New York City
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Whether it was at Ellis Island or JFK Airport, the first glimpse that many Czechs and Slovaks had of America was provided by New York City. And while the majority of émigrés spent just a couple of nights in the city before moving on to other locations, hundreds stayed - making New York City home to one of the biggest, and liveliest, Czech and Slovak communities in the country.
Here are the stories of some of the Czechs and Slovaks who settled in New York City:
August 25, 2011
Ladislaus (Lou) Bolchazy was born in Michalovce in eastern Slovakia in 1937. In 1948, Lou's father emigrated to the U.S., and one year later, Lou and the rest of his family joined him. They lived in Yonkers, NY. Lou has a PhD in classical studies and he owns Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers. He lives with his wife Marie in Barrington, Illinois.
May 16, 2012
Alex Cech was born in Kolín in 1927. In 1949, he escaped across the border into Germany. Alex lived in Venezuela from 1950 to 1958 where he worked for an export company. He moved to New York City in 1958 and, after working several jobs, bought his own export company. He has been an active member of the Czech community of New York. Today, Alex lives in Bronxville, New York with his wife.
November 28, 2011
Marek Eisler was born in Prague in 1980 and moved to New York City with his parents and older brother when he was three years old. He visited the Czech Republic twice before returning to Prague to live in 1999. Today he is an English teacher at The Waldorf School in Jinonice.
March 05, 2012
Tomas Hadl was born in Prague in 1985. He worked for Czech public television before moving to the United States in 2005. Today, he is a manager for the Bohemian Benevolent and Literary Association in Manhattan and lives in Staten Island with his wife and son.
May 09, 2012
Katerina Kyselica was born in eastern Moravia in 1973. She was an avid swimmer and, at the age of 14, was selected to attend a sports school in Prague where she boarded with other athletes. Katerina studied law at Charles University and worked in the profession for five years. She moved to the United States in 2001 where she returned to school and received a degree in interior design. Today, Katerina is a freelance interior designer in New York City.
November 10, 2011
Gabriel Levicky was born in Humenné, eastern Slovakia, in 1948. He was heavily influenced by Western culture and became involved in the hippie movement. He emigrated to Israel following the Warsaw Pact invasion in 1968, but returned one year later. After ten years of interrogation, which intensified after signing Charter 77, Gabriel left Czechoslovakia for the United States. He lives in New York City.
January 11, 2011
Vojtech Mastny was born in Prague in 1936. He attended the first years of secondary school but was unable to pursue his education further because of school reforms in the early 1950s. He obtained his degree from Charles University in 1962, after being sent to work as a mechanic and on a collective farm. He is considered today to be one of the foremost American authorities on the Cold War and Soviet Affairs.
February 28, 2012
Pavel Opočenský was born in Karlovy Vary in 1954. He completed an apprenticeship at a fine metal workshop in České Budějovice and began designing and producing his own jewelry. In 1979, Pavel signed Charter 77 and decided to leave the country when he was approached by the police. He lived in New York from 1982 to 1990, when he returned to Czechoslovakia. Today, he is an artist in Prague.
April 07, 2010
John Palka is the grandson of Milan Hodža, the prime minister of Czechoslovakia between 1935 and 1938. He was born in exile in Paris in July, 1939.
January 05, 2012
Jiří Pehe was born in Rokycany, western Bohemia, in 1955. He obtained a law degree from Charles University before leaving Czechoslovakia in 1981. In New York City, Jiří worked for the non-profit Freedom House. He returned to Europe to become an analyst for Radio Free Europe, and moved back to the Czech Republic when RFE moved its headquarters in 1994. From 1997 to 1999, Jiří was President Václav Havel's chief political advisor. Today, he is the director of New York University in Prague.
July 20, 2011
Frank Schwelb was born in Prague in 1932. He left with his family in 1939 after his father had been arrested and then released by the Nazi Gestapo. The Schwelbs lived in Great Britain until 1947, when Frank's father's job at the UN brought them to the United States. Frank worked for the U.S. Department of Justice before being named to the Superior Court of D.C. He is currently a Senior Judge on the D.C. Court of Appeals and lives with his wife in Washington, D.C.
July 08, 2011
Klara Sever was born in 1935 in Trebišov, Slovakia. Because her family was Jewish, they endured much difficulty throughout WWII, including being sent to a concentration camp. Klara attended art school in Bratislava and worked on restoring castles throughout Czechoslovakia. Klara and her family left the country following the Warsaw Pact invasion and eventually settled in the Washington, D.C. area where she enjoyed success as a sculptor.
February 15, 2012
Peter Sis was born in Brno in 1949 and grew up in Prague. He attended art school and, during the Prague Spring, traveled through Europe, played in a rock band, and became a DJ. Peter won a Golden Bear at the International Berlin Film Festival in 1980. He was sent to Los Angeles in 1982 to make a film for the upcoming Olympics and stayed in the United States when the project was scrapped. Peter has enjoyed world renown as a children's author and illustrator.
May 07, 2012
Otto Ulc (also known as Ota Ulč) was born in Plzeň in 1930. He studied law at Charles University and worked as a district judge. After two unsuccessful attempts at leaving the country, Otto crossed the border into West Germany in June 1959. He arrived in New York City one year later and earned his PhD in political science from Columbia University. After teaching for many years at SUNY-Binghamton, Otto is now retired and lives in Binghamton, NY with his wife.
August 19, 2011
Hana Voris was born in Písek in 1947. Following the Communist coup in 1948, Hana’s father left Czechoslovakia and settled in France, where he organized for Milly and Hana to receive visas. They traveled to Paris on the Orient Express in June 1948. When Hana was 11 years old, the family moved to Cleveland. She says it was at this time that she and her parents became particularly active in Sokol. Following the Velvet Revolution, she spent five years in Prague teaching English.
August 17, 2011
Milly Voris was born in Bělčice, Bohemia, in 1924. When she graduated from high school in 1943, she says that she and her classmates were ‘given as a gift to the Third Reich’ and that she received papers to work in Germany. She managed to remain in Bohemia, however, by marrying her husband Ladislav. She left Czechoslovakia with her daughter Hana in June, 1948.