Marie Sněhotová

* 1938

  • "Mr. Mosler was the headmaster at the school in Vratimov. One day I went up the stairs and there he stood. For me he was still Mr. Headmaster, I couldn't get over it. I said, "Hello." And he said: "Come back downstairs!" I didn't understand why, but I went back down and then I didn't say anything. And he said: "Don't you know how to greet properly? It is 'Honour Work!'" So from then on I either greeted him with 'Honour Work' or avoided him completely."

  • "We live nearby, so my husband and I went there. We were shocked. There was one fire truck after another arriving. They were trying to put the fire out, but it was impossible. The fire kept spreading. It was five o’clock when everything burnt out. The tower fell, it collapsed, as well as the rest of the church. And then the bishop arrived at six o’clock in the morning. So we were glad to see him there, and he promised to re-build the church. And people started arguing. Some wanted a stone church, saying it would be safer than a wooden one. Others wanted it preserved. The bishop was also in favour of keeping the original one. My husband had retired, so he spent many days there with the workers, seeing how the construction was done, how the beams were carved and how it was built."

  • "My mother was religious and my father went to church now and then. Our neighbour, Mr. Kaloč, once talked him into voting for the communists. He said he would be fine, that everything would be great under socialism. So my father voted for the communists in 1946. I was eight years old then, but I could hear my parents arguing and it was not pleasant. Then February came and my father 'sobered up' immediately when he saw what was happening. And then he was labelled a capitalist. So we lived humbly. Not wealthy at all."

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    Ostrava, 06.09.2022

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I didn’t like communists but I wasn‘t afraid of them

Marie Sněhotová, ca.1990
Marie Sněhotová, ca.1990
zdroj: archiv pamětníka

Marie Sněhotová was born on 30 August 1938 in Ostrava - Hrabová. Her father, Bohumil Balušek, was a shoemaker who was forbidden from running his own business by the communists in the 1950s. Marie knew many people from Hrabová who ended up in prison in connection with the trial of Jan Buchal, who was sentenced to death for anti-communist resistance. The Balušek family were religious and did not stop practicing their faith even during the totalitarian regime. Marie trained as a laboratory technician and worked at the Vítkovice Ironworks in Ostrava. She never joined a pioneer or union organization, she refused to join the Communist Party and justified everything by her faith in God. Her family friend was the parish priest Vratislav Schneiderka, who was imprisoned and served in the auxiliary technical battalions. In 2002, she witnessed the burn-out of the unique wooden church in Hrabová and then participated in its restoration. In 2022 she lived in Ostrava - Hrabová.