Ignacy Jan Paderewski. A Touch of Poland in America.

Champion of Liberty. Pianist. Significant contributor to resurrection of Poland after WWI.   

USA stamps, Scott catalog numbers 1159 & 1160 affixed to catcheted 8.5 x 11 sheet with first day of issue (FDC) cancel in Washington D.C.   on 100-th anniversary of artist’s birth.

Nice addition to Polish political leader, music, composer or artist topical collection.

Cancel shows city hall in Krakow.

Suitable for framing. Makes a great gift.

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE.

  IGNACY JAN PADEREWSKI

( November 6, 1860 -   June 29, 1941)

  Ignacy Jan Paderewski was born on November 6, 1860 in Kurylowka Podolia, Poland, one of the provinces of Poland's easternmost borderland.  

  Ignacy was a precocious child.   At 3 he exhibited an affinity for the piano; at 4 he could read and write Polish and Russian and speak French; at 8 he showed a remarkable facility for mathematics; and at 14 he was admitted to the conservatory of music in Warsaw, without an examination.   He graduated in 1878, and in 1884 moved to Vienna to further his piano studies.  

As a child he witnessed the tragic suppression of Poland in 1863, which resulted in the imprisonment of his father and consequently, in the wrecking of his home.   This and happenings of the following years, instilled in Paderewski a great love for Poland and a strong patriotism.  

 In 1888, he made his world debut as a concert pianist in Paris.   Success was instantaneous.   Triumph after triumph followed: Vienna (1889), Brussels (1889), London (1890) and the United States, Carnegie Hall (November 17, 1891).   This was the greatest of all.   He enchanted the audiences with his startling execution of technique and his dramatic interpretation of the compositions.   He was an internationally acclaimed concert pianist.  

 During the First World War, because of his impassioned patriotism, he not only contributed large sums of money, but also devoted himself to the cause of Polish relief in America.   Later he took an active part in the restoration of Poland.   His ardent and intimate friendship with Woodrow Wilson and the high esteem the president had for Paderewski, led Wilson to incorporate Point 13 into the Treaty of Versailles, which resurrected Poland as an independent state.   In 1919 Paderewski represented Poland at the Versailles Treaty meeting as its first premier and minister of foreign affairs.   Later that year, discouraged and heart-broken because of the political situation in Poland, he resigned his office and returned to France.  

Generous to a fault, Paderewski made and gave away huge fortunes.   In 1920 Paderewski, exhausted, retired to his farm in California, and began to prepare for a new musical career.   In 1922 he began his American tours and concerts, steadily restoring his fame and fortune.  

In 1939 he returned to Switzerland only to learn of the Nazi invasion of Poland.   He was  

chosen as a member of the three-man steering committee governing the Polish government in exile.   Paderewski now was and old and sick man, but his enthusiasm, patriotism and supreme faith in Poland, not only awakened his spirit, but also revived his energy to return and tour America once more for the cause of Polish relief.   On June 22, 1941 he collapsed from heat exhaustion from which he never recovered and on June 29, 1941 he died of pneumonia at the age of 81.  

As a statesman Ignacy Paderewski, by his tireless efforts in peace and war, won eternal gratitude and immortality as a champion of liberty, not only in the hearts of the Polish and American peoples, but in the hearts of freedom loving peoples everywhere.