjer Stanislawowski September 3, 1905; and February 24, 1907. In New York City, the first taxicabs with meters were the French-built Darracqs; 65 of them hit the streets in 1907 (The New York Times May 4, 2011). Kurjer Lwowski January 4, 1911, reported that the first metered taxicabs in Lvov were to start service the same year.

  42. Kurjer Lwowski January 23, 1908.

  43. Kurjer Stanislawowski February 17, 1907.

  44. Kurjer Stanislawowski January 1, 1905, reported on a visit to the city by Ernest Baudisch of Vienna, the main architect of the ambitious reconstruction. The work was to begin later that year and also include the building of an additional post office.

  Kurjer Lwowski December 24, 1909, described new multilingual tickets being sold in Stanislawow.

  45. Kurjer Stanislawowski July 26, 1908.

  46. Kurjer Stanislawowski August 11 and 25, 1907.

  47. Kurjer Stanislawowski May 27, 1906.

  48. Karl Baedeker. Austria Including Hungary, Transylvania, Dalmatia, and Bosnia. Leipsic 1900; pp. 25, 31–40, and 71–72. This travel book described various tourist attractions awaiting visitors in Vienna. It also provided detailed information on the train journey between Galicia and the capital of the empire, the route traveled by the Regiec family.

  49. The Viennese Giant Wheel had opened in 1897 and was based on an original built only four years earlier by John Ferris Jr. for the World Expo in Chicago. In 1916, the Wiener Riesenrad was scheduled for demolition, but because no funds were available, the plans were never carried out. It has remained in its original place and is still working today. For several decades, it was the largest Ferris wheel in the world.

  50. Skorowidz Przemyslowo-Handlowy Krolestwa Galicyi; Lwów 1906; pp. 76–79; and Kurjer Stanislawowski June 18, 1905.

  51. Kurjer Stanislawowski January 6, 1907.

  52. Kurjer Stanislawowski January 22, 1905, provided an early description of the just opened Gartenbergers’ Passage and its main attraction, the elegant Cafe Edison. Two Gartenberger brothers owned several buildings downtown. The shopping arcade was situated between Sapiezynska, Karpinski, and Kosciuszko streets; the buildings on the Karpinski Street side were largely destroyed during World War I.

  Kurjer Stanislawowski April 7, 1907, published what appeared to be a paid advertisement on the benefits of owning one of the American typewriters available in Gartenbergers’ Passage.

  53. Kurjer Stanislawowski February 25, 1906; and May 6, 1906; described the construction boom that swept the city that year and the high hopes of Stanislawow’s public.

  54. Kurjer Stanislawowski July 22, and 29, 1906; and August 5, 1906. The estimated value of the revenues was calculated based on the Consumer Price Ind
ex.

  55. Kurjer Stanislawowski February 16, 1908.

  56. Kurjer Lwowski January 8, 1908; and Kurjer Stanislawowski January 12, 1908. Joseph Regec (sic) from Stanislawow is listed as promoted to rank VIII. There is no single metric that precisely measures the relative value of wages over time. For calculating the value of Joseph’s salary, so-called economic and income value metrics were used.

  57. Kurjer Lwowski December 1–3, 1908. Kurjer Stanislawowski November 29, 1908; and December 6, 1908; provided descriptions of local celebrations.

  Szematyzm Krolestwa Galicyi i Lodomeryi z Wielkim Ksiestwem Krakowskim na Rok 1912; Lwów; p. 873 mentioned that two commemorative decorations had been presented to Joseph Regiec in preceding years.

  58. A reference to Joseph Regiec’s professional success can be seen in the history of the small school in Wieloglowy where he had taught; as already noted, it was written by another teacher approximately 20 years after Joseph had left.

  59. The annual report listed Joseph Regiec as a member of the association in 1904. Kurjer Stanislawowski March 20, 1910, reports on the election of Joseph Regiec to the executive committee. Kurjer Stanislawowski October 26, 1912, lists Regiec among the contributors.

  60. Kurjer Stanislawowski July 11, 1909, reports that Joseph Regiec joined a civic association supporting an orphanage and paid his annual dues.

  CHAPTER 4

  1. Slownik Geograficzny Krolestwa Polskiego i Innych Krajow Slowianskich. Editors F. Sulimierski, B. Chlebowski, and W. Walewski. Warszawa 1880; vol. I, p. 287. The description of Bohorodczany and surrounding villages in the original text has been altered in a few places for linguistic clarity; it was supplemented by additional information from the period, including Austrian census data (Gemeindelexikon der im Reichsrate Vertertenen Königreiche unf Länder; Galizien; Vienna 1907; vol. XII, pp 40–43 and 824).

  2. At that time, Bohorodczany and Lachowce were owned by a man named Jan from the village of Buczacz, who became a royal official.

  3. Pinkas Hakehillot. Encyclopedia of Jewish Communities, Poland. Vad Yashem, Jerusalem 1980; vol. II, pp. 71–72.

  4. Szematyzm Krolestwa Galicyi i Lodomeryi z Wielkim Ksiestwem Krakowskim na Rok 1885. Lwow; p. 642.

  5. M. Hasten. Mark My Words. Brotchin Books 2003. The description of the synagogues refers to the beginning of the twentieth century.

  6. Kurjer Stanislawowski October 11, 1903, reported on the history of the ikonostas and a visit to Bohorodczany by the metropolitan Szeptycki, the highest official in the Greek Catholic Church in Galicia. The artwork originated in the Skit Maniawski monastery, which belonged to the Russian Orthodox Church. That order was dissolved by decree of the emperor Joseph II of Austria in 1785. In 1782 or 1785, the famous ikonostas was moved to the Greek Catholic church in Bohorodczany.

  7. Handbuch des Statthalterei-Gebietes in Galizien für das Jahr 1861. Lemberg; p. 340. Several Potockis founded churches for the Dominican order in the Stanislawow district. Besides Constantia Potocka and the church in Bohorodczany, Jacob Potocki established a church in Jezupol in 1600, Stephan Potocki founded one in Potok in 1608, and Nicolaus Potocki set up another in Tysmienica in 1631.

  8. Grand hetman was a highly prestigious military title; Palatinus referred to an overseer of the province (voivodeship), a title bestowed by the crown.

  9. Two of Sophia’s children, Ignatius and Stanislaus, were baptized in Bohorodczany in 1722 and 1723. (Based on the baptismal records of Bohorodczany.)

  10. The infant boys, Adalbertus and Nicholaus Leszczynski, were sons of Jacob and Alexandra Leszczynski. The godparents included several members of the Potocki family (based on the baptismal records of Bohorodczany).

  A. Szarlowski. Stanislawow i Powiat Stanislawowski. Stanislawow 1887; pp. 76–80. Joseph Potocki’s wife was Victoria Leszczynski, claimed by some to be a sister of King Stanislaus Leszczynski of Poland, whereas others believed she was his more distant relative. Victoria married Joseph Potocki at the age of 14.

  11. The brick church was established by Stanislaus Kossakowski, the son-in-law of the original founder of the church. By 1775, it was consecrated in the name of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The church was reconstructed in 1904 but suffered significant damage in 1916, during World War I. It was rebuilt between 1928 and 1933.

  12. Franz Stadion held the post of governor of Galicia for two years (1847 and 1848); his younger brother Rudolph was the governor of Moravia (1845–1847).

  13. The land was bought by Franz Stadion (1808–1853). By 1849, ownership had passed to his younger brother Rudolph. By 1876, Rudolph Stadion’s daughters, Rudolphine and Gisela, would own other real estate in the neighboring town of Łysiec. The last owner of the family’s Bohorodczany and Lachowce estates was George Stadion, who was listed as the owner of the still largest property in Bohorodczany in the waning days of World War I (J. Bigo; Najnowszy Skorowidz Wszystkich Miejscowosci z Przysiolkami; Lwów 1918; pp. 13 and 86).

  14. Kurjer Stanislawowski November 29, 1903. The advertisement section contained a call for applications to manage forests in Bohorodczany. It listed the address of the management offices in today’s Czech Republic.

  15. Overall, the entire district of Bohorodczany contained two smaller towns, 37 rural settlements, seven special self-governing tracts of land, and 47 smaller administrative units. In 1880, the district numbered 51,892 people.

  16. Skorowidz Przemyslowo-Handlowy Krolestwa Galicyi. Lwów 1906. The publication provided detailed listings of shop owners. The lumberyards selling firewood were owned by Abraham Leib Karliner, Jakob Kern, Löwi Kern, Naftali Schultz, and Gabryel Schwalb. Among the owners of tanneries, Hersz and Majer Schreyer, Mechel Rieger, and others were listed.

  17. One of the midwives would be needed in due course when my mother was born a few years later.

  18. Slownik Geograficzny Krolestwa Polskiego i Innych Krajow Slowianskich; editors F. Sulimierski, B. Chlebowski, and W. Walewski; Warszawa 1880; vol. I, p. 287; and Gemeindelexikon der im Reichsrate Vertertenen Königreiche unf Länder; Galizien; Vienna 1907; vol. XII, pp. 40–43 and 824.

  19. The village name has been Pidhirja (Підгір’я in Ukrainian) since 1963. It was known as Bystryca from 1944 to 1963, and Lachowce prior to that.

  20. Jan, the first known owner of Lachowce (previously mentioned), agreed to the payment of 300 grzywna. The grzywna was a measure of weight, mainly of gold and silver, used throughout medieval central Europe. The grzywna was also a unit of exchange, used as money.

  21. Slownik Geograficzny Krolestwa Polskiego i Innych Krajow Slowianskich; editors F. Sulimierski, B. Chlebowski, and W. Walewski; Warszawa 1884; vol. V, p. 54; provides a description of the village and the census data from 1880. Gemeindelexikon der im Reichsrate Vertertenen Königreiche unf Länder; Galizien; Vienna 1907; vol. XII, pp. 40–43 and 824; gives detailed statistics from the beginning of the twentieth century.

  22. Slownik Geograficzny Krolestwa Polskiego i Innych Krajow Slowianskich. Editors B. Chlebowski, W. Walewski, and F. Sulimierski. Warszawa 1890; vol XI, pp. 267–268. The name is still in use today. Current maps indicate a distance of 11 miles from Bohorodczany.

  23. Dziennik Polski August 12, 1885. The article dismissed the idea of exporting oil to China but lamented that barriers to supplying oil existed within Austro-Hungary itself. Interestingly, the biggest imports of oil to China were then coming from Russia and America.

  CHAPTER 5

  1. Wiktor Wittyg. Nieznana Szlachta Polska i Jej Herby. Krakow 1908; p. 299. It is unclear whether Jarosz Sobolo(e)wski, who paid the tax in 1564, was the earliest recorded member of the family. The records provide conflicting information about his coat of arms, which might have been used for identification beyond the similar last name. Nonetheless, Janowice was the village where Thecla Regiec, Joseph’s mother, was from.

  2. Jerzy Sewer Dunin-Borkowski. Spis Nazwisk Szlachty Polskiej. Lwów 1887; p. 52. This source listed Kula Sobolewski from the village of Sobolów as a knight in Cracow’s official roster of 1633
.

  3. Swietoslaw Sarnecki. Zwiazek Nierozdzielny. Krakow 1679. The pamphlet includes an entry by Michael Cyrus Sobolowski, who was listed as a student; the family of Cyrus Sobolowski was mentioned in the poem.

  4. Oswald Zaprzaniec, Elektorow Poczet, Lwów 1845, p. 338, listed several Sobolewskis, including Joseph Sobolewski from Cracow province, an elector of Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski in 1764.

  5. Kasper Niesiecki. Herbarz Polski. Published by Jan Nep. Bobrowicz. Leipzig 1841; vol. VIII, p. 438.

  6. Zbigniew Leszczyc. Herby Szlachty Polskiej. Poznan 1908; vol. 2, table XLIX. There was another family of Sobolewskis that originated in central Poland and was distinguished by a different coat of arms, called Slepowron.

  7. On the occasion of the births of Franciscus and Sophia, Simon Sobolewski, of unknown profession, and his wife, Anna, were mentioned in the church baptismal books of Stanislawow (1723 and 1725). Among other early entries were Nicolaus Sobolewski, born in 1738; he was the son of Stanislaus Sobolewski, a member of the military, and his wife, Anna.

  8. M. Vishnitzer. The Memoirs of Ber of Bolechow (1723–1805). Oxford University Press 1922; pp. 96–100. The book provides graphic descriptions of attacks on the Jewish community.

  9. A. Szarlowski. Stanislawow i Powiat Stanislawowski. Stanislawow 1887; pp. 137–143. When Oleksa Dobosz, who had plundered Bohorodczany, was killed, a cross studded with diamonds was found sewn into his clothes. This was returned to Stanislaus Kossakowski. In 1754, the next leader of opryshky was caught in the area. After interrogation and torture, he was sentenced to death.

  10. A quill pen was the writing instrument of the time; goose feathers were most commonly used. Dip pens were introduced approximately 50 years later.

  11. Continuato Edictorum et Mandatorum Universalium in Regnis Galiciae et Lodomeriae. Leopoli 1783; pp. 20–25 and 35–37. The initial laws requiring the registration of nobility were issued in 1775 and were followed by the edict of 1782, in which all hereditary classes were joined together by Emperor Joseph II. This was an attempt to dilute the power of the large, landowning families of the old Poland. It is surprising to see that the Sobolewskis applied much later. The same year, Joseph II issued a progressive edict that abolished free labor and established the right of former serfs to marry and relocate at will, without permission of their estate owners. This edict was largely ignored in Galicia and was later rescinded by Joseph’s brother.