„There was a kind of an open shed-roof based on four poles, and under this roof there was a bed covered with straw. I sat down on the bed and it seemed to me that there is no and cannot be a greater luxury. The birds were singing and the crickets were chirping. The air was filled with countless voices and sounds. Nearby, the chickens and roosters sauntered. When I lifted my head I saw a synagogue of Bilgoraj and fileds that spread around to the edge of the forest. They were of different shapes and colours: squares, diamonds, triangles, green, dark yellow. I was in paradise and I had only one desire: never to be exiled…"Issac Bashevis SingerFrom collection Majn tants bes-din sztub, I. L. Perec Farlag, Tel-Aviv 1979

In April 2016 the restored house of Isaac Singer, the Noble Prize winner in literature who spent his childhood in Bilgoraj, started functioning. The facility will have an educational nature and that of a museum. The workshops on the history and customs of residents of the former culture will be held there. Soon the library, richly equipped with books related to the history of Jews, will be opened. We plan to organize interesting exhibitions and expositions. We would like to revive the history of merging cultures, to document the memories of those who are still witnessing the coexistence pervading communities inhabiting the land of Bilgoraj. We invite anyone who wants to talk about the issues related to local history of their loved ones, anyone who derives pleasure from the memories about the people, places, events inextricably linked to the coexistence of different cultures in our region. We want to give the climate of prewar times by moving those who are interested to a place that is unquestionably unique, that is to the Singer’s House. A place where the past meets the present in a new dimension. Just like at the beginning of the last century, the house of Isaac Singer’s grandfather Rabbi Zylberman was steeped in with the smell of old books, sacred books and the local wood burned in the local furnace, and also now above the threshold of today’s Singer’s House, we will feel the smell of a pine board from the forests of Bilgoraj, we would warm up in the heat beating from the faithfully reconstituted clay hearth, we can relax holing up in the volume of our favourite reading which will take us into the previous Singer’s age.

The Singer’s House is an open place for all , regardless of age, belief and life stories. We would like the space, limited by four wooden walls, give each of us the opportunity to freely express their own opinion, to break stereotypes and to renounce prejudices. We wish ourselves and others that every visit to this House would bring something permanent into our cultural customs, so that the younger generation untainted by, at times controversial, history of our times learn from Singer’s House something more than a textbook history lesson. We will focus in our actions on innovative ways of conveying historical content concerning cultural issues. Multimedia presentations of , for example, former Bilgoraj (the so called virtual shtetl) will appear. We will implement social media in the process of functioning of the House of Singer, so that one can communicate with it from any place in the world. Our aim is to create a vibrant institution which is a source of inspiration but also a reflection and a professional workshop facility for all those who want to know more about the existence of communities who used to live here.