Girls from the Clouds - 95th Anniversary of the 1st Women Aviators’ Rally around Poland

Four women aviators from Lwów and Silesia flew all the way round Poland’s borders in October 1931, in two PZL.5 aircraft. The Polish Aviation Museum gives them a small display of boards and showcases of keepsakes. It is on the mezzanine of Hangar 5, next to an RWD-13 aircraft, with no separate ticket, until 30 November 2026.

Polish Aviation Museum on the exhibition (the museum’s own English text):

The exhibition presents the extraordinary story of a pioneering rally from October 1931 - the first aviation feat by women around the borders of the Polish Republic. The nearly 3,000-kilometre route included stops in Katowice, Krakow, Lwow, Wilno, Warsaw, and Luck, and the challenge was taken up by four outstanding female pilots: Maria Wardasowna, Maria Lierowna, Danuta Sikorzanka, and Wanda Olszewska, flying PZL.5 aircraft. The exhibition can be viewed next to the RWD-13 aircraft in Hangar No. 5 from 7 March to 30 November 2026.

The undertaking attracted enormous interest from the press and the public. At a time when aviation was still regarded as a male domain, four young female pilots proved their skill, courage, and professionalism, earning widespread admiration and recognition. Their success became a symbol of the growing presence of women in aviation.

What to expect

This is not a room of its own but a display set into the space of the permanent exhibition “With the Wind and Against the Wind - Civil Aviation”. The museum has placed it on the mezzanine of Hangar 5, beside an RWD-13 aircraft. At its core are boards of photographs of the rally and of what became of the women afterwards, with showcases alongside. The museum does not say how many objects are on show.

The objects in the showcases are on loan from the Gustaw Morcinek Museum in Skoczów, which first showed them in autumn 2025 in its exhibition “Maryśka from Silesia - A Remembrance of Maria Wardas”. The museum names three of them:

• A bust of Maria Wardasówna by the sculptor Hanna Nałkowska.
• The pilot’s own wristwatch on a black leather strap, with five miniature aviation badges, among them the military pilot’s “Gapa” eagle with a golden laurel and a glider badge with three gulls.
• A clipping from the magazine “Światowid” of 1931 with the article “What inspired me to become a female pilot?”.

One thing the exhibition page does not spell out. According to the route map the museum included in its press material, on 1 October 1931 the crews were at Kraków-Rakowice airfield, the very ground on which the museum stands today. One of the photographs on that map shows the damaged wing of the aircraft “Śląsk” there.

The exhibition opened on 7 March 2026 during the museum’s Aviation Women’s Day. According to the museum’s report, more than 150 people joined the themed tours on women in the history of aviation that weekend. The curator is Ewa Cuber-Strutyńska; the graphic design is by Anna Firszt.

It pairs well with part of the permanent exhibition in the same hangar. One of the seven sections of “With the Wind and Against the Wind” is devoted to the women pilots and glider pilots of the post-war aero clubs. The museum says so in the description of its own YouTube film. For the opening the museum also published a book, “Kobiety w lotnictwie polskim. Biogramy, część 1.” (Women in Polish Aviation: Biographies, Part 1), a collection of short lives of the first Polish women pilots; the museum does not present it as a catalogue of this exhibition.

Context

According to the museum’s map, the rally took off on 1 October 1931 from Katowice-Muchowiec airfield. It circled the borders of the time through 16 towns, from Lwów, Tarnopol and Łuck to Wilno, Grodno, Toruń and Poznań. There were two crews: the pilot Wanda Olszewska with the observer Maria Wardasówna in the aircraft “Powstaniec”, and the pilot Danuta Sikorzanka with the observer Maria Lierówna in “Śląsk”. They landed in Kraków again on 10 October.

The PZL.5 is a biplane sports aircraft built by the State Aviation Works (PZL) and first flown in 1930. Only 15 were made, because production was halted by the better RWD-5. The RWD-13 beside the display is a few years younger: its prototype first flew in January 1935. So it is not an aircraft from the rally, merely its neighbour in the hangar.

Maria Wardasówna (1907-1986) went to school in Skoczów, where Gustaw Morcinek was her teacher; the museum named after him now keeps her keepsakes. After the war she was commandant of Łódź airport. She was also a writer: she published a memoir, “Próba skrzydeł” (A Trial of Wings), and a novel for young readers, “Maryśka ze Śląska” (Maryśka from Silesia), whose title the Skoczów exhibition borrowed.

Tickets and time

• Tickets: included in museum admission, with no extra charge. According to the museum’s price list , a standard ticket costs 35 PLN, a reduced one 21 PLN, and a family ticket (two adults and two children, or one adult and three children) 92 PLN. Children under 7 go in free.
• The English version of the exhibition page says “free admission”. The Polish exhibition page is clear, though: the show is included in the museum ticket, so except on Tuesdays you need one.
• Tuesdays are free. Admission to the museum is free on Tuesdays, as the museum states in its price list . The show has no separate ticket, so on that day you see it for nothing.
• Hours: Tuesday to Sunday, until 31 October 9:00-17:00 (9 AM-5 PM), in November 9:00-16:00; the museum is closed on Mondays. Ticket sales end, and last entry falls, 45 minutes before closing time; the museum is closed on 1 and 11 November (hours on the museum’s website ).
• In practice the last day is 29 November. The show formally runs until 30 November, but that is a Monday, when the museum is closed. On Sunday 29 November the last entry is at 15:15.
• How long: 20-30 minutes for the boards and showcases. The display alone does not justify the trip out to Czyżyny; treat it as a stop within Hangar 5, whose permanent exhibition on civil aviation will take you much longer.
• Best for: anyone interested in women’s history and interwar sports aviation, teenagers who like true adventure stories, and anyone heading to Hangar 5 anyway.
• Skip if: you came to look at machines rather than read boards. The exhibition page does not say that any PZL.5 is on display, and the RWD-13 next to it has nothing to do with the rally.
• In English: the museum publishes the exhibition text in English on its website; it says nothing about English captions on the boards.

What the press says

PAP (7 Mar 2026, a Polish Press Agency dispatch on dzieje.pl): a report from the opening day, based on information from the museum’s director, Tomasz Kosecki. The show is meant to recall the first such feat by women in Poland and is set up on the mezzanine of Hangar 5. Listing the route, the dispatch repeats “Puck” from the press material instead of Łuck, which is the town on the museum’s map - link (Polish-language source).

Telewizja Małopolska (9 Mar 2026, a video report on YouTube): coverage of Aviation Women’s Day; the opening of the exhibition is one item on its programme, alongside meetings with women aviators, workshops and a concert - link (in Polish).

PAP (13 Jul 2026, Tomasz Szczerbicki, on dzieje.pl; reprinted by dlapilota.pl): a summer piece about the museum. The exhibition opens its story of the whole institution, which CNN ranked eighth among the world’s aviation museums - link (Polish-language source).

Three pieces, all informational: two PAP dispatches and a regional television report. No critical review had been found by 22 October 2026.

The museum’s director, Tomasz Kosecki, on the rally’s 95th anniversary, speaking to PAP: “It was a good pretext to tell the story of Polish women who flew.” (our translation)

Updates

• 19 Oct 2026 - the museum was nominated for the BohaterONy 2026 Award in the “Institution” category. According to its announcement, the jury recognised Aviation Women’s Day, and the museum calls this exhibition one of the event’s highlights (source: the museum’s announcement , in Polish).

See also

• Polish Aviation Museum - our profile of the whole museum on the former Rakowice-Czyżyny airfield: eleven permanent exhibitions and a suggestion for fitting the visit into three hours.
• Warrior Women: Japanese Herstories - at the Manggha Museum until 11 November 2026. Another era and another continent, but the same subject: women in a role their culture left to men.
• Museum of Engineering and Technology - its Hangar Czyżyny branch stands wall to wall with the aviation museum; separate ticket, separate hours.

Opening hours and current details are on the Polish Aviation Museum website .

Museum profile: Polish Aviation Museum .