Томашув-Мазовецкий: История и современность польского города

Tomaszów Mazowiecki (, or Tomashuv) is a city in central Poland with 60,529 inhabitants (2021). In autumn, the city hosts the international Love Polish Jazz festival, organized by the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage.

Tomaszów is situated in the Łódź Voivodeship (since 1999); previously, it was part of Piotrków Voivodeship (1975–1998). Tomaszów occupies an area of as of 2002. The town is situated on the banks of three rivers, the Pilica, Wolbórka, and Czarna Bielina, and is near the Sulejow Reservoir and the edge of the Puszcza Spalska wilderness area.

Tomaszów Mazowiecki was founded in 1788 by Count Tomasz Adam Ostrowski when iron ore was discovered there. Ostrowski invited the first miners and metallurgists from the Old Polish Industrial Region. The settlement fell into the Prussian Partition in 1793 during the Second Partition of Poland. In 1807 it was regained by Poles and included within the short lived Duchy of Warsaw, and since 1815 it was located in the Russian Partition. The metal industry was expanded around 1820. Tomaszów received city rights in 1830 during the Polish November Uprising against the Russian Empire. The first weavers came to Tomaszów from Zgorzelec. The first Lutheran church was established in 1823. In 1825, Antoni Ostrowski transferred from the village of Tobiasze to Tomaszów a Catholic parish with the church of St. Wenceslas – Duke of Bohemia, which was located at Wieczność St., in the area of the first Catholic cemetery (nowadays Słowackiego St). In 1831 Qahal was founded. From 1867, it was administratively located in the Piotrków Governorate. During World War I, Tomaszów was occupied by Germany, which policies led to poverty and hunger among the population. During the war, local Poles organized secret resistance in the town, including the Polish Military Organisation. After the war, on November 11, 1918, Poland regained independence, and the Poles disarmed German troops, who afterwards left the town. In mid November 1918, the town's first Polish military unit was organized. Within interwar Poland, the Polish Army was stationed in the town, and it administratively belonged to the Łódź Voivodeship. By 1931 the Jewish population of the city grew to 11,310 inhabitants, or about 30% of the general population of Tomaszów.

On September 1, 1939, the first day of the German Soviet invasion of Poland that started World War II, the Germans air raided the town twice, killing seven people. Further air raids were carried out in the following days, forcing many inhabitants to flee. The Germans then looted the town, burned houses, and committed some murders of its inhabitants. The Great Synagogue was burned to the ground as first on 16 October 1939; the remaining two synagogues were destroyed on 714 November. Most were released after November 11, but some, including the pre war mayor, were imprisoned in Piotrków Trybunalski. On 12–13 June, the Germans arrested 280 people, while on 12–13 August they arrested many women. The victims were then interrogated by the Gestapo, and most were afterwards deported to the Sachsenhausen, Ravensbrück and Buchenwald concentration camps, while some were murdered on the spot. A ghetto for the imprisonment of 16,500 Polish Jews was created in December 1940 and closed off from the outside in December 1941. Hunger was rampant, followed by the typhus epidemic. In December 1942, 15,000 Jews were deported aboard Holocaust trains to the Treblinka extermination camp. Some 200 Jews from Tomaszów are known to have survived World War II. and also established and operated a Nazi prison, and a Baudienst forced labour camp for young Poles in the town. In 1944, even 12 year old Polish children were used as slave labourers to build fortifications in the area in preparation for the advancing Eastern Front. In 1944, during and following the Warsaw Uprising, the Germans deported thousands of Varsovians from the Dulag 121 camp in Pruszków, where they were initially imprisoned, to Tomaszów Mazowiecki. Those Poles were mainly old people, ill people and women with children. The reserve is situated near the end of Saint Anthony Street (in Polish: ulica świętego Antoniego) that begins in the centre of Tomaszów Mazowiecki, in proximity to the central Kościuszko Square.

Tomaszów Mazowiecki has a humid continental climate (Cfb in the Köppen climate classification).

Since the mid 19th century to the 1990s, a large center of the textile industry. The second, after Łódź, center of clothing wool production in the Congress Poland and nineteenth century Russia. In the 20th century – thanks to Tomaszów's Artificial Silk Factory – one of the largest European centers for the production of fibers and plastics. Nowadays, Tomaszów Mazowiecki incorporates the Łódź Special Economic Zone, which is one of the 14 special economic zones in Poland. The city is home to a variety of industries: ceramics, construction, chemicals, plastics producers, electrical machinery manufacturers, upholstery, food, logistics and service.

The major minerals companies in the area are Ceramika Paradyż a manufacturer of ceramic tiles and Sacmi which specialises in ceramic tile production machines. The Wagran factory (built on the area of the former Artificial Silk Company of Tomaszów), is a producer of granite sinks

Within the construction sector Balex Metal produces high quality steel construction components. Ezbud Budownictwo focuses on the construction of residential and service premises, sales and management of constructed properties and also produces ready mixed concrete and other building materials. The company has been engaged in the construction of several housing estates in Tomaszów and Łódź from 1989 onwards and since 2019 has been the main sponsor of Tomaszów's largest football club "Lechia 1923".

Major chemical companies in Tomaszów include Sicher Bautechnik which is a producer of construction chemicals, EcoHydroCarbon which specializes in polymer waste processing and Toma a plastics processing company that also operates a private clinic at its plant for employees to use.

The region has several specialist equipment manufacturers that include Markom, a producer of welding and transport equipment, and Glass Product, which manufactures automatic fertilization and raw material transport systems.

The Japanese car manufacturer Toyota has a base in Tomaszów, specializing in the production of upholstery for its range of premium vehicles. Weltom, a producer or carpets and rugs, also has a base in the city. The company was founded by Eleonora and Jan Roland. Their son, Edward Roland, began the business in 1848 from a small workshop consisting of a spinning mill and a weaving mill operated by three people. The workshop was located on Kaliska Street (today Piłsudskiego). In 1905, the company had expanded to employ a hundred and thirty weavers. The company quickly made a name for itself and became known throughout the Russian Empire. After World War II, the company was nationalized and renamed the "Weltom". In the 1990s, the plant underwent a transformation into a joint stock company. Today, in addition to carpets, the company produces upholstery and coconut wipers. The entire western district of the city (Rolandówka) has been named after the company's founders.

Within Tomaszów's food and beverage sector PepsiCo produces the famous Cheetos crisps, Chipita produces croissants and Roldrob (Drosed) produces poultry products for customers such as KFC. Additionally, Las Vegas is a producer of energy drinks where the group also own the "Bulwary" shopping center in the city.

Other companies in the region specializing in logistics and services are FM Logistic, serving Carrefour and Makro Cash and Carry, and Syntom, a recycling company.

The town's most notable sport clubs are pl with football and volleyball sections and pl with speed skating and bowling sections. The sports venue Ice Arena Tomaszów Mazowiecki hosts main international speed skating competitions; including ISU Speed Skating World Cups. It is also an ice hockey venue.

In the city there is first in Poland year round ice skating rink that serves for speed skating, figure skating, ice hockey, short track and roller skating. It is located near Pilica River. During the occupation of Poland in World War II, several strategic bunkers were built by Nazi Germany near Tomaszów Mazowiecki. The construction of the two large air raid shelters was started in early 1940. The so called Konewka Bunkers (now a tourist attraction) were a complex of various concrete structures hidden in the woods, including an enormous long bunker capable of protecting an entire trainset from the possible air raid. The shelters in Konewka and in Jeleń, built of reinforced concrete, served as unloading stations for military cargo.

The Sulejow Lake is a large reservoir built from 1969–1973 in order to help meet the demand for fresh drinking water in the city of Łódź and the city of Tomaszów Mazowiecki. The reservoir is situated on the territory of three gminas: Tomaszów, Piotrków and Wolbórz. It is a popular place for water sports, including windsurfing, canoeing and sailing.

In the south of the town there is an eighteenth century quartz sand mine The Nagórzyckie Grottoes (Polish: Groty Nagórzyckie). Today, an underground tourist route. At the entrance there is a pavilion with ticket desk, food vending machines and public toilets. They can be reached from the town center by a city bus or by an illuminated bicycle path.

The 25th Air Cavalry Brigade is deployed in Tomaszów Mazowiecki. Headquarters there are in the town and main barracks. Garnison Polish Armed Forces in Tomaszów Mazowiecki has existed since 1918. At the north eastern border of the town, by Expressway S8 there is the Brigade airport (Tomaszów Mazowiecki Airport).