“I do not know who came up with the idea, there were more of us. We discussed it, at first, we came and wanted to take it off or tear it down, but we were not successful.” – “You mean to tear down the statue?” – “Yes. Then we, there were more of us, but I do not remember the names, agreed to tear it down.” – “We did not succeed.” – “We placed on it; someone came with an idea to place – to do something – to place a backpack on its back.” – “How did you do it? Did you do it at night?” – “We did it in the daytime. People were laughing on the pavement; we were also amused by it.” – “How did you get there? The statue was quite high.” – “The statue was about six metres high. We found out we could not do anything with it. We said to ourselves we would ask the carpenter behind the tower on that short street to punish him [V. I. Lenin] for what they had done. He lent us a wooden ladder. Back then, the aluminium, folding ones did not exist. We took the ladder and the backpack there. We pulled that one up and put it up there. So that he could see Boleslav."
“So, I and the men were standing opposite Rozvoj, and a Russian shot out of the opposite window, he shot a signal rocket between us. I mean the rockets that are usually shot. Between us as we were there – there were a lot of us men there. He should not have done it. Wherever there were rocks, they started flying at the barracks, at the windows. However, they took photos of everything, not only Russians but also our people, comrades who supported that the Russians were there. They were filming everything, so they had everything noted – who was where, who took part in in.”
“It seemed strange to me that there were a lot of people there when I left the house, I lived in Leninka at that time, and (it seemed to me) something was going on. I did not even know that they had invaded us. So, I arrived at the barracks. The men there were already dressed up. I quickly joined them as if I spent all night there. And in less than an hour the Russian soldiers stormed into the Žižkova barracks to us. They came with TOPAS vehicles and with tanks. And we were in the barracks, and they did not want to let us go. And we did not cook in the barracks, lunches were brought from the 9th May barracks and they did not even let us bring lunches. So, my wife brought me food there for three days."
„Monetary reform took place at that time. I was looking forward buying a now motorcycle because we were making quite a lot of money on the work trip. And when I had almost enough money saved, President Zápotocký announced one evening that people did not need to be afraid of monetary reform or something similar but in fact… He declared the next evening that monetary reform was taking place and (validity of) money ended and who had money should exchange them – I think you got a ratio of 5:1 up to three hundred crowns and a ration 50:1 for the rest of your money, so you got a crown for fifty crowns. It came as a surprise to me what the party and the government did at the time."
Jaroslav Horáček was born on 2 April 1934 in Mladá Boleslav. He started an apprenticeship in the Škoda company in Mladá Boleslav in 1949 and he later worked there as an auto mechanic. He went on a half-year work trip to the construction of Klement Gottwald´s steelworks in Ostrava in 1953. Monetary reform took place at that time and Jaroslav lost the money he had saved. When he returned from Ostrava, he was called for military service which was prolonged by two months because of the emergency concerning the Hungarian Uprising. In 1961, he joined the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia so that he could get a company flat for his family. He was taking part in military trainings in Mladá Boleslav at the time of the invasion of the Warsaw Pact troops in August 1968, and the occupational soldiers kept them in barracks for three days. Jaroslav subsequently took place in a mocking protest when they placed a backpack on the statue of V. I. Lenin and participated in unrests which started in Spring 1969 after defeating the Soviet Union in hockey. Jaroslav Horáček was expelled from the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia during the purges at the beginning of normalisation and he could no longer go on business trips abroad. Nevertheless, he kept on working on racing cars produced by Škoda Mladá Boleslav. Later in the 1980s, as a salesclerk, he witnessed the desperate efforts of hundreds of people to get a new Favorit. He got retired in 1994. Jaroslav Horáček died on March 29, 2024. The story of the witness could be documented thanks to financial support from Škoda Auto and Bohemian Heritage Fund.
Hrdinové 20. století odcházejí. Nesmíme zapomenout. Dokumentujeme a vyprávíme jejich příběhy. Záleží vám na odkazu minulých generací, na občanských postojích, demokracii a vzdělávání? Pomozte nám!
