Piotr Trzos

Seweryn Kurowski – a pharmacist from Wadowice
2019-10-31

Seweryn Kurowski – a pharmacist from Wadowice

Seweryn Kurowski was born in 1839 in Rzeszów, into a bourgeois family. In 1863, he took part in the January Uprising. After its suppression, as a political fugitive from the Kingdom of Poland, on the run from the tsarist repressions, e.g. forced deportation into Siberia, he made his way to Krakow, and subsequently commenced his pharmaceutical studies at the Faculty of Philosophy, Jagiellonian University. Having obtained his Master of Science degree in pharmacy in 1865, he settled in Wadowice, where he became the proprietor of a regional pharmacy around 1880. Good fortune in business allowed him to purchase a tenement house at 7 Kościelna Street. In 1920, Karol Wojtyła, later Pope John Paul II, was born at the very same premises. Kurowski also happened to serve on the city council, eventually rising to the position of a deputy mayor of Wadowice. He died in 1889. Presently, his former tenement house accommodates a museum – The Holy Father John Paul II Family Home in Wadowice.

Keywords: Wadowice, history of pharmacy, January Uprising, John Paul II.

© Farm Pol, 2019, 75(10): 561–567