Dear all, a short report from the Wikipedia Meeting in Solothurn which happened last Saturday.
User:Gestumblindi organised some cultural program for those who were interested and had time to come to Solothurn three hours prior the actual meeting in the restaurant "Kreuz". We were invited to see the museum about Tadeusz Kosciuszko, a polish national hero who lived 1746 - 1817. He spent his last two years in Solothurn, in the appartement he lived is today a small museum about him. Kosciuszko is famous in Poland for his fights to re-establish Poland afte the second division and disappearance of the country. He was partly successful but ended as a prisoner in Russia until Zar Katharina II died and the new Zar freed him. In the USA Kosciuszko is famous because he fought successfully against the British, established fortifications and thus played an important role in the War of Independance. The museum holds a lot of old stuff from Kosciuszko and is run by volunteers. We had a nice tour given by an elderly polish man. Never heard of Kosciuszko before the most interesting part for me was the thorough update of my knowledge about polish and US history which has a lot of european context as well. Eg. Kosciuszko studied and lived in Paris before he went to the USA, as he had no opportunities in Poland after the first division and its weak leadership. He was inspired by the spirit of the french before the revolution. When he came back he dealt with napoleon France, then with the russian Zar, later he went to the Vienna Convention before living and dying in Solothurn. The Wikipedia Meeting was well visited, there were 16 people in the museum and even more in the restaurant, I would guess around 20 persons in total. Due to the big amount of people there was not a single, common discussion but many groups and pairs discussing different topics. They ranged from the Edelweiss project over Wikimania to Third Age Online, Open Data. Many more happening on other tables I will have missed. I noticed somebody from SeniorWeb, a directrice from the library of Solothurn, Patrick Kenel from the Wikimedia CH board and many well-known Wikipedians. We introduced Muriel Staub as Community Manager and distributed some give-aways like Wikimedia CH USB sticks with offline Wikipedia, red-white lanyards and Wikimedia CH stickers. It was a very nice meeting with interesting discussions. What I found very interesting is the fact that we had more visitors than in Zürich. I want to thank to all who were engaged to organise this meeting and those who came, making it so interesting. For those who have time today: There is the Wikipedia:Basel meeting tonight at 19:00 in restaurant "Crea'tif" in Weil am Rhein, just across the border of Basel, easily reachable with S5 station "Weil am Rhein Ost". If you drop me a note I can pick you up at Basel Bad. Bf or Weil am Rhein so you don't have to fiddle with german railway. Regards, Manuel -- Wikimedia CH - Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens Lausanne, +41 (21) 34066-22 - www.wikimedia.ch _______________________________________________ http://wikimedia.ch Wikimedia CH website Wikimediach-l mailing list https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediach-l
