Pia Dziekonski Obituary (1926 - 2022)

Pia Dziekonski was born in Chojnice, Poland on January 13, 1926 and died in Seattle on June 27, 2022. Born Pia Teresa Bieszk, she spent her preschool years with her aunt in southwestern Germany. She returned to Poland when she was school age, and lived through the hardships of Nazi occupation, which included the imprisonment of her father. She was sent back to Germany at the age of 15, and completed high school in Baden Baden after the war. After attending the University of Heidelberg for two years, Pia was hired as an English teacher for a Polish labor company by the US Army of Occupation. There she met Tadeusz Dziekonski, her beloved "Tadzio." They married and immigrated to Seattle in 1950. They and their four children, Elizabeth, Tom, Christa, and Gregory, were active in the Polish ethnic community, which included numerous public performances of Polish folk songs. Their marriage was cut short by Tadzio's death in 1991. Pia worked at Washington Federal Savings Bank for 25 years, and was for a time a volunteer tutor at Whitworth Elementary School for students learning English as a second language. Besides her four children, she is survived by seven grandchildren and eight great grandchildren. She has 3 living sisters, multiple nephews and nieces in Poland. Private services have been held.