One Polish refugee family’s journey to a life in England -1940-1969 -told through a national identity dance costume.
Dance costume, 1967-68, made by Mrs Helena Pogoda (née Kubik,) born in 1908 in South East Poland for her grand daughter, Elizabeth Morris(née Elzunia Tanska) -a member of the Krakowiak Dance Troupe,of Little Chalfont, Bucks. Elizabeth’s family lived from 1948-1958 at Hodgemoor Polish Resettlement Camp, Bucks. She was born in 1954 and grew up with Polish as her first language. She remembers her grandmother making the costume and that:
‘My granny, –my maternal grandmother -was a professional dressmaker. She loved sewing. Helena Pogoda, my ‘Babcia’, was an extremely talented lady.’ … I joined the dance group in 1968 aged 14 and continued to the age of 17. We were a group of [Polish] young people, aged between 14 and 21. Whenever there was a ‘Polish event’ like a dance, festivity or celebration of some kind, then we would perform a few dances (the Krakowiak, the Mazurek or a Polonez –various dances from different regions of Poland). … This was never a professional dancing troup –purely amateur. It kept the Polish youth community together at the time … but as we all grew up, the dance group disbanded. We married and moved away or went our own ways.’ Helena Pogoda died in 2001 in Amersham, aged 83.
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University of Brighton Dress History Teaching Collection.
DEAW 458.1-5. Given in 2015 by Mrs Elizabeth Morris, along with oral testimony details and press cuttings.
Read the complete project document on pdf.
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