JULIE HAVELKOVÁ

Julie Havelková nèe Škrábová, born 1892, died 3. 8. 1972

Grave in Humpolec

(the grave has been desecrated and vandalised in about 2016).
The following is extract from Childbirth register at catholic parish in Humpolec

Husband Josef Havelka.
Children Gustav, Marie and Otylie.
On the left she is in the Domov Důchodců in Humpolec (1971), on the right she is about 50 y.o.:

Above, she is sitting on the left with her daughter Marie (my mother). Taken about 1971 in the garden of Domov Důchodců in Humpolec. She can also be found in the group photographs in Adolf and Josef Havelka entries. A few family pictures featuring her (except for the first):

Top picture l-r: Frantisek Hatvani, Marie nee Havelková, Krasava Nedvedová, Josef Havelka.
Middle: Julie Havelková, Krasava Nedvedová, Josef Havelka, Marie, Josef Nechanicky.
Bottom:Marie, Rozália Hatvaniová (Ruzen), Josef Havelka, Krasava Nedvedová, Karol Hatvani, Julie Havelková, Otka Nedvedová (nee Havelková). Top 2 pictures taken in Humpolec, the bottom one in Bratislava.

Called Julča and Julinka by her husband. In my early years she was always around, like her husband, either in person or via correspondence. Of medium height, slim, with a reputation for being tough. Heavy smoker (used to roll her own), with a smoker's raspy voice.
While her husband was away in the army (1914-1919) she ran his hairdressing shop; their children were being taken care of by the grandparents (Adolf Havelka and his wife).

Fond of knitting and embroidery; a few of her delicate items can be still seen around. A good talker, she liked to relate in a dramatic fashion stories of her everyday life. A good walker, too, she led many a mushroom and blueberry gathering family expedition to the pine forests surrounding Humpolec, mostly on and beyond the hill called Trucbába (a loose translation of this word being ‘a recalcitrant old woman’).

She visited us in Bratislava on many occasions, the last I remember being some time in 1953-4. In December, 1967, myself, Mireille and 10 months old George spent three days with her in the house at 635 Nerudova Street in Humpolec to say goodbye before leaving for Australia the following year. She was not told that it was the 'goodbye' visit. On us leaving she handed to me the viola (a Czech imitation of a Stradivari), which used to sit on the top of her wardrobe, as a present, and asked me to take any of the books she knew I always liked; to my regret now, I declined the offer at the time...
She wrote several letters to us in Australia, which are preserved in the 'heirloom' folder, one of them is shown here:

In the letter she thanks for our letter (from Australia), would love to cuddle our boys, and hopes we would be able to settle down soon. She talks about her daughter (my mother) who invites her to come to Bratislava, complains about the atmosphere in the Retired Home where she lives ("full of mad people, others without brain and old people tired of life"). She writes about the visit from her daughter Otka, her son Gusta, and how she keeps busy knitting and crocheting. Regrets again not being able to cuddle our children, and how she misses us (Inserted by myself: we miss you, too, bábo, even now, 40 years after your death!) . She was fond of cooking traditional rich Czech foods, knedloveprozelo, houbove polevky and bublaniny. Ruzen told me that when they lived in Bratislava she used to make a wiener schnitzel for her husband to take to work every morning.

With her daughter Marie, my mother, she had a bit of a turbulent relationship, and on several occasions the two were not on speaking terms; I do not remember - nor did I care at the time - the reasons.
Her daughter in law, Anna, Gustav's second wife, whom I visited in 1995 and again in 2004, in her flat in Lnárská Street, Humpolec, spoke of her as 'that gossipy woman, who never liked her only son (Anna's husband)'.
I remember her fondly as a kind, although at times strict, woman, and a pleasant grandmother.

I was privileged to know her brother Gustav Škrába, a butcher, a tallish, lean man, somewhat leathery looking, like her, who was, apparently, a good businessman, judging by the two well-run shops in Humpolec. His wife Anezka, a kindly, worried-looking woman, their daughter Otylie, to me an exceptionally beautiful woman; her husband Franta Stepek, a teacher, very upright, straight speaking man, and their two children, Lubos, about my age, and Jarka, a pretty but mentally retarded girl about 5-6 years younger than me. Lubos worked all his life as an aircraft mechanic, and we used to meet on occasions. Last time, in 2006, I visited him in his house at Slatina (near Hradec Králove), met with his family and the pleasure of that meeting I will cherish for a long time.

Also living in Humpolec was Adolf’s daughter Emily, with her husband Josef Nechanicky (originally from around Jilemnice) and with their son, Jaroslav, who was about 10-15 years older than me, and working as an eye surgeon in Most near Praha (he also spent a couple of years in Yemen (Sana'a), and Tunisia). They were excellent people, and with Emily (teta Emilka), Josef (Pepa) and Jaroslav (Jarda) I spent many a happy hour in their flat in Humpolec, their nearby garden, or gathering mushrooms in the nearby woods. Jaroslav used to come to see us in Bratislava often, and it was always a happy occasion. With his son Robert, a doctor in Semily, I am still in email contact

JOSEF HAVELKA

Josef Augustín Havelka, born 27. 8.1888, died 22. 8. 1947, 

grave in Humpolec (the grave has been desecrated and vandalised in about 2016).
The following is extract from Childbirth register at catholic parish in Humpolec

Wife Julie née Škrábová
Children Gustav, Marie (my mother) and Otylie.
Extract from his entry in the Czech Legions History (my translation in Italics).

Education: měst'anka. 3 (3 years of lower secondary school, normally 4 years)

Employment: holič (a hairdresser)

Political leaning: soc.dem. (social democrat)

Compulsory military service in austro-hungarian army: 21.p.pl. (21st foot regiment)

Unit in austro-hungarian army at the time of becoming P.O.W.: 66.p.pl. (foot regiment)

Date of becoming P.O.W.í: 8.7.1917

Place of becoming a P.O.W.: Stanislaw (Poland)

Rank at the time: četař (3 ranks above Private)

Where applied for membersip in the Legion: Bobrujsk

Date of admission: 20.7.1917

Initial unit: 9.stř.pl. (LR) (9th rifles regiment)

Initial rank in the Legion: vojín (Private)

Ended in Legion: 22.4.1920 (V)

Last unit in Legion: 3.stř.pl. (3rd rifles regiment)

Last rank in Legion: desátník (2 ranks above Private)

Source of information:

Legionářský poslužný spis (A discharge document from Czech legions)

Osobní karta legionáře (A legionare's identification card)

Databázi spravuje Československá obec legionářská

na základě dat poskytnutých VÚA-VHA PRAHA.

__________________________________________________

Here he is in his Czechoslovak Legionary uniform:

He was my mother’s father. I remember him since my early childhood. Stocky, maybe even a bit fat, with raspy voice with a French sounding 'r' (very similar to one of the Czech presidents, Havel’s). There is bust of a Kelt in the Czech National Museum in Praha - it has uncanny likeness of him, including something which almost looks like his glasses, and the mouth puckered in a whistle, which he was also fond of (see the middle picture below):

Compare the above with this:

Top picture l-r: Frantisek Hatvani, Marie nèe Havelková, Krasava Nedvědová, Josef Havelka

Middle l-r: Julie Havelková, Krasava Nedvědová, Josef Havelka, Marie, Josef Nechanicky

Bottom l-r: Marie, Ruzen Hatvaniová, Josef Havelka, Krasava Nedvědová, Karol Hatvani, Julie Havelková, Otka Nedvědová nèe Havelková

 Origin of his surname is from the word Havel, which was Czech name of Kelt; Havelka is a diminutive of Havel (= rooster in the language of Boii, a Keltic tribe living in the area of Bohemia>>Boiohaemia). I can see some of his features in the faces of my mother and my son John.
Between 1906 and 1909 he served as a soldier in the Austrian army in Krakow, Poland, and in 1914 he also served some 3 months with the same army in Bosnia-Herzegovina. In Osijek he spent some time in a hospital with a "problem with his nose", according to a postcard he sent to his parents in Humpolec. From there he returned to spend some time in hospital at Kutná hora (ailment untraceable, but in his later years a polyp was removed from his nose) and eventually he was dispatched via Hungary to Poland to fight against the Russians. 

Fighting in the Austrian army during the first world war he fell prisoner to the Russians in 1917 (see type-written book in my possession called 'Moje pamĕti'). Joined the newly formed Czechoslovak Legionnaires Army where he served for 3 years as a "desátnik" (two ranks above the Private) in the 3rd Rifles' regimental orchestra. Crossed Russia mostly by train via Bobrujsk, Odesa, Yekaterinburg, Chelyabinsk, Slyudyanka, Chita, Harbin, Ussurijsk, Vladivostok (where he lived for about 5 months on the Russian Island), and then back home on the american ship Madavaska (spelling uncertain) via Singapore, Port Said and Trieste. In his house at Humpolec there were many artefacts hand-made from bits of ammunition during the war years. The picture below is of one such ship being boarded by the legionnaires in Vladivostok.

After returning from the first world war in April 1920 he lived in Bratislava with his family from early twenties until 1939, when many Czechs were expelled from the new state of Slovakia after Czechoslovakia fell apart.

    In Bratislava he worked as a (probably payroll) clerk at the main railway station, living in a block of flats a few hundred metres downhill from the station. In 1946, during a brief visit in Bratislava, he took me along to his old office where he talked with his pre-war colleagues. From there we travelled by train to his home at Humpolec; my parents joined us there a few weeks later. He was a barber by trade and inflicted on me quite a few very short haircuts.
     
    I discovered the first draft of his hand-written application for a job of taxation clerk in Humpolec, dated 1920, shortly after his return from the 1st World War. In it he states the years of his service in the armed forces (1903-1906 in Cracow, 1913 Bosnia for 3 months, 1914-1917 Austrian Army, 1917-1920 Czech Legionaries in Russia) ending as corporal in the military band, his being unable to work in his profession as a barber and the dire financial situation he found himself in after the war:

The letter is addressed to the "Famous (or Glorious) taxation department", etc., signed J. H., Russian legionary presently on leave...

An accomplished musician, he played several instruments (he mentions violin, bassoon & percussions) in a variety of orchestras; I do not recall of hearing him play, though. This is the entire family in their flat in Bratislava:

In Bratislava, with his son Gustav, he played in the Railwaymen orchestra (Gustav is not in this picture):

    One viola (replica of a Stradivari) and one violin (original by Stainer of Absam) that were acquired before 1914 by him at a place now unknown are still in the family possession (the viola itself is mentioned in his book Moje pamĕti, page 136, where it is being played by him with an orchestra in Petropavlovsk). In his bookshelf there were many children's books, a few books about the Czech legionnaire army in Russia he was part of, a complete edition of the 1001 nights, the Good soldier Švejk by Jaroslav Hasek, bound volumes of Czech general knowledge magazines, Brehm's Life of animals, Czech version of Alice in wonderland (one Czech version of the Jabberwocky is called Tlachapoud, and is equally as charming) and many others.

    On a few occasions I travelled with him on a steam train from Bratislava to Humpolec and back. We always stopped in Kuty (visiting a friend called Koula) and slept in a hotel in Brno where he visited some old wartime friends. I wish I could remember who it was and what they were talking about.

    He died of complications probably caused by too much fatty food (diabetes, high blood pressure, and emphysema) - fairly common ailments among the Czechs. And again, I do not recall anything bad said about him by anybody, and I remember him fondly. The tone of his book, Moje pamĕti (Reminiscences of my army years 1914-1920), although showing his lack of formal education, is measured, impartial, and he does not put himself forward in any way.

He was very fond of writing letters and sending postcards. Here is one of them addressed to my parents who lived in Bratislava. He writes from Prague about his preparation for trip to Karlovy Vary to take a spa cure for his malady (never disclosed, but I heard the word emphysema being uttered at home). He is urging my parents to write to him as soon as he is able to send them his spa address, and especially to write about their then 3 years old daughter Hanka (my sister). He was accompanied by his wife and the daughter Otka, who both added a few words of greetings. The card is dated 16. 5. 1947; he died a few months later (22. 8. 1947).

    His son, Gustav, I remember as a friendly man; in Bratislava, in about 1936, he married a woman called Hansi. When the Czechs were forced to leave the newly formed state of Slovakia in 1939, they moved to Humpolec but Hansi with their daughter Helenka returned to Bratislava, allegedly unable to bear ethnic taunts by the locals. He later married Anna Sirucková, a pretty, tallish woman. With Anna they had no children. Gustav, a heavy smoker, died in 1973 after a short and painful fight with stomach cancer. While visiting Anna with George in 2004 I asked her if she had any knowledge of Helenka's whereabouts. Anna replied rather angrily and tersely "none whatsoever!".

    Otylie (a.k.a. Otka), born 1916, a slim, petite woman, married in Bratislava to a Czech man called Robert Nedvĕd; in Bratislava in about 1932 a daughter Krasava was born to them. Robert (called Róba by everybody) left for England in 1939, became a soldier in the British army and was killed by a land mine on 15. 3. 1945 near Loon-Plage. Buried at Bourbourg, in 1959 exhumed and re-buried at La Targette. Through a French organization Memorial du Souvenir and the Czech outfit below I managed to have his name included on the wall of the war memorial at Dunkirk.

https://vets.estranky.cz/clanky/vpm-francie/dunkerque.html

Probably as a result of his not returning from the war Otka became a bit distraught and impulsive; after WW2 she left Humpolec for Praha where she married a much older man called Stary, a high ranking public servant and a keen philatelist. Krasava (died about 1992), with whom I was quite good friends during my holidays in Humpolec, was brought up since 1940 by her grandmother Julie, married a man called Karel Kalina, went to live in Pisek and had two sons one of whom was named Karel. With Karel I was in internet contact until he died in about 2018. With his daughter Katka I am still in internet contact.

l to r: Gustav Havelka, Julie Havelková, Josef Havelka, Otylie Havelková-Nedvĕdová, Krasava Nedvĕdová, Robert Nedvĕd, Marie Havelková, Otylie Štĕpková nee Škrábová.

    The picture was taken in the early 19-thirties in a flat at Bratislava, Zabotova ul.

    In the bottom picture it is him standing on the right, with his wife Julie next to him. Standing third from the left is his sister Emilie; the little blond girl standing in the middle is his daughter Marie (my mother). The year is 1920 approx.

ADOLF HAVELKA

Adolf Havelka.

Born 9. 5. 1864 in Humpolec, died 16. 5. 1952 in Humpolec, grave in Humpolec (grave desecrated & destroyed in about 2016). I enquired if restoration could be permissible. Alas, the site has been leased to some other person, as indicated in this email: 

Kateřina Kocmanová 17:29 (1 hour ago) to me Dobrý den pane Hatvani, Hrob, o kterém píšete tady B-IV-11 byl paní Mičianovou v roce 2015 zrušen dopisem a urna převezena do Prahy k uložení do rodinného hrobu. Hrob byl následně pronajat dalšímu nájemci. S pozdravem Logo města Humpolec Kateřina Kocmanová Oddělení správy majetku, Odbor investic a správy majetku + 420 565 518 192 katerina.kocmanova@mesto-humpolec.cz Link http://digi.ceskearchivy.cz/DA?lang=cs&menu=3&id=3938 (Snimek 98). 

This is him at the age of 75 (approx..)

 

 

This is extract from his birth records:

Born & baptised 9. 5. 1964, out-of-wedlock son of František Havelka, who was son of František Havelka and Rosalie née Chrastová, both from Bystřice na Moravě. 

Wife Anna, née Vašáková. Children Josef (my grandfather), Marie, Emilie and Albína. His father was František Havelka from Bystřice na Moravě (see above extract), mother Josefa née Kryštůfková, from Humpolec (they married about two years after Adolf's birth). In 1921 he left the Church to become an agnostic.

He had a brother by the name of Emanuel Havelka, born in Humpolec on 18. 12. 1855, registered in https://digi.ceskearchivy.cz/3937/173/2400/1080/38/0 on page 173. Of this Emanuel I have never heard anything, until prompted in 2022 by an amateur archivist who claimed that she is my distant relative. My reply to her remained unanswered.

This is him and myself at our house in Bratislava, Račianska 794, during his last visit in 1951:

He was accompanied during the visit by his grandson Jaroslav Nechanický, see picture below:

With Jaroslav’s son Robert, a medical practitioner in Semily, I have been in frequent contact since he found me on the internet some 10 years ago.

The next 'photo in front of his house at Lužická ulice, Humpolec:

 

 

Adolf was my great grandfather from the mother's side. He was a man of medium height, slim, with a somewhat prominent aquiline nose, and a raspy smoker's voice. My earliest memories of him reach to when I was about 4 or 5: of him sitting in his one room part of a house he shared with a married couple called Vacek in Lnářská ulice, Humpolec: He used to smoke a long pipe, of which he had several models displayed in a wooden stand hanging on the wall. The room, about 5 x 5 metres, with a fairly low ceiling, contained a stove, large bed in the corner, a table, a few chairs and a sitting chair by the window, and it always smelled - not unpleasantly - of stale tobacco smoke. When I was about fifteen and working during school holidays in a grain harvest in Humpolec I was sent to fetch beer. I went to his favourite pub (Na Kocourku = By the little tomcat), long since demolished, and, sure enough, he was there and I was introduced by him to the people around his table: By the way, the above pub’s name is a fine comparison of the Czech and English languages - two words against four...

Most of his working life he was employed as a cloth/fabric maker. In the early 20th century he was working as a travelling salesman. He was also involved with the publication of Právo lidu, a Czech newspaper (I heard a daily, contrary to what is written at the bottom); the extent of his involvement I am still researching. During the late 19 forties he was still working as a window blinds installer (the roll down canvass type, with vertical stripes, popular at the time). He was involved in the local labour movement, and I saw a newspaper article with his name on the wall in the Humpolec museum, next to the main church. He had a position in the local Fabric Assistants' Association and in the amateur theatre group as both organiser and an actor. His son Josef in the typewritten book "Moje pamĕti" mentions his parents as 'sitting in the house on their little farm': it was in the part of Humpolec called Luka, around the so-called Trnkova vila, as described in the local internet magazine:

 

Re: Soukenictví v Humpolci a různé povídky i příběhy VI (Hodnocení: 1) Od: pierre (pierrezacek@centrum.cz) - Sobota, 04.10. 2008 - 10:44:10 (O uživateli | Poslat soukromou zprávu) V Lukách se říká oblasti směrem od Kuchařova na Světlici. Prochází tudy ulice s dnešním jménem Lužická a před koncem této části Humpolce leží i jedna se soukenických továren s vilou (Adolf Trnka) dnes www.aso.cz , naproti přes ulici v dnešním Domově důchodců byla kdysi soukenická ubytovna a internát. V okolí v některém z rodiných domů zřejmě bydlel praděda.

 

The email above informs that the area is centred around Lužická ulice in Humpolec. His wife died a few years before I was born and I do not recall anything related to her, except I heard somewhere that she was a bit of a martinet. My aunt Ružen recalls that he used to say that since he is not allowed to do anything at home, and because of her obsession with cleanliness, he prefers spending his free time with his comrades in the trade association; they had a special room set aside for them in the above-mentioned pub. Her daughter-in-law, Julie Havelková, could not stand her, and used to call her (behind her back, of course) a "biskura", an obscure derogatory term. According to her son-in-law Josef Nechanický, she was "a noblewoman in a small house". He, Josef, in turn, was not exceedingly fond of Adolf...

 

Adolf's son Josef is described in a separate article; his daughters, except Emily, I have no recollection of. They are mentioned in the typewritten book Moje pamĕti written by Josef (Albina married a man called Vanĕk and living in Krušovice, Marie married a man called Vanĕček; Albina lived in Praha-Karlín, Emily marrried a man called Josef Nechanický and lived in Humpolec, died in Jilemnice, her husband’s birthplace). I do not recall anything bad said about my great-grandfather by anybody, and I have only good memories of him: the smell of tobacco, his mocking of my imperfect Czech (at the time I used to live in the Slovakian speaking Bratislava, spending only four to eight weeks each year in the Czech speaking Humpolec); him and his son Josef launching a kite for me on a paddock near the Cihelna fish pond, a bus trip with the two from Humpolec to the nearby town and castle called Ledeč nad Sázavou, having a lunch there in a restaurant and haggling with the waiter over food coupons (which were part of the food rationing system in Czechoslovakia after the 2nd WW war). In 2014, typewritten memoirs of one of his sons-in-law (Emily's husband Josef Nechanický) came to my attention. In one passage in those memoirs Adolf is mentioned as "a man of larger format, with not much regard for his closest family, and with irregular times for regular meals." Also, "he always preferred to have some meat on his plate". During a visit of my sister in Prague in 2007 I chanced upon some of his handwriting, some 50 pages all-up. He was writing about history of fabric manufacture in Humpolec from the perspective of weaver’s assistant, which must have been one of his jobs. Also, there are photographs of him taking part in the local theatre performances. The "History of fabric making" is written in the Czech language of the period, fluently, with a few grammatical and spelling errors, suggestive of only basic (primary school ?) education.

 

This is Havelka’s family in Humpolec:

 The group photo was taken about 1928, probably near Humpolec.

FRONT ROW, L to R: Otka Havelková, ??, Gustav Havelka, Otka Škrábová, Marie Havelková (my future mother)

TOP ROW, L to R: ??, Julie Havelková, Adolf Havelka, Emilie Nechanická, Anna Havelková, Josef Nechanický, Josef Havelka, Gustav Škrába, Anežka Škrábová.

This is a sample of his handwriting. The text contains his reminiscences of the fabric making trade:

The style is a little on the lofty side, as indicated in the translation of the first 3 lines: "The town of Humpolec is for more than 400 years known in the whole world for its Loden type fabrics, for Loden type fabrics made in Humpolec are known world-wide."

In mid-2008 the type-written version of the above text has been offered to the Citizen's Association of fabric Makers in Humpolec. The offer has been eagerly accepted, and the text has been published as a serial in the local newspaper called Humpolák, in 2008 editions.

And below is him (marked by an arrow) taking part in the local drama production called Ten minutes' long alibi:

 In my possession is his handwritten list of theatre productions staged in Humpolec during (about) 1900-1910; some of the titles on the list sound fairly ambitious (a Hamlet, for instance).

Remark.

In 2014, independently of each other, I was contacted by two descendants of his: my distant niece Kateřina Kalinová from České Budĕjovice region, and Robert Nechanický from Semily, son of Jaroslav and later by Kateřina's father Karel (Krasava's son, died 2018). Both of them were seeking information about their parents, grandparents, etc., and I supplied whatever was on my hand, together with personal reminiscences. From verbal recollections of one of my relatives I learned that Adolf had his fingers in the publication of Právo lidu (People's rights), a popular two-weekly in the early 1900, for about 2 years while it was temporarily being published in Humpolec (the publication extinguished by the communist government after WW2). While (4 years long) military service was compulsory in Austria during his days I was unable to find any mention of him being in the army. Curiously, I discovered a remark of him being in Korneũburg during his travels (my grandfather Karol Hatvani spent 4 years of his military service in the same town, around the year 1900).

INTRODUCTION

    I am Charles Karol Juraj Štefan Hatvani. My father's name was František Hatvani, my mother's Marie nèe Havelková.
    Greetings to you alive and yet to be born. The people listed here were but a fragment of your lives; remember, there are millions of such ancestors in the haze of time not far behind me and you…

    This is our family in Healesville in 2020 (John with his family was unable to come due to the virus pandemonium):

Standing l-r: Julia, James, Martin, Natasha, Dianne, Robert, Janet, Katrina, George.

Sitting l-r: Finn, Tom, Mireille, Charles, Jake, Ella. The underlined are our children.

The girl in the middle, with roundish face, is Dianne Clare, our friend since her childhood.

This is our younger son John with Gerlie Abacahin & John Junior at Butuan, 2019:

   And this was my Hungarian/Slovakian family in about 1950:

And this was my Czech great-grandparents Adolf & Anna Havelka. Between them is their daughter Emily, in about 1928 (full picture can be found in the Adolf Havelka entry):

  And now, what I remember of my relatives.

    At the beginning it must be mentioned that the country they all lived in has politically changed several times during their lives. Both Bohemia (Czech land, which includes Morava) and Slovakia used to be part of Austrian Empire since about 1550 (Emperor Rudolf II) until 1918. Bohemia (the word comes from the Latin name of Boiohaemia, after the Celtic tribe of Boii living there before the Slavs began to arrive around the fifth century A. D. and started to peacefully merge with the variety of indigenous tribes, Celts, Germans, Quadi, etc.) used to be politically and culturally associated with Austria, Slovakia with Austria and Hungary. From 1918 to 1939 the two countries, together with the western part of Ukraine, were known as (first) Czechoslovakia. From 1939 to 1945 Bohemia was part of Germany, and Slovakia was an independent state politically aligned with Germany. From 1945 to 1992 the two countries were together again, but gradually being absorbed into Russia, after the collapse of which in 1989 became independent again.

    Since early 1800, persons born and living in the same place would have the following nationalities, depending on the year and district of birth: Austrian, Austrian or Hungarian, Czechoslovak, German, Polish, Slovak or Hungarian, Czechoslovak, Czech or Slovak. My father's family, for instance, living in and around Bratislava, the Hungarian part of the Austrian empire, would be Austrians prior to 1848, Hungarians after that year, Czechoslovaks after 1918, Slovaks from 1939 to 1945, Czechoslovaks again, Slovaks after 1992 (& variations to be continued, no doubt).

    Geologically speaking, the entire country used to be under a shallow sea (Tethys), some dunes of which can still be seen in westernmost Slovakia. At the confluence of Morava and Danube rivers there is a sandstone hillock containing a profusion of seashells, possibly the last remnant of the last beach. There is an underground aquifer under the entire country and beyond, with constant level of water and numerous warm springs, the best known of which are Piešťany and Karlovy Vary. There is a daily geyser in Eastern Slovakia (Herľany), possibly caused by the tides in the aforementioned aquifer.

    During my time there.

    A couple of years after I was born Czechoslovakia surrendered the Czech half of MY country to the Germans (& for 6 years I lost the Czech side of my family, grandparents, even a great-grandfather, uncles, aunts, cousins, etc.). Immediately after that, about 1/3rd of the remaining Slovakian half was given to Hungary (and for the same 6 years I lost the Hungarian side of my family). And a few years later the entire Czechoslovakia was put into the suffocating Russian embrace, for some 40 years altogether.

    Surrounding nations had varied influence on the cultural make-up of the Czechs and Slovakians: Germans, Austrians and Poles on the Czechs, Austrians, Hungarians, Romanians (sheep industry), Poles and (chiefly around the eastern end) the Ukrainians on the Slovaks. And, of course, they were influencing each other, the Czech influence on the Slovaks being stronger than the other way around. Bratislava itself used to be (almost) part of Vienna until 1918, and strong influence of that city and culture has always been felt.

    The Czechs have a strong sense of their history and culture: they used to be protestants long before Luther (read about the Husites), they had a number of prominent kings (Přemyslid dynasty, Ladislaus of Lithuania, John of Luxemburg, his son Charles, George Poděbrad - the first ruler ever to espouse European unity!), one of their princesses was married to a British king; many words from their fairly difficult language found their way into the world's dictionaries (robot, bren, haubwitz, pilsener, budweiser, dollar), they produced Smetana, Dvořák, Suk, Janáček, Dusík, Mysliveček, Stamic, Emmy Destinn, Friml, Martinů, Rejcha, Fučík, Vejvoda, Příhoda, Kubelík, Talich, Hollar, Hrdlička, Komenský, Bolzano, Diviš, Purkyně, Stránský, Neruda, Kafka, Winter, Jirásek, Čapek, Hašek, to name but a few (Hrdlička, Martinů, Stránský, Mahler, Kafka's parents, they all came from my mother's birthplace Humpolec district), they produced Nobel laureates (Heyrovský, chemistry, Seifert, poetry) and their industrial products are world renown (Škoda, Tatra, CZ, Seiler-Bellot, Avia, Letov, CKD, Zlín, Jawa, various beers, Bohemia Glass, Jellinek, Becherovka, Baťa, etc.). Many Czechs used to work on the Habsburg Imperial Court: Chotek, Kaunitz, Kolowrat, Hadik (Slovak), A. F. Kollár (ditto), Andrássy (ditto), Apponyi and many others. Curiously, I am unable to think of many inventions by Czech inventors. Maybe a soil turning plough (brothers Veverka), studies of genetics (Mendel), Janský (blood groups), Doppler effect (Doppler), ship's propeller (Ressel), contact lenses (Wichterle), Antonín Svoboda (computers)...

    The Slovakians, having spent centuries under Hungarians, who were far less tolerant than the Austrians, industrially backward and politically, economically and culturally predominantly feudal, have their sense of national identity and pride less developed, and are more than the Czechs prone to accepting meekly whatever somebody else has to say at any given moment in history.

    Of the Slovakian contribution to the world a few names come to mind: Banič (inventor of parachute), Bahyľ (inventor of helicopter, heavier-than-air), Mikovíny (steam power), Bell (cartographer), Max. Hell (astronomy), Kempelen (water reticulation system, voice simulator, steam turbine, etc.), Beňovský (adventurer), Štefánik (astronomer, soldier and politician), Pantoček (glass manufacture), Dopiera (musical instruments), Segner (jet propulsion principle), Jedlík (electrical machines), Stodola (turbines), Petzval (mathematics, optics - his system is still being used in all mobile telephones with cameras), Murgaš (radiowaves, possibly before Tesla and Marconi), Philipp Lenard (cathode rays, Nobel prize winner), J. D. Matejovie (forestry. "Forests are the foundation of all life on Earth!"), Tihanyi (TV plasma screen). Some connection to Slovakia had musicians Nedbal, Bartók, Kodály, Lehár, Kálmán, Marschner and Dohnányi; Hummel was born in Bratislava, van Beethoven spent a few holidays nearby, Haydn was born and lived for a time between Bratislava and Vienna, Liszt had some connections to Slovakia as well, Tilgner (sculptor) was born in Bratislava). Poets and letter writers are good and famous only to those who understand the rather complicated language.

    The Czech country is a bit colder and wetter than Slovakia. The predominant forests are pine and related species. Forests in Slovakia, except for higher altitudes, consist of deciduous trees, mostly oak, beech and related species. Czech rivers, with one exception, flow into the northern seas, Slovakian, with one exception again, into the Black Sea.

    In general, Czech people are industrious, cautious with their money, widely travelled, well read and articulate; the Slovakians are hard-working, less cautious with their money, less travelled, less read and less articulate, than the Czechs. The religious influence has been rather strong in Slovakia (predominantly catholic, with remnants of pre-christian rites), much less strong in Bohemia (predominantly protestant – long before Luther - of various creeds; their Moravian Brethren are world-renown).

    Unable to bring to fruition some of my projects (two radar centres above Bratislava, inception of, and follow-up on the success of, the First Aerobatic Championship of the World, etc.), and following the continuous political turmoil mentioned above I have decided early in the 19 sixties to emigrate to Australia. Why Australia? Because it was far away from the turbulent Europe, because it had a stable political system, because the official language was English and because it was a constitutional monarchy, which I prefer to a republic. Fortunately, my future wife agreed with my dreams and intentions. Living behind the so-called Iron Curtain traveling abroad was near impossible and we had no money, the Czechoslovak currency not being convertible to any "western" money at the time.

    After our first son was born, and we were expecting our second child soon, our hopes to emigrate were becoming dimmer, we were almost resigned to remain in Czechoslovakia, when in August 1968, a neighbouring army invaded (not for the first time) OUR country and in the ensuing turmoil we managed to slip across the border to Vienna, Austria. Our possessions consisted of one suitcase, and we had no money. Our second child was born in Vienna a day after we crossed the border. I applied for immigration to a number of non-European countries, namely Australia, USA, Chile, Canada, South Africa and New Zealand. Some European countries were asking us to come, namely Switzerland, Germany and Sweden; in Austria I was offered a job in their Area Air Traffic Control Office. Luckily, the first country to reply and accept was Australia. Towards the end of September 1968, we boarded (for free!) a Qantas Boeing 707 and 2 days later we found ourselves at Sydney airport. From there we boarded a TAA 'plane (a Lockheed Electra), were taken to Melbourne Essendon airport and from there to Migrant hostel at Broadmeadows, where we received board, lodging and medical care, all that for free for the first month.

    Within a few weeks I found a job (washing airplanes at Essendon airport, soon another one at Ericsson factory, and so on) and was able to start paying for the board and lodging; I was also able to repay the money lent to me in Vienna by a few Austrian associates from my time in the aviation industry. My attempts to get a position as an Air Traffic Controller with the Department of Civil Aviation were unsuccessful, for one of the conditions was that the applicants must be "British Subjects", as it was phrased at the time. According to the system at the time we were allowed to apply for that hallowed status after 3 years of residence, by which time I would be at the top edge of the age limit for the new ATC intakes. As we had no money, I was forced to change tack and started looking elsewhere. After Ericsson, I found a job at General Motors-Holden's, then contract engineer, etc., etc. My wife was keeping the home flames burning, what with 4 children that were born to us over the time. After the Broadmeadows hostel we found a flat at Elwood, then Glen Huntly, Glen Iris and Carnegie. From Carnegie I started dreaming of building a house, in 1973 we bought a block of land, found a builder, borrowed some money ($22,000, at some 7.5% interest; my annual income at the time was about $6,000) and we moved into our new house at 11 Valley Ho rd, Chirnside Park in 1974.

    Now, in 2014, our relatives mentioned in the following pages are all long gone. We have four children, two boys and two girls, and they have their children; soon, their children will start having have their children. Janus-like, with one part of me looking into the past, the other into the future I have a sense of quiet satisfaction of .... ? .... of a life job fairly well done, perhaps. Hopefully, someone - children George, John, Julia and Janet, and grandchildren Natasha, James, Jake, Ella, Tom, Finn, Jj - will read these lines in 20, 50, 100 years' time, and devote a moment of reflection to those left behind in time, the grandparents, great-grandparents, great-great-great, and take a quiet bow same as I am bowing to their memories now...

    As our children - and their children, and their children - are taking possession of their world, my wife and myself, having emerged from their past, are now slowly receding into it - may your future be happy, our children, beloved...