Dwa nieznane dokumenty dotyczące epidemii „choroby papuziej” w Warszawie w 1951 roku

Piotr Daszkiewicz; Dariusz Iwan

doi:10.31648/ep.7221

Published: 2021-11-171

No. XXII/2 (2021)

Two unknown documents concerning the parrot disease epidemic in Warsaw in 1951

Piotr Daszkiewicz , Dariusz Iwan

Echa Przeszłości

Section: DOCUMENTS AND MATERIALS

https://doi.org/10.31648/ep.7221

Abstract

Two documents relating to the 1951 parrot disease epidemic in Warsaw are kept in the archives of the Museum and Institute of Zoology of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw. For many years, any information concerning the epidemic had been censored and treated as a state secret. The political and social aspects of the epidemic have not been studied to date. On 17 January 1951, the
Antwerp Zoo donated ten parrots to the Warsaw Zoo in the spirit of post-war reconstruction. The birds suffered from psittacosis, and the disease was transmitted to the employees of the Zoo and the State Museum of Zoology. The first document, dated 21 April 1951, is a letter from the patients – the museum’s employees – thanking the medical staff (physicians and nurses) of the convent of the Sisters of Charity. The second document is a poem by Stanisława Witaczek, which recounts her stay in the hospital and thanks the hospital’s staff. Both documents are analyzed in the context of the political situation in Poland in 1951: the suppression of academic institutions’ independence, police scrutiny over research, the omnipresence of censorship and propaganda, and the persecution of former Home Army soldiers.

Keywords:

parrot disease, Warsaw Zoo and the State Museum of Zoology, science in the communist era, sovietization of Poland

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Daszkiewicz, P., & Iwan, D. (2021). Two unknown documents concerning the parrot disease epidemic in Warsaw in 1951. Echa Przeszłości, (XXII/2), 359–368. https://doi.org/10.31648/ep.7221

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Piotr Daszkiewicz

Affiliation:

Instytut Historii Nauki PAN, Warszawa Poland

Dariusz Iwan

Affiliation:

Muzeum i Instytut Zoologii PAN, Warszawa Poland