Oberschlesisches Landesmuseum - Wir beleben Zusammenarbeit

Upper-Silesia, an Industrial Region, rich in History, Interesting Present and European Future

“This all is not really distinguishable, subsumable or ascertainable, not in its nationality, not in its religiousness, some remembers of the “Kohlenpott“ (colloquial German: Ruhr-area), as if shifted to the East, but more appropriate it would be to call the “Kohlenpott“ an Upper-Silesia, shifted to the West”, Heinrich Böll writes under the title ”The Painful of Upper-Silesia” in his recension of Horst Bienek´s “The first Polka” about pre-wartime Upper-Silesia. He alludes to the historical relations between the both industrial region, which is shaped by immigration of Upper-Silesian people in the Ruhr-area – earning migrants since the end of 19th century, who were followed by refugees and displaced persons after 1945 and later by resettlers – as well as to structural similarities. In addition comparable problems caused by the reduction of coal and steel industry are appearing.

“Upper-Silesia is not Silesia, both is not explicit: neither German, nor Polish, and its demands for independence were not far-fetched, although politically hopeless. (…) crushed and constantly torn between two ambitious and totally humourless nations, people were simply tired of having to admit“, Böll writes furthermore and therewith referes to the woebegone history of Upper-Silesia in the 20^th century, when it was bone of contention between Germany and Poland. As result of the Second World War Upper-Silesia now belongs to Poland. Many Upper-Silesians escaped, were displaced or felt the need to resettle. Often North-Rhine Westfalia was their destination, so that many inhabitans of North-Rhine Westfalia have Upper-Silesian roots. On the other side many Eastern-Polish people, who were displaced as well, found a new home in Upper-Silesia.

Today’s wojewodship Silesia persists in its core of the Upper-Silesian indutrial area, but also contains the beskids, which are adjoined in the South and reaches beyond the historic northern boarder of Upper-Silesia through the inclusion of the region around Tschenstochau. But also the wojedwodship of Oppeln and areas in today’s Czech Republic, adjoining in the south-west, belong to the historic Upper-Silesia and therefore are in interest of the Upper-Silesian Provincial Museum. In search of their identity the wojewodships Silesia and Oppeln bethink of their history and culture, also of the German part, now represented by the German minority. They perceive themselves as a region, which was formed by multiple cultures, and therewith differentiate from other Polish regions. In the Silesian part of the Czech Republic it is tied in with Silesian traditions, too.

1964 the state of North-Rhine Westfalia took over a sponsorship for the Upper-Silesians in the light of the multiple relations of both regions, and at September, 1^st 2000 a “concerted declaration of cooperation and extension of friendly relations” was signed. This gives an official frame to the numerous public and private initiatives and to the relations resulting from that. The “concerted declaration” provides a “Deepening of cultural and linguistic interchange of both regions under special consideration of the interests of people of Polish and German nation to conserve identity”. The Upper-Silesian Provincial Museum escorts this interchange with appropriate activities and conceives itself as an information centre.