David Wilson
Contributor
A new thread focusing this time on the production of basic diving gear in Poland during the era of the People's Republic [Polish: Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa, PRL], which ran from 1952 to 1990.
Between the early fifties and the late eighties, Poland was subject to a Soviet-backed communist régime and effectively became a satellite country of the USSR. More information can be found in the Wikipedia article at Polish People's Republic - Wikipedia.
During the 1970s I toured several East European countries. One of the countries I visited was Poland. I have a vague memory of a display of fins and masks in the sports department of a large store somewhere in the capital Warsaw, but I cannot remember any details from that event four decades ago.
Fortunately for this thread, there are several online sources of information about basic underwater swimming equipment made in Poland. All of them are written in Polish, which is a Slav language related to Russian, Ukrainian, Czech and Bulgarian. Like Czech, Polish uses the Roman alphabet, while Russian, Ukrainian and Bulgarian use the Cyrillic alphabet. If I quote Polish sources in subsequent messages, I will provide a rough tranjslation into English.
In my next posting I will concentrate on the Polish STOMIL rubber company responsible for the manufacture of diving equipment during the era of the People's Republic.
Between the early fifties and the late eighties, Poland was subject to a Soviet-backed communist régime and effectively became a satellite country of the USSR. More information can be found in the Wikipedia article at Polish People's Republic - Wikipedia.
During the 1970s I toured several East European countries. One of the countries I visited was Poland. I have a vague memory of a display of fins and masks in the sports department of a large store somewhere in the capital Warsaw, but I cannot remember any details from that event four decades ago.
Fortunately for this thread, there are several online sources of information about basic underwater swimming equipment made in Poland. All of them are written in Polish, which is a Slav language related to Russian, Ukrainian, Czech and Bulgarian. Like Czech, Polish uses the Roman alphabet, while Russian, Ukrainian and Bulgarian use the Cyrillic alphabet. If I quote Polish sources in subsequent messages, I will provide a rough tranjslation into English.
In my next posting I will concentrate on the Polish STOMIL rubber company responsible for the manufacture of diving equipment during the era of the People's Republic.