Obituary for Anna Romana Dadlez
Anna Romana Dadlez
Saginaw, Michigan
Anna Romana Dadlez was born in the then-Polish city of Lwow in 1926. Her father was a judge and her mother was a teacher with a Masters degree. Together, they instilled in her a love of learning that stayed with her for the rest of her life. When Poland collapsed under the onslaught of both Soviet and German armies in 1939, arrests, executions, and deportations began in Lwow. Roman Gasowski, Anna's beloved father, was arrested and later executed in a Soviet prison camp. Anna and her mother were deported with hundreds of thousands of others to Soviet Asia, where many deportees died from starvation.
Within a few years, Germany and the Soviet Union were at odds, and policies changed. Those deportees to the USSR who still survived were given a chance to leave. Anna and her mother embarked on a protracted series of journeys that began with a refugee camp in Lebanon and led to the north of England, where Anna obtained an undergraduate degree in philosophy at the University of Durham. She then traveled with her mother to the United States to join her future husband, Tomasz Dadlez, who had proposed by mail and invited her to visit. Anna and Tomasz married and had two daughters (who, it should be mentioned, remember her as the single best storyteller they have ever encountered). Despite challenges posed by physical disability, language, and economic concerns, Anna earned a PhD in political science from the Maxwell School at Syracuse University, one of the country's top ranked schools for public affairs. Her dissertation, which explored the ingenious strategies employed by Poles to evade Soviet censors in post-war Poland, was published by a university press shortly thereafter. She taught political science and history (and sometimes Polish language) at colleges in New York and Michigan, and was eventually tenured at Saginaw Valley State University in Michigan. She retired reluctantly from her professorial position at the age of 89. She was a redoubtable person, always willing to speak truth to power, always willing to rise in defense of the oppressed.
She is survived by her daughters Eva and Alexandra, by cousins, nieces and nephews, and by many students who also loved and appreciated her.
Funeral Liturgy will take place at 10:30 a.m. on Friday, April 28, 2023 at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church, 5376 State Street. Rev. Fr. Richard Bokinskie will officiate. Friends may visit at the church on Friday from 9:30 a.m. until the time of Mass. In lieu of flowers, those planning an expression of sympathy may wish to consider memorials to UNHCR – United Nations Refugee Agency.
**For those that wish to attend the Funeral Mass remotely, please use the following link https://vimeo.com/event/844336
Saginaw, Michigan
Anna Romana Dadlez was born in the then-Polish city of Lwow in 1926. Her father was a judge and her mother was a teacher with a Masters degree. Together, they instilled in her a love of learning that stayed with her for the rest of her life. When Poland collapsed under the onslaught of both Soviet and German armies in 1939, arrests, executions, and deportations began in Lwow. Roman Gasowski, Anna's beloved father, was arrested and later executed in a Soviet prison camp. Anna and her mother were deported with hundreds of thousands of others to Soviet Asia, where many deportees died from starvation.
Within a few years, Germany and the Soviet Union were at odds, and policies changed. Those deportees to the USSR who still survived were given a chance to leave. Anna and her mother embarked on a protracted series of journeys that began with a refugee camp in Lebanon and led to the north of England, where Anna obtained an undergraduate degree in philosophy at the University of Durham. She then traveled with her mother to the United States to join her future husband, Tomasz Dadlez, who had proposed by mail and invited her to visit. Anna and Tomasz married and had two daughters (who, it should be mentioned, remember her as the single best storyteller they have ever encountered). Despite challenges posed by physical disability, language, and economic concerns, Anna earned a PhD in political science from the Maxwell School at Syracuse University, one of the country's top ranked schools for public affairs. Her dissertation, which explored the ingenious strategies employed by Poles to evade Soviet censors in post-war Poland, was published by a university press shortly thereafter. She taught political science and history (and sometimes Polish language) at colleges in New York and Michigan, and was eventually tenured at Saginaw Valley State University in Michigan. She retired reluctantly from her professorial position at the age of 89. She was a redoubtable person, always willing to speak truth to power, always willing to rise in defense of the oppressed.
She is survived by her daughters Eva and Alexandra, by cousins, nieces and nephews, and by many students who also loved and appreciated her.
Funeral Liturgy will take place at 10:30 a.m. on Friday, April 28, 2023 at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church, 5376 State Street. Rev. Fr. Richard Bokinskie will officiate. Friends may visit at the church on Friday from 9:30 a.m. until the time of Mass. In lieu of flowers, those planning an expression of sympathy may wish to consider memorials to UNHCR – United Nations Refugee Agency.
**For those that wish to attend the Funeral Mass remotely, please use the following link https://vimeo.com/event/844336