A recap of two days of gumshoe detective work, unique sites and the Polish countryside.
I expected this would happen.
There’s too much going on to keep all the interesting stories coming. Everything is going according to plan. In fact, much better than we imagined. More details to come about the last few days in future postings .
Yesterday we were spent a beautiful day touring Krakow. Today, we are heading to Auschwitiz so we expect the mood to change but feel excited about the new experience.
I should add that coincidentally it’s Father’s Day! I’m feeling something special about that on this trip.
As a quick update on some past days …
Last I left the notes on this trip, we were heading into heading to our hotel Polanca Palace in Krosno on Wednesday night. It was a beautiful restored mansion with a great restaurant.
THURSDAY – JUNE 13
The next day (Thursday), we drove southwest another 40 or so miles to Brzezowa. Here we were on a hunt for traces of my grandmother’s family on my father’s side. Joseph Peter Kiczek had married Katarzyna Kuchnicka who records had shown were from this village town.
The hills became broader and steeper as we neared the Tatra Mountains range bordering Poland and Slovakia. We did not have much to go on but a record that she was from this town in either her immigration papers or marriage certificate.
Our translator and guide’s, strategy was to visit the town hall records and see if they had either direct records for Katarzyna father or some other clue that could tie in the family. Basic detective work. This led us to several municipal records stops and a possible cemetery where others in the family had been buried. It was gumshoe work with small gains in our research. We found a woman who had Kuchnika roots but perhaps from another branch of the family. Name on gravestones and other records could not directly tie those past lives with our family.
In nearby Binarowa, we visited the very unusual wooden church of Michael the Archangel, This church built in the early 1500’s is listed on UNESCO’s historical sites list. It’s one of several very old country wooden churches with unique wooden carvings and invaluable art located in a small country town. Many were destroyed by either the Nazis or Communists. There’s lot’s of pics to come on this.
At day’s end, in Stróże we we located Sadecki Bartnik, our most unique place to stay. It would be hard to categorize this place except to say it was a honey farm, and nature camp, a resort dedicated to nature and beekeeping. Sounds odd I know, but a beautiful resort with some interesting twists to buzz about later.
FRIDAY – JUNE 14
Our last day of family research. Records we had showed that my grandmother on my mother’s side, Anna Semla Kmak, had come from Wyskitna or Biala Nizna area not too far from Stróże. Again, we went to the municipal records offices and found a trace of the family which we followed with some success and met a few interesting characters along the way. It was an interesting day to end our research. We added more mystery finding and meeting a connection to the family.
Paul Kiczek
(This blog post series originally appeared on Paul’s blog (https://myplanc.blog/) and is published with his permission.)