Twardy człowiek

A Tough Man: Biographical Sketch of the Peasants’ Movement Activist Edward Kaleta(1913-2000) The article is about Edward Kaleta, a lawyer and politician, who in 1933 became a member of the Peasants’ Party (Stronnictwo Ludowe – SL), a party of Polish farmers, active in the Second Polish Republic. During World War II, under the German occupation, he was the SL’s Silesian representative in the underground Political Consultative Committee at the Government Delegation for Poland (a secret structure of the Polish Government in Exile in London). Kaleta then served as head of the office of the Regional Delegation of the Government in Exile in Krakow. After the war, he became a member of the Supreme Executive Committee of the Polish Peasants’ Party, the only political group in opposition to the communist authorities installed in Poland by the Soviet Union, led by Stanisław Mikołajczyk. During this time, he was arrested several times by the communist security apparatus. In the 1970s, he supported the activities of the Student Solidarity Committee, an anti-regime organisation established after the death of Stanisław Pyjas. The article is based on, among other sources, archival materials collected at the Archives of the Institute of National Remembrance in Krakow, the Archives of the Jagiellonian University, the Museum of the History of the Polish Peasant Movement, and the Wincenty Witos Museum in Wierzchosławice.