Agreement keeps Lithuania’s underground printing press open to visitors

An agreement signed on the initiative of Defence Minister Robertas Kaunas will ensure the continued operation of the underground “ab” printing press in Kaunas District, LRT reported, citing ELTA.

“The historic printing press will remain open to the public,” Kaunas said. School students will continue visiting for educational purposes, Lithuanian troops will conduct exercises and study resistance, and members of the Lithuanian Riflemen’s Union will use the facility for training.

The site will also be presented to foreign guests during Lithuania’s presidency of the Council of the European Union as evidence of enduring resistance, he said. Kaunas described it as the only surviving authentic object of its kind in Lithuania and said it had been preserved as a museum asset.

The underground printing press will remain part of the Vytautas Magnus War Museum’s exhibition. Its maintenance and guided tours for visitors will continue.

The “ab” printing press attracts several thousand visitors each year. Vytautas Andziulis and Juozas Bacevičius established it in 1980. Built beneath Andziulis’ home and carefully concealed, it operated until Lithuania restored its independence. Soviet security services never discovered it during its entire operation.

Over a decade, the printing press produced 23 titles of patriotic and religious publications, with a combined circulation of 138,000 copies. The publications included books on Lithuanian history, religious literature, patriotic poetry, Juozas Urbšys’ memoirs and Adolfas Damušis’ study of Soviet genocide, as well as other works that could not be freely published under Soviet censorship.

In 1997, the printing press became a division of the Vytautas Magnus War Museum. In 2008, it was added to an international list of historically valuable Cold War facilities and sites.