Decydent & Decision Maker

Barbara Wierzbiańska

Bolesław Wierzbiański

Barbara Nagórska and her several years younger sister Krystyna (still her trustee and closest friend) were brought up in pre-war Sopot. Their father Bohdan Nagórski, an engineer, was in 1922-35 the Polish director of the Port Council in the Free City of Gdańsk (a German was employed in a shadow position). Their mother Zofia, born Krzyżanowska, worked first as a secretary to the Port Council, and after her marriage in the Oliwa Cathedral to the young director, she devoted her time to bringing up their children.

We had a fantastic childhood – Barbara recalls. – We lived in a villa right at the edge of a wood; we would go horse-riding, or go on long walks or to the beach. It was a modern upbringing for those times. Their parents spent a lot of their time with the children but they also led their own lives. They would depart for the French Riviera for their holidays; my mother loved to play tennis – says Barbara. – We had a Swiss governess and because it was too far to the Polish school in Gdańsk, when I reached school age, a lady called Helena started coming to our home, and for the first four years she prepared my cousin, our friends’ son and me for the secondary school. So I always laugh that English, the language in which I feel most comfortable – is actually my fourth language – adds my conversation partner.

History entered into her childhood almost unnoticed. There were more and more Nazi flags hanging in the streets – Barbara recalls that period. – I remember that one day in 1938 we were having our breakfast on the verandah when we suddenly noticed a red flag with a swastika billowing from one of our villa’s windows. It transpired that the culprit was our German keeper and my father’s driver. A terrible altercation erupted and obviously he had to take it down immediately. In 1935 Bohdan Nagórski resigned from his work in the port and moved to a Polish-Norwegian freight company. Just before the outbreak of the war, the Nagórski family departed Sopot for Bohdan’s family in Nałęczów. At the beginning of September, Bohdan and his brother Zygmunt, his wife and a few others left for Romania – like members of the Polish government and many representatives of the intelligentsia. Whereas Zofia and her children took refuge with her brother, a mathematics teacher, in Milanówek.

Games in the ditch

It was in Milanówek where they first came across the Nazis. The Germans first bombed the town, and then they appeared on the streets – remembers Barbara. – I recall that we dug a ditch and we sat in it during the air raid. Granny was praying but I – like a small child – kept fooling around. Zofia decided to take advantage of the fact that at the beginning of the war the Germans were allowing women and children to leave. My father arranged Italian visas for us in Romania and my mother fought the Germans like a lioness to get them to allow us to leave.

Finally, in January 1940 they were allowed to leave for Italy, but another year would pass before they could reunite permanently with their father (who was already working in London for the Polish shipping company Gdynia America Line). They spent that time moving around Europe, escaping the Germans’ advance. When Italy entered the war, we traveled to Bordeaux and lived there until France capitulated – narrates Barbara – who describes her wartime peregrinations as comfortable in comparison with what others went through at the time.

After France’s capitulation, we were refused entry into Spain by the French, but then some Polish soldiers whom we met told us that the Polish liner Batory was about to sail from a nearby port, and that is how we reached London. Their father then sent all three of them to Montreal and only in 1941 did they reunite for good. This meeting almost did not happen because the British liner, the Benares, aboard which Bohdan Nagórski was sailing to Canada, was torpedoed by a German U-Boat. In fact, in march of this year Hyperion published a book called “Miracles on the Water” by Tom Nagórski, Barbara’s cousin’s son, describing the disaster – the drifting of the survivors, who included several dozen children, in rescue boats on the icy waters of the North Atlantic. Bohdan’s boat was found miraculously after eight days. Mother told us about our father’s travails, only when she was sure that he was going to survive – Barbara reminisces about that event.

A difficult start as an emigré

At the start of their American odyssey, the Nagórski family set up home in Forest Hills in Queens, moving later to Manhasset, and then on to Roslyn on Long Island. My father started off working for Gdynia America Line, moving later to the British Mission in New York, but then that finished with the end of the war and lean years followed – remembers Barbara. – For some time he tried his hand at business while mother worked to maintain us: she worked as a shop assistant, a secretary, and then she managed to find a position with Air France. Lacking the money for college fees, Barbara went to a secretarial school and only several years later was she able to complete her studies in economics at the prestigious Mount Holyoake womens’ college in Massachusetts. I must confess, that as a student I behaved very conservatively, maybe excessively so – she says. – I never had a complex about my Polish background but the fact that I was alien to this culture was a hindrance – she adds. My conversation partner is reluctant to discuss her failed marriage from that period to a rookie American journalist. What luck that life gives us a second chance – she says laughing. – Second wives and second husbands are the best!.

Meanwhile, Bohdan Nagórski had a turn of fortune, when in 1952 he started work for the UN as a port construction consultant. He was sent to Jordan, and Barbara decided to join her parents to lick the emotional wounds from her divorce. She divided her time between Amman and Beirut, where her sister was studying at the American University. Each one of us has a time in our youth, which we remember in rosy tints, and for Barbara without a doubt it was the year spent in the Middle East, which left her with a deep empathy for the Palestinians. I met many fascinating people – she recalls willingly. – Arabic culture has something profoundly charming, especially when it is suffused with European customs, as in Beirut.

After returning from the Middle East, she worked at the Rockefeller Foundation. In 1957, two of her acquaintances, American attorneys John Richardson and John Paige started organising medical aid to Poland (mainly medicines, including the polio vaccine) and she spent a year traveling with them as an interpreter to Poland ruled at the time by Gomułka. It was not the done thing to travel to Poland in those days, but then I was not regarded as being of any importance in the Polish community. – she says. Those trips awakened in Barbara a desire to help those repressed by undemocratic political systems, but they also changed her personal life. Bolek, whom I had already known for eight years as a friend of my parents (she always refers to her husband, who died in 2003, as “Bolek” – adds ZB), was working with Radio Free Europe. Apparently, like a typical teenager I turned my back on him the first time we met, but we met again after my second trip because he wanted me to tell him about Poland. Bolek loved Poland but on the other hand he was exceptionally cosmopolitan and tolerant in outlook: he was not a nationalist – she recalls. Their common backgrounds, experiences and interests brought them closer together. I admired him and loved being in his company, although I was afraid of the umpteen year age gap between us. In the end, he overcame that barrier too.

A memorable year: 1958

That year was without a doubt a turning point in Barbara’s life. The Wierzbiańskis were married, and Barbara’s trips to Poland ended with the offer of a job with the International Rescue Committee, a large private organisation assisting refugees from all over the world in settling in the United States. I loved that job – recalls Barbara. – The best proof is that when I left it after 35 year’s service, I was the deputy director of the whole organisation. The future publisher of the Nowy Dziennik helped, amongst others, the cuban exilios (about whom she speaks warmly to this day), but she also had contact with hundreds of Poles, including some now famous names such as Professor Jan Gross or Andrzej Rapaczyński (from the wave of refugees following the anti-semitic purges in Poland fomented by Moczar’s supporters in 1968) or Andrzej Czeczot, Polityka’s current cartoonist from the Solidarity emigration. I always had a sentiment for Poland, but I only became so engaged in Polish affairs thanks to my marriage to Bolek. Amongst their closest friends in that period were Tadeusz Horko, Maciej Feldhuzen from Brasil and Jerzy Ponikiewski a journalist on the Polish community’s Nowy Świat newspaper, who was even referred to as "the Wierzbiańskis’ first child" – he spent so much time with them. Adam – their actual and only son – was born in 1963.

Was it difficult to grow up in a home, in which the conversation continually revolved around Poland, a country which as I child you did not know and having parents with such strong characters? – I asked Adam, whom at the editorial office we call Kuba. Absolutely not, particularly because I attended a school run by the UN, where everyone was from a different part of the world – he rebuffed. – I was the toughest character at home. I must have gone through all the possible stages of rebellion of a New York teenager, including playing the base in many punk bands.

At the end of the 60’s, the Nowy Świat, a Polish community newspaper founded at the start the century in New York, started to go under, and several colleagues - including Bolesław Wierzbiański, Father Michał Zembrzuski, Bolesław Łaszewski and Dr Edward Luka – began to consider publishing their own daily. I remember that day in 1971, when Bolek returned home with the first edition of the Nowy Dziennik – the front page densely covered in type and only one small picture – remembers Barbara. – How could you publish something so hideous?! – I shouted – But it did not dent his mood. Wierzbiański was particularly proud of the fact that the founders did not receive any financial assistance from any organisation. They decided to cover the costs of the publication by selling shares to a widening group of founders, who to this day are the joint owners of the newspaper. Bolek right from the start used the expression 'Polish language newspaper abroad', and not 'Polish community newspaper', wanting to underline the openness of the Nowy Dziennik – says Barbara. – The Nowy Dziennik never generated a very large income, but the fact that it has survived for so long says much about my husband’s knowledge of how to bring out a good newspaper; he always treated its readership seriously.

A stormy and stressful time

The 1970’s saw the rise of the stormy tide of the anti-communist movement. A stream of outstanding representatives of the opposition movement started to arrive from the Peoples’ Republic of Poland (PRL), many of whom would often stay at the Wierzbiańskis’ apartment in Peter Cooper Village on First Avenue. The Wierzbiańskis developed several long-term friendships at that time with, amongst others, Władysław Bartoszewski and Jerzy Turowicz.

1978 was another important year, because Karol Wojtyła was elected to the papacy and Edmund Koch was elected mayor of New York. In his administration, Bolek held the function of Commissioner for Human Rights and thanks to his contacts was able to find accommodation in the city for certain political refugees from Poland – Barbara recalls. The Nowy Dziennik also started regular public fund raising for the support of the democratic opposition in the PRL (funds were sent to, amongst others, the Association of Polish Journalists, and later for the free parliamentary elections in 1989). When Solidarność appeared, being a Pole in New York was very cool – Adam remembers. – I recall that I was getting hold of Solidarity t-shirts for many stars, including the actress Lauren Bacall.

The Round Table Discussions were the realisation of Wierzbiański’s dream of a free Poland. I remember that we were then in Switzerland and Bolek was ringing Prof. Bronisław Geremek daily, asking should he start making plans to come to Poland for the agreement signing ceremony as the representative of the Polish American Congress – recalls Barbara. – In the end, we went and those were some of the happiest days of his life". Everyone who knew Bolesław will know that he was a "political animal" of the highest class. Bolek dreamed of becoming a politician in a free Poland, but when communism fell, he was already 76 and could only count on being a figure of public moral authority, a role later played by Jan Nowak-Jeziorański – says Barbara. – He chose instead his beloved Nowy Dziennik.

A change of guard

In 1994 Bolesław’s health started to fail and Adam resigned from his work in Hollywood, where he assessed potential film scripts sent to the studio. He returned from Los Angeles to New York to help his father in the family business. I was supposed to pop in briefly to set up a computer network and I have ended up staying for 12 years – laughs Adam, who divides his time between the Nowy Dziennik and writing film scripts. And it was in fact Adam who installed Barbara at the Nowy Dziennik, where she gradually took over the roles of general manager and publisher.

In the beginning, I was missing my old job and I felt very uncomfortable in my office on 38th Street – Barbara remembers. – I had, though, a feeling of responsibility towards the employees of the newspaper and I wanted my husband’s creation to survive as long as possible. It was certainly a great help that I had my son as a partner in running the business. I am generally more conservative and I tend to get bogged down in details, whereas Kuba seems to sit in a crow’s nest and can see when we are heading in the wrong direction..

It is thanks to Wierzbiański junior’s inspiration that colour was introduced in 1996, later an internet page, and last year a completely new graphical format, designed by Garcia Media, one of the best companies of its type in the world. I think that we are now offering a much more professional product than a dozen or so years ago – thinks Adam. Since we spend so much time in the office together, we have an unwritten agreement that when I visit my mother at her weekend home in Hampton Bays, we don’t talk about the Nowy Dziennik – says Adam.

Both of them see the future of their family business optimistically. Nowy Dziennik has always come out on top – says Barbara. – What is most important is to continue to go foward. Adam, who operates in the worlds of Hollywood and the American media, adds a wider perspective: More and more people are getting their information from the internet and television, and in the end only one paper will survive in the Polish sector of the market. I earnestly hope that this will be the Nowy Dziennik.

Zbigniew Basara
Nowy Dziennnik, New York

35 YEARS OF THE NOWY DZIENNIK

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