The pair crossed the border into Germany near the Bohemian town of Poběžovice. Paul spent the next 18 months in nearly a dozen different refugee camps in Western Germany before signing up to go to Canada. Paul’s first job in Canada was as a lumberjack, in Batchawana Ontario, for the Algoma Timberlakes Corporation. After one year, Paul moved to Toronto, where he became involved in the Slovak community at the city’s St. Cyril & Methodius Church. In 1959, Paul was granted an American visa and decided to settle in Cleveland, where his friend Jozef Strechaj was already living. He started to work as a printer at the local Czech paper Nový Svět, but left the publication after a short time to take a job at the Cleveland Press, where he subsequently worked for over 20 years. Paul married a third-generation Slovak-American, Kathleen, and had four children, two of whom have become priests with different orders in the Cleveland area. Paul is a member of several Slovak organizations in Cleveland, such as the First Catholic Slovak Union, the Cleveland Slovak Dramatic Club and the Zemplín Club. In 1971, he founded the city’s annual Slovak Festival which continues to this day.
]]>Paul Brunovsky was born in the spa town of Piešt’any, in western Slovakia, in September 1930. His father Štefan was a builder, while his mother Katarína stayed at home raising Paul and his five siblings. Paul says Piešt’any was ‘peaceful’ during the War; so much so that a large number of German children were sent there to escape the bombings of major German cities. Paul says relations were strained between the local Slovak kids and their visiting German peers. After the War, Paul finished his schooling in Piešt’any and started an apprenticeship in the glassworks of Gustáv Gelinger. There Paul trained to become a glass beveler. At this time, Paul became very involved in the Slovak Catholic youth movement Orel. When this group was outlawed by the Communists in 1948, Paul and fellow members of the local chapter renamed themselves Divadelný krúžok Jána Hollého [The Ján Hollý Dramatic Circle]. Paul says this theatre group had a good deal of success, with several members being invited to become professional actors in the nearby town of Nitra. With pressure growing on the group to conform or dissolve, and Paul’s place of work in line for nationalization, Paul decided to leave the country. He left with a friend, Jozef Strechaj, in October 1949.
The pair crossed the border into Germany near the Bohemian town of Poběžovice. Paul spent the next 18 months in nearly a dozen different refugee camps in Western Germany before signing up to go to Canada. Paul’s first job in Canada was as a lumberjack, in Batchawana Ontario, for the Algoma Timberlakes Corporation. After one year, Paul moved to Toronto, where he became involved in the Slovak community at the city’s St. Cyril & Methodius Church. In 1959, Paul was granted an American visa and decided to settle in Cleveland, where his friend Jozef Strechaj was already living. He started to work as a printer at the local Czech paper Nový Svět, but left the publication after a short time to take a job at the Cleveland Press, where he subsequently worked for over 20 years. Paul married a third-generation Slovak-American, Kathleen, and had four children, two of whom have become priests with different orders in the Cleveland area. Paul is a member of several Slovak organizations in Cleveland, such as the First Catholic Slovak Union, the Cleveland Slovak Dramatic Club and the Zemplín Club. In 1971, he founded the city’s annual Slovak Festival which continues to this day.
“Then the Hitler-Jugend came over to Piešt’any, it was a tourist city and they took a lot of hotels over. They were a nuisance to us, they were an arrogant bunch of punks that we didn’t like, they took our places where we used to play. They thought that Slovakia was their colony. Germany was being bombed more, while the war was almost unnoticed in Slovakia, nonexistent, it was peaceful there during the War – especially Piešt’any. There was no bombing, and so they sent their German kids over there to indoctrinate them in Hitler’s propaganda and make them into new citizens, tough new citizens.
“One time I remember there was a skirmish when I pushed one of those kids into a river. We had to hide in our back yards because they were chasing us and there would have been a penalty if they had caught up with us and found out who did that. It was a little river, there was water flowing and in the middle there was only one board, and he purposely… I was on that board first and he thought that he had the right, that I should back up from it, and I did not. So that was the only skirmish that we had.”
“There were two bridges in Piešt’any, we heard that they were blown out by the Germans, so we went up there, and as I got to the bridge there was a boat with soldiers, Russian soldiers, coming across the river, and they had prisoners. And when they came to this side of the river where we were, they told the prisoners to get up out of the boat and walk on the dike. And as one man walked up the dike the Russian soldier who was on the top of the dike pulled his pistol and emptied it right into this guy. So his body rolled down. There was about twenty, thirty, people witnessing this whole thing. They were looking for prisoners, German prisoners, who were hiding. And so people were willing to tell them if they knew somebody was hiding some place.
“Then later on we walked over to around the airport. There was an airport in Piešt’any, and they had bunkers in there. So we went up there to see what it looks like and we saw some dead bodies of Germans, their boots and belts were missing. And some of the explosives were still there, so we tried to grab some of those explosives, we later on used them for fishing. We threw the explosive in the water and the fish popped out and we had it, but we didn’t do too much of it because it was forbidden.”
“We could not go under the Catholic Youth name anymore and so we went under the name Divadelný krúžok Jána Hollého. What we did? We put on about five plays every year, and we were pretty good. We competed locally and county-wide and finally we even ended up in Turčianský Svätý Martin, where there was a national competition. And we placed there in a pretty good position, and actually some of us, including myself, were later offered professional acting roles, in Nitra. However, next door to our Orlovna, where we had our own place, was a facility that was owned by a baron. He escaped some place, never came back, and the commies took over that facility and installed a youth program in there. They wanted us to go with them. We resisted. And they were pushing on us in this Catholic Orlovna – what used to be – to get more socialistic. And we resisted, so they were using all kinds of tricks and oppression and threats, and some of the boys were almost ready to go to the military, and I decided to go overseas.”
“We had to go see in the garbage dump and see to find ourselves some kind of a can, washed it off, and that is when we got our first food, some kind of eintopf [stew] – a big spoon of it for both. We had no spoons to eat it with, so we just ate it the best way we could. The next day, Joe had a ring, we sold that ring, and bought a spoon and cigarettes – we were smoking in those days. Breakfast every morning was just a slice of margarine, a slice of kind of a bread and a black coffee. For noon, there were mostly things that were in one pot, like what the Germans call eintopf sometimes, like soup. And the same thing was for supper, something close to it, not much food anyway – and bread with it.”
“We had some political frictions, the Slovaks, but the biggest friction was between the Czechoslovaks and Slovaks. Fights erupted on a weekly basis, and the MPs marched in with big sticks and beat anybody who was outside regardless of what it was, who it was, whether they were fighting or not. Then finally the Germans took over the camp. Rocks were being thrown and even I had to sleep with a pipe in my bed, for my own protection. So anyway, there were a lot of fights, and sometimes the Germans marched in, the German police, and there were a few times that it was so bad that some people… the Germans opened fire and some people got shot.”
“When we got to that place, 25 of us, the wagon was pushed to the side, the train continued, and there was only that little station there, where you could stop the train yourself, and hop on the train and go wherever you wanted to. And at the camp, there was a barrack with bunk beds. You picked your own, wherever you wanted to stay, and then next door was a barrack with kitchen and dining room. We were very hungry and when we got in there we ate like we never ate in all our lives, for maybe an hour or so and finally we filled up! We got back to the barracks and next day was an assignment. It was an assignment to go into the bush, three men to a team. Two pushing the saw and one with a horse bringing the wood to the road. Well, I was not strong enough, nobody wanted to get me in their trio, and there was another Czech fellow who didn’t have no trio. So they assigned us to chop the wood for the kitchen. So we did that for about a week or so, supplied the kitchen with the wood, and in the meantime the others were working as a team piecework. They were making better money, we only got around 80, 79, cents an hour. The food was plenty and good. The sleep was okay, even though there were the trains passing by we never heard them anyway. We got used to it.”
“I suggested at the [Cleveland Slovak Dramatic Club]… I came with the idea of a Slovak Festival. And immediately they made a chairman of me of the thing, to organize it. So I started organizing and got some of the factions together, Slovak musicians and all the people to participate. And despite some of the opposition that we had, especially from the older generations, it was a huge success from day one. Nobody ever knew that it would be so successful, people were standing in lines of eight or nine for food and drinks and we had a good program. So we found out that the facility is not big enough if we continue – we started continuing – and we moved to a larger facility. The next year we had so many people that they were fighting outside to get in!”
In 1999, Stanislav traveled to the United States at the invitation of a girl he had met at a concert in Prague. He spent six months in New Orleans, which he says he ‘didn’t like much,’ before moving to Austin, Texas, where he met his wife Tracy Miller. The pair then settled in Chicago, where Stanislav took a job as curator at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art (UIMA). Stanislav says he enjoyed meeting Czechs and Slovaks once a week in the pub in Austin, but has not sought out members of the Slovak and Czech communities in Chicago, as he does not want to be part of a ‘closed’ society, the likes of which he sees in parts of the Ukrainian Village district in which he works. Stanislav remains a Slovak citizen and does not exclude the idea of returning to live in Europe later on in his life. He says he travels there with his wife at least once every two years and that each time they go, they stay for at least one month. Stanislav says that it has been good for his art to live in a larger city, as there is more ‘competition,’ which he finds stimulating.
Stanislav paints and creates mixed media pieces influenced by his surroundings. He says that he draws upon his memories from Slovakia, incorporating political and anti-political symbols in his work, as well as aspects of his country’s history, which is ‘very difficult to take out of your head.’ He recently exhibited a number of his newest prints and sculptures in Calgary at a solo show entitled Icons & Altars.
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Stanislav Grezdo was born in Piešt’any, western Slovakia in 1972. His father (also called Stanislav) worked at the local nuclear power station, while his mother Viera taught Russian and Slovak. Of his youth, Stanislav remembers disliking school and spending most of his time there drawing cartoons. He has fond memories of being a Pioneer and taking part in the annual First of May workers’ parades. In 1986, Stanislav moved to Bratislava to attend Polygrafická škola (Graphic Arts School). He was there when the Velvet Revolution happened, which he refers to as a ‘great time in his life.’ Stanislav graduated in 1991 and returned to Piešt’any, where he worked as a printer for eight years.
In 1999, Stanislav traveled to the United States at the invitation of a girl he had met at a concert in Prague. He spent six months in New Orleans, which he says he ‘didn’t like much,’ before moving to Austin, Texas, where he met his wife Tracy Miller. The pair then settled in Chicago, where Stanislav took a job as curator at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art (UIMA). Stanislav says he enjoyed meeting Czechs and Slovaks once a week in the pub in Austin, but has not sought out members of the Slovak and Czech communities in Chicago, as he does not want to be part of a ‘closed’ society, the likes of which he sees in parts of the Ukrainian Village district in which he works. Stanislav remains a Slovak citizen and does not exclude the idea of returning to live in Europe later on in his life. He says he travels there with his wife at least once every two years and that each time they go, they stay for at least one month. Stanislav says that it has been good for his art to live in a larger city, as there is more ‘competition,’ which he finds stimulating.
Stanislav paints and creates mixed media pieces influenced by his surroundings. He says that he draws upon his memories from Slovakia, incorporating political and anti-political symbols in his work, as well as aspects of his country’s history, which is ‘very difficult to take out of your head.’ He recently exhibited a number of his newest prints and sculptures in Calgary at a solo show entitled Icons & Altars.
“During the time I was going to school, I was drawing comics during classes, because I was kind of bored. This means I drew many comic books during school times. And after that, I started working in the print shop and I had many leftovers from the print machines – screws and springs and things – and I started making collages from that. And later, after I moved to America, I was starting to do paintings, and now I do like mixed media painting, anything.”
“That was the great time in my life. I was in Bratislava, I was like 17 or something and the revolution started in… or some kind of signs of the revolution were in 1988 – the year before the real revolution, there was the candle demonstration. I remember I was in school, and they told us ‘don’t go there,’ and that kind of made us wonder, and we went there. And there was like the police and these firemen with hoses. That was so much fun that after, the year later, November 17 came, and we really wanted to go there. We were there and it was like, for young people – it was so much fun for us to be there. I saw Karel Kryl come to Bratislava and a performance there. It was kind of like a big event.”
“I’m not a person who is changing that often, but I met this girl from America – I was at a concert in the Czech Republic and I met this girl – and she really wanted me to see America. I really didn’t have that much interest about that, because it was kind of far, you know? Well, and after I [thought I’d] just go and see, so I was in New Orleans. I don’t like it that much, but in that time I want to make money, because in that time you don’t make that much money in Slovakia, but in the half a year that I was in New Orleans I was thinking I can just work there for a year and come back and I will have some money that I can do something with.
“And after I went to Austin to make some money, but I met there my current wife, and I just kind of got stuck in America. And after we decided to move to Chicago. And I am here. It was like totally unplanned. I still have all my stuff in Slovakia, you know, my room. Because I was not planning to stay here and I just kind of stayed. I am like 12 years here.”
“I was not really looking for the Czechoslovak community, because what my experience was that if I want to meet somebody from Czechoslovakia, it was just kind of for the memory of the past, not too much about the future, what I want to do. And I can see it perfectly with the example of the Ukrainians – some Ukrainians just live in their little Ukrainian communities; they never go outside of the community, they don’t speak English and they have their jobs where they speak only Ukrainian, they go to stores where there is only Ukrainians. And they are just kind of so closed that they are like living in some kind of little village in Ukraine. Which is good about the Slovaks and Czechs, because they don’t have that, they need to progress beyond that community. That is good for them because they need to learn English and don’t… you know – they need to do something else.”
“Yes I do, the language is more similar than… at least they are saying it – I think it is kind of between, between Russian and Slovak. I understand them, ninety percent of what they are saying. They understand me and what I am saying in Slovak. And I think the culture is kind of similar, also because we were in the same bloc. You know, we talk about these Pioneers outfits and stuff like that – everybody remembers. You know, we have similar things. Of course, there in the Soviet Union it was a little bit different but at some points we can get the same memories.”
“At that time I was not aware that this is a totalitarian state, because as a child I was very happy, because I don’t know any better. If I look back, especially at the time when I was older, I was not understanding why I have a problem with music, for example, why I cannot listen to that music. Or like, why somebody cares if I listen to Western music. I totally don’t understand that, like what was the reason for it? And I still do not understand what was the reason why we could not listen to Western bands, especially KISS, which is a very mild band – just because they have on make-up. What is the difference, you know? I still remember, KISS was enemy number one. And people don’t even know what they played. It’s a very mild rock and roll band. They’re not like Satanists or anything, you know, or capitalists, or anti-communists. They had nothing to do with that. I just don’t understand why we had so many problems with Kiss.”
“Yeah, I think my father liked that, you know, the time. Because imagine that you were born under communism, you live your whole life under communism and after things change and everything that you were preparing for or that you built all your life is like gone. I think he kind of lost his job in the end, or some money at least was stolen from his company because of the privatization, and he was kind of very angry about that. And I think he would be very happy to go back to communism, at least at some points, you know. “Yeah, my mother was also mentioning something; the children were much better at school. In communism there was more… it was better. Now they are just crazy – this is why she is not teaching any more. Well yeah, I know some people who would totally go back. At least like just the idea. There is no way how to go back, but they just kind of have good memories. Maybe because they were young or something, just kind of nostalgia. I’m not sure if that is real – all the memories, you know. I don’t think they really want to go back, sometimes you just have good memories.”
Viera Noy was born in Zemianske Sady, a small village in western Slovakia, in 1947, where her father, Rudolf, was a director of agriculture while her mother, Margita, was a homemaker who cared for Viera and her older sister Marta. When Viera’s father earned a promotion, the family moved to Borovce near Piešt’any, where Viera began elementary school.
Because of their Jewish background, Viera’s parents had been in hiding during WWII; their other family members were killed in the Holocaust. Viera says her parents were the sole survivors of the War. According to Viera, it was not easy to attend school as a Jewish child in communist Czechoslovakia. She explains that she was treated unfairly by her classmates and often by her teachers.
She attended high school in Piešt’any and, upon graduating, completed a degree in physical therapy in Bratislava. Viera’s first job was as a physical therapist researching rheumatism at a spa in Piešt’any. She started in August 1968, shortly before Warsaw Pact troops invaded Czechoslovakia. It was then that she began making plans to leave the country. In November of that year, Viera and her sister Marta received visas to attend a wedding in Austria. In Vienna, they connected with the international organization HIAS (Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society) which provided accommodations and assistance with the immigration process. Viera says that she had the option of immediately immigrating to Israel (because both she and her sister practiced licensed professions), but that she wanted the ‘adventure’ of moving to the United States. She spent three months in Vienna where she worked in a boutique popular with Slovak tourists on Mariahilferstrasse. She moved to Rome when the HIAS building in Vienna was attacked, and thousands of emigrants were relocated to Italy.
On March 6, 1969, Viera and her sister flew to New York City. Viera says that HIAS provided them with intensive English language classes, accommodation and food. Viera’s first job was in a jewelry factory but, through a family friend, she soon found a job working for Dr. Hans Kraus as a physical therapist. Dr. Kraus was a well-known physician, and Viera says that the selection procedure she went through before getting the job was rigorous. In his office, she came in contact with many famous and influential people and used those contacts to aid her fellow émigrés, helping them find jobs and process immigration paperwork.
After becoming an American citizen in 1976, Viera began returning to Czechoslovakia on a yearly basis to visit her parents and friends. When she got married in Tel Aviv in 1984, Viera wanted her parents to be at the wedding, but says that Czechoslovakia and Israel did not have diplomatic relations at the time. Viera and her husband have two children who speak fluent Slovak and Hebrew, as they spent summers when they were younger in Slovakia and Israel. Today, Viera lives with her family in Larchmont, New York.
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Viera Noy was born in Zemianske Sady, a small village in western Slovakia, in 1947, where her father, Rudolf, was a director of agriculture while her mother, Margita, was a homemaker who cared for Viera and her older sister Marta. When Viera’s father earned a promotion, the family moved to Borovce near Piešt’any, where Viera began elementary school.
Because of their Jewish background, Viera’s parents had been in hiding during WWII; their other family members were killed in the Holocaust. Viera says her parents were the sole survivors of the War. According to Viera, it was not easy to attend school as a Jewish child in communist Czechoslovakia. She explains that she was treated unfairly by her classmates and often by her teachers.
She attended high school in Piešt’any and, upon graduating, completed a degree in physical therapy in Bratislava. Viera’s first job was as a physical therapist researching rheumatism at a spa in Piešt’any. She started in August 1968, shortly before Warsaw Pact troops invaded Czechoslovakia. It was then that she began making plans to leave the country. In November of that year, Viera and her sister Marta received visas to attend a wedding in Austria. In Vienna, they connected with the international organization HIAS (Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society) which provided accommodations and assistance with the immigration process. Viera says that she had the option of immediately immigrating to Israel (because both she and her sister practiced licensed professions), but that she wanted the ‘adventure’ of moving to the United States. She spent three months in Vienna where she worked in a boutique popular with Slovak tourists on Mariahilferstrasse. She moved to Rome when the HIAS building in Vienna was attacked, and thousands of emigrants were relocated to Italy.
On March 6, 1969, Viera and her sister flew to New York City. Viera says that HIAS provided them with intensive English language classes, accommodation and food. Viera’s first job was in a jewelry factory but, through a family friend, she soon found a job working for Dr. Hans Kraus as a physical therapist. Dr. Kraus was a well-known physician, and Viera says that the selection procedure she went through before getting the job was rigorous. In his office, she came in contact with many famous and influential people and used those contacts to aid her fellow émigrés, helping them find jobs and process immigration paperwork.
After becoming an American citizen in 1976, Viera began returning to Czechoslovakia on a yearly basis to visit her parents and friends. When she got married in Tel Aviv in 1984, Viera wanted her parents to be at the wedding, but says that Czechoslovakia and Israel did not have diplomatic relations at the time. Viera and her husband have two children who speak fluent Slovak and Hebrew, as they spent summers when they were younger in Slovakia and Israel. Today, Viera lives with her family in Larchmont, New York.
“There was no rabbi or synagogue to really practice the religion. My parents were Holocaust survivors. They didn’t go to any concentration camp, but they survived in hiding and they were afraid to practice, but we always knew from people that we are Jews because kids in school made fun of us and even the teacher would not favor us, knowing that we were Jewish.”
How did you take it?
“Up until 12 years old, not terribly bad, but when I was 12 years old, all the children went to religious school on Wednesdays, and around Easter time, I think, the subject was the Jews drink Christian blood during Easter, and all of the sudden my best girlfriend didn’t want to sit with me, nobody wanted to walk to and from school with me, because I was the only Jewish kid – and my sister, but we were two classes apart, so we had different schedules. So it was very difficult, because at 12 years old you want to have a girlfriend. We used to walk and do things together – on the bicycle, after school we had fun things to do – and all of the sudden I’m all by myself. Nobody wanted to associate with me. Until high school, and then I went to Piešt’any for high school and things were a little different.
“In the first grade when our teacher was giving us our school certificate, she asked every student where they were going for summer vacation. Since my name started with ‘N,’ I heard the words ‘grandma, grandpa, cousin, aunt.’ I never heard these words at home, so when I came home I asked my mom ‘How come I’m not going for vacation to some relatives?’ So my mom was crying and said ‘Oh, we don’t have any relatives.’ But then she found some family in Nitra – friends – it was also a Jewish family that had no children, and they became our aunt and uncle, so we used to go there practically regularly for summer vacation to Nitra.”
“I really did believe in it until the invasion of Czechoslovakia because I think my parents kind of taught us to believe in communism, knowing that this is the only system you can live in. I think they believed in communism out of fear. I really believed that this is the best because you don’t have any other literature and you’re really not connected with the world, so you really believe that this is what it is and the Russians are the best, and American imperialism is the worst and they’re enslaving people or hurting people and they’re really not good for people, and how wonderful we have a life in a communist country. So I really did believe it until it was the invasion. I was shocked. I was just finished with physical therapy school, worked for a couple months, and one morning you have Russian tanks in the city and you say ‘How could that be? They were such people?’ and ‘Why did they do that to us?’ I was just so unhappy.”
“We had a choice to go to Israel the next day due to our professions. My sister was a biochemist, I was a physical therapist, and they looked for professional people and the agency was right there in Vienna. But [I wanted] some kind of adventure. I just wanted to come to America. And they wanted to send us to California because New York was full of Czechoslovak refugees who had a lot of family here since WWII, or before WWII, so they had preference, and somehow they kind of squeezed the two of us to bring us to New York, so we came to New York.”
“In the ‘70s, ‘80s and ‘90s, the job I had as a physical therapist was a place where a lot of influential people came – politicians, economists, artists – so I was able to provide jobs and accommodations for almost everybody. Even the legal papers, the senators, ambassadors. All different people. But even people I didn’t know would ask me. My parents were even scared that somebody was going to arrest them because somebody would knock on the door and bring a present for my father: ‘Oh your daughter in New York let my son stay for two weeks or found him a job.’ My parents didn’t even know who these people are. Yeah, always.”
“I had to phone my parents to get them to Vienna and from Vienna to fly to Israel, but I cannot tell this on the phone because Czechoslovakia and Israel had no communication; they didn’t have any contact at the time. This was 1984. So I told my parents on the phone ‘Come to Vienna. We are changing the wedding to Vienna.’ So my parents were hysterical and came to Vienna. They said ‘Where is Eli? Where is my sister?’ so I had to whisper and say ‘They went to Israel.’ So my parents almost fainted at the bus station where I met them. Because also this rabbi got me all these connections. His daughter was married in Vienna to the Minister of Finance, and I needed a visa for my parents to fly from Vienna to Tel Aviv, out of the passport. They cannot come back to Czechoslovakia with an Israeli stamp in a passport. He also told me to be careful who to contact. ‘Vienna is full of Czechoslovak spies and your parents are going to be followed all the time.’ We needed to get to the embassy which is a little bit on the outskirts of Vienna, and not to be followed. But we got to the embassy and they already knew everything about us. They issued [a visa] on tissue paper for my parents to go to enter Israel and exit Israel. But they needed another visa to enter Austria again because they had already used it used. Everything needed to be out of the passport, so all this was issued. We happily went to Tel Aviv and quickly got married. My sister was there, her husband was there, and so we got married in Tel Aviv.”
Vladimir devised the plan to leave Czechoslovakia with his cousin Jozef Fleischhacker and his friend, Gustav Molnar (both company sergeant majors in the Air Force), in 1952. It is said the escape was organized at Reduta dance hall in Bratislava while the American tune ‘Domino’ was playing, and so the men later referred to their escape as ‘Operation Domino.’ It was decided that when Gustav found himself on guard duty, Vladimir and Jozef would sneak into a hangar, prepare a plane for takeoff and then, in the early hours of the morning, set off for Graz in the British-controlled zone of Austria, where the three would ask for asylum. The opportunity presented itself on Friday, March 13, 1953 in Piešt’any. Vladimir says that while the plan went perfectly, once in the air, the trio found themselves pursued by Soviet MIG 15s. He says, however, that he managed to shake them off by flying low and changing course.
The three made it to Graz, where they were debriefed and were presented to journalists at a press conference. Around 10 days later they were transported to London, where they were advised by British officials to adopt false names for security purposes. Vladimir took the name Frederick Tornil, which he still uses to this day. After one year in Britain, Vladimir moved to Canada, where he started working as a flight instructor at Toronto Island Airport and, at the same time, for General Motors. In 1958, he moved to the Chicago area. After stints working at Rockwell-Standard and Zenith Electronics, Vladimir again went to work for General Motors in La Grange, Illinois, where he stayed for more than 30 years. He gained a commercial pilot’s license and flew from DuPage County airport as a hobby, he says. In 1967, he married his sweetheart from the Bratislava Aero Club, Ružena. She came to live with Vladimir in La Grange alongside her son Roman (who later joined the U.S. Air Force). Vladimir and Ružena had two more sons; Daniel and Martin. Vladimir says he used to enjoy playing soccer and attending dances at the Slovak Athletic Association in Chicago. Today, he enjoys DIY and fixing scooters and motorbikes.
Vladimir’s biography in Slovak (without diactrics)
PDF Vladimir’s interview clips in Slovak (without diacritics)
Vladimir Krman was born in Bratislava in June 1929. He attended business academy in the city as his parents wanted him to become a bank clerk, but dropped out so that he could train to become a pilot in the Czechoslovak Air Force in 1946. He started learning how to fly at the Aero Club in Vajnory, a suburb of Bratislava, and once he gained certification to became a flight instructor, his first posting was at Piešt’any airfield in Western Slovakia. Vladimir was a sergeant in the Czechoslovak Air Force until 1948 when, he says, Soviet rules were adopted and he was elevated to the rank of second lieutenant. Vladimir worked as a military flight instructor until leaving Czechoslovakia in early 1953, though he says he latterly came under increasing scrutiny due to his ‘political inactivity.’ He was also a member of an aerobatic flight team. Vladimir says he was about to be stripped of his right to teach, and indeed fly, which was why he decided to leave the country.
Vladimir devised the plan to leave Czechoslovakia with his cousin Jozef Fleischhacker and his friend, Gustav Molnar (both company sergeant majors in the Air Force), in 1952. It is said the escape was organized at Reduta dance hall in Bratislava while the American tune ‘Domino’ was playing, and so the men later referred to their escape as ‘Operation Domino.’ It was decided that when Gustav found himself on guard duty, Vladimir and Jozef would sneak into a hangar, prepare a plane for takeoff and then, in the early hours of the morning, set off for Graz in the British-controlled zone of Austria, where the three would ask for asylum. The opportunity presented itself on Friday, March 13, 1953 in Piešt’any. Vladimir says that while the plan went perfectly, once in the air, the trio found themselves pursued by Soviet MIG 15s. He says, however, that he managed to shake them off by flying low and changing course.
The three made it to Graz, where they were debriefed and were presented to journalists at a press conference. Around 10 days later they were transported to London, where they were advised by British officials to adopt false names for security purposes. Vladimir took the name Frederick Tornil, which he still uses to this day. After one year in Britain, Vladimir moved to Canada, where he started working as a flight instructor at Toronto Island Airport and, at the same time, for General Motors. In 1958, he moved to the Chicago area. After stints working at Rockwell-Standard and Zenith Electronics, Vladimir again went to work for General Motors in La Grange, Illinois, where he stayed for more than 30 years. He gained a commercial pilot’s license and flew from DuPage County airport as a hobby, he says. In 1967, he married his sweetheart from the Bratislava Aero Club, Ružena. She came to live with Vladimir in La Grange alongside her son Roman (who later joined the U.S. Air Force). Vladimir and Ružena had two more sons; Daniel and Martin. Vladimir says he used to enjoy playing soccer and attending dances at the Slovak Athletic Association in Chicago. Today, he enjoys DIY and fixing scooters and motorbikes.
Vladimir’s biography in Slovak (without diactrics)
PDF Vladimir’s interview clips in Slovak (without diacritics)
“They were very much against that, they didn’t want for me to be a pilot although I started flying in 1946 right after the War. I joined the soaring club, the air club in Bratislava and I accomplished, I got the C exam, which is pretty high, and also the Silver C, which qualified me for Air Force duty. Also we started jumping with parachutes and I had six jumps before I went to the Air Force, so actually I was pretty well qualified there.”
“Well, we actually started, what was available at that time was, like three years after the War ended, we had the surplus German aircraft, and that’s what we were using. Way back then in parachute jumping, there were old German parachutes sometimes infested with mice. And they had holes in them, we had to patch them in order to be serviceable so we could jump out of DC3s. And that was another thing that we got – we were so grateful to the UNRRA [United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration], which was the help after the War. And we got those planes there, actually they were still with the military colors, and that’s what we were using. And also the German planes of course, they were all surplus material. And we had some problems, we had some people getting killed because of the old structure. But overall we did good training and we went through all the curriculum they had in Britain. At that time, 1948, we still had members of the Royal Air Force, our Slovaks and Czechs that were fighting on the Allied side, and they were our instructors.”
“This was in 1952 when I was getting pretty well persecuted because of my political inactivity. We got together with my cousin and a friend from the aero club – we got together and decided there is no way, no future for us. Because pretty soon my flying career ended; they stopped me from flying, and my two friends were mechanics whereas they joined the Air Force for the purpose of flying so that they would get flight training. And so actually when they demanded that after so many years of being mechanics they get flight training they were told no, so they wrote to the minister of defense, and the result was that they put them in jail as they went over the official procedure. They just couldn’t get anywhere, and they wanted to fly so badly and so we decided that it’s time to go.”
“We had an alternative airport which was Graz in Austria. And we were still not 100% sure if it is in the British zone, if it is safe to land there. But there was from Bratislava another 45 minutes of flight. We wanted to go as far West as Frankfurt or Munich, but we didn’t have enough fuel. And of course then there was a Soviet airbase in Vienna, which, when we were flying over Bratislava they were getting our flight path and then they took off and went after us. But the thing we devised was that we would change direction from Bratislava to Vienna, descend down to tree level almost; it was still night, pitch dark, and then change course towards the British zone, which was, I would say, almost another 90 degrees to the left. And sure enough, in about five minutes, there were MIG 15s that were flying looking for us. We could see their exhausts, the flames from their exhausts, just about, I would say, a couple of miles away. But we were already sneaking out the other way and they were going the direction we were in before. But they didn’t find us, because like I said, we were already heading the other way and disappearing fast.”
“It was such that we landed, but we were still not sure whether it was a British airport or not because of the runways. They were marked – actually they were not runways, there was a grass area which was marked with evergreen twigs, which didn’t look like a civilized airport really. After landing when we were passing by hangars, it did say ‘N’ ‘O’ underlined, like ‘No. 1’, ‘No. 2’, ‘No. 3’ and we couldn’t decipher it, whether it was the way the Russians marked their hangars or not. We were coming towards the quarters and there was a bunch of soldiers that were coming towards us with their rifles, and then ‘Heck, what are we going to do?’ But what happened when we were circling the airport, I noticed barracks where there were soldiers with white belts and white things over their boots, their shoes, which I remember from movies, American movies, that this is actually the MP, the military police. I remember that, and I couldn’t even tell my guys in the back that this is what I saw. So I was pretty well sure that we are in British hands, but I wasn’t sure about the guards, which later came true, that they were Austrians.”
“In London, they gave us new passports and also they wanted us to change the names we had for safety purposes because communists were kidnapping people even from England, they managed to kidnap someone and brought him back to Czechoslovakia and executed him, really. So they said, now, this is for your safety, do that, and we agreed.”
What was the name you chose?
“The name that I chose I am still using is Frederick Tornil. Tornil was a name of a racing-horse that won the Irish sweepstakes that particular weekend when we arrived there. So it was kind of funny because it took us a long time to pick up names, and so Tornil was the one, and they used to call me Freddie alias potápka in Bratislava, and so I adopted the name Frederick.”