This is where Grandma ( Anna Rzeznik) was born.

Mike

The first information about the settlement comes from the year 1224, and the next one from the bulla of Pope Gregory IXth edited in 1229. It is highly possible that the village existed already at the end of the 12th century. Around 1373 the parish of Mielec was established. In 1429 a new church was consecrated - this church was presumably founded by the Gryfits. The first of the Gryfits who owned Mielec became Jan of Mielec in 1405, an author of the line's power. His son, Jan (named like his father) in March 1457 received the authorization from King Kazimierz Jagiellonczyk to found a town on this site under the rules of the Magdeburg law. The said king's privilege gave the town authorities for weekly fairs on Saturdays and for two annual fairs - one on the day of the Holy Trinity and the second on the day of Saint Matthew. According to this document, the town was to be called Nowy Targ. Yet, mentioned Jan Mielecki didn't found the town for the reasons to the present day unknown. Perhaps his disease interrupted these efforts, since he died between 1459 and 1460. The final location of the town was accomplished by his sons, the owners of Mielec - Jan and Bernardyn, by the document edited on 18th November 1470. In coming from the 16th century the foundation charter's copy we can find among others the following statement ..."we are erecting, settling from the start a town called Mielec on a raw root in our woods, forests, backwoods and soils calling for grubbing"... Inhabitants were granted a licence for free of charge supply in timber from lord's forests, moreover they were exempted for the period of 20 years from all duties on behalf of the town's owners. The only obligation in the light of the foundation charter, was to repair roads and bridges within the town's area. The new town was located by Sandomierz route, which in course of time started to lose its primary importance. Time of grubs, erecting houses and farms and organisation of life, was followed by rapid development of craft. Rapid development of Mielec was based on this development of craft. The first guilds were organised in the first quarter of the 16th century. A smith's guild, who obtained its statues on 4th February 1522, is considered to be the first guilds' organisation. In the 16th century the town was an important centre of smith's, tailor's, weaver's and potter's guild. There were also shoe-makers, wheelwrights, millers, maltsters, brewers and even goldsmiths. Local products were sold not only on site but also in other major towns of this part of the Kingdom of Poland, including the capital city of Cracow. The new town must had a seal to sign official documents. The emblem on the seal originated the arms of Mielec. The oldest picture of the seal is on a document edited in 1535. In the emblem there is the letter M, knight's helmet with two antlers and an inscription in a rim - "S. Civitatis Mielec". There are found here elements of a crest called Rogala: a deer's and an aurochs's antler. Nobody knows why the town, belonging to the Mielecki, had never used this family's crest called Gryf as it's arms. However this crest occurred in 1867 and remained in use till 1944. On the coat of arms there was the white Gryf (griffin) against a red background. The snout and the forelimbs of the Gryf were golden-coloured. Above the coat of arms there was put a crown and a half-griffin sitting on a trumpet. In 1957 the using of the Gryf's crest was finally given up. In fact, it was never officially conferred on Mielec and they resumed using the preceding the partitions of Poland arms. In 1991 a Commune Council passed a resolution conferring on the town new arms, a flag and a seal using the symbols of the Rogala's crest. The Mielecki family, using the Gryf's crest, reached the highest posts and positions in the 16th century. This success was initiated by Stanislaw Mielecki, who thanks to his marriage with Elzbieta Teczynski entered circles of political elites. He achieved the position of the castellan of Polaniec and Zawichost (1515), what gave him a possibility to have a seat in senate. In 1526 he founded a provostry for a local church in Mielec, in the same time there was created a parish school, finally construction of the castle in Mielec is attributed to Stanislaw Mielecki, unfortunately this castle didn't remain till today. Jan Mielecki (1501-1561), Stanislaw's son was a voivode of Podole as well as the Great Royal Marshal; he commanded a squadron of horse in common defence in the years 1526 to 1555 and he leaded as a borderland hetman the Royal Army in Inflanty at Pozwole in 1557. His brother, Sebastian was a castellan of Wislica, a starost of Brzesko-Kujawy and finally the first castellan of Cracow i.e. a royal senator. The most famous from the history representative of the Family was Mikolaj Mielecki (circa 1540 to 1585), made by Stefan Batory the Great Royal Marshal on 2nd February 1579. The Mielecki in the care for their position sought appropriate matches for their daughters. Stanislaw's sister, Anna Mielecki married Mikolaj Firlej, Zofia (Sebastian's daughter) married Stanislaw Tarnowski and Zofia - Mikolaj's daughter became a wife of Jan Karol Chodkiewicz. However with time, the Mielecki were loosing their position, their property as a result of numerous divisions dispersed and at last this meritorious family died out without progeny in 1771. Inaccessible vaults with graves of the Mielecki are situated under the building of the St. Matthew's Parish Church. As just as the other towns of that time heaving wooden dense buildings, Mielec often fell a prey to fire. In 1502 it was burnt down by Tartars (after that invasion the town was rebuilt by Stanislaw Mielecki), in 1550 a fire consumed most of the buildings around the Market Square and another dangerous conflagration destroyed the town in 1575. That disasters had undoubtedly delayed development of Mielec and were contributive to the situation that it didn't obtain a great economic importance. In a document coming from the year 1532 there is a description of the town, a grange and the castle. From the beginning of the town, a market constituted its central part, around which were concentrated buildings as well as life of the town. From the market ran streets and more important lines of communication, among others the Sandomierz road. There was a town hall in a central part of the market - a wooden structure surrounded by stalls and craftsman's work-shops. Undoubtedly similarly to other towns of that time, also in Mielec there was a wooden log - a pillory, meant to inflict a corporal punishment. Except from the town hall and the pillory an integrated part of the market buildings was a wooden prison, which for the first time was mentioned in 1719. At the beginning of the 16th century Mielec had 500 inhabitants and at the end of the century about 800. In the second half of the 17th century the town's regression began. During the "Swedish Flood" and the invasions of Rakocsi's troops the castle and part of the town were destroyed. From then until the 1850s Mielec was a humble small provincial town situated peripherally in the Austrian part of partitioned Poland. At the end of the 18th century Mielec had about 3 thousand inhabitants, with those quite a large percentage was constituted by the Jews. Sources dated back to the 18th century and to the first half of the 19th century portray Mielec as an impoverished and neglected centre. This is how Maciej Bogusz Steczynski described Mielec in essay "Galicja neighbourhood" coming from the year 1847 - "A little town wealthy and commercial in the past, similarly to almost all little towns in Polish past, later became completely impoverished and nowadays there is no trace of its ancient splendour except the graves of the Mielecki family. Today the town mostly inhabited by the Jews, it has famous only mud during rainy weather in autumn, which often happens in this region, and it makes then the more famous and sad floods with waters of the Wisloka river swollen by the rains, which floods neighbouring plains, fields and soils so perfectly, that the hill, on which Mielec is situated seems to be an island on a huge infinite lake". Frequent changes of owners and very diversified level of their concern for their property wasn't favourable for development of the town. Next owners of the town, after the Mielecki were in 2/3 the Ossolinski family and the remaining part was in power of the Morsztyn family. At the end of the 18th century Anna Ossolinska brought the inherited part of the town belonging to her family, as a dowry to Jan Pieniazek who she married in 1795. In the 19th century the whole Mielec was already owned by Pieniazek, but not for long, since in the mid- 19th century after Anna's and Jan's Pieniazek death, the proprieties of Mielec were taken over by their daughter Paulina, who then married Ignacy Suchorzewski. In 1874 he resold the property of Mielec to Ludwik Starzenski. Ten years later the property was bought by Jewish family the Gross and in 1891 the Oborscy became the next and the last owners of the property. This is the history of possessional relations in the Mielec town. Only the establishment of Mielec administrative district in 1853 was a real turning point. Since then the role of Mielec as a regional centre has been systematically growing and the start up of a railway line in 1876 that run through the town and a significant part of the district was an additional stimulus to further development. The establishment of local authorities and institutions as well as a secondary school contributed to the town's architectural development and enlivened its socio- cultural life. Brick buildings in central town and the adjacent streets were built. The citizens set up political, religious and welfare organizations. In 1874 the Voluntary Fire Brigade was established. At the end of the 19th century new public services were added. In 1892 at Kosciuszki Street there was erected an edifice for a Commune Council and for barracks of gendarmerie, in this building there was placed the Blessed Kinga 7-years girls' school. The same year at Panska Street a school of baron Hirsch's foundation was put to use. In the year 1896 in Mielec there were installed the first street lamps lighted up with gas and lamp-oil and later also with gasoline. But this favourable period was interrupted in 1900, when the town was afflicted by a conflagration of disastrous dimensions - a fire destroyed almost 3 of the town's buildings, which were mostly wooden. In June 1901 a District Department passed a resolution, ordering realisation of laid out buildings, using (especially in the market) tough timber. Very helpful in rapid reconstruction was not repayable state loan of the amount of 12 thousand krones. Already in 1902 the market was surrounded by the curb-plate of one-storeyed brick tenement houses. Urban life was going back to normal. In 1902 there was raised a law court, in 1905 there was created a grammar-school in Mielec, in 1909 to use was put a new seat of the District Council, in 1912 there was put to use a new grammar-school building and a new pupil's hostel. But the next factor impeding development of the town was World War I, which not only strained considerably human potential in the district area but also made damages in economy and in the town's buildings. From the bombardment of the Austrian squads storming Mielec the northern frontage of the market burnt down. After the war the Mielec district was located in the Cracow province. The 1920s present a slow period of extricating from a critical situation, the town's streets are getting managed, appears more and more of pavements, craftsman's works and business establishments are multiplying. In 1923 Zygmunt Rymanowski - a private businessman launched his own power plant, which soon started to supply with energy not only main public service buildings, but starting from 1st September 1925 it began to illuminate streets of Mielec. Recession of the 1930s affected also Mielec, with an unemployment as the most noticeable symptom. Difficult situation was made worse by the largest in the history of the town flood in 1934, which affected 93 communes destroying 11022 possessions. At the end of the 1930s in Mielec there were built an aircraft factory and an airport within the new-created Central Industrial Area, which was a real turning point in the town's history. In the year 1939 in the factory the first specimens of the PZL-37 "Los" bombers were produced. At that time this aircraft was a triumph of the military air-engineering. The creation of the factory significantly reduced the unemployment in the town and the region and stimulated economic and social development. Full name of the factory was "State Aircraft Factory - Airframe Plant No 2 in Mielec". At the same time there was initiated development of urban infrastructure. There was planed construction of a new housing estate (280 blocks), hotels, a technical school, a stadium, an institutional hospital, a community centre and a church. First block was put to use on 17th December 1938; in total, till outbreak of war, 15 blocks for 300 families and 15 houses for managerial and technical staff were completed. The German aggression interrupted the town's and factory's prosperity. On 8th September 1939 German squads invaded Mielec after bombing the aircraft factory. The first thrilling act of genocide of the Nazis was burning alive tens of the Jews inside the synagogue. In 1941 the extermination of the Jewish inhabitants began. Hard repressions - arrests, transportations to concentration camps, to forced labours in the Reich, executions marked gloomy days of occupation. As a response to the invader's terror a resistance movement came into existence. In Mielec and the region there operated groups of the Home Army and the Peasants' Battalions. Special fame won a diversionary-fighting group called "Jedrusie" commanded by Wladyslaw Jasinski, coming from Sadkowa Gora. This group executed several daring actions against the invader, among others at places like the "Spolem" bank and German magazines in Mielec. From the beginning of the occupation period a secret teaching system there was created in Mielec. It gradually embraced the whole administrative district. There acted the underground District Committee of Education and Culture, the president of which was an esteemed educator Piotr Adamski. During the Nazi occupation the factory kept its military character and the local population was forced to do slave labour. On 6th August 1944 the Soviet Army and the AK troops entered Mielec. The occupation was over. The time of the town's reconstruction and formation grounds of dynamic development of Mielec began. Administratively, the town and district were included into the newly established Rzeszow Province as one of its major industrial-agricultural centres. In 1945 Mielec had 10 thousand inhabitants. In the year 1952 the Aircraft Factory was renamed the Factory of Transport Equipment - WSK, where there were produced among others multitask planes, Leyland's engines, precise devices, vehicles of the electromotion, popular "Melex" vehicles. Other companies were also developed: the Factory of Technical Gases "Polgaz", the Mielec Building Company. The last-mentioned undertook to extend the town, raise new housing estates and create urban infrastructure. In 1965 the number of inhabitants of Mielec was above 25 thousand. In the year 1975, after the territorial reform of the country, Mielec administrative district was no more, while the town remained within the bounds of Rzeszow Province as a separate administrative unit. In 1980s symptoms of the economic breakdown started to appear, housing rate dropped and the industry was passing through hard times which was caused by difficulties in finding of outlets and aging of productive devices. In 1985 the small towns Wojslaw and Rzochow were included into Mielec, thus increasing its area up to 46.6 sq km. The economic and political transformation in 1989 showed all weaknesses of the centre, being developed basing on one large factory. Difficulties were enlarged by the slump in export to the ready eastern market. The restructuring process at the WSK and other companies, inevitable in this situation mass reduction of employment caused that the number of unemployed people increased to above 6 thousand. Other realms of life felt the unfavourable effects of the economic breakdown. The pride of sporting Mielec - the "Stal" football team - double winner of the Polish First League Championship, the participant of the European cups, first degraded to the Second League and then, after the following degradation it disappeared from the football map of Poland. Also the remaining sections of the club, excepting the woman's volleyball, found themselves in the deep crisis. The "Stal" club, which worked basing on the rich and generous industrial plant, recede into the background and lost its good status in the country, after it had lost the patronage of the WSK. From the mid 1990s downward it's clearly visible that Mielec managed to overcome difficulties and it cuts a dash in the new economic reality. That principally happened thanks to the first in Poland Special Economic Zone named "Euro-Park Mielec" established in 1995. The year 1999 is one of the latest significant dates, when Mielec administrative district was established for the second time during the administrative reform of the country. This change seems to have a profitable effect on the development of the town and the region.