Jan Krawiec (15 June 1919 — 28 October 2020) was a Polish-American journalist, historian, and political activist. He was chief editor of

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

's leading

Polish language Polish (Polish: ''język polski'', , ''polszczyzna'' or simply ''polski'', ) is a West Slavic language of the Lechitic group written in the Latin script. It is spoken primarily in Poland and serves as the native language of the Poles. In a ...

newspaper.

Biography

Krawiec was born in Bachorce,

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

. He finished his officer training shortly before the

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

and participated in the defense of Poland. On 17 September 1939, 16 days after the Germans invaded Poland, Krawiec joined the

underground Underground most commonly refers to: * Subterranea (geography), the regions beneath the surface of the Earth Underground may also refer to: Places * The Underground (Boston), a music club in the Allston neighborhood of Boston * The Underground ...

and ran a secret newspaper until he was arrested by the Germans in April 1943. He was transported to Auschwitz, where he did slave labor instead of being immediately murdered, since he was a Polish Catholic. He was later transferred to

Buchenwald Buchenwald (; literally 'beech forest') was a Nazi concentration camp established on hill near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within Germany's 1937 borders. Many actual or sus ...

. In April 1945, the Germans evacuated the prison camp and forced the inmates, including Krawiec, on a

death march A death march is a forced march of prisoners of war or other captives or deportees in which individuals are left to die along the way. It is distinguished in this way from simple prisoner transport via foot march. Article 19 of the Geneva Conven ...

until they were freed by American troops. In 1949, he arrived in Chicago and worked for ten years as a mechanic for Canfield Beverage Company. He earned a degree from Loyola University in

political science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...

. He then became a writer for a Polish-language newspaper, ''Dziennik Chicagoski''. He later moved to competing newspaper '' Dziennik Związkowy''. He was appointed editor-in-chief and remained such until 1985 when he retired. He was part of President Nixon's press pool during his presidential visit to Poland. Krawiec never married. He contracted

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickly ...

in October 2020, and died two weeks later at the age of 101.

References

1919 births 2020 deaths 20th-century Polish journalists Journalists from Illinois Auschwitz concentration camp survivors Buchenwald concentration camp survivors Polish Roman Catholics Writers from Chicago Deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic in Illinois Polish emigrants to the United States Polish centenarians American centenarians Men centenarians 20th-century American journalists American male journalists People from Przemyśl County {{Poland-bio-stub