29-10-2025

The Lithuanian State Historical Archives presents the virtual exhibition “Juozapas Montvila [Józef Montwiłł] – The Great Philanthropist” in English

At the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the renowned activist Juozapas Montvila [a.k.a. Józef Montwiłł] (1850–1911) stood out for his desire to help others. He was a businessman and banker, and initiated the construction of many ecclesiastical and secular buildings. He was born on 21 March 1850 at Mitėniškiai Manor near the small town of Šėta (on the border of the present-day Kėdainiai and Jonava Districts) and this year marks the 175^th anniversary of his birth. This anniversary has become the stimulus for the Lithuanian State Historical Archive along with other Lithuanian state archives and national memorial institutions to organize an exhibition to remind people today of this noble person’s contributions to architecture, scholarship, art and especially charity. The exhibition is called “Juozapas Montvila – The Great Philanthropist”.

We hope that the archival documents presented in the exhibition will not only interest scholars studying the personality of this prominent social activist and philanthropist, who has left a long-lasting footprint in the history of Šėta and Vilnius, but also that it will encourage us all to think about our own contributions to public welfare. Montvila himself acknowledged that “people often complain that the world is unfair to them, but if they were to compare exactly what good they have done themselves with what they have received from others, most likely they would be convinced that in the final calculation it is they that are the debtors”.

Please look over the Exhibition: https://byt.lt/nLoUh

Exhibition Organizer – The Lithuanian State Historical Archive.

Exhibition Curators – Neringa Češkevičiūtė, Dr Violeta Pansevič and Dovilė Korovacka.

Translator of the Exhibition texts and document notes – Dr Stephen Christopher Rowell.

Exhibition Partners:

Kaunas Regional State Archive,

Lithuanian Central State Archive,

Lithuanian Special Archive,

Lithuanian National Museum of Art,

Embassy of the Polish Republic, Vilnius,

The Polish Institute, Vilnius

University Library of the Humboldt University of Berlin