After months of work, the Jewish cemetery in Mszana Dolna, a small town south of Krakow, was ceremonially reopened after completion of the repair of its fence and the renovation of 22 matzevot.
The work was carried out by the Mszana Dolna Shtetl Foundation, with government funding obtained in conjunction with the City of Mszana Dolna from the Government’s Monument Reconstruction Fund. Limanowa County also contributed. Total cost of the work was 498,000 zloty (around €117,500).
“The work took many months, and there were numerous obstacles – including the digging up of the railway track and the access road to the cemetery, which made work practically impossible,” the Foundation said in a web site post announcing completion of work.
All work required formal approval from the Provincial Conservator of Monuments, the Religious Community, the Rabbinical Commission for Cemeteries, and other authorities.
A reopening ceremony took place August 17, during an event commemorating the 83rd anniversary of the Holocaust in Mszana Dolna.
At another ceremony August 20, the gate to the restored cemetery was symbolically reopened with a ribbon cutting by Ewa Poray-Zbrożek, Secretary of the City of Mszana Dolna, and Marek Rekucki, the Vice-President of the Mszana Dolna Shtetl Foundation, who had overseen the work. A new, updated information board was also unveiled.
The Foundation meanwhile said it planned to apply for further funding “to restore the remaining historic tombstones and save them from oblivion.”
The Jewish cemetery in Mszana Dolna may date from the 18th century but the surviving 30 or so gravestones are from the 19th and early 20th century. There are also the mass graves of an estimate several dozen people murdered in the town during the Holocaust.
Devastated during and after WW2, the cemetery became abandoned and overgrown during the communist period. In 1991, Holocaust survivor Lejb Gatterer carried out some restoration of matzevot and funding fencing around the cemetery. However, the Mszana Dolna Shtetl web site states,
over the years, the fence began to crumble and fall apart, the metal spans fell off, and the tombstones deteriorated; urgent steps were needed to save this site, so important to the city’s history. We are extremely happy that we managed to completely renovate the cemetery fence and restore most of the tombstones. We will strive to complete this work so that all the tombstones can be restored.