We judge past events through the lens of the present, and that doesn’t work
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Petr Langr was born on 27 April 1941 in Mikulovice near Pardubice. His father, Josef Langr, was a People’s Party politician and later regional secretary of the National Union in Pardubice. His mother Ema Langrová took care of the children and the household. Grandfather Alois Fryček owned the Kašpar brickyard in Mikulovice, on whose land the family villa was located. His parents, Jan and Anna Langrovi on his father’s side, managed the family farm in Vysočina region. After 1948 the brickyard and the villa were expropriated from the family. A harsh fate did not escape the paternal grandparents who refused to join the JZD (Unified agriculture cooperative), so in 1955 they were evicted from the farm and both uncles of Petr Langr ended up in prison. In 1954, six years after his entry into politics, Josef Langr was sentenced to ten years for treason in a mock trial. Due to an unfavourable personnel report, both Langr brothers were forbidden to study. Petr Langr decided to develop his artistic talent in the private studio of the academic painter F. V. Danihelka. For many years, he worked as a stoker or as a painter. In 1983 he successfully graduated from the Secondary Industrial School of Construction. He was able to devote himself fully to artistic work only after the fall of the communist regime. In 1968, his cousin Adolf Toman emigrated to Canada. Josef Langr, the witness’s father, did not live to see his name cleared and rehabilitated. At the time of filming, in 2024, the witness lived in Jezbořice near Pardubice.
