"At Pankrác my father almost trained to be a bookbinder. Then in Mírov he threaded those small metal plates on fabric - they used to put it on labels. The norm was five thousand. There was no way a man in his sixties who didn't see well would ever fulfill that norm. So he couldn't even earn money to pay for the necessities."
"He didn't deliver the prescribed rations and thus damaged the state. They just wouldn't understand that it was impossible. Then the court in Prague cancelled one year of insufficient rations but added a year of prison sentence. Dr. Tausch told me before the court hearing that it would end up worse than back in Mělník. The judgment was written before the hearing even started."
"My uncle hadn't moved out instantly; he stayed with his daughter in Prague because he was forever banned from residing in the Mělník district. Not only had they taken everything from him but also he couldn't live in the district. But our grandma was old and so they tolerated him visiting her. He was employed at a state farm in Prague and on weekends he went to visit his wife and mother in Kanina. Nobody complained."
Jiřina Jaroměřská, née Hrabětová, was born on 14 July 1931 in Kanina near Mělník to a farmer’s family. During World War II her father Jan served as the village mayor and strived to help partisans in the region. After the end of the war when communists took over power he and his brother were labeled as kulaks. In 1956 Jan was accused of sabotage for not being able to deliver the required rations from his farming. He was sentenced to three and half years in prison which he served at Pankrác and in Mírov. The family farm was confiscated and never again had they returned to their house in Kanina.
