"KOLBUSZOWA ~ MY HERITAGE" a Kolbuszowa Travel Page by Pawtuxet

THIS IS WHERE I FOUND THE FIRST TRACE OF MY FAMILY'S NAME IN MY SEARCH FOR GRANDFATHER'S VILLAGE.

In the center of Kolbuszowa is a village green. A simple park with a small structure at its center. The business district surrounds this park. It is a quiet town where few tourists venture. We found the people helpful and hospitable. Across from the cemetary where we found my family's name on several stones...there was a little neighborhood store. The owner spoke English as he had spent a few years in Brooklyn, NY! We had a nice chat. I'd like to go there again and sit with him for a while.

I've discovered a young man in g.father's village who has a web site. He asked me to write my story for the site and I did. Gosia translated it for me so it can be read in Polish or English. Hoping someone will help me to find members of the family before my next trip. Here is the story...
Poreby Dymarskie

There are a number of Skansen villages throughout Poland. I commend them for being able to preserve their heritage in the face of mostly hard times in Poland. The Skansen villages are created by collecting houses, windmills, tools, furniture and so forth from around the surrounding area and bringing it all together to form an outdoor museum depicting the life and culture of the people who have lived there. Seeing this Skansen village, enables me to visualize how my grandfather must have lived and how the daily life must have been. It's as close as I will ever come to knowing more about his life in Cmolas and Kolbuszowa. I'm creating a Travelogue on the many wonderful details of the village.
The gift shop was small but stocked with many treasures for me. I bought as much as could be crammed into my suitcase. A wonderful painting by a local artist who comes to the village to do his paintings. Treasures for my thoughts of Poland when I'm at home.
Skansen 2006

I found the cemetary to be fascinating. Of course I was excited to finally find my family's name on many of the stones, but aside from that...the cemetary was very different from what I've known at home. Every inch of space has been used. Sometimes you can barely walk between the stones, so dense are the markers. I was fortunate to be in the country during the week prior to All Saints/ All Souls Day. Everyone was cleaning and decorating grave sites to ready them for the major celebration on November 1. Thousands of flowers and candles brightened every cemetary.