The program welcomed Andreas Boukas, researcher and prominent figure of the Greek community in Sweden, who spoke about the impact of the Polytechnic Uprising on Greeks living in the country at the time. As he explained, during the dictatorship they learned news from Greece through the radio, Greek newspapers, and phone calls with friends and relatives back home. Swedish Radio maintained a correspondent in Athens, so when the report came that a tank had entered the Polytechnic, anxiety spread quickly, and many expatriates gathered at the offices of the Greek–Swedish Association to find out whether there were victims.
When the full extent of the events and the number of casualties became known, the Greek Students’ Association of Stockholm issued an informational leaflet in Swedish to ensure that the Swedish public was properly informed about what was happening in Greece.
Mr Boukas, a researcher who for many years served as president of the Hellenic Cultural Centre of Sweden, has amassed an exceptional body of material that, as he noted, urgently needs an institutional home. His collection includes 30,000 volumes, mainly related to Greek history and culture, historical documents from the 18th century to the present, photographs, writers’ manuscripts, posters, extensive press archives concerning Greece and Hellenism in the Swedish press from the 1930s to today, dozens of archives documenting the life and activity of Greek associations, unions, and communities in Sweden and the wider Scandinavian region, along with material from resistance organisations active during the 1967–74 dictatorship.
The collection also features one of the largest archives of anti-dictatorship periodicals and ephemeral publications circulated in Scandinavia and internationally between 1967 and 1974; more than 20,000 photographs dating from the late 19th century to today; and over 2,000 records (vinyl and CDs) covering the full spectrum of Greek musical tradition. There is also a significant number of audio recordings (radio reel tapes) capturing cultural events of the diaspora, as well as interviews or sound documents of major personalities such as Mikis Theodorakis, Sture Linnér, Georgios Rallis, Manos Hadjidakis, Theodor Kallifatides, Olof Palme, and Andreas Papandreou. Finally, the archive contains approximately 5,000 works by Greek and philhellene artists.