He almost lost his leg in the mine
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Josef Kurek was born in Šumperk on 19 June 1952 as the eldest of four sons. His parents of Slovak origin came to the region from Romania after the war, settling in Vápenná near Jeseník where the witness spent a major part of his childhood. His father Karel Kurek left the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia circa 1967, vacating his son’s prospects for education. Instead of apprenticing for a car mechanic, he ended up in a mining apprenticeship in Karviná. As an apprentice in a mine in Ostrava, he suffered a serious accident in 1972. A conveyor belt hit him and nearly severed his leg. The factory doctor gave him a shot and let him attend a CPC meeting. Following months in hospital and convalescence, he was left with lasting consequences - his leg a centimetre and a half shorter and a disability pension. The witness lost his compensation lawsuit and was ruled to be at fault. Despite his handicap, he became a mining rescuer at the Mír Mine where he spent eight years. He witnessed several disasters with casualties. He did not join the Communist Party; after his sincere statement regarding people joining the party, his candidacy was cancelled. He married Eliska in 1977 and welcomed two children. He moved back to the Jeseník area and worked at Rudné doly Jeseník as a deputy head of mining operations at the Zlaté Hory plant. He returned to Karviná in 1990, then did high-rise work and drove a bus for twenty years. At the time of filming, Josef Kurek lived alternately in Zlaté Hory and Vápenná in 2025.
