Anna Walentynowicz

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Lore & Background

Anna Walentynowicz was born in 1929 in the village of Sinne, Poland (today Sadove, Ukraine) in Rivne oblast, to a family of Ukrainian Shtundists. During the Second World War at the age of ten she began to work as a maid. Later, after the war, she migrated into Poland. She began working in the Lenin Shipyard in Gdańsk in 1950, first as a welder, later as a crane operator. Recognized as a "Hero of Socialist Labor" or Stakhanovite for her hard work, she became disillusioned with the communist system in Poland, especially after the bloody events in December 1970 on the Baltic Coast. She was never formally a member of the communist party. Anna was a devout Catholic. She began her quest for justice by speaking out publicly when one of her supervisors stole money from the workers' bonus fund to play the lottery. Instead of reprimanding the corrupt supervisor, the system turned on her—she was harassed by secret police. Walentynowicz joined the newly formed WZZ or Free Trade Unions of the Coast in 1978. As editor of the Polish samizdat (bibuła) Robotnik Wybrzeża (The Coastal Worker), she distributed an underground newsheet at the shipyard. She was fired by the shipyard on 7 August 1980, 5 months prior to her plan to retire. This management decision enraged the workers, who staged a strike action on 14 August, defending Anna Walentynowicz, and demanding her return. On the third day of the strike, 16 August 1980, management granted Lenin Shipyard workers their working and pay demands. Lech Wałęsa and others announced the end of the strike. The women of the shipyard, Anna Walentynowicz and Alina Pienkowska, are credited in most eyewitness accounts for transforming a strike over bread and butter issues into a solidarity strike in solidarity with other striking establishments. Walentynowicz and Pienkowska managed to close the gates of the shipyard and keep some workers inside, but many workers went home, only to return by the next day. The Gdańsk Agreement was signed on 31 August 1980, recognizing the right to organize free trade unions independent of the Party for the first time in the Communist bloc. Walentynowicz was a member of the Presidium of MKS. After the strike, she became a member of the Presidium of Inter-Institute Founding Committee (MKZ) of NSZZ Solidarity in Gdańsk. On 1 April 1981 the Presidium of the Lenin Shipyard Institute Commission (KZ) of NSZZ Solidarity 'recalled' her from the Presidium of MKZ on trumped up accusations. As a commission of inquiry determined, not only were all of these charges false, but the KZ Presidium had no jurisdictional right to remove Walentynowicz from her MKZ position. In October 1981, during a meeting with workers in Radom, two officers of the security police—in collaboration with the secret cooperant (TW) Karol—attempted to poison her.

Reader's Guide

Anna Walentynowicz's significance lies in her role as a catalyst for the largest strike in history and a co-founder of Solidarity, which became the first independent trade union in the Eastern Bloc. Her firing directly sparked the August 1980 Gdańsk strike, which quickly paralyzed the Baltic coast and led to the Gdańsk Agreement, recognizing the right to organize free unions. Walentynowicz's later marginalization within Solidarity, including her recall from leadership on false charges, illustrates internal conflicts within the movement and the distance that grew between early strike leaders and new activists. She remained critical of Solidarity's development, comparing its structure to the PZPR. She was among the dignitaries killed in the 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash near Smolensk in Russia, which also claimed the lives of Lech Kaczyński, the President of Poland and his wife, and the senior commanders of the Polish Armed Forces. She was awarded Poland's highest honour, the Order of the White Eagle, in 2006. In 2020, Time magazine included her on the list of 100 Women of the Year who influenced the world over the last 100 years.

Did You Know?

• At age ten, during the Second World War, she began working as a maid.
• She was recognized as a 'Hero of Socialist Labor' or Stakhanovite for her hard work at the Lenin Shipyard.
• Her firing on 7 August 1980, five months before her planned retirement, directly ignited the strike that led to Solidarity.
• In October 1981, two security police officers attempted to poison her during a meeting with workers in Radom.
• She was among the dignitaries killed in the 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash near Smolensk, which also killed Poland's president and senior military commanders.