Walesa Visits Heiress, Shrine as Tour Ends
Lech Walesa wound up his whirlwind U.S. tour today after stops at a shrine for an activist priest and at the home of the Johnson & Johnson heiress who has pledged millions to help save the site where Solidarity was born.
The Nobel Peace Prize laureate visited St. Hedwig’s Roman Catholic Church in Trenton, where he laid a wreath Sunday night at a shrine for the Rev. Jerzy Popieluszko, the activist priest slain five years ago by Polish secret police.
Before visiting the church, Walesa was a guest at a private dinner at Jasna Polana, the Princeton estate of Barbara Piasecka Johnson. The Polish-born Mrs. Johnson, 52, inherited much of the Johnson & Johnson pharmaceutical fortune after the death of her husband, Seward Johnson.
In June, she said she will spend up to $100 million for a 55% interest in the Lenin shipyard in Gdansk, where the Solidarity movement was first kindled by Walesa in 1980.
Walesa left Teterboro Airport this morning for Caracas, Venezuela, aboard a private jet.
At Teterboro, Walesa said he was happy with his weeklong visit and optimistic that President Bush and Congress would work to help Poland, and he emphasized that he was not just looking for a handout.
“I came to gain expertise and advice from captains of industry in this country,” he said. “(But) money is an issue.”
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