Today’s #stampoftheday honors a pianist, a composer, a prime minister, a political activist, a philanthropist, and a noted vintner. Amazingly, though, they’re all the same person, Ignacy Jan Paderewski, who, among other things was prime minister of Poland, a concert pianist who once packed Madison Square Garden and is still the only Pole to have his opera performed by the Metropolitan Opera in New York City.

Paderewski was honored on the 4- and 8-cent stamps issued on October 8, 1960, the seventh stamps in the “Champions of Liberty” Series, which were intended to provide dramatic counterpoints to the Soviet Union’s totalitarianism by honoring men who fought for freedom in their homelands. The 4-cent stamp was good for domestic mail; the 8-cent stamp was for international mail, the idea being that the stamps would carry the fight against communism throughout the world.

Though little known today (at least to me), in his time Paderewski was a superstar. While his his Romantic style of piano playing was initially panned by British critics (who called him the Blacksmith of the Piano), audience loved him, particularly in the US where he toured over 30 times in 50 years (and was the first person to give a solo performance at Carnegie Hall.) He was so well-known that Irving Berlin’s “I Love a Piano,” pays homage to him with these lyrics: “And with the pedal, I love to meddle/When Paderewski comes this way./I’m so delighted, when I’m invited/To hear that long-haired genius play.”

In addition, he was a talented composer, whose works include “Manru,” the only opera by a Polish composer performed at the Met, where it premiered on 1902 – on the same night that he was playing a concert at Carnegie Hall. By the turn of the century, he was wealthy and became a generous philanthropist who aided Polish orphans and victims of reprisals, provided scholarships for young musicians, endowed music posts, and unemployment stipends for musicians, supported veterans, rehabilitation clinics and maternity wards, and other medical facilities, and funded the construction of many monuments including the Washington Square Arch in New York City.

He also was an ardent nationalist who had grown up at a time when what was (and is now) Poland had been divided up by its neighbors (Russia, Germany, and the Austro-Hungarian empire). Although he was living in California (on a 2,000 acre spread where he later grew grapes made into wine that, according to the LA Times “was as coveted as his music”) he became an active member of the Polish National Committee in Paris. He was the committee’s spokesman (giving so many speeches that he stopped performing), and also helped form the Polish Relief Fund, in London, and the White Cross Society, in the United States. And he also he helped persuade Woodrow Wilson to support Polish independence.

In late 1918, when Poland’s fate was still up in the air, Paderewski visited Poland and gave a speech that helped spur a public uprising the helped spur the formation of a new unified country. In early 1919, Jozef Pilsudski, who was chief of state for the new country’s interim government, appointed him prime minister and minister of foreign affairs. In that role, he represented Poland at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference and signed the Treaty of Versailles, which recognized Polish independence.

In just ten months, Paderewski’s government achieved remarkable milestones: democratic elections for Parliament, ratification of the Treaty of Versailles, passage of the treaty on protection of ethnic minorities in the new state and the establishment of a public education system. It also tackled border disputes, unemployment, ethnic and social strife, the outbreak of epidemics and secured aid that prevented a devastating famine.

Once the elected government was in place, Paderewski resigned as prime minister and became Poland’s representative at international conferences and at the League of Nations. In these roles he helped settle several outstanding issues with Poland’s neighbors. In 1922, he stepped down and returned to performing playing a host of concerts in the U.S., including a performance at the 20,000 seat-Madison Square Garden. He also continued to be politically active, often playing benefits, such as a 1933 concert in Paris that raised money to help Jewish intellectuals in Nazi Germany.

In the late 1930s, his home in Switzerland became the base for a variety of Poles opposed to the country’s right-wing government, a group that became the core of the National Council of Poland, a government in exile created after the German Nazi attack on Poland in 1939. The group’s leaders asked the almost 80-year old Paderewski to head this body. He agreed and again turned to America for help, giving a radio broadcast that was carried by over 100 radio stations. In late 1940, he came to America where he gave many speeches, restarted the Polish Relief Fund and played several benefits concerts.

However, he was fading, and he died in June 1941. A capacity crowd of 4,500 attended his funeral in St. Patrick’s Cathedral while another 35,000 stood outside the church. President Roosevelt issued a special decree allowing Paderewski’s body to be laid to rest (not buried) at the Arlington National Cemetery (because Paderewski wanted to be buried in free Poland when it again became possible). This wish was granted in 1992 when his ashes were placed in a crypt in St. John’s Cathedral in Warsaw.
How to sum all this up? Robert Lansing, who was U.S. Secretary of State during the talks, later wrote: “What Mr. Paderewski has done for Poland will cause eternal gratitude. His career is one which deserves to be remembered.” For my part, I merely note that unlike the current occupant of the White House, Paderewski probably was a genius. (I have no idea if he was stable.)

Be well, stay safe, fight for justice and work for peace.