Casimir Pulaski Monument
On October 1, 1936 the Polish community in Camden announced that a monument to Casimir Pulaski would be dedicated on October 11. The monument was placed at a park that lay at Benson Street and Haddon Avenue, where Camden's City Hall had stood prior to the present City Hall's opening in 1931. The park came to be known as Pulaski Park.
At the dedication there were many notables and dignitaries. Among the speakers were Mayor Frederick von Nieda, Commissioner Frank J. Hartmann Jr., Monsignor Arthur B. Strenski of St. Joseph Roman Catholic Church, and Congressman Charles A. Wolverton.
Camden's Polish community celebrated Pulaski Day with a parade through at least the late 1970s. In more recent times, Polish groups formerly based in Camden such as the Polish American Citizens Club have participated in Philadelphia's Pulaski Day Parade.
When Camden's Pulaski Park was designated to be the site of a new medical school, the monuments that were there had to be relocated. The South Jersey Division of the Polish American Congress, along with Polish Army Veterans Post 121 and the Polish American Citizens Committee raised funds to move the Pulaski Monument to a new site. In 1984 the monument was moved to Cooper River Park, at Park Drive and Route 130 in Pennsauken, N.J. A new monument to Thaddeus Kosciusko was also dedicated that October.
The two original monuments to Thaddeus Kosciusko and Casimir Pulaski were joined in 1995 by a new monument dedicated to those members of St. Joseph Roman Catholic Church located at 10th & Liberty Streets in Camden who gave their lives for our country in World War II. Information from a plaque inside the church was the basis for this monument. The site of the three monuments is now known as the Polish Heroes War Memorial at Cooper River Park.
Monument at Cooper River Park
Tag: casimir-pulaski-monument
Polish Heroes War Memorial
The Polish Heroes War Memorial at Cooper River Park in Pennsauken, N.J. (Park Drive and Route 130) unites three monuments — to Casimir Pulaski (1936, moved here 1984), Thaddeus Kosciusko (1984), and, since 1995, the members of St. Joseph Roman Catholic Church of South Camden who died in World War II.
St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (Polish)
St. Joseph's Parish, the Polish Roman Catholic church of Camden's Whitman Park, began in 1891; its Baroque-style church at 10th and Mechanic Streets, designed by George I. Lovatt and consecrated in May 1914, is on the New Jersey and National Registers of Historic Sites.
A Polish Camden Kitchen
A personal memoir by Deborah Large Fox about the childhood hours she spent in her grandfather Watson Burdalski's produce store at 1545 Mount Ephraim Avenue, in Camden's Polish neighborhood — a recollection of the sights, sounds, and smells of the shop and his kitchen.
Pulaski Day Parade
The "Mending Our Heritage" float — depicting Betsy Ross presenting the first United States flag to Gen. George Washington — won first prize at Camden's 1976 Pulaski Bicentennial parade; Gov. Brendan Byrne praised the people of Whitman Park for their conduct during the march.
Pulaski Day Observed In Camden
A crowd estimated at nearly 3,000 witnessed Camden's Pulaski Day observance in October 1966, featuring 40 bands and floats depicting Polish history, followed by a Pontifical Mass celebrated in Whitman Park by Archbishop Celestine J. Damiano.
Polish Hero Honored Here
More than 5,000 persons — the biggest Polish gathering in Camden's history — attended the October 11, 1936 unveiling of the Casimir Pulaski monument in Pulaski Square, with speeches by Mayor Frederick von Nieda, Monsignor Arthur B. Strenski, Congressman Charles A. Wolverton, and Polish consul Dr. Szygowski.
Pulaski Monument Will Be Dedicated Here on October 11
Announcement that a monument to Brigadier General Casimir Pulaski would be dedicated on October 11, 1936, in Pulaski Square, Camden — the site of the old City Hall — with a parade and ceremonies involving the 32 units of the United Polish Organizations.