Korczak's Saxon Garden
An Exploration of Space and Memory
by Romuald Roman Wasserman Wroblewski
Janusz Korczak’s favorite place during his childhood and youth was the Saxon Garden (Ogród Saski), where he regularly met with peers and older schoolmates. As a child, when he lived at Krakowskie Przedmieście 77 *, he surely visited the park accompanied by his mother, Cecylia, and his grandmother, Emilia. Probably, it was here, on the frozen surface of the park's pond, that he first learned how to ice-skate.
The memory of plucking flowers and the ice rink is deeply intertwined with the topography of the Saxon Garden. The exact, vivid description from Korczak’s own entries in his Ghetto Diary (Pamiętnik z getta) reads as follows:
"From the age of 7 to 14, I was continuously in love, over and over again, with a different girl. Interestingly, I remember many of them. — Two sisters from the ice-rink, a cousin. Stacha, the one in mourning, Zosia. Kolchorn, Anielka, Irenka from Nałęczów — Stefcia, for whom I used to pluck flowers from the flowerbed near the fountain in the Saxon Garden. — And the little tightrope walker; I wept over her heavy lot. I loved for a week, a month, sometimes two or three girls at the same time."
Leon Rygier, who was Henryk Goldszmit’s schoolmate during their gymnasium years, described a formative encounter with the young Korczak—who was still wearing his blue university student uniform at the time. Korczak was sitting on a bench in the Saxon Garden, completely absorbed in studying the children playing under the watchful eyes of their nannies. When Rygier questioned him on why he had chosen medicine and whether it would hinder his writing aspirations, the young Korczak responded with words that would become the ultimate manifesto of his future clinical and pedagogical methodology:
"Being a physician did not prevent Chekhov from becoming a great writer. On the contrary, it deepened his creative work. To write anything of true value, one must be a diagnostician. (...) Medicine will grant me an insight into human personality, and even into the very nature of children's play. Look at those children over there. Every single one plays differently. I want to know why."
When Korczak formally opened the Orphanage (Dom Sierot) at 92 Krochmalna Street in 1912, the Saxon Garden transformed into the primary destination for excursions and recreation for his small wards. Krochmalna Street was at that time a densely populated, impoverished, and entirely gray quarter of the Wola district, completely starved of green spaces. For the children who spent their entire days trapped in those tenement courtyards, a walk to the Saxon Garden felt like an expedition to an entirely different universe. Consequently, Korczak organized regular group walks to the park.
Within the Saxon Garden, the so-called Wilhelm Elias Rau Children's Gardens operated. These were specially designated, modernly equipped playgrounds and sports fields where trained animators organized physical games, sports, and gymnastics for youth. Korczak, as a progressive educator and a pediatrician deeply concerned with physical development and hygiene, immensely valued this space. He made certain that his podopieczni (wards) frequented it regularly to breathe and move freely.
* During my own childhood and youth, it was the Saxon Garden (Ogród Saski), where I regularly met with peers and older schoolmates. As a child, when we lived at Krakowskie Przedmieście 15, Saxon Garden was the place where I played with my lovely dog Alba.
