The communists liked the dollar, so they robbed us
Stáhnout obrázek
Ivo Čagánek was born on 17 July 1937 in Zlín. He grew up in Uherský Brod until he was fifteen. His father Ferdinand worked as an accountant in a trade credit union, his mother Marie took care of the household. His uncle was Rudolf Čagánek, a member of the Czechoslovak RAF squadron during the Second World War. In April 1945, he experienced gunfights during the liberation of Uherský Brod. After 1948, his father was convicted in a political trial, imprisoned and then sent to the uranium mines in Jáchymov. Also after the February coup, his grandfather Josef Kunčík, a veteran of the First World War, lost his own bakery. In the 1950s Ivo Čagánek graduated from the Secondary Industrial School of Chemistry in the then Gottwaldov. After completing his compulsory military service in Brno and Znojmo, he joined the Svit factory. As an employee of Svit, he used to travel to Ghana on business, where he helped to introduce rubber production. In January 1989, he witnessed the events of Palach Week in Prague. At the time of the interview (2020) Ivo Čagánek was living in Zlín.
