Established in 1907 by a handful of Polish Immigrants calling themselves “The Sons of Poland”, the Organization became one of the largest community oriented groups of Polish Canadians in Canada. The first branch was formed in Toronto and eventually 47 active branches were located in Ontario as far south as Windsor and as far north as Fort Frances and Red Lake.
“In honour of all the members of The Polish Alliance of Canada, of the founders and volunteers of this centennial organization, who created a piece of Poland in Canada for their countrymen with the achievement of their noble motto Tolerance-Brotherhood-Education.”
With this very personal dedication, I would like to express my recognition and deep respect of the Alliance’s founders and thousands of devoted volunteers, who over the years built an organization that well serves the Polish community, Poland and Canada.
This publication represents a small collection of historical knowledge about The Polish Alliance of Canada, based on materials and documents that I was able to obtain. I used two excellent publications – Golden Jubilee (a collection of works) published in 1957 and The Diamond Jubilee of The Polish Alliance of Canada edited by Dr. Franciszek Kmietowicz in cooperation with Maria Kiczma, Anastazja Kozlowska, Henryk Lopinski, Henryk Skrzypkowski, Leszek Wawrow, Michal Wolnik and Wladyslaw Woloszczak and published in 1982. My objective was to collect as many photographs as possible in this work, in order to show the silhouettes of those who successfully led the Alliance for 100 years. Understandably, enormous reductions were required. Certain facts had to be more thoroughly discussed; others were only briefly pointed out; and still others were not even mentioned.
These facts were presented in detail in the above-mentioned jubilee books. Did I make the right choices? I do not know. I spoke with many Alliance volunteers and asked for their help and advice. Nearly all of them were very kind to me and offered valuable directions. For this, I would like to sincerely thank them all.
Working on this book was not easy, just like working in volunteer organizations is not easy. Tracking the saga of the Alliance, I easily discovered the difference “between the old and the new times.” We now have increasingly less time for ourselves, we are unable to speak with one another, and we more often expect spite, impatience and jealousy, instead of mutual respect. “Old” volunteers yearningly look at the young who do not take to volunteer work. This is not their fault. The fault lies with the unusual life tempo sprung on us by reality. Our values have been revalued. We hear questions like “Why?” and “For how much?” more often. These types of questions were not asked by our predecessors.
They created organizations for us, built up their prestige, outlined wide-ranging objectives, and accomplished them. The current situation of The Polish Alliance of Canada is very difficult. This centennial organization does not have its own domicile; many documents have disappeared from the mobile archives, while others have been lost or damaged. This is our sad history. But there is also another – devoted members of Alliance branches and their affiliated organizations are writing this history. They are the heroes within this publication.
I give warm thanks to the Alliance volunteers who have worked with me. They include: Zenon Lewaniak (PAC Branch 2 in Hamilton), Stanislaw Krupski (PAC Branch 6-27 in Cambridge), Urszula Glowala (PAC Branch 10 in Brantford), Piotr Telecki (PAC Branch 13 in Sudbury), Helena Celnar, Maria Warnke, Konrad Mrowiec (PAC Branch 14 in Sarnia), Anna Grabowy, Tadeusz Michalak (PAC Branch 19 in Thunder Bay), Jan Zubrzycki (PAC Branch 21 in Oshawa), Zbigniew Mielczarek (PAC Branch 40 in Wawa), and Jozef Kazmierczak (PAC Branch 43 in Barrie).
I would also like to thank Philadelphia Zawierucha for translating this book, for its timely completion, and for her enormous work and reliability. I would like to thank everyone and to wish them luck in the difficult volunteer work for The Polish Alliance of Canada.
— Teresa Szramek
