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Beneficiary

The National Museum in Szczecin

The Title of the Project

The First Maritime Museum in Reborn Republic of Poland. Warsaw Stanisław hr. Ledóchowski Museum.
The exhibition financed by the resources of The Ministry of Culture and Natiional Heritage from the state budget within Program Wieloletni "Niepodległa” 2017–2022.

Number of the Contract

Contract No. 82/20/MNS of June 8th 2020

Finances and Budget

A two-year project carried out in 2020–2021, financed by the state budget (PLN 250 000 yearly).

Project Description

Stanisław Ledóchowski was a landowner from the Eastren Borderlands, a graduate of the Kherson Maritime School. After graduation, he became an industrialist. He atempted taking up shipbuilding and shipping. Paradoxically, he was financially successful with the land activity of Polskiej Fabryki Siatki Jednolitej Hrabiego Stanisława Ledóchowskiego SA (a mesh factory) located at Przemysłowa 32 in Warsaw. In 1932, he opened the first Polish maritime museum in the area adjacent to the main building of the plant. It operated until the outbreak of World War II. In the rooms on the ground floor, ship models were displayed (mny of them were made in the museum's model shop), sea-related oil paintings, numerous photographs, posters of shipping lines etc. Activities that Ledóchowski himself described as maritime propaganda were part of the museum's activity. He set up a newsletter and managed to publish its three issues. Fragments of the exhibition were shown in various parts of the country (Cracow, The National Museum in Warsaw) and abroad - in Brussels and, supposedly, at the World Exhibition in New York in 1939. In the latter case, perhaps under the name of the Maritime and Colonial League of which he was a member. He died during the war in 1940. After the war, a part of the museum's collection was located in Szczecin, where the Central Maritime Museum was to be established, and is currently held by The National Museum in Szczecin.

The aim of the project is to restore the memory of the history of the first Maritime Museum in reborn Poland as well as the profile of Stanisław Ledóchowski and his achievements, resulting from deep patriotism, which were aimed at promoting the idea of the importance of the sea in the entire Republic of Poland. It is also a jubilee exhibition to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Poland's return to the Baltic Sea. The project is to include several parts: from the presentation of monuments and mementoes, through the digital reconstruction of the museum, to elements of art in the form of a mural.

Project Location and Time

The main part of the project will be carried out in five selected centres in Warsaw, Gdańsk, Gdynia, Kołobrzeg and Szczecin.
Moreover, a travelling board exhibition is to be held, which will include reproductions of photographs by Ledóchowskiego and his associates and the history of the return of Poland to the Baltic Sea, of the Maritime Museum and of Ledóchowski himself. 

The project is to be completed on December 31st 2021.

The Manager of the project is Tomasz Budzan PhD, the Manager of The Maritime Department of The National Museum in Szczecin.