Olsztyn

Old Town Hall on the Market Square

In 1334, a watchtower was established on the Łyna River. In 1346, the forest was cleared at the location for a new settlement, mentioned in a historical document from 1348.[10] The following year, Teutonic Knights began the construction of an Ordensburg castle as a stronghold against the Baltic Prussians.[11] Allenstein was granted municipal rights by the cathedral chapter of the Bishopric of Warmia in October 1353.[11][12] The German "Allenstein" referred to the river's Baltic Prussian name Alna, which meant a hind.[13] Local Poles, having arrived along with German settlers, called it Holstin and Olsztyn,[11] which are Polonizations of the German name. The castle was completed in 1397.[13] The town was captured by the Kingdom of Poland during the Polish-Lithuanian-Teutonic War in 1410, and again in 1414 during the Hunger War, but it was returned to the monastic state of the Teutonic Knights after hostilities ended.

The city joined the Prussian Confederation in 1440 and rebelled against the Teutonic Knights in 1454 upon the outbreak of the Thirteen Years' War to join Poland under King Casimir IV Jagiellon. The townspeople took the castle and recognized the Polish king as the rightful ruler.[13] Although the Teutonic Knights recaptured the city the following year, it was retaken by Polish troops in 1463.[14] The Second Peace of Thorn in 1466 confirmed Olsztyn as part of the Kingdom of Poland.[15] Administratively it was located in the Prince-Bishopric of Warmia within the provinces of Royal Prussia and Greater Poland.

St. James's Cathedral in the Old Town

From 1516 to 1521, Nicolaus Copernicus lived at the town's castle as administrator and in Mehlsack (Melzak, now Pieniężno). Copernicus was in charge of the Polish defenses in the Siege of Allenstein during the Polish-Teutonic War of 1519–21.[16] He also started and managed the repopulation of the region, inviting a new wave of Polish settlers from Mazovia.[13] The town along with Warmia then entered what is considered the region's golden age,[14] crafts and trade developed, also due to the city's location on the Warsaw-Königsberg (Królewiec) trade route.[13] During this period, the city was still visited several times by Copernicus, as well as leading figures of Polish Renaissance, writers, royal secretaries and diplomats: Johannes Dantiscus, called the "father of Polish diplomacy", and Marcin Kromer, who was also a historian and music theorist. The St. James' Cathedral, one of the most distinctive landmarks of the cityscape, was completed.[15]

Prosperity was halted in the 1620s, when the town suffered a fire[15] and an epidemic.[14] In 1626, during the Swedish invasion, canons from Frombork (Frauenburg) took refuge in the town, which the Swedes did not reach.[14] The city was sacked by Swedish troops later, in 1655 and 1708, during the next Polish-Swedish wars, and its population was nearly wiped out in 1710 by epidemics of bubonic plague and cholera.

The town became part of the Kingdom of Prussia in 1772 after the First Partition of Poland and its economy initially collapsed.[10] Poles became subject to extensive Germanisation policies. A Prussian census recorded a population of 1,770 people, predominantly farmers, and Allenstein was administered within the newly created Province of East Prussia. It was visited by Napoleon Bonaparte[17] in 1807 after his victories over the Prussian Army at Jena and Auerstedt. The growth of the city started again after it became a district seat in 1818,[14] a significant influx of German settlers began and by 1825, the town was inhabited by 1,341 Germans and 1,266 Poles.[18] In the early 1830s the city suffered from a cholera epidemic and a hunger crisis, however afterwards it flourished again, when despite Germanisation policies it was administered by Polish mayor Jakub Rarkowski from 1836 to 1865.[14][19] Under Rarkowski the city was expanded and modernized,[14] and the mayor also hid Polish insurgents in the city during the January Uprising.[19] The first German-language newspaper, the Allensteiner Zeitung, began publishing in 1841. Polish historian Wojciech Kętrzyński was arrested in Jomendorf (the present-day district of Jaroty),[14] and imprisoned in the city's High Gate in 1863 for smuggling weapons for the Polish January Uprising in the Russian Partition of Poland.[20] The town hospital was founded in 1867.

Historic building that was once the headquarters of Gazeta Olsztyńska (Olsztyn Daily Newspaper)

In 1871, with the unification of Germany, Allenstein became part of the German Empire. Two years later, the city was connected by railway to Thorn (Toruń). Despite Germanisation attempts the city remained an important Polish centre.[10] Its first Polish language newspaper, the Gazeta Olsztyńska, was founded in 1886.[15] Allenstein's infrastructure developed[21] rapidly: gas was installed in 1890, telephones in 1892, public water supply in 1898, and electricity in 1907. The Provincial Mental Sanatorium Kortau was established in 1886 just south of Allenstein (today part of Olsztyn-Kortowo). In 1905, the city became the capital of Regierungsbezirk Allenstein, a government administrative region in East Prussia. From 1818 to 1910, the city was administered within the East Prussian Allenstein District, after which it became an independent city.

Kopernikusplatz (postcard, 1917)

Józef Bem Square, 2020

Shortly after the outbreak of World War I in 1914, Russian troops captured Allenstein, but it was recovered by the Imperial German Army in the Battle of Tannenberg.

After the defeat of Germany in World War I, the East Prussian plebiscite was held in 1920 to determine whether the populace of the region, including Allenstein, wished to remain in German East Prussia or become part of Poland, which had just regained independence. In order to advertise the plebiscite, special postage stamps were produced by overprinting German stamps and sold on 3 April of that year. One kind of overprint read PLÉBISCITE / OLSZTYN / ALLENSTEIN, while the other read TRAITÉ / DE / VERSAILLES / ART. 94 et 95 inside an oval whose border gave the full name of the plebiscite commission. Each overprint was applied to 14 denominations ranging from 5 Pfennigs to 3 Marks. The Polish community faced discrimination, Polish rallies were dispersed, the participants were threatened and beaten.[14] In March, Polish activist Bogumił Linka died in Olsztyn, a few weeks after being brutally beaten by the German militia in nearby Szczytno in Masuria.[22][23][24] He was buried in Olsztyn, however, his grave was soon devastated by local German nationalists.[22][23][25] A monument to Linka was unveiled after Poland regained control of the city after World War II.[22][23] The presence of a Royal Irish battalion ensured a relative peace in Allenstein.[26] The plebiscite, held on 11 July, produced 16,742 votes for Germany and 342 votes for Poland.[14]

Headquarters of various Polish organizations in the interbellum

In the interwar period, numerous Polish organisations operated in the city, including the Polish Scouting and Guiding Association, Union of Poles in Germany, a People's Bank (Bank Ludowy),[10] local Poles organised a school, library, puppet theatre.[14] The Polish Consulate also operated. After the January 1933 Nazi seizure of power in Germany, Poles and Jews in Allenstein were increasingly persecuted.[14] In 1935, the German Wehrmacht made the city the seat of the Allenstein Militärische Bereich. It was then home of the 11th and 217th infantry divisions and 11th Artillery Regiment. At the same time, the football club SV Hindenburg Allenstein played in Allenstein from 1921 to 1945.

Beginning in 1936, members of the Polish minority was increasingly persecuted, especially members of the Union of Poles in Germany.[14] In early 1939, many local Polish activists were expelled.[27] In an attempt to rig the results of an upcoming census and understate the number of Poles in the city and region, the Germans terrorized the Polish population and, in May 1939, the Gestapo confiscated 10,000 Polish information leaflets in the headquarters of the Gazeta Olsztyńska.[28] In August 1939, Germany introduced martial law in the region, which allowed for even more blatant persecution of Poles.[29] In August and September 1939, the Germans carried out mass arrests of local Poles, including the chairman of the local Polish bank and his assistant, the chief of the "Rolnik" Cooperative,[30] and the principal of the local Polish school.[31]

Nazi Germany co-formed the Einsatzgruppe V in the city, which then entered several Polish cities and towns, including Grudziądz, Mława, Ciechanów, Łomża and Siedlce, to commit various atrocities against Poles during the German invasion of Poland that began World War II in 1939.[32] German troops invaded Poland also from Olsztyn.[3] After the German invasion of Poland, local Poles were also subjected to mass executions[10] and deportations to occupied Poland. Arrested Poles were held in a local prison and then forced to remove Polish signs and inscriptions in the city, while the German population gathered and insulted them.[33] The Gazeta Olsztyńska was abolished by the German authorities, the newspaper's headquarters was demolished and the editor-in-chief Seweryn Pieniężny was arrested and executed in the KZ Hohenbruch[14][3] along with co-publisher Wojciech Gałęziewski and the "Rolnik" Cooperative chief Leon Włodarczyk, while Pieniężny's wife was deported to the Ravensbrück concentration camp.[34] The last pre-war Polish consul in Allenstein, Bohdan Jałowiecki, along with the consulate staff, was imprisoned in the Hohenbruch and Soldau concentration camps,[35] and then murdered.[36] Polish teachers were deported to the Dachau concentration camp.[34]

Home Army monument

During the war five forced labour camps were established in the city.[10] On 12 October 1939, the Wehrmacht established an Area Headquarters for a military district that controlled the environs of Allenstein, including Lötzen (now Giżycko), and Ciechanów in occupied Poland. As part of the Aktion T4, Nazi Germany conducted medical experiments on the patients of the psychiatric hospital in the present-day district of Kortowo, in which at least 5,000 people were killed.[37]

On 22 January 1945, near the end of the war, Allenstein was plundered and burned by the conquering Soviet Red Army, and much of its German population fled.[38] The remaining, mostly Polish population, was subjected to various crimes, including murder, rape and looting.[3][14] The Soviets also murdered the remaining patients and staff of the psychiatric hospital, who were either burned alive or shot.[37] On 23 May 1945, Olsztyn became again part of Poland under border changes promulgated at the Potsdam Conference. In October 1945, the remaining German population was expelled, to be replaced by new Polish settlers,[39] mostly those expelled from pre-war Polish regions of Vilnius, Grodno and Volhynia, annexed by the Soviet Union, as well as settlers from Warsaw destroyed by the Germans.[14] Reconstruction and removal of damages lasted until the 1950s.

In December 1945, a match factory was launched in Olsztyn, as the city's first post-war industrial plant of national importance.[40] A tyre factory was founded in Olsztyn in 1967. Its subsequent names included OZOS, Stomil and Michelin.[41] City limits were greatly expanded in 1966 and 1987.[3]

On the 500th anniversary of the birth of Nicolaus Copernicus, in 1973, a planetarium was opened in Olsztyn.[15] In 1989 the former Gazeta Olsztyńska headquarters was rebuilt and re-opened as a museum. In 1991 Pope John Paul II visited the city.[15] In 1999 the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn was established, which is now one of the largest universities in northeastern Poland.

Olsztyn became the capital of the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship in 1999. It was previously in the Olsztyn Voivodeship.

Though Jews did trade in the city fairs during medieval times, they were not allowed to trade freely in the villages surrounding the city.[42] In 1718, Bishop Teodor Andrzej Potocki imposed a ban on Jewish trade.[43] Other bishops after him continued the ban, which apparently wasn't successful since the city population complained about Jews dealing with animal leather and other products in 1742. Permanent Jews were found in the city in 1780, and they were allowed to settle outside the city walls.[44] In 1814, the Simonson brothers opened the first Jewish store in town. In 1850, the city official authority announced that any citizen that hosted a wandering Jew in his house, would be fined and imprisoned.[45]

Remains of the Jewish cemetery

The Jewish community of the city as a congregation was established in 1820. Shortly after, a prayer room was established on Richterstrasse. In 1877, the congregation bought a plot of land on Liebstädterstrasse and built a synagogue there.[46] A Jewish cemetery was built on Seestrasse (present-day Grundwalzka). While at its peak, the town's Jewish population was 448 Jews in 1933.

On Kristallnacht, the town synagogue was destroyed and later used as a bomb shelter.[47] Now, a sports club sits on the site of the synagogue.[48]

By 1939, 135 Jews were left in the city, after most others fled from the country. Those who lived in town in 1940 were deported to Nazi concentration camps.[49] In June 1946, 16 Holocaust survivors settled in the city and in 1948, the congregation had 190 worshipers. Most of them emigrated to Israel throughout the next few decades. There is no current trace of the Jewish cemetery.[50]

The city was the birthplace of world-famous Jewish architect Erich Mendelsohn. In town, Mendelsohn planned the mourners' chapel (called the Mendelsohn house) next to the cemetery.[51] The building is currently restored.[52] In addition, it was the birthplace of German Socialist and SPD leader Hugo Haase. Frieda Strohmberg, an Impressionist, lived and worked in the city from 1910 to 1927. Documentation of the Jewish owned shops in town exists.[53]

More than half of the forests occupying 21.2% of the city area form a single complex of the Municipal Forest (1050 ha) used mainly for recreation and tourism purposes. Within the Municipal Forest area are situated two peat-land flora sanctuaries, Mszar and Redykajny. Municipal greenery (560 ha, 6.5% of the town area) developed in the form of numerous parks, green spots and three cemeteries over a century-old. The greenery includes 910 monuments of nature and groups of protected trees in the form of beech, oak, maple and lime-lined avenues.

The city is situated in a lake region of forests and plains. There are 15 lakes inside the administrative bounds of the city (13 with areas greater than 1 ha). The overall area of lakes in Olsztyn is about 725 ha, which constitutes 8.25% of the total city area.

• Stefan Jaracz Theatre (est. 1925) the host of International Theatre Festival DEMOLUDY
• Puppet Theatre

• Helios
• Multikino

• Museum of Warmia and Mazury (Muzeum Warmii i Mazur) – Olsztyn's largest museum.
  • Gazeta Olsztyńska House (Dom "Gazety Olsztyńskiej")
  • Museum of Nature (Muzeum Przyrody)
• Museum of Sports (Muzeum Sportu)
• Muzeum Nowoczesności

Old townhouses at the Rynek (Market Square) in the Old Town

The historic central district of Olsztyn is the Old Town (Stare Miasto), which contains various historic buildings and structures, including:

• the Gothic castle of Warmian Bishops, built during the 14th century, former home of Nicolaus Copernicus, now a museum
• Gothic St. James' Cathedral with Gothic-Renaissance-Baroque interior
• Old Town Hall on the Market Square – built in the mid-14th century.
• Gazeta Olsztyńska House at the Targ Rybny ("Fish Market"), now a museum.
• the town walls and the High Gate (until the mid-19th century known as the Upper Gate).
• Our Lady Queen of Poland church
• Monument to Nicolaus Copernicus
• Park Zamkowy (Castle Park)
• Baroque Archpresbyter's Palace (Pałac Archiprezbitera)
• Gothic Revival Church of the Salvator

Notable structures outside of the Old Town include:

• the New City Hall
• the astronomical observatory
• the Jerusalem Chapel, built in 1565
• Neogothic Sacred Heart church, built during the years 1901–1902
• Church of St. Lawrence in the Gutkowo district, built in the late 14th century
• Home Army and Stefan Jaracz monuments and the White Eagle Column
• the Railway Bridge over the River Łyna gorge near Artyleryjska and Wyzwolenia streets, built during the years 1872–1873
• Main Post Office
• Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship office
• Instytut Północny im. Wojciecha Kętrzyńskiego ("Wojciech Kętrzyński Northern Institute")
• Park Centralny (Central Park)
• the Książnica Polska building with one of the oldest active passenger elevators in Poland and Europe
• FM- and TV-mast Olsztyn-Pieczewo – 360 metres high, since the collapse of the Warsaw radio mast the tallest structure in Poland

• 
  High Gate
• 
  Our Lady Queen of Poland Church
• 
  New City Hall
• 
  Astronomical observatory
• 
  Jerusalem Chapel
• 
  Sacred Heart church
• 
  Voivodeship office

Death metal act Vader, regarded as one of the first and most successful death metal bands from Poland.

Currently a bus network with 36 bus lines exists, including 6 suburban lines and 2 night-time lines.[55]

In 1939, due to poor economic situation throughout the interwar period and city's growing population, a trolleybus line began operation, partially replacing the original tram network. Olsztyn was a third city in Poland having this method of transportation at that time. During the Second World War the cars were mainly driven by women.

The trolleybus network consisting of 4 lines was decommissioned on 31 July 1971.[56]

Olsztyn has train connections to Warsaw, Gdańsk, Szczecin, Poznań, Bydgoszcz, Iława, Działdowo and Ełk. Olsztyn Główny is the main railway station in the city. Plans exist to demolish current building and replace it with new infrastructure,[57] contrary to previous information about current building being renovated.[58]

Tram network in Olsztyn re-opened in December 2015

Historically, city's first tram line was built in 1907 and gradually expanded over the years. It ceased operation in 1965.[59]

In 2006 authorities considered reintroduction of trams in the city to address transport problems and subsequently concluded feasibility studies on the matter in 2009.[60] A 11 kilometres (7 miles) long tram network was built between 2011 and 2015. The contract was signed in 2011 and construction commenced in 2012.[59] It was a first new tram system built in Poland in 55 years; 15 low-floor Tramino trams were ordered from Solaris in September 2012.[61] There are currently 3 tram lines in operation.[55]

A 6 kilometres (4 miles) long extension is planned and Turkish manufacturer Durmazlar had been selected to supply 24 trams for the network.[62]

Olsztyn-Mazury Airport

The region and city is served by Olsztyn-Mazury Airport with scheduled international passenger flights. It is located in Szymany, 10 km off Szczytno and 58 km south of the city of Olsztyn. The airport operates flights to London, Dortmund, Lviv, Cracow and Burgas.[63]

Olsztyn is twinned with:

Olsztyn belongs to the Federation of Copernicus Cities, an association of cities where Copernicus lived and worked, such as Bologna, Frombork, Kraków, and Toruń. The main office of the federation is situated at Olsztyn Planetarium and Astronomical Observatory, located on St. Andrew's Hill (143 m) in a former water tower erected in 1897.