Zdzisław Abramowicz Named Honorary Citizen of Bolesławiec

Update

The council adopted the resolution with 20 votes in favour. No one voted against it or abstained.

One of the items on the agenda of the September session of the Bolesławiec City Council was a vote on the draft resolution concerning the “granting of the title of Honorary Citizen of the City of Bolesławiec to Mr Zdzisław Abramowicz”. The justification for the document states:

A teacher and scouting instructor, journalist, regional historian, co-author of guidebooks to the municipalities of Bolesławiec County, editor of historical television programmes, commander of the scouting district in 1982–1988 and 1999–2011, and a councillor for six terms of the Bolesławiec City Council.

He was born on 4 April 1947 in Wołów, Lower Silesian Voivodeship. He came to Bolesławiec with his parents in 1948. He completed primary school there, followed by secondary school. He studied technical, humanities, agricultural and theological subjects. After graduating from the Catholic Theological College, he became a catechist and taught religious education for several years at Primary School No. 1 in Bolesławiec.

As early as the 1970s, he was actively involved in scouting. Between 1978 and 1980, as one of the members of the Sports, Tourism and Recreation Department, he co-organised events, rallies, road races and technical-defence competitions at city and voivodeship level, and supported individual scouting teams and groups. In 1981, he was involved locally in the establishment of the A. Małkowski Circles of Scouting Instructors, which referred to the traditions of pre-war scouting. In the autumn of the same year, he also began efforts to establish the “Wigry” team, named after the Home Army battalion of the same name that took part in the Warsaw Uprising. The team, later transformed into a scouting group, was established four months before martial law was declared and operated very actively despite the significant restrictions on civil liberties introduced in Poland.

In 1982, Zdzisław Abramowicz was elected Commander of the Bolesławiec Scouting District of the Polish Scouting and Guiding Association. He held the position until 1988, when he decided to resign because he did not want to give in to the ideological influences affecting the scouting movement at that time. When traditional values began returning to scouting in 1989, he became Commander of the Scouting District again. He held the position until 2011.

At the request of veterans from Bolesławiec, he was elected President of the Bolesławiec Branch of the World Association of Home Army Soldiers, a position he held from 2006 to 2024. In 2005, he received a badge recognising his contribution of social work to the World Association of Home Army Soldiers and its dedication to the ethos of the Home Army.

Zdzisław Abramowicz was first elected to the City Council in 1994. He served as a councillor during the second, third and fourth terms, as well as the sixth, seventh and eighth terms. He served as deputy chair of the City Council and chaired a permanent committee several times; during the Council’s second term, he was also a member of the Bolesławiec City Board.

From his earliest years, he was interested in Polish history and is also passionate about regional history. His subjects of interest included Polish traces in the so-called Recovered Territories, as well as local history from the 1930s to the 1950s. He often investigates the individual histories of people and their families. His interests led to active involvement in the work of the Council of the Museum of Ceramics in Bolesławiec, as well as participation in the editorial work of the “Bolesławiec Yearbook”. He took part in academic conferences, including “The Security Office in Bolesławiec” in 2009 and “Residents of Bolesławiec – They Did Not Come from Nowhere. Around the Settlement Landscape of Lower Silesia” in 2016. He is the author or co-author of more than twenty historical monographs. He contributed to studies of the history of many localities in the Bolesławiec region, including Bolesławiec, Iwiny, Gościszów, Nowogrodziec, Zebrzydowa, Osła and localities in the Bolesławiec Municipality. His research and investigations cover the area from Zgorzelec to Krzeszów, as well as Lubusz Land and Greater Poland.

He published in local and regional newspapers, including “Gazeta Wrocławska” and “Gazeta Wojewódzka”. He co-created more than 1,100 television programmes. The most popular were the “Echoes of the Past” series produced by TV Łużyce, the “Discovering History” programme made by Telewizja Lokalna Bolesławiec, and “Signs of History”, broadcast on TVT Zgorzelec. He worked with several well-known television and press editors and also served as an organiser and consultant for a number of cultural and historical projects.