The New Owner

Teofil Ponikowski had been a peasant all his 47 years. But never before had he owned even a fistful of the soil he tilled. Like his father and his father's father, he had farmed the estate of the pan (master, i.e., the manor lord). He had taken a share of the harvest, struggled against debt, raised a family. He had not forgotten to doff his cap and bow his head as the gentry rode by on horseback, in old-style coach or modern limousine. Now the new Government at Lublin had divided the pan's land among the peasants.

Teofil Ponikowski was proud of his three hectares (7 1/2 U.S. acres) and of the whitewashed hut, now his own, with its pictures of the Roman Catholic saints. He talked readily with a visiting American, New York Timesman W. H. Lawrence.

The Government had given him a deed of ownership. He had plans. Already he had sown winter wheat and rye. He would have sown more, but the former landlord had hidden the seed. In the spring he would plant potatoes and more grain. . . .

The visitor had a question. What had happened to the former owner, Casimir Rajowski? Teofil Ponikowski shook his shaggy head. Some said Pan Rajowski had been a friend of the Germans and had run off with them. Others said he had merely gone to Warsaw to be with his wife & children. Not all landlords were of the stripe of Count Alfred Potocki, who, gossip said, had fled from Lancut Castle to Vienna with 30 trunkfuls of furniture. There were some like Prince Czartoryski, who quietly gave up his land to the Government, retired to his town house in Jaroslaw. As compensation, the Government offered him a pension of 600 zlotys ($112.80 at prewar exchange rate), equivalent to the prewar salary of a sixth-class civil servant.

War the Destroyer. But Pan Rajowski's 600 acres had supported only 20 peasant families. Now his estate had been divided among 122 families. It was true that Pan Rajowski had had 40 horses and 60 cows. Now there were only one horse and 24 cows. "The German Army took them, the Soviet Army took them, the Partisans took them, everybody took them." Teofil Ponikowski spoke without ill will. War--he had lived through two world wars and a Soviet invasion (1920).

But how could a man make a living on three hectares of land? Teofil Ponikowski answered promptly: "Three hectares is not enough." How much was enough? He hesitated a shrewd moment, then said: "Fifteen hectares."

The visitor had one more question. Would it not be efficient to farm the land as they did in Russia? For example, ten peasants could collectivize their land, labor and tools. Up rose Ponikowski's broad peasant shoulders, scornfully he spat upon the earth. He was the lord now, and this was his land--at least until the Lublin Government should decide to change its land policy.

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