2011-12-21, 11:22
Bollard construction stuck for the first sailor to ride the Atlantic
© A sketch created by sculptor Klaudijus Pudymas for the bollard of Bronius Rozinskas.
Bronius Rozinskas is the first Lithuanian sailor to cross the Atlantic Ocean with his yacht, but with the Polish flag.
With the help of his brother Adolfas from the U.S., Bronius Rozinskas, who emigrated from Lithuania to Poland, built his yacht Hermes II. On 7 September 1962, he and his other three crew members Poles sailed from the Polish town Szczecin and successfully overcame the Atlantic Ocean and on 15 January 1963 reached the shores of Martinique Island.
He was connected with Klaipeda because he lived in the city from 1934, here he learned how to sail and studied at Smiltyne sailing school. After 1939 German occupation of Klaipeda, he moved to Kaunas.
U.S. based Bronius’s daughter Nijole Zelvinder asked Klaipeda Municipality to permit her to build a bollard for her father’s memory. She asked to build a bollard on Dane embankment, where other similar bollards for famous Lithuanian sailors are standing.
“We can agree on funds. I would like to get your approval. I also hope that you are going to select a place. I would like to capture my father’s brave journey in the city which he loved so dearly,” – wrote Nijole Zelvinder.
The suggestion to build a bollard for Bronius Rozinskas was approved by the Maritime Cultural Coordination Council and Klaipeda City Council on 27 September 2010. Then, the Secretary of Municipal Council Vidmantas Pleckaitis said that the bollard is going to be built using private funds. However, the bollard is still not built. The daughter of Mr. Rozinskas which planned to fund the bollard does not give any feedback on the project.
The employees of Klaipeda City Municipality are left wondering what to do. The bollard for Mr. Rozinskas has acquired the honorable first place in line of bollards. A sculptor Klaudijus Pudymas has already made sketches for bollard, but the main organizer of the project has disappeared.
Maybe she is silent and waits for her fellow Lithuanians to built bollard using public money. The cost of such a project would be 15 thousand LTL.