Biography

Adam Heydel was the son of Zdzisław as well as Maria Heydel, his brother named Wojciech. He was a student at John III Sobieski High School and later studied in Moscow and Kiev. In 1922 he studied law at the Jagiellonian University, where he got his doctorate. In the years 1921–1922 he worked in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In 1925 he got a habilitation in the field of political economy. Two years later he became a lecturer of economics at the Jagiellonian University.

Together with Adam Krzyżanowski and Ferdinand Zweig he became a follower of the Cracow School of Economics, which advocated free market reforms. Heydel was familiar with western economic developments, especially with the Austrian School and the economists of Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich von Hayek. He criticised the arguments concerning the general level of prices present by Joseph Schumpeter despite his personal friendship with him, as alive as the monetary doctrines of Irving Fisher.

Heydel considered himself a nationalist and was sympathetic to the National Democratic movement and in the years 1930–1931 he lead the National club in Cracow. He was critical of Sanation and due to this he was removed from the economics department at the Jagiellonian University and proceeded to become a director of the economics institute at the Academy of Learning.

Heydel was arrested on 6th of November 1939 as a element of the operations of Sonderaktion Krakau and with other academics he was placed Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Due to international pressure Heydel was released from the camp together with other academics which reached 40 years of age. After his release he got involved in the Union of Armed Struggle and on 23 of January 1941 he was arrested by the Gestapo.

After refusing tothe Volksliste he was moved to Auschwitz where he later died on March 14th, 1941.