Dr. W. S. Kindraczuk Forgotten Chemist of Łańcut and Pioneer of Probiotics
Zapomniany aptekarz miasta Łańcuta i naukowiec-pionier probiotyki
Romana M. Bahry
Toronto: York University Press, 2018
A lost discovery. A forgotten scientist. The Spanish flu pandemic of 1919 and two World Wars.
About the book
In 1912 a young chemist from Galicia published a short paper in a Viennese dairy journal. In it he described a new bacterium in huslanka, the fermented milk of the Hutsul shepherds of the Carpathians, and named it Bacillus carpathicus. War and upheaval followed, and the discovery was forgotten.
This biography, the product of thirteen years of research and writing, restores Dr. Włodzimierz Sylwester Kindraczuk (1882–1969) to the history of probiotics. It follows him from Horodenka and the University of Lviv to his pharmacy in Łańcut, through flight from Poland in 1944, to a new life in Hamilton, Ontario. The author is his granddaughter.
The bilingual edition grew out of a translation project with Leszek Puchała, Director of the Public Library in Sanok, Poland.
The edition
- Edition
- Bilingual, English and Polish
- Translation
- Polish by Leszek Puchała
- Preface
- Roman Plyatsko
- Publisher
- York University Press, Toronto, 2018. Reprinted 2021.
- Extent
- xxiv, 346 pages. Paperback, 7 × 10 inches.
- Pictures
- More than one hundred in colour, with a map and family charts
- Apparatus
- Glossary of names, notes, bibliography, index
- ISBN
- 978-1-77355-016-9
In the press
“Impeccably researched and lavishly illustrated.”
A life in dates
Dr. Włodzimierz Sylwester Kindraczuk
- 1882Born on January 9 in Horodenka, in Austrian Galicia.
- 1909Master’s degree in pharmacy.
- 1912Describes Bacillus carpathicus in huslanka, in a Vienna dairy journal.
- 1915Pharmacist in Łańcut, where he works until 1944.
- 1918Marries Maria Antonina Kubaty, a pharmacy technician from Kraków.
- 1921The monument he paid for, to the Ukrainian soldiers who died in the Łańcut camp, is dedicated on February 20.
- 1925Owner of the pharmacy Apteka pod Matką Boską.
- 1944Flees west to Austria in July.
- 1951Emigrates with his family to Hamilton, Ontario.
- 1960Becomes a Canadian citizen.
- 1969Dies on January 30.
Order
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