NOWY-TOMYŚL

Nowy-Tomyśl county town located on the Szarka river, ca. 62 km west of Poznań, by the Warsaw–Poznań–Berlin axis. The town’s coat-of-arms refers to the of Łodzia, used as the personal token by Feliks Szołdrski, the founder and proprietor of Nowy-Tomyśl.

History

The town was set up on as late as 8^th April 1786, next to an Evangelical church built there earlier on. Notably, the settlers were mostly Protestant by confession. Nowy-Tomyśl matter-of-factly remained Wielkopolska’s only town without a Catholic church almost till the end of 19^th century. The name of a former village, mentioned in a 1296 record as Thomisle, was added the affix Stary meaning ‘Old’: this is how the village of Stary-Tomyśl was originated, along with a new hub which started acting as a crafts and services hub, and even more importantly, as a commercial centre for the nearby Olęder (Dutch-originated) settlements. It is worth mentioning that the Nowy-Tomyśl area is the largest Olęder colonisation area in Wielkopolska as a whole.
Resulting from the 2^nd Partition of Poland in 1793, Nowy-Tomyśl was contained within the limits of Prussia; in 1807–1815, it was part of the Duchy of Warsaw, and thereafter was subject to the western invader’s rule again. The town was eventually liberated on 3^rd January 1919 by Wielkopolska Uprising militants. During the Nazi occupation of 1939–1945, the occupiers put special emphasis on the land’s Germanisation: Polish people were resettled to the Generalgouvernement or into the depth of the Reich to perform coerced labour there.
Today, Nowy-Tomyśl is a significant industry and post-primary education hub. Also, it is the centre of the Wielkopolska asparagus basin, the product being successfully exported to Western-European markets.

Worth Seeing

F. Chopin Square is the location of a former Evangelical church of the Holiest Heart of Jesus from 1778/1779. Built upon a Greek-cross plan, with its equal arms, it is associated with the town’s history and location (establishment).
Nowy-Tomyśl boasts the world’s largest wicker basket. The curiosity is a work of the local wicker-product makers. The basket, 17.3m long and 9.5 m wide, was designed by Jędrzej Stępak.
A park in the south-eastern section of the town is the site of a wooden hunting residence of 1977, since 1986 being home to the Wickerworking and Hop-Growing Museum.

For more information, go to:
www.nowytomysl.pl/en