Eugeniusz Piasecki

Who was Eugeniusz Piasecki?

Eugeniusz Piasecki was a Polish physician, promotor of sports and hygiene and boyscouting activist.

He was the son of Wenanty Piasecki, a gym teacher at Lwów's schools and member of Gymnastic Society Sokol. Eugeniusz studied medicine at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, and there he became familiar with ideas promoted by Henryk Jordan. In 1896, after graduation, he returned to Lwów where became a gym teacher at the local 4th high school. Soon afterwards, he founded first sports teams for students and in 1904 he opened Sports-Gymnastic Club of the 4th High School, which three years later took on the name Pogoń Lwów, becoming one of the most popular sports organizations in the history of Poland. Piasecki was the first director of the club, keeping the post until 1909, when he took up the job of a lecturer at the University of Jan Kazimierz.

In 1912 Piasecki, together with Mieczyslaw Schreiber, published one of the first Polish handbooks of scouting titled Harce mlodziezy polskiej. He wrote that a scout should cultivate national traditions together with emphasis on physical development. Piasecki made up several terms which are until today used in Polish scouting.