RNDr., CSc. Milan Práger

* 1930

  • “It was after that, at the beginning of 1941 Professor Pavelka announced that Scouting activities were going to continue, obviously without all the fancy Scout things, no uniforms or anything like that. And we started to meet up, I don't know, there were maybe three of us from that first year, maybe there was a fourth person, at the parish premises in Podskalí. We would go there once a week. We had the usual Scout meetings with lectures on Scout Law. Mainly we played Scout games, I always loved that. We would go on trips. There was always a trip outside of Prague on Saturdays or Sundays.”

  • “The Institute of Mathematics was a rare oasis, a rare oasis. That was definitely thanks to Professor Knichal who led the institute from 1953 to, I don't what year, till the 1970s, and even though the local communist organization obviously existed there there was no particular pressure on the workers. So the only sacrifice there was ROH (Revolutionary Trade Union Movement) membership and participation in the 1st of May demonstrations. Otherwise there was nothing, and, well, later there were some, after 1968, when normalization began, there were some checks.”

  • “But my father had Jewish ancestry so for of financial and other reasons, I don't know much about it, my parents divorced formally. My mother died when I was twelve. My father had already gone to Terezín half a year prior to that and at the end of 1944 he went from Terezín to Auschwitz and the traces end there. I was taken care of, I lived with my mother's parents.”

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    ZŠ Radlická, Praha 5, 09.05.2017

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    duration: 01:10:00
    media recorded in project The Stories of Our Neigbours
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Be more than just a mummy’s boy

Milan with his grandfather
Milan with his grandfather
photo: archiv pamětníka

Milan Práger was born on the 21st of April 1930 in Prague. He grew up in the Košíře neighbourhood. During the war he studied at Vančurovo gymnázium and joined an illegal scouting unit at Klamovka that became the Mawadani centre after the war. His father was sent to Terezín due to his Jewish ancestry and later to Auschwitz, where he died. His parents had divorced and his mother died soon after his father. Milan Práger studied mathematics and spent his whole life working at the Institute of Mathematics of the Academy of Sciences. He also taught mathematics from the 1960s. Today he still meets up with his Scout friends from his senior Scout group.