Bodzów was first mentioned as a location in the 12th century as a village of the Kraków chapter, and from 1884 — as part of the fortifications of the Kraków Fortress — construction of Fort 53 Bodzów began there. In the early 1930s, the Kraków Glider Circle began basic glider flight training on a small hill (260 m above sea level) in Bodzów. The official opening of this glider field took place on October 22, 1933. A hangar was already in place there, and the Circle had at its disposal a glider built by students of Kraków’s 9th Gymnasium. The first glider course was held in autumn 1933/spring 1934.
On April 1, 1935, the glider field was placed under the management of the Air and Anti-Gas Defence League (LOPP), and a center was established there under the name: Glider School of the Kraków Provincial District of the LOPP in Bodzów. Participants of successive residential courses lived in a dormitory housed in the buildings of the former Austrian fort. Each year at the Bodzów glider field, young glider pilots obtained Categories A and B (from a dozen to several dozen annually), and — as limited sources indicate — more advanced pilots trained there as well. In the autumn of 1938, the Bodzów glider field, previously authorized for training at levels I and II (slide flights), received from the Ministry of Transport the right to conduct training soaring flights. The outbreak of war in 1939 put an end to the School’s activities, but not to flying — the site was then used by glider pilots from the Hitler Youth. Shortly after the end of the war, still in 1945, a group of aviation enthusiasts gathered in the Aviation Circle at the Polytechnic Faculty of what was then Kraków’s Academy of Mining began flight trials there using former German gliders. Thus, Bodzów became the place where the beginnings of Kraków’s academic flying were born after World War II.
Students from the Aviation Circle used former German SG-38 and Grunau gliders found in Kraków (among other places, in the Resurrectionist Church), later called “Jerzyki” (Swifts), as well as the only aerobatic glider, “Olimpia.” Among them were future lecturers of the Kraków University of Technology, distinguished scholars: Dr. Fryderyk Schäfer, Professor Janusz Bogdanowski, Dr. Wiesław Wielgus, the long-time director of the Polish Aviation Museum Marian Markowski, and the art historian and expert on wooden architecture, Dr. Marian Kornecki. The development of Kraków’s academic aviation was, however, cut short in 1949, when the authorities curtailed aviation activities, liquidated aero clubs, and banned flying. In 1956, the Bodzów fort was demolished, and throughout the 1960s its remains were gradually dismantled. In the following decade, hang glider pilots began using the Bodzów flying field — among them were Jan Psuj and Michał Ornakiewicz. Finally, in the late 1980s, paragliding flights began there. Today, the hill is used by model aircraft enthusiasts, mainly those building radio-controlled slope soaring gliders with large wingspans that require mountain conditions. Paraglider pilots are also present.
