Hidden gems
By : Celia Barnes
Rare find: Stalins limousine.
When it comes to Poland's wretched 20th-century vehicular history, Joanna Mikiciuk wears her heart on her sleeve: All you have to do is turn the conversation to the ignominious fate of this country's wartime car population.
First there were the cars that were destroyed in battle. Others were confiscated by Germans and later, Russians. But the cruelest blow, says Mikiciuk, came in the postwar decades when Poles, more interested in buying a fashionable Fiat "Maluch", abandoned their family's heirloom cars. She suspects many of these valuable vehicles were secreted out of the country long ago for wealthy collectors in the West.
"It's a very sad history," she said quietly. "There was no protection. The government didn't pay any attention to these vintage cars, and neither did society."
And that's where Mikiciuk, a one-time dentist, and her car-hobbyist husband, Zbigniew, stepped in: They are two of only a handful of Polish vintage car collectors, and they have devoted their lives to preserving this neglected piece of Poland's past.
Their vintage car museum Mikiciuk Muzeum Motoryzacji i Techniki on the southern edge of Warsaw, is the country's biggest with more than 100 renovated vehicles.
They started collecting in the 1970s, sacrificing their home deposit to buy their first vintage car, a 1930s Czech-made "Aero" sports car that was close to ruin.
"But mostly we didn't pay for a lot of these old cars because people were just happy that someone was willing to take them away," says Mikiciuk, whose children Izabella and Patryk also help in the family business during their holidays.
Today, some of their pieces like their 1928 BMW "Dixi" could fetch as much as Ł20,000 on the European market. But the Mikiciuks, and other Polish collectors, will not see these fortunes anytime soon: Poland's restrictive laws, which prohibit the export of any pre-1945 items of cultural significance, also prohibit them from trading their vintage cars with foreign collectors.
But this law, which also covers antique furniture, jewelry and art, could become more flexible with Poland's accession to the European Union (EU). Parliament is considering amendments to the law, but it is still circulating in draft form. The Culture Ministry responsible for such matters declined to comment on the bill's contents or progress.
However, Mikiciuk feels certain that the law should be changed, "because if we're going to create a union, there shouldn't be limitations." Whether she could stand to part with one of their collection pieces is another question though.
Every item in their museum has its own story. The big black "Zis" limousine was custom-built in Russia for Stalin's 1953 visit to Warsaw. He was supposed to open the Palace of Culture and Science, but he died before his black trousers even got to touch the luxurious leather interior.
Many of their pieces were discovered in Poland's southwest corner. During the war, it was known as the "green border" and Poles looking to escape drove there, abandoned their cars and walked across the mountains to freedom.
Their 1932 "Adler" was once owned by the wartime German mayor of Zakopane. With the Nazi defeat imminent, he gave it to a local Pole to hide.
"He said he'd come back to collect it," Mikiciuk said. And this Polish man was still waiting for the mayor to collect it when the Mikiciuks found it in 1986 after they received a tip-off.
It was hidden under piles of newspaper and firewood in a shed that had been walled up. As they removed the papers, mice scurried, but what they uncovered was a perfectly preserved car minus the seats, which the rodents had spent the past 40 years gorging on. There were even swastika flags fluttering on the hood.
"When we looked inside, the key was still in the ignition," Mikiciuk said. "There was no air in the tires, but we wanted to take it there and then because it was like a dream come true."
They did get the vehicle out, after pumping the tires with a bicycle pump, dismantling the shed, and towing it out with their tiny Maluch. They only have the car on loan, "just in case the mayor comes back for it," Mikiciuk said.
While they are waiting to see what changes the government will make to its cultural heritage law, the Mikiciuks are continuing with their hunt for old cars, and the never-ending renovation process. To fund their work they sell tickets to their museum, lease vehicles for film shoots (including Roman Polanski's current project, "The Pianist"), as well as hire out vehicles typically 1950s and 1960s American cars as wedding vehicles, for up to zl. 300 per hour.
"It's hard to say where else we'll find cars because people have hidden them in all sorts of places," Mikiciuk said. "We're always surprised by what we find."
And what sort of car does Poland's premier vintage car collector drive? A 1986 golden X76 Jaguar previously owned by the permanently tanned and coifed actor, Boguslaw Linda.
