Joint Stock Company „Gazolina” is undoubtedly a special and unique creation in the history of the Polish economy. The origins of the company, which later adopted the name „Gazolina” S.A, are primarily associated with the figures of the two main founders and initiators of economic activities in the sphere of the oil and gas extraction industry, namely engineers Marian Wieleżyński and Władysław Szaynek. A significant part of the archival materials, created primarily as a result of their professional activity, is now at the disposal of the Wieleżyński Gasoline Association, which has its headquarters in the suburban town of Brwinów, in the home of Mr. Zbigniew Jamroz, great-grandson of Marian Wieleżyński.
Marian Wielezynski, the initiator and co-founder of the company „Gazolina” S.A., was born on February 17, 1879 in Zastavna (today's Chernivtsi district in Ukraine). He was the son of Valerian, a landowner, and Natalia, née Knapp, who was in turn related to the well-known Armenian Abgarovich family. At an early age, Marian lost his father, who died in a train crash. The family was forced to move to Olomouc, where Marian's grandfather lived. It was there that he began his education. In addition to German, which was used in his grandparents' home, he mastered Polish. After his grandfather's death, he returned with his mother to Chernivtsi.
He graduated from gymnasium in 1896 and then entered the Faculty of Chemistry at Lviv Polytechnic. During his studies, he was involved in student government and political activities (he belonged to the Polish Socialist Party). When he was expelled from the university, he left for Vienna, where he continued his studies at the Vienna University of Technology.
He received his engineering degree in 1901, while also receiving an award for excellence in science.
Shortly after graduating, he married Jadwiga Siedlecka. Together with his wife, they settled in Drohobych, where he was employed at a refinery
„Galicia.” It was one of the oldest, largest refineries in the Borislav oil basin, built in Drohobych by Austrian capital, which also owned and operated many of the production wells of the oldest and largest oil basin on the European continent after Baku on the Caspian Sea and Ploeszti in Romania. After a few months on the job, he handed in his notice and started his own business.
In 1902, he established the Experimental Plant for the Oil and Natural Gas Industry of Eng. Maryan Wielezhinsky. The laboratory carried out analysis, expertise and inspection of crude oil and products derived from it produced in Galicia. The plant issued quality certificates necessary, due to current regulations, in the trade of the raw material. Without these expert opinions, the export of Boryslaw oil would have been impossible.
As a result of the knowledge gained and the analyses carried out, Marian Wielezhinsky discovered that Borislav natural gas has specific properties.
It is „wet,” containing significant amounts of light hydrocarbons (propane, butane, pentane, hexane or octane), which can be easily and cheaply liquefied by decompression, producing a liquid fuel called gasoline. Using a method developed in 1898 by engineer Waclaw Wolski, he constructed a mobile installation of so-called wet gas degassing, with which he traveled from shaft to shaft and checked the amount of hydrocarbons that could be easily liquefied.
Already working on his own account, Marian Wieleżyński repeatedly tried to convince shaft owners to take advantage of the occurring
Along with oil, natural gas. The explosion and consequent fire at the Oil City mine in 1907 was Marian Wielezynski's crowning argument for seeking precisely the proper use of gas extracted along with oil. The problem, however, was the lack of a market for natural gas in the Boryslav Basin. It was therefore necessary to find places to use this fuel first, in order to encourage oil mine owners to invest in gas facilities.
This pioneering period was extremely important. It can be said that Marian Wielezynski noticed a certain gap to be exploited in business. This undeveloped field was the use of natural gas in the economy, but the road to the creation of a large company was still far away.
The next stage of Marian Wielezynski's activity, decisive for the further development of his company and the establishment of „Gazolina” S.A., took place in 1912. As he pointed out, at that time he obtained a state concession for the construction of a fourteen-kilometer gas pipeline from Tustanovice to Drohobych and a gas compressor station to supply the refinery located there with the necessary fuel. This was an investment made for the Viennese company „Erdgas GmbH”. At that time, Eng. Marian Wieleżyński began professional cooperation with Wladyslaw Szaynok, an engineer he had met during his studies (born November 28, 1867 in Rzeszow), a graduate of the Mechanical Engineering Department of the c.k. Lviv Polytechnic School.
Work on the gas pipeline from Tustanovice to Drohobych was completed successfully and on time, in good and effective cooperation with the American company Ingersoll Rand, which supplied equipment for the Tustanovice gas compressor station. Coping with this task was a turning point in the activities of Marian Wielezynski and Wladyslaw Szaynek.
In 1913, at the invitation and expense of the aforementioned American company, the two engineers traveled to the United States and for two months gained new experience in the world's leading oil and gas industry.
Even before the American expedition in March 1913. Marian Wieleżyński had formed a new company called the Natural Gas Plant Eng. M. Wieleżyński Limited liability company in Hubicze. In addition to Wieleżyński, the shareholders were Włodzimierz Kunowski, whom Marian Wieleżyński knew from his Lviv days and activities in the PPS, later a member of the Provisional Regency Council, and Dr. Izydor Kreisberg, a lawyer from Drohobych, nota bene one of those whom Alexander Ładoś later tried to rescue from the hands of the German Nazis. Kreisberg soon sold his share to Stanislaw Siedlecki, whom Marian Wieleżyński knew from his Lviv university days and who was the brother of his wife, Jadwiga. He remained a well-known politician, social activist and senator in the Second Republic.
In turn, after returning from the United States (June 1913), Marian Wieleżyński and Wladyslaw Szaynok formed a new company in December 1913 called Natural Gas Limited Liability Company Lviv. Wladyslaw Szaynok headed the company in Lviv, running the technical office there. Marian Wieleżyński, meanwhile, undertook the construction of Europe's first gasoline factory in Boryslav. The shareholders took advantage of the
experience gained in the United States, perfecting Wolski's method by using compressors and special valves made by the American company Ingersoll Rand. Gasoline Plant No. 1 was commissioned in the spring of 1914 and operated until 1930.
Although the outbreak of World War I did not promote economic development, it did not mean total stagnation. Gradually, demand for light gasoline increased. Wielezynski and Szaynok saw further opportunities for development, which, however, required major investments, especially the construction of another factory. The intensification of their activities came in 1916, in which they undertook several important projects, which were, as it were, the basis for further activity and faster development. In order to build a new gasoline factory with even greater production capacity, a new company was established in August 1916, named „Gazolina” Company with limited warranty in Boryslav/Tustanovice, in which the pre-existing company, Gaz Ziemny Sp. z o. p., had a significant stake.
In December 1916, another company was established under the name of Natural Gas Company Limited by Guarantee in Kaluga, also involving Natural Gas, with a primarily mining profile.
In October 1916, a venture was inaugurated, which was not later part of the company „Gazolina” S.A., but was extremely important for the history of the Polish chemical industry, and its origins were closely associated with the persons of Marian Wieleżyński and Władysław Szaynek. It was mainly they, along with the later President of the Republic of Poland Ignacy Moscicki, who initiated the establishment of the company called Metan Limited Liability Company in Lviv, the heir of which is the Professor Ignacy Moscicki Institute of Industrial Chemistry, which still exists today and operates as part of the Lukasiewicz Research Network.
From left: Marian and Ignacy Wieleżyński, Prof. Ignacy Moscicki and Leszek and Zbyszek Wieleżyński. / Photo: Brwinów Archives
Summarizing the economic and organizational activities of Marian Wielezynski and Wladyslaw Szaynek during this period, it is worth noting that the main enterprise, whose economic efficiency consisted not only of its own economic activities, but also the activities and assets of the other companies, was the company founded in late 1914. Natural Gas Company with limited surety. It was this company that held shares in the other companies, i.e., the Natural Gas Company of Eng. Marian Wielezynski (founded in 1913), the Gazoline Ltd. (founded in August 1916), the Natural Gas Company of Kalush (founded in December 1916) and the Metana Ltd.
The people who appeared in the Natural Gas reporting documents at the time were mostly later also involved in the activities of the „Gazolina” Joint Stock Company. In 1916, the board of directors was made up of partners, namely engineers Wladyslaw Szaynok, Marian Wielezynski and Wlodzimierz Kunowski. The supervisory board was chaired by Eng. Jozef Tomicki, director of the city power plant in Lviv16, and the members were Dominik Kazimierz Potocki - landowner, Wit Sulimirski - owner of the Kobylany mine, engineers Gabriel Sokolnicki - later professor and rector of Lviv Polytechnic, Roman Januszkiewicz - deputy director of the Lviv Electric Works, and Aleksander Litvinowicz - soldier of the Legions, later general and first president of the „Legia” Military Sports Club. A member of the Council was also a member of the Galician National Sejm, Jan Wasung. The latter three were also members of the audit committee.
In 1918, Eng. Marian Wieleżyński became Polish government commissioner in Boryslaw. In November of the same year, he was interned by the Ukrainians in a prisoner of war camp in Kolomyia and held there until May 1919. He managed to slip out of captivity and travel to Vienna thanks to the contacts of the Armenian part of his family. Upon his return, he found the company working without the slightest misconduct, with a team of employees overseeing the maintenance of the processing condition.
By coincidence, after the turmoil of war, Marian Wieleżyński managed to purchase an attractive plot of land for the construction of a mine for a symbolic sum. In September 1916, he helped an elderly man at the train station in Stryj to carry a heavy suitcase into the carriage. More than two years later, while in Vienna on business, i.e. finalizing a deal for the purchase of a plot of land over oil deposits in Tustanovice, which had been interrupted by his arrest, it turned out that the person met at the station in Stryj was the director of the ordinance of the heirs of David Lindenbaum, who owned extensive and the suitcase contained gold. As a token of gratitude, the financier facilitated Marian Wieleżyński's transaction, and in addition to buying the plot of land, he also bargain-sold the oil wells in Tustanovice and Orowa.
Significant changes in the company took place after Poland regained its independence. At that time, the decision to transform „Gazolina” from a limited liability company into a joint stock company matured. The approval by the Ministry of Industry and Trade in Warsaw is dated September 26, 1919, and the approval of the Articles of Incorporation of the converted company by the Minister of Industry and Trade and the Minister of the Treasury is dated March 31, 1920.
The transformation of „Gazolina” from a limited liability company to a joint stock company was carried out by notarization, i.e. the signing of so-called concession contracts and the assignment of shares. These documents show that „Gaz Ziemny” Sp. z o. p. ceded its shares it held in „Gazolina” Sp. z o. p.
The process began in July 1919 and the last surviving file dates back to July 1920. Shares in the ownership of the company were held by employees, but also by people outside „Gazolina.” The largest share was held by Marian Wieleżyński, who, to the 35 shares in Gazolina he already owned, bought another 35 shares from Natural Gas, which amounted to almost 30% of the capital of the new joint-stock company. Among the shareholders were the members of the Board of Directors and Supervisory Board of Natural Gas already mentioned, but also, for example, Professors Ignacy Moscicki and Stefan Osowski, Galician parliament member Natan Loewenstein and many engineers and employees associated with Gazolina or Natural Gas. Officials from these companies also held shares, but also people outside the circle directly connected with the oil and gas industry: doctors, lawyers or local officials.
The transformation initiated processes that led not only to the economic development of the company, but also to the full implementation of the concept of the company's founders to make its employees co-owners as well. This innovative solution applied in the „Gazolina” group, known to us today as employee shareholding, was the first in Europe, and perhaps even in the world. The origins of the system, in which employees were allowed to share in the ownership of the company, date back to 1916. This is what allowed the company's employees to feel that they were co-owners of the company, thanks to which they saved the enterprise from destruction during the Polish-Ukrainian war in 1919.
The first formalized statute of „Gazolina” defining the principles of employee shareholding was approved by the Board of Directors in 1920, and by the General Meeting of Shareholders on February 22, 1922. This statute was gradually refined, however, without any fundamental changes. The last version dates back to May 5, 1936.In addition to the statute, an important document was the „Terms and Conditions of Agreement with Permanent Employees of Gazolina S.A.”, according to which employees were divided into permanent and temporary ones.
Permanent employees were those who chose to acquire employee shares, thus becoming co-owners of the company. Provisional employees, on the other hand, were those hired on a temporary employment contract.
In the aforementioned landmark year of 1920. „Gazolina” Limited Liability Company, based in Tustanovice, near Boryslav, was transformed into „Gazolina” Joint Stock Company, with its headquarters in Lviv, at 3 Leon Sapieha St. The formation of the joint stock company closes the first period of operation of the group of companies centered around Marian Wielezynski and Wladyslaw Szaynek. From that year, already in free Poland, there was a period of gradual development of the company. The company expanded its activities, gradually going beyond Boryslav and Lviv, developing not only the industrial and mining division, but also expanding it by searching for new innovative solutions and expanding the gas pipeline network and sales network.
The company's main sources of income were primarily the production and sale of natural gas, which began to dominate oil production and extraction after the discovery of rich gas deposits in Dashava in 1924. In turn, natural gas extracted in increasing quantities allowed the company to expand its production of fuels, especially gasoline and then, starting in 1929, liquefied natural gas, sold under the name of gazol. Sales of gas and gas-based products were a major factor in the company's value growth.
„Gazolina” also invested in the construction and operation of gas pipelines, notably the pipeline from the Daszawa fields to Lviv (1929) or the municipal gas pipelines in Gdynia (1931). Not without significance was the constant expansion of its own sales network. Branches and fuel depots were established in Lviv, Warsaw, Poznan, Gdynia, Lodz and Dabrowa Gornicza. The company also introduced new inventions. While still Wladyslaw Szaynok developed Poland's first fuel distributor, the 1930s saw the introduction of new solutions patented by Gazolina in the process of processing iron ore. This line of production had great prospects, but the outbreak of World War II interrupted Gazolina's activities.
Preserved archival materials provide insight into the company's assets shortly before the outbreak of World War II. At the time, fixed assets were calculated at PLN 13,070,961.95. It consisted of owned real estate (642.8 thousand zlotys), warehouses and stores (855.8 thousand zlotys), pipelines (5,209.9 thousand zlotys), mines in Boryslaw, Daszawa, Orowa and near Debica (with a total value of 3,167.5 thousand zlotys. zlotys), gasoline factories (1,097.3 thousand zlotys), a refinery (580.5 thousand zlotys) and others, such as the gas plant in Stryj, barrels and tanks, transportation equipment, workshops, movables and a laboratory (totaling 821.3 thousand zlotys). Added to this were liquid assets (cash in coffers and banks, rhymes or bills of exchange, shares in foreign enterprises, materials in warehouses and stocks of finished goods) in the total amount of PLN 2,973,234.37, amounts with debtors for a total of PLN 2,845677.18, and construction in the amount of PLN 249,291.32, in addition to transitory sums and invoices (almost PLN 27 thousand). A serious item was a deposit with the Petroleum Bank in the amount of 758 thousand zlotys. The total assets at the end of 1938 were calculated at more than 19 million 924 thousand zlotys.
The scale and value of the achievements of the company „Gazolina” are accurately characterized by the words of its founder, engineer Marian Wielezynski, who spoke in Lviv to employees and shareholders in the company's jubilee year of 1937:
- We are optimistic and love our work, and since love is the most powerful force in the world, so we prevail. Justice and a sense of duty must rule in our company, and a willingness to help each other must reign.
„Gasoline” is an organization calculated for the long haul. One of our oil contracts ends in 2006, and I want our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, while gaining a piece of bread for themselves, to work on these principles, giving our country what it needs to live, to defend itself and to take a great spiritual offensive around the world.
Photo: Collection of the Oil and Gas Industry Museum Foundation in Bóbrka
Extensive and detailed information about the history of the „Gazolina” company, collected as a result of the project „Research and dissemination of innovative economic and social achievements of the Gazolina Company in the Second Republic” under the Science for Society program (identification number NdS/550914/2022/2022) - is presented in the other sections of this website, including a record of a substantive scientific conference and book publications and documentaries.
[based on, among others, the introduction to the article by J.Golębiowski, T.Nowicki and P.Rachwal in: Joint work, joint yield. Success of the fuel company „Gazolina” in the Second Republic. Studies and materials from the scientific conference, Lublin 9-10 X 2023, edited by N. Turkiewicz, Lublin 2024]