Communism ruled everything and everyone. I conformed many times.
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Anežka Kesslerová was born in Pustina on 31 January 1934 to parents Josef Smejkal and Marie Smejkalová. She spent her entire life within the Bohemian-Moravian Highlands. She had eight siblings, three girls and six boys in total. Her parents owned a large farm, which they lost after 1948. Even after her graduation from high school, the witness was still labelled with ‘peasant origin’. She first completed the primary school in Měřín, then studied at the grammar school in Velké Meziříčí and finished her studies at the teaching high school in Jihlava. After graduation, she was assigned to Třešt’ and worked at the local school with short breaks until her retirement. Třešť is also where she met her husband Jan Kessler with whom she has two daughters. Her husband became the head of the culture centre in Třešt’ and his wife helped him organise theatre performances and exhibitions. She was active in the puppet theatre, playing the puppet Kašpárek for about twenty years. Her other hobbies were foreign languages, which she both studied and taught. She was living in Třešt’ in November 2023 .
