Miasto i Gmina Gniew

The Bartkowski family house – People’s Reading Room

The building belonging to the well-known Gniew family of the Bartkowski family is located along the street by the Tower. In the interwar period of the XX century, it housed the reading room of the Association of the People’s Reading Rooms and the tavern.

It gave birth to the priests, who were meritorious for the Church and Pomerania:

• Juliusz Bartkowski (1864–1939) priest, national and social activist, well-deserved pastor, pastor of the cathedra in Pelplin, collective canon, general vicar, apostolic protonotary. He was arrested by the Germans and was killed in the mass execution along with other priests from Pelplin on October 20, in the barracks in Tczew;
• Tadeusz Bartkowski (1876–1953) priest, pastor and honorary citizen of Nowe, spiritual adviser, pastor in Lignowy (1938–1947) and then pastor in Gniew (1947–1953).

Not far from the people’s reading room there was once an inn, which was the favourite diner of the German part of the inhabitants of Gniew. It was owned by Georg Domst. It was there, in the period of 1920–1939, that the parties of the German Singing Association “Liedertafel” took place, as well as the events of German inhabitants of the city.

The ceiling beams at that times bore the big sing with the slogan in German: “Each man should drink as much as there are days in the entire year – 365. And every 4 years, the so-called «leap» year comes, one party will be even more abundant” (free translation).