History of Szczecin
Another stronghold was built in the 8th century-first half of the 9th century at the ford of the Oder River, (at the same location where later was a ducal castle) and a few craftsmen, fishermen and traders settled in the vicinity.
After the decline of Wolin in the 12th century, Stetinum became one of the most important and powerful cities of the Baltic Sea south coasts, having some 5,000 inhabitants.
In a winter campaign of 1121–1122, the area was subjugated by Boleslaw III of Poland, who invited the Catholic bishop Otto of Bamberg to baptize the citizens (1124).
[4] In the second half of the 12th century, a group of German tradesmen (from various parts of the Holy Roman Empire) settled in the city around St. Jacob's Church, which was founded by Beringer, a trader from Bamberg, and consecrated in 1187.
For centuries the dukes invited German settlers to colonize their land and to found towns and villages (see Ostsiedlung).
In the 14th and 15th centuries, Stettin conducted several trade wars with the neighboring cities of Gartz, Greifenberg (Gryfino) and Stargard over a monopoly on grains export.
The grain supplying area was not only Pomerania but also Brandenburg and Greater Poland – trade routes along the Oder and Warta rivers.
The 16th century saw the decline of the city's trading position because of the competition of the nobility, as well as church institutions in the grains exports, a customs war with Frankfurt (Oder), and the fall of the herring market.
In the 16th century, it remained an important port for Polish exports of grain, wood, ash, tar and hemp, floated from western Poland down the Warta and Oder rivers.
[citation needed] During the Thirty Years' War, Stettin refused to accept German imperial armies, instead the Pomeranian dukes allied with Sweden.
In 1713, Stettin was occupied by the Kingdom of Prussia; the Prussian Army entered the city as neutrals to watch the ceasefire and refused to leave.
Economic development and rapid population growth brought many ethnic Poles from Pomerania and Greater Poland looking for new career opportunities in the Stettin industry.
New branches of industry were developed, including shipbuilding (at the AG Vulcan Stettin and Oderwerke shipyards) and ironworks using Swedish ores.
Among them was Kazimierz Pruszak, director of the Goleniów (then Gollnow) industrial works, who predicted eventual "return of Szczecin to Poland".
After World War I, the economy of Stettin declined again because the seaport was separated from its agricultural supply areas in Posen with the creation of the Second Polish Republic.
[15] According to German historian Jan Musekamp, the activities of the Polish pre-war organizations were exaggerated after World War II for propaganda purposes.
[26][further explanation needed] After World War II, the Polish-German border was preliminarily moved by the Allies to the west of the Oder-Neisse line, which would have made Stettin remain German.
It was undecided if the city would be in Poland or in the Soviet occupation zone of Germany, but eventually Szczecin was handed over to Polish authorities on 5 July 1945 -as agreed by the Soviet-imposed Treaty of Schwerin of 21 September 1945.
Szczecin became a major industrial centre of and a principal seaport not only for Poland (especially the Silesian coal) but also for Czechoslovakia and East Germany.
In December 1956, Szczecin was the site of a mass protest against the Soviets and communist rule and in solidarity with the Hungarian Revolution.
[33] In 2016, to commemorate the 60th anniversary of Polish solidarity with the Hungarians, the Hungarian-funded "Boy of Pest" monument was unveiled in Szczecin.
[34] Szczecin together with Gdańsk, Gdynia and Upper Silesia was the main centre of the democratic anti-communist movements in first in March 1968 and December 1970.
The protesters attacked and burned the Polish United Workers' Party regional headquarters and the Soviet consulate in Szczecin.
On 30 August 1980, the first agreement between the protesters and the communist regime was signed in Szczecin, which paved the way for the creation of the Solidarity movement, which contributed to the fall of communism in Central and Eastern Europe.
Communist-dominated municipal administration was replaced by a local government in 1990, and the direct election of the city president (mayor) was introduced in 2006.
