Stefan Skąpski “And […] when [this] historical turmoil occurred, I didn’t show up and it was hanging in the air” – the last president of Wrocław during the period of the Polish People’s Republic

Stefan Skąpski’s account shows a biography that is, on the one hand, typical of people who came to Wrocław after the Second World War, and on the other hand, slightly more privileged than others. It is a story about the experience of war from the perspective of a little boy who came into contact with two occupiers in his hometown of Słupia near Kępno, a Wrocław resident by choice who started his studies in Wrocław in the 1950s, but also a member of the Polish United Workers’ Party (PZPR), an ELWRO employee and an official, and finally the last president of the city (1986–1990) just before the transformation in 1989.