Mieczyslaw Jakuczek – a well-known artist, expert and popularizer of the history of Oswiecim, witness to history – has died at the age of 95.
He was born in 1928 in a barrack settlement in Oswiecim. He was the child of refugees from Zaolzie, occupied in 1920 by Czechoslovakia. His father Jan Jakuczek, pseudonym “Zaolziański,” headed the Union of Armed Struggle/ Home Army outpost in Oświęcim during the German occupation as a commander. Together with other conspirators arrested by the Germans, he was executed on 25th January 1943.
muzeumpamieci.pl/25-stycznia-1943/
During the war Mieczysław Jakuczek was subject to compulsory labour for the Germans. This is how he recalls the time when he was sent to the newly built German cinema. It was established on the site of the current Salesian facility. It functioned for a very short time. It was destroyed during one of the American air raids in 1944.
“I went to the Arbeitsamt. There was an assignment for a new job. I got a job in a cinema. I had to pass an exam, so I travelled for several days to Katowice. I remember one movie that I really liked – about a parade on ice,” he recounted on 3rd August 2021, in an account recorded by the Remembrance Museum.
As a witness to history, he repeatedly participated in historical meetings and talked about his occupation experiences.
The staff of the Remembrance Museum extend their deepest sympathy to his family and loved ones.
