Muzeum Miasta Jaworzna

About the museum

The museum’s founding date is taken as 23 May 1972, when the Społeczny Komitet Organizacyjny Muzeum Regionalnego (Social Organising Committee of the Regional Museum) was appointed. The first collections – old maps and plans of mine workings and tools from local mines – were gathered by activists associated with mining in the Zagłębie Krakowskie (Kraków Coal Basin), and later also by the PTTK and the Towarzystwo Przyjaciół Miasta Jaworzna. The first exhibition opened on 15 December 1972 in the attic of the Dom Technika at ul. Grunwaldzka.

Over the following decades the institution changed premises several times, as it lacked space to present its collections. At the beginning of the 1980s the town handed over to it the building at ul. Pocztowa 5, which it shared with a public library. In 1994 the museum became a department of the library, and on 17 June 1998, by resolution of the Town Council, it received the status of Muzeum Miasta Jaworzna. It is supervised by the gmina.

Today the museum presents permanent exhibitions devoted to the former hard coal mining, the ethnography of the Krakowiacy Zachodni (Western Krakowiacy), the interior of a salon from the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and the Jewish culture of the town’s former residents. A separate exhibition tells the story of the camp which operated in Jaworzno from 1943 to 1956 as a German subcamp of KL Auschwitz and later as a post-war labour camp and prison. The museum also runs museum lessons, workshops, a museum cinema and a series of meetings, “Z Historią na Ty”.

Highlights

• Exhibition “Obóz dwóch totalitaryzmów. Jaworzno 1943–1956” with a reconstructed camp gate
• Reconstructions of mine adits and the shift overseer’s office
• Interior of a cottage and costumes of the Krakowiacy Zachodni
• Salon from the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries
• Judaica – mementos of Jaworzno’s Jewish residents
• Virtual tour of the museum on the website

Permanent exhibitions

• Obóz dwóch totalitaryzmów. Jaworzno 1943–1956 – The exhibition shows the history of the camp, which operated as the German subcamp KL Auschwitz Neu-Dachs and after the war as the Central Labour Camp and Central Prison Jaworzno. Visitors enter through a reconstructed camp gate.
• Najdawniejsze dzieje górnictwa węgla kamiennego na ziemiach polskich – Two rooms show the beginnings of mining in Jaworzno: a reconstruction of mine galleries with miners’ equipment, and the office of the shift overseer with surveying instruments and a mining uniform.
• Ekspozycja etnograficzna – The exhibition shows the interior of a village cottage from the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and the festive costumes of the Krakowiacy Zachodni.

Founded

1972

Operated by

Gmina Miasto Jaworzno

Director

Przemysław Dudzik

Admission & discounts

Free admission: On Thursdays admission to the exhibitions is free for all visitors (the exemption does not apply to the guide service).

Holders of the Karta Dużej Rodziny receive a 50% discount on the ticket price.

Accessibility

The museum hasn’t published any information on this.

Kids & families

Great for kids & families

• Family tours & workshops

The museum runs museum lessons, workshops and trips for children and young people of different ages, and offers a family ticket and a discount for holders of the Karta Dużej Rodziny.

Getting there & parking

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Amenities & dining

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Events & venue rental

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