Town Hall in Siedlce

The town hall in Siedlce is colloquially called Jacek — after the statue of Atlas at the top of the tower, which legend says was modelled on a local blacksmith. This late-Baroque and Classicist building, laid out on a Greek cross plan, stands by the former market square (today the Tadeusz Kościuszko square) and since 1928 has housed the Regional Museum.

The Czartoryski foundation

The building was erected in 1763–1767 to a design by Jan Zygmunt Deybl, Stanisław Zawadzki or Karol Bogumił Schutz — the founders were the Czartoryski family, who after taking over the town estates set about tidying the main square. In 1772 a clock with four dials was mounted on the tower, and the statue of Atlas was placed atop the building.

Fires, a lightning rod and war

The town hall burned several times: after the fire of 1784 the mathematician Adam Kukiel mounted the third lightning rod in Poland on top of the tower, another fire broke out in 1789, and the next in 1888 — by then the old town hall with its 30 trading stalls had lost its functions to a new building of 1892. Interestingly, the bombings of 7–8 September 1939 destroyed the municipal office building and the New Town Hall, while Jacek survived — it burned only in 1944. The reconstruction lasted from 1945 to 1952.

The legend and the returns of Jacek

The statue weighs 600 kilograms. On 31 January 2000 a gale threw it down from the tower; after reconstruction it returned to its place on 31 August of the same year. In 2021–2023 the statue was taken down again and renovated at a cost of PLN 165,000.