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WOMAN OF IRON: Anna Walentynowicz, dead, on the tragic flight bound for Katyn
April 13, 2010
Michael Szporer
 The April 10,
2010 list of the Katyn plane dead included Anna Walyntynowicz over
whose firing the 1980 Solidarity strike in the Gdansk shipyard
began, as a birthday present...
Anna Walentynowicz did nothing less than "gave birth" to
independent Poland. If "the Great October Revolution of 1917,"
really, a relatively speaking, small coup, had its mythic
mother--Maxim Gorky's that inspired Pudovkin, Brecht and scores of
others around the world--the 1980 Solidarity Strike [referred to
ironically as "Great August"] had Anna Walentynowicz.
The Solidarity strike was a birthday present from her fellow
shipyard workers; she was born on August 15, 1929. Her firing on
August 7th and forcible removal on August 9th from the shipyard
sparked the strike, which began on August 14th and subsequently
turned into the largest labor strike in history in which more than
a million workers participated nation-wide mobilizing more
millions.
Arguably, one can claim that this century began with the 1980
GdaDsk strike, which led to the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the
1980 Gdansk strike began with Anna Walentynowicz. At this tragic
time for Poland in the 30th year of Solidarity, it is worth
remembering that the first protest of the Gdansk Free Trade Union
[WZZ], the cradle of Solidarity, was a hunger strike and a church
vigil for the imprisoned dissident Bla|ej Wyszkowski, which took
place at "the Katyn Chapel" in 1978.
I met the Solidarity legend with Krzysztof Wyszkowski, Bla|ej's
brother, one of the founders of the Gdansk free trade union.
Instead of attending Solidarity observances, I went to see "Pani
Ania"--with bouquet of red velvet roses. We came with Krzysztof's
son Konrad, who at the time couldn't have been more than seven. The
Solidarity legend offered Konrad a bar of Wedel chocolate and us
some tea.
"Pani Ania" was just like my grandmother, a religious, very
selfless woman--tough, oh, yeah, she could be tough! But most
Polish women aren't snowflakes. Long-stringy hair pulled back in a
simple bun, penetrating blue eyes, thin wire-rimed glasses over
widening high cheekbones. And she was really "mala" [tiny], so
nicknamed by her fellow shipyard workers--came up
to my shoulder and I'm only five feet four.
She would crawl up the bows of ships and weld them. Everyone these
days is watching Andrzej Wajda's film "Katyn." Few know, however,
that Wajda's other classic "Man of Iron," evoking Sergei
Eisenstein's "Ten Days That Shook the World," really was about a
woman of iron, based on the life of Anna Walentynowicz.
Walentynowicz was a Heroine of Socialist Labor turned dissident.
Her life was very much like Poland's, never nothing, but if you are
not afraid to speak up for yourself and care for others, just look
what you can become," Pani Ania," a worthier role model than most,
because an honest one. Our caring and protective mother!
During her last visit to the United States in 2005, Anna
Walentynowicz was compared by leaders of AFL-CIO to the icons of
American labor, like Frances Perkins and was "the cover girl" of
the largest US labor publication. America's first lady of the news,
Georgie Anne Geyer, reflecting on powerful women around the world,
called Walentynowicz "the inspiration" of the most decisive event
that brought down communism in a column reprinted in over two
hundred newspapers. This pint-sized heroine had better press
than
presidents.
It is fitting that probably the last letter written by Pope John
Paul II before his death in April was to Anna Walentynowicz,
wishing her a speedy recovery from back surgery. Walentynowicz's
idea of social justice emerged from her deep Christian faith. She
lived for others and through her actions gained the respect of
ordinary people, perhaps the highest form of respect.
Once recognized for exemplary work by the communist regime,
Walentynowicz joined the opposition after her numerous protests
against the inequities and corruption in her workplace went
unheeded, and met with threats from Poland's notorious security
police, the SB. In all, Walentynowicz, SB alias "Suwnicowa" [crane
operator],spent 1.7 years in prison standing up for human rights.
She had been frequently detained, imprisoned and brutalized for her
courageous defiance. Former SB documents indicate at least one
attempt on her life involving an opposition activist [SB alias
Karol].
After her release from martial law internment in June 1982,
Walentynowicz was soon rearrested for trying to memorialize the
slain miners from the Wujek with plaques, spending four months in a
hospital ward. In October 19, 1983, Walentynowicz returned her
labor hero medals -- the brown, the silver and the gold crosses--to
protest the gruesome murder of Solidarity priest, father Jerzy
PopieBuszko by an SB goon squad. In December 1984, she took part in
a hunger strike in the Church of St StanisBaw Kostka in Gdansk
against the arrest and beating of Andrzej Gwiazda, in solidarity
with political prisoners in Polish jails.
After communism's collapse, Walentynowicz was unfairly portrayed in
the press as a moralizing retiree, mainly for her dispute with Lech
Walesa, accusing him of vanity. However, at the wedding of Magda
Walesa, she made up with Magda's father, jokingly saying she will
only break her promise and publicly slap him, if he runs for
Poland's president again. WaBsa laughed but I think she was
serious, scolding even the leader of Solidarity in a maternal jest.
Walentynowicz really cared about the common people, forgotten by
the changes.
On December 13, 2005,Walentynowicz accepted the Truman-Reagan Medal
of Freedom on behalf of "the first free trade union Solidarity,
Gdansk 1980" from the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation in
Washington DC that also recognized her dissident activities.
Born in Rowny, Volynia [now Ukraine], she was repatriated as a
ten-year old orphan to Poland with a farming family who adapted but
abused her, making her their servant. She ran off to Gdansk and
ended up in the shipyard. A self-made woman of iron and a single
mother of her son Janusz until her marriage to her husband
Kazimierz, she was all about "the solidarity of hearts." In the end
it was all about John Paul II and a belief in something greater
than us.
She was 80 and listed among the dead on the Russian-made TU 154
Polish presidential airplane bound for Katyn.
"Piotr and Bogdan arrive at my apartment, and I'm nowhere to be
found. The woman in Apartment Four lets informs me the director's
car has arrived for me, and that I must immediately go with them to
the shipyard. At first, I'm apprehensive, because I'm always
followed, but she tells me it was OK, our boys from shipyards. When
we arrive at Gate Two [Now main entrance by the monument] of the
shipyard, Piotr simply commands the guard to open it, and to my
complete amazement, the guard obeys. Inside a sea of faces, workers
as far as the eye can see. Out of the crowd a young woman
twenty-something, greets me with a bouquet of roses. I ask her,
"Child, where did you get these flowers? It's still early for
roses." She responds, "From the director's garden. They're our
roses!"
The boys lift me up on top of a mechanical shovel, above the sea of
faces. I see a simple cardboard sign pinned to a plank, RETURN ANNA
WALENTYNOWICZ TO WORK, ONE THOUSAND ZL BACKPAY. An unforgettable,
incredibly moving moment--that sign over the heads of the shipyard
crowd! "
Anna Walentynowicz, from interview with Woman of Iron in Solidarno
[anticipated from Oxford University Press, 2010]
Michael Szporer is a Professor of Communications at University
of Maryland University College and Member of the Board of
Directors of Victims of Communism Memorial
Foundation.
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