History
Beginnings
The settlement of Giszowiec does not have a long history. The company "Georg von Giesches Erben", which in late 19th century owned many mines in Upper Silesia, planned its own settlement for workers, and therefore Colonie Gieschewald was founded 1907.
Structure of the colony
The leading director of the settlement was Anton Uthemann, who came up with the basic project. This work was completed by George and Emil Zillmann, architects from Charlottenburg, who designed the settlement inspired by Ebenezer Howard's idea of the "Garden city". In just three years the project was completed: high living standard houses for 600 families were built, with four main streets leading to the central marketplace (today called Plac pod Lipami - Square under the Linden Trees). The settlement had its own institutions, a hotel, department stores, a swimming pool and a water tower. Some dwellings were offered to those miners who lived without family. Most inhabitants worked for the Giesche coal mine (today: Wieczorek coal mine), and the total cost of the colony was estimated at 5 million German Marks. In 1914, a narrow-gauge railway to Janów was opened. Throughout its early history the colony was an independent municipality.
Giszowiec in Poland
On 20 June 1922 Gieschewald was renamed Giszowiec and became part of the new Autonomous Silesian Voivodeship and was since then part of the Second Polish Republic. In the subsequent years, numerous Polish associations, among them also a choir were created. Giszowiec lost its independent status in 1924, when it was incorporated into the new municipality of Janów.
German troops occupied the settlement on 4 September 1939. During the occupation, the Nazis tried to destroy everything related to Poland, including a monument of the Silesian Uprising. On 27 January 1945, Red Army captured Giszowiec.
After the Second World War, Giszowiec was merged with Szopienice, but later this decision was voided.
In the course of time the appearance of the colony changed. 1964 were established in the area of the colony after hard coal finds the Staszic Steinkohlebergwerk. In order to take up the inflow of new workers, new populated areas were proven. It was decided that the colony should be torn off and be established in the area a new settlement with zehnstoeckigen blocks of flats. Thus 1969 the Stanisław Staszic housing development was built, which approximated in the next decades ever more near to the old colony. In the western part and East part new disk's buildings replaced the old brick houses, and the colony began to lose their old character of a company-owned housing estate. With the resolutions of the responsible curator of 1978 and 1987 to place the old land development under monument protection the colony could be saved fortunately. In the nineties was begun to maintain and also restore the historical settlement. Nevertheless, only one third of the old land development remained. 1984 were begun with the building of the Barbarapfarrkirche in the Staszic settlement.
Giszowiec is also today still surrounded by forest and is by its relatively large distance to the urban tightness, a popular local recreation place for the inhabitants of the whole city and, since it is the only garden city in Poland, gladly visited and also inhabited. The houses of the colony were transferred 1999 of the city Katowice, since the houses become sold at private people.
Education
In the old colony there is an elementary school number 51(Szkoła Podstawowa nr 51) with approximately 1000 pupils. School building was constructed in 1993 and is the newest in Giszowiec. The two high schools are older. In the seventies the Konopnicka High School (Gimnazjum numer 16 imienia Marii Konopnickiej) was established, the school chronicles go back however until 1908, thus the beginnings of the Gieschewalder school history. Here there are 400 pupils. In addition there exists another high school (Gimnazjum nr 15), with 374 pupils.
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Nikiszowiec a part of an administrative district Janów-Nikiszowiec of Katowice city.
East Upper Silesia is the easternmost extremity of Silesia, the eastern part of the Upper Silesian region around the city of Katowice. The term is used primarily to denote those areas that became part of the Second Polish Republic on 20 June 1922, as a consequence of the post-World War I Treaty of Versailles. Prior to World War II, the Second Polish Republic administered the area as Autonomous Silesian Voivodeship. East Upper Silesia was also known as Polish (Upper) Silesia, and the German (Upper) Silesia was known as West Upper Silesia.
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The Upper Silesia 1980 strikes were widespread strikes, which took place mostly in the Upper Silesian mining cities Jastrzębie-Zdrój, Wodzisław Śląski and Ruda Śląska and its surroundings, during late August and early September 1980. They forced the Government of People's Republic of Poland to sign the last of three agreements establishing the Solidarity trade union. Earlier, agreements had been signed in Gdańsk and Szczecin. The Jastrzębie Agreement, signed on September 3, 1980, ended Saturday and Sunday work for miners, a concession that Government leaders later said cut deeply into Poland's export earnings.
Poland 
