At the end of the 19th century, hundreds of Poles arrived in Manchuria - a land located in the north-east of present-day China - to find employment in the construction of the East China Railway. The capital of their settlement was the city of Harbin, founded in 1898 on the Sungari River. Among the Polish entrepreneurs operating there, the most famous was the owner of a timber combine, Władysław Kowalski. Although little remains today of the company he founded, there is still a grand villa in Harbin that he built for his family.
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Villa in Har bin
The Poles settling in Harbin were mostly skilled professionals and were an important part of the local administrative and economic elite. They undoubtedly also contributed much to the architectural landscape of the city. Of the private buildings associated with them, by far the most important was the villa of Władysław Kowalski. This urban residence with neoclassical forms was built in 1909. The Italian architect Aleksandr Bernardazzi was probably responsible for the design. The building, surrounded by a small garden, stood on one of the city's main squares (opposite was the now-defunct Nikolaevsky Cathedral, built to a design by the Polish architect Jozef Padlevsky). Vladislav Kowalski lived in his villa for only a few years. When his wooden empire began to decline, he was forced to move out.

After some time, the building was taken over by the Chinese Communist Party and the Mao Zedong Museum (now the Museum of Famous Achievements of Revolutionary Leaders) was established there. In the exhibition organised there, you can also find a piece on the building's first owner. Luckily, the residence has survived in its original form. Even the interior decoration has survived, with original wood panelling from trees from the forests exploited by Kowalski.

The Polish King of Manchuria
Władysław Kowalski (1870-1940) came from Podolia and began his professional career in Vladivostok, where he left in 1896. He worked on the construction of the railway line connecting this port city with Khabarovsk. He quickly realised that the key raw material in this business was timber, and that its supply could be a very profitable source of income. His innate sense of the market and flair for business did not allow him to delay his decision for long. In 1911, he was awarded the first official concession to exploit the Manchurian forests, which he named Apple Tree. He quickly grew into a major supplier of raw timber to the expanding East China Railway and to other construction entrepreneurs.

Smith leased forests covering more than 6,000 square kilometres. The entire area was connected by a well-developed transport network guaranteeing fluidity of supply. The dynamically growing company built not only modern sawmills and the transport infrastructure serving them, but also numerous office and residential buildings, workshops and power plants. In fact, a small state was created where Kowalski employed more than 8,000 people, many of them Poles.

After 1918. Harbin still remained the centre of Polish settlement in the region. In 1925. Władysław Kowalski established a modern plywood factory there, which for years was the only plant of its kind in China, also producing for export. He also financially supported the activities of Polish organisations in Harbin - mainly the Polish Farm Association, founded in 1907, and two Polish Catholic parishes (St Stephen's and St Josaphat's).

Collapse of the wooden empire
Although over the years Wladyslaw Kowalski coped well with the local bureaucracy and the local peculiarities of doing business, the financial crisis of 1929 and deepening corruption led his enterprise to financial collapse. Wanting to salvage his business and hoping this would provide him with the security of doing business, he entered into a partnership with some Chinese officials. Unfortunately, the opposite happened and by 1930 the company was already on the brink of bankruptcy.

The political situation at the time, i.e. the separation of Manchuria from China and the creation of the Japanese-controlled puppet state of Manchukuo, deprived Smith of his last hopes of rebuilding his empire. In 1936, his concessions were cancelled by the Japanese authorities, who were unwilling to buy such a valuable resource as timber from foreigners. These exhausting and fruitless struggles certainly took a toll on Wladyslaw Kowalski's health. He died in 1940 in Harbin of a heart attack. His wife and two daughters emigrated to the United States.

Even after Kowalski's death, his company continued to operate under the Japanese authorities for some time and was profitable. It only collapsed in 1945 after the Red Army entered Manchuria.