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[Identification of item], Series number, Box and Folder number, Andrzej Korbonski Collection of Radio Free Europe Materials, 098, Department of Archives and Special Collections, William H. Hannon Library, Loyola Marymount University.
Gift of Bohdan Oppenheim. Accession Number: 2013.33
Containing materials (all textual) in both Polish and English, this small collection (1.25 linear feet) consists principally of publications of the research arm of Radio Free Europe and photocopies of original documents from a major Polish state archive and from the United States Department of State (these are declassified). Dr. Andrzej Korbonski collected these sources for his research on Communist Poland.
The Radio Free Europe materials are in Series 1 and Series 2. These include reports on social, political, and economic conditions in Poland; noteworthy are the reports on the Polish Roman Catholic Church and John Paul II, and the rise of Solidarity under Lech Walesa. These reports are in English, although there are a number of press summaries in Polish in Series 2 that "East (sic) Europe Research" of Radio Free Europe gathered.
Of special interest is Series 3 with its photocopies of documents from the Archiwum Akt Nowych, a major Polish governmental repository. Samples of these documents include an information bulletin from the Ministry of Internal Affairs concerning meetings of Polish Roman Catholic bishops. Another concerns a statement from the Archbishop of Krakow, Karol Wojtyla (John Paul II), to a member of the Polish Parliament concerning a religious procession. The materials are all in Polish in this series. Dr. Nibel Raab, of LMU's Department of History, graciously helped in the translation of some of the documents, which provided insight into the information that they contain.
Series 5 consists of photocopies of memoranda and telegrams sent either to President Franklin D. Roosevelt or to the Secretary of State from the Department of State, and messages from the Secretary of State to F.D.R. The memoranda and telegrams concern U.S. views of, and meetings with, the Polish government in exile in the last years of World War II. The materials also cover the U.S. government's relations with Polish Premier Stanislaw Mikolajczyk, U.S. financing of the Polish underground, the American Polish Congress, Polish-Soviet Union relations, the Warsaw Uprising, and U.S. and Soviet views on the post-war form of Polish government and society.
Most of the original material in Series 5 was classified until the 1970s. Names of note in this series include diplomat
Dr. Andrzej Korbonski (1927-2013) was a long-time political science professor at UCLA, whose research interests in Communist Poland and Eastern Europe stemmed from his Polish birth. Korbonski served in the Polish Free Army in Great Britain during World War II, and after the war ended, he immigrated to the United States. He earned a doctorate in political science from Columbia in 1962, upon which he gained a position in the Department of Political Science at UCLA in 1963. He retired from UCLA in 1994, although remaining active as an emeritus professor.
Dr. Korbonski published numerous books and articles on Communist Poland, a research pursuit that is reflected in the materials in this collection.
All information in this biography comes from the UCLA Department of Political Science web page
The Andrzej Korbonski Collection of Research Materials on Communist Poland is arranged in the following series:
Series 1: Radio Free Europe Research Department Situation Reports
Series 2: Radio Free Europe Polish Press Summaries
Series 3: Polish Government Documents
Series 4: Publications
Series 5: United States Government Declassified Documents
Series 6: Andrzej Korbonski Conference Papers and Other Research Materials
Series 1 holds reports that the research department of
The dates of the reports run from 1988 through 1999.
Series 2 provides press summaries of Polish print media that Radio Free Europe gathered. Each summary consists of photocopies of excerpts of articles, preceeded by a table of contents providing the date and title of the article. The dates of the materials span the years 1989-1991. In Polish, the materials are found in Box 2, Folders 1-2.
This one folder series (Box 2, Folder 3) contains documents in Polish that the Polish archepiscopate and other Polish entities issued. All are photocopies, mostly from the Archiwum Akt Nowych of Warsaw, one of the main governmental repositories in Poland. The originals date from 1966 through 1987. Samples of these documents include an information bulletin from the Ministry of Internal Affairs concerning meetings of Polish Roman Catholic bishops. Another concerns a statement from the Archbishop of Krakow, Karol Wotlyja (John Paul II), to a member of the Polish Parliament concerning a religious procession.
The materials here are all in Polish. Dr. Nibel Raab, of LMU's Department of History, graciously helped in the translation of some of the documents, which provided insight into the information that they contain.
This small series, found in Box 2, Folder 4, contains three issues of "Report on Eastern Europe" specifically on Communist Poland, when the Research Institute of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty published these reports in journal form.
There is also an occasional paper from the East European Program European Program of the Wilson Institute of the Smithsonian (1985) on religion and nationalism in Eastern Europe, and a periodical dedicated to book reviews on communism ("Problems of Communism"; 1982).
In two folders (Box 3, Folders 1-2), this series consists of memoranda and some telegrams (all photocopies) from the Department of State and Secretary of State sent either to President Franklin D. Roosevelt or to the Secretary of State concerning U.S. relations with the Polish government in exile in the last years of World War II. Topics include the U.S. government's relations with Polish Premeir Stanislaw Mikolajczyk, U.S. financing of the Polish underground, the American Polish Congress, Polish-Soviet Union relations, the Warsaw Uprising, and U.S. and Soviet views on the post-war form of Polish government and society.
Most of the original material was classified until the 1970s. Names of note in this series include diplomat Averell Harriman (1891-1986) and U.S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull (1871-1955).
This series consists of miscellaneous resources that Andrzej Korbonski gathered for his research. Most important is a press release from the Polish People's Republic embassy in Washington, D.C., concerning the visit of John Paul II to Poland in 1983. There is also master's thesis from the University of Toronto on relations between church and state in Communist Poland from 1956 to 1970.
Also there are conference papers that Korbonski wrote on the role of religion in Eastern Europe, in one case, specifically Poland.