Editing Bolesław Bierut (section)

===Youth and early career===
Bierut was born in Rury, [[Congress Poland]] (then part of the [[Russian Empire]]), now a part of [[Lublin]], to Wojciech and Marianna Salomea (Wolska) Bierut, [[peasant]]s from the [[Tarnobrzeg]] area, the youngest of their six children. In 1900, he attended an elementary school in Lublin. In 1905, he was removed from the school for instigating anti-[[Russian Partition|Russian]] protests. From the age of fourteen he was employed in various trades, but obtained further education through self-studies. Influenced by the [[left-wing politics|leftist]] intellectual Jan Hempel, who in 1910 arrived in Lublin, before [[World War I]] Bierut joined the [[Polish Socialist Party – Left]] (''PPS – Lewica'').<ref name="Eisler siedmiu 38–41">Jerzy Eisler, ''Siedmiu wspaniałych. Poczet pierwszych sekretarzy KC PZPR'' [The Magnificent Seven: first secretaries of the PZPR], pp. 38–41.</ref>

From 1915, Bierut was active in the [[cooperative]] movement. In 1916, he became trade manager of the Lublin Food Cooperative, and from 1918 was its top leader, declaring the cooperative's "[[social class|class]]-[[socialism|socialist]]" character. During World War I, he stayed at times at Hempel's apartment in [[Warsaw]] and took [[trade]] and cooperative courses at the [[SGH Warsaw School of Economics|Warsaw School of Economics]].<ref name="Eisler siedmiu 32–35"/><ref name="Eisler siedmiu 38–41"/> In Warsaw, he established contacts with [[Maria Koszutska]] and in December 1918 some form of association with the newly created [[Communist Workers' Party of Poland]] (KPRP), from which, according to his later testimony, he withdrew in fall 1919. Bierut kept assuming ever higher offices in the cooperative movement. In 1919 he and Hempel went to [[Prague]], where they represented the Polish cooperatives at the congress of their [[Czechoslovakia|Czechoslovak]] counterparts. Bierut's increasingly radical views, however, eventually hindered his cooperative career and caused his departure from the leadership of the movement, beginning in 1921. From 1921, he officially functioned as a member of the KPRP.<ref name="Eisler siedmiu 38–41"/>

In July 1921 Bierut married Janina Górzyńska, a preschool teacher who had helped him a great deal when his illegal activities forced him to hide from the police. They were married by a [[Priesthood in the Catholic Church|priest]] at the [[St. John the Baptist Cathedral, Lublin|Lublin Cathedral]], even though the priest, according to Janina, excused them from the [[Confession (religion)|confession]] requirement. In February 1923 their daughter Krystyna was born, followed by son Jan in January 1925.<ref name="Eisler siedmiu 38–41"/>