That family was affected. Nobody was arrested at the time, nobody was killed, but we lost all of our property. Back then, the merchants didn't actually pay themselves any money. What was earned went back into business. So when they nationalized our store in '50, we were destitute. And we had a grandfather... I don't think there was a pension back then, and I think there was some kind of arrangement between my father and grandfather. My father was obliged to take care of my grandfather also financially. But my father didn't have any money. So I remember that he wrote a begging letter to the then Minister of Finance - Ďuriš, a well-known name. After a few reminders and explanations, they released 42,000 CZK from the deposit to my father so that he could contribute to my grandfather's subsistence. Actually, to support him, as my grandfather was already retired. This is what happened. They took the property built by two generations. Property worth of hundreds of thousands CZK and they "kindly" released 42,000 CZK. And this story from the last few years documents how indestructible the bureaucracy is, how it works. When I was informed that I had the right to restitution of the property, I applied for it. And the first condition was to pay back the 42,000 CZK that Ďuriš had given to my father from the stolen property."
"When I was about three months to my graduation, I got a draft order. At first I thought it was a mistake, that the District Military Administration had made a mistake. So I went there and I told them, 'Please, I have a deferment, I'm about to graduate, so this must be a mistake.' The soldier who was sitting behind the desk said, 'It's not a mistake, we received a report from your place of residence not recommending you to take the graduation exam. Someone in Černovice (and he read the name: Mr. Burian, the secretary) wrote you a report claiming that you're not eligible.' Then I got it. Mr. Burian, formerly a confectioner in Černovice, had a son, about two or three years older. His name was Ota. He was a good boy, we were friends. He didn't get into the secondary school, not because of his background, but because he wasn't smart enough. And his father couldn't get over it, so he took revenge and wrote this report on me. When I told this to our headmaster, his name was Mr. Petelík, he said, 'Don't worry, I'll sort it out.' He went to the ministry and they let me graduate eventually. I don't know how he did it."
"The beginning of the war was sad, of course. I was a boy, when the Second Republic was declared, that is, when the Republic was cut off the borderlands. Tt was sad. President Masaryk died, it was understood in the context of the republic ending. And then came the rapid succession of bans on everything. The Sokol, which was a family to us, was dissolved. My father was the chief, we all trained in the Sokol and it was our life. The gym was our second home. Then the theatre was banned and cinema was allowed to screen only sporadically and only selected films, of course. Then we weren't allowed to sing, we weren't allowed to do amateur theatre. There were the first arrests, and in the first wave it was the Sokol members who were pursued. Many of them, who were arrested, never came back. They died in concentration camps. Then they arrested people who were doing some kind of resistance without weapons. They were just tearing down German flags and for that they went to the concentration camp too and some of them died there. Then there were also cases when envious people denounced their neighbours for violating regulations of pig home slaughter or sale of milk. People were arrested and it also cost human lives. So this was a truly sad era. Fortunately, our family was not affected, nobody lost their lives, although several of my father's friends from the Sokol died in concentration camps. Unfortunately."
Pavel Janeček was born on 3 October 1933 in Černovice in the Tábor district. His parents owned a department store there. In 1949 he completed the primary school in Černovice. As a son of a businessman, he was not allowed to apply for secondary school so he entered a bricklayer‘s apprenticeship. In 1950, the communists confiscated all of the Janeček family‘s property, and his father had to earn a living as an ordinary salesman. After completing his apprenticeship, Pavel was accepted into the secondary school of civil engineering, and graduated in 1954. In 1960, he obtained a degree in civil engineering at the Technical University in Brno and joined Stavoprojekt in Mariánské Lázně as a designer. He married Vlasta, née Krčmářová, and shortly afterwards they had two children. Among other things, he participated in the construction of the ice rink in Pilsen. In the mid-1960s he joined the Communist Party. He disagreed with the occupation by Warsaw Pact troops in August 1968 and was expelled from the party. Both of his children had problems getting into secondary school. In 1990 he restituted the family property, but did not resume the operation of the shop. In 2021 Pavel Janeček was living in Černovice.
Parade of Sokols in Černovice (August 1934), Pavel Janeček Sr. - the chief, next to him sister Maximovičová (tortured to death in a concentration camp)
Parade of Sokols in Černovice (August 1934), Pavel Janeček Sr. - the chief, next to him sister Maximovičová (tortured to death in a concentration camp)
