New Publications on Tadeusz Pankiewicz – a Biography and a Comic

KJ, 16 November 2016
Two new publications have appeared in bookshops to coincide with the 70th anniversary of the liquidation of the Kraków ghetto and also with the opening of the permanent exhibition at the Eagle Pharmacy. The two publications, about the pharmacy’s former owner, Tadeusz Pankiewicz. are a biography by Anna Pióro and a comic by Tomasz Bereźnicki.

During the War, the pharmacist Tadeusz Pankiewicz owned the Eagle Pharmacy on Kraków’s Podgórze. Despite the fact that the ghetto had been established there in 1941, Pankiewicz decided to keep the pharmacy open on that site. He was the only non-Jew within the ghetto’s confines. The pharmacy rapidly became a contact point for helping the Jews. Pankiewicz helped to provide food, medicines and false papers. He also hid Jews for short periods. In recognition of his actions, he was honoured as a Righteous Among the Nations. In 1947, he wrote his wartime memoirs entitled Apteka w getcie krakowskim (The Pharmacy in the Kraków Ghetto). He died in 1993.

The publication of the book Magister Tadeusz Pankiewicz is the first biography on Pankiewicz. Its author, Anna Pióro, has been the custodian of the Eagle Pharmacy for thirty years. It became a museum in the 1980’s. The biography has been published by the Kraków Muncipal History Museum.

Tadeusz Pankiewicz’s fate and his activities within the Kraków ghetto are also presented in a newly published comic by Tomasz Bereźnicki, Aptekarz w getcie krakowskim (The Pharmacist in the Kraków Ghetto). The comic is based on Pankiewicz’s own memoirs published in 1947.