![[Krolewski Picture]](KrolewskiM_01.JPG)
Michal Krolewski (1950-2005)
The driving force of the American Polish Assistance Association
By Loretta Lyk, Warren, MI
Born to Polish American parents. Graduated from college at age 19. Taught at St. Ladislaw High School, Taught at Orchard Lake St. Mary's and was Director of International Students.
Organized Holy Thursday Church tours of old Polish churches for 28 years.
For more than 30 years organized drives for packages for the needy in Poland.
After Hurricane Katrina sent 28 boxes of supplies to the victims there and organized care for a Polish family that came to our area from Louisiana. Worked with other nationalities in an ecumenical way.
He was the driving force of the American Polish Assistance Association.
Quoting from an article by Robert Strybel, Polish Polonian Affairs Writer, " Over the years, KrolewskiÕs varied activities have included running a Polish import shop in the Detroit suburb of New Baltimore, setting up Polish import courses and developing diverse charitable activities including the American Polish Assistance Association (Komitet Polonia Polsce) which benefits orphans in Poland.
As International Students Director at Polonia's St. Mary's College in recent years. Krolewski was largely instrumental in boosting the schoolÕs enrollment to an all-time high by recruiting students from Poland and other Slavic countries.
His community will always remember him as "their Polish Angel" According to a writer Maria Allard of Eastpointe, Michigan, "Michal never forgot his Polish roots. As president of the American Polish Assistance Association, he was forever sharing the culture's rich history through dance, art, language and visitors".
From: Polish Cultural Club of Greater Hartford, 2006
Community remembers their Polish angel
American Polish Assistance Association loses President Michal Krolewski
By Maria Allard, C & G Staff Writer
Eastpointe
Michal Krolewski never forgot his Polish roots.
As president of the American Polish Assistance Association, he was forever sharing the culture's rich history through dance, art, language and visitors.
He greeted everyone with a hug, kiss, and smile, and never tired of helping to provide for orphaned children in Eastern European countries.
Working out of a tiny "Eastpointe office, his influence impacted people in his own back yard and as far away as Poland, Belarus and Ukraine.
Those who knew Krolewski gathered Oct. 26 at St. Hyacinth Catholic Church in Detroit to pay their respects to the man who deeply touched their lives. On Oct. 11, Krolewski, of Eastpointe, passed away from intestinal bleeding complications. He was 55.
"I still can't believe he's gone," said Eastpointe resident Catherine Krueger, who attended the funeral Mass with seven Catholic priests and one Orthodox priest officiating.
Krueger worked on projects with Krolewski, including the city's annual ethnic festival, to which he brought several dance groups.
"I think Michael must have put half the festival together," Krueger laughed. "We became friends. He was really passionate about getting different types of people together."
Krueger would occasionally stop in the APAA office, and "you never knew who you'd be runninig into."
"You'd meet people from Belarus, Poland," she said.
As Krolewski, a Catholic, shared his Polish heritage with others, he took in other cultures and religions. He often coordinated trips to local churches, and even accompanied groups to a local synagogue.
"He knew more about my family history and where my family came from than I did," said Donna Markiewicz. "He was quite the historian."
Markiewicz remembers the first time she spotted Krolewski. He had just began teaching at Hamtramck's St. Ladislaus High School where she was a student.
"We mostly had nuns and he was this young, good-looking teacher," she recalled.
Although she didn't have Krolewski as a teacher, he soon developed a reputation as a "true gentleman of the old school," Markiewicz said. The two caught up years later when they worked at St. Mary's College in Orchard Lake, developing a bond as colleagues and friends.
"It was like two little Polish kids from the block," she said.
The two worked together for the International Student Services, recruiting Eastern European students to study in the United States.
"They all thought of him as a surrogate dad," Markiewicz said.
Caught up in Krolewski enthusiasm for sharing his culture, Eastpointe resident Suzanne Pixley enrolled in APAA's Polish language classes.
"I spoke Polish like a Frenchman," said Pixley, East Detroit Historical Society president.
She said she will miss Krolewski's influence.
"He was just outstanding. I think he really instilled in the Poles to be proud of their culture. They were saddled with Polish jokes for so long," Pixley said. "He had boundless energy. He worked on and on and on."
Brian Derowski, who teaches in Sanilac County, feels the loss of his friend.
"Our paths followed many of the same directions, but we did not manage to catch up with each other on our journeys until fairly recently and became such close friends," Derowski said. "The man exuded love and compassion for all, especially the unfortunate. His hearty laugh and genuine smile reflected a soul tilled with such spirit."
Derowski remembers Krolewski teaching in Room 213 at St. Ladislaus.
"I taught just after he left, right across the hall in Room 212," Derowski recalled.
"Our heritage has always been important to us. Our families hail from the same regions of Poland. Michal and I shared a passion for all things 'Polonia.' I am honored to have known this fine man," Derowski said.
Derowski last saw his good friend about a week before his passing. Derowski listened as Krolewski told many stories and plans for the APAA.
"MichalÕs family and friends are in my thoughts and my prayer," derowski said.
Krolewski is survived by his mother Adeline Krajenka, sister Dolores Cetlinski, brother John Krolewski, and many nieces and nephews. His father, John, who passed away when Michal was a young boy, and brother, Richard, predeceased him. Krajenka's second husband, Harry, also predeceased him.
A memorial service is planned for Michal Krolewski for Jan. 22. Further details will be provided in a future issue of the Eastsider.
For more information on the APAA, log onto www.apaa.us.
From: The Eastsider, November 9, 2005
Michal Krolewski's death is a great loss to Polonia!
APAA President Dies
by Robert Strybel, Polish/Polonian Affairs Writer
I first learned of Michal Krolewski's untimely death from Marcin Zmudzki, listowner of the Friends of Poland (yahoo) discussion group that Michal regularly contributed to. I then checked the webpage of the American-Polish Assistance Association and found the following brief obituary:
APAA President Dies
We are deeply saddened and regret to announce that Michal Krolewski, the longtime President and heart and soul of American Polish Assistance Association, passed away on October 11, 2005. His sudden death left many of us who had a chance to know him personally in deep sorrow and disbelief. He will be always remembered in the hearts of the many people whose lives he touched. We will miss him and the world will miss him.
When I checked on Google to see if I could find anything more on this, after typing in "Michal Krolewski", the mentions of him that occurred all came from articles I had written about his activities over the years. I had known Michal since he was a student in his late teens in late 1960s Detroit and have associated him with "things Polish" ever since then. I have also worked with him of different projects including a campaign to brighten Christmas for Polish orphans. Although U.S. born, he preferred Michal (pronounced: MEE-how) to Michael or Mike, and rather than the Anglo-mangled "crow-LOOSE-key", he pronounced his surname the proper way: kroo-LEFF-ski. He came from a Polish immigrant family that catered to Polish weddings on Detroit's heavily Polish northeast side and the adjacent Polonian suburb of Hamtramck.
Back in the 1960s, with a handful of like-minded young Polonians Michal set up the Polish-American Folk Theater which, despite its innocuous-sounding name, was an extremely dynamic and, at times, rebellious youth group. Far from being just another dance group or theater circle, the PAFT was more of a movement that attracted young, mainly American-born Pol-Ams in their teens and 20s. It included the Galicja Dancers and later Little Galicja for children. The group began issuing a newspaper called "Pokoj" (Polish for "Peace") and traveling to Poland to gain a deeper appreciation of authentic Polish culture, costumes, customs and dance routines. The group had its ups and down, but Krolewski's unbridled enthusiasm and infectious determination enabled it to overcome many a hurdle.
At its peak, the movement spread from its base in southern Michigan to outposts in Pennsylvania and Ohio, infecting many young name-only Polish Americans with a new-found appreciation for their roots. PAFT members also revived many traditions that were fast disappearing in the Detroit area, including pisanki, wycinanki and other crafts, koledy concerts and Corpus Christi processions down the streets of the old Polish neighborhoods. And those vibrant dazzling folk-dance performances by young Pol-Ams, who really put their heart and soul into it, set a new benchmark for non-professional performing ensembles of their kind. Krolewski used to say that, unlike the drug-tripping hippies and Vietnam War protesters of the day, "Our kids are getting high on their Polish heritage."
But Krolewski and his faithful followers were also sensitive to the anti-Polish slurs that abounded during the heyday of the "Polack joke". When the "Detroit Free Pres" ran an insulting article entitled "Survivors' report from a Polish wedding" (about the alleged low-class, drunken rowdiness of such celebrations), the PAFT turned out in force and picketed the paper's offices in downtown Detroit. This was but one example of the group's ethnic assertiveness.
Not all the second-generation parents of the PAFT's youthful members appreciated such involvement. Many of them wanted nothing better than to forget their Polish roots and become "just plain Americans", and here their third-generation children were getting increasingly involved the heritage of their immigrant grandparents. But Krolewski's kids did not want to be "rootless Americans", swept along from one commercial fad, trend or fashion to the other. Today the children of many of those teenagers and young adults are carrying on their parents' appreciation for their Polish ancestral legacy.
Over the years, Krolewski's varied activities have included running a Polish import shop in the Detroit suburb of New Baltimore, setting up Polish language, folkcraft and dance courses and developing diverse charitable activities including the American-Polish Assistance Association (Komitet Polonia Polsce) which benefits orphans in Poland. Krolewski's group pioneered the Holy Thursday bus pilgrimages and tours of Detroit's old Polonian parishes. As International Students Director at Polonia's St. Mary's College (Orchard Lake, MI) in recent years, Krolewski was largely instrumental in boosting the school's enrollment to an all-time high by recruiting students from Poland and other Slavic countries.
Books could be written about Krolewski's numerous contributions of Polonian self-awareness and self-appreciation, and hopefully some day they will. Yes, he was steeped through and through in traditional Polishness and Roman Catholicism, but stood out for his ecumenical approach to other religions and ethnic groups. After 9-11 he assisted non-Christian students from Albania, Bosnia and elsewhere who were feeling the painful sting of America's anti-Muslim backlash. And his parish tours raised eyebrows in some comers of Polonia because they included visits to Polish National Catholic and Eastem Orthodox churches, even Jewish synagogues and Muslim mosques. But that's the way Michal always was: a true Polish-American patriot devoid of any chauvinism or xenophobia.
"Wieczny odpoczynek racz Mu dac, Panie.
A swiatlosc wiekuista niechaj Mu swieci na wieki. Amen"
(Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord,
and may the perpetual light shine upon him. Amen.)
From: Reminiscence, Robert Strybel, Polish/Polonian Affairs Writer, Oct. 2005