Invention of photography enabled us to immortal our reality, to immortal all what is transient and unique. From the beginning of the 20th century, also in Nowy Targ, there appeared some professional photographers, as well as some groups of amateurs who started to document events and everyday life of inhabitants.

Religious and patriotic ceremonies, anniversaries, performances and plays constituted important elements of town’s everyday life and gathered many of its inhabitants. After ceremonial worships at church or synagogue, the inhabitants of Nowy Targ, Poles and Jews, poor and rich, young and old, were going to the Main Square of the town. Those gatherings were usually accompanied by pompous ceremonials. There were speeches of high officials, horse banderias, marches of “Sokołów”, youngsters and different organizations and also great orchestra. In the afternoon everybody were going to the party called in Polish “wieczornica” that took place in the building of the “Sokół”. The old photographs kept in the museum show the specific aura of the town. Thanks to them, we can see the town looked in the past, how the inhabitants were dressed, and even we can get some information concerning customs or even political propaganda. 

In the late 19th  and early 20th century the liberal policy of the Austria-Hungary favoured the revival of the Polish identity. In Nowy Targ national traditions were fostered by impressive anniversary celebrations, which were manifestations of patriotism. The remembrance of heroes of national uprisings was living in the town. In 1903, Komitet Budowy Pomnika Pamiątkowego [Committee for the Construction of the Memorial Monument] was established to honor those who died fighting for independence. Owing to the subsidy passed by the Town Council the monument was erected on the graveyard in Nowy Targ. (Photo from the National Archives collection)

Celebrations of the Mickiewicz's Year on the 100th anniversary of the poet's birth were beautiful. A day before the celebrations, on Saturday 25 June 1898, „among excellent illumination and accompanied by music played by the town's orchestra, a parade set off: a horse convoy in the front, made up of 70 brave highlanders led by colonel Baumann” („Rok mickiewiczowski. Księga pamiątkowa”, Lvov 1899). On Sunday a ceremony of the monument's exposure took place in the town's park, which was then named after Adam Mickiewicz.

A significant fact in the history of the town and the region was the long-term endeavour to set up a high school in Nowy Targ - the first one in Podhale. Town authorities and inhabitants, as they understood the role of education in the development and perseverance of the Polish culture, with a great determination interpellated in the relevant ministry departments of Vienna and Lvov for the establishment of an institution for the education of the young people of Podhale, Spiš and Orava. Already in 1877 A High School Committee was created to collect funds for this purpose. Since 1898 the MP of the Nowy Targ district, Jan Bednarski, school inspector Ludomił German and town mayor Mikołaj Halikowski, who initiated the resolution on the construction of the building, relevant equipment and their maintenance by the municipality at its own cost, were committed to this case. In 1904 from the Vienna court there came a permission signed by the emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria for the establishment of a royal-imperial high school with Polish as a language of instruction. On 10 September a ceremonial opening of the school took place, two classes of the first year admitted 80 students. Kazimierz Krotoski (1860-1937) became the first and, as it turned out, a long-term headmaster of the school. At first teaching took place in rooms rent in the Józef Herz's block of flats, on the corner of the main square and Sobieskiego Street. In 1905 construction works of the school building began.

The impressive edifice in the neo-gothic style was designed by the excellent architect Teodor Talowski, construction works were supervised by the engineer Eugeniusz Katerli. First students were admitted to the new school in 1906. The building was consecrated on 9 September 1908 by the bishop Anatol Nowak. The first graduation exams took place in 1912, bishop Adam Sapieha took part in the graduation ceremony of 28 graduates. (Photo No. 501) In 1912 the whole Galicia celebrated the 100th birth anniversary of Zygmunt Krasiński. This is when the street leading to the school and square on which its building was located was named after the romantic poet. In 1926, on the 50th anniversary of Seweryn Goszczyński's death, the school was named after him. The poet, participant of the November Uprising and author of „Dziennik podróży do Tatrów” [Journal of the Expedition to Tatra], one of the first compendia of knowledge about Podhale, Gorce, Tatra and the highlanders, became the patron of the school. In the school year 1937/38, a mixed humanities- natural sciences high school was established.