"We had a tent, and in the tent, we slept on straw mats. Near our campsite, there was a solitary farm where they raised cattle like in the Valašsko region, and we used to go there to stuff straw into the straw mats. Those who didn't stuff it enough would get pushed by the lower branches. Those who stuffed in enough had it good."
"We used to go to Napajedla-Zámoraví, and there we had a clubroom in Kratochvíl's brickyard. It was practically illegal, but we used to go there every day, and a lot of people knew that we had our meetings there. We maintained our cohesion throughout the war, and we had fun. We played sports there, mostly volleyball, but we also practised track and field, high jump, long jump, and we even had a discus. And we used to run and race on the road. And eventually, we formed a band because most of us were playing some instrument."
"I remember sometimes it rained at camp, and the wood in our kitchen got wet. Then, we would cut the lower branches of the spruce trees, which were dry, and use that to start the fire. The cook was always an older scout. The girls had it better, they used to have someone's mommy cook for them. We slept in tents on straw mats. We stuffed them with straw from a nearby farm where they raised cattle. Those who didn't stuff enough slept on a hard surface, and those who stuffed enough slept well."
"Either my sister or I used to send him [my brother] parcels. We used to put in whatever Dad could get. Bread, usually some sausages from self-employed people who used to go to the newsagents. The fastest connection was on Mondays at about two o'clock when the express train departed from Otrokovice for Vienna. There was a post office right at the station, which used to open at that time. We had to be there on time. There were always a lot of people waiting there. The main thing was to weigh the parcels quickly and get them on the train. The post office staff were aware of this. We paid the appropriate fees afterwards. The express train took it to Vienna, where they reloaded it, and my brother received it the next day in Linz. It was kind of a fast mail."
”The Scouts played theater and they naturally participated in the contests. The conventions of the provinces were held every year. We belonged to the Komenský province, which spread all the way from Břeclav to Napajedla. Thanks to these conventions, the Scout movement greatly prospered.”
“I had to explain to them, where my father got his newsstand and what it means to be called a newsstand man. And when I told them, that my father was a former French legionnaire, they looked at each other in such a strange way and I knew that I could go.”
“Well, as I said, there was a lot of leftover fabric. It was of no use to them, so the Scouts got it. Whoever joined the Scout got a piece of fabric for a shirt. The girls cut all the fabric and their mothers at home were sewing shirts and skirts. Therefore in two or three months all the scouts in Napajedla were better dressed than anyone in the district.”
Joseph was born on December 1, 1926, in Napajedla. His family had three sons and one daughter. Josef was the youngest son. His father was a French legionnaire during World War I. After graduating from an elementary school he went on to become an apprentice to a local tradesman and graduated from an apprentice school. By the end of World War II, he was sent to forced labor in a factory in Napajedla that belonged to the Pařík brothers and later on to the railway in Ivanovice na Hané, from where he later escaped. After World War II, he was employed in the farmers’ credit union. On October 1, 1948, he finished military service. After his return in 1950, he worked in the sales department of the Motor Union (the former factory of the Pařík brothers), but he was soon transferred to the production department. During his employment, he graduated from a two-year industrial school, which made it possible for him to get a job as a planner. Later he graduated extra-mural from an engineering secondary school. From 1973 until his retirement, he worked as a safety administrator at the Services department of the Gottwaldov district.
He joined the Scout movement through his older brothers, when he participated as an 8-year old in his first Scout Camp. He became an official member in 1945, after World War II. Between the years 1946 - 1948, he led a wolf cub unit and in 1947 he attended for 14 days a local forest school in Starý Hrozenkov. After his return from military service, the Scout movement was banned, so he - and with him many others - joined the Vojan, a voluntary tourist and theater group. There he met his current wife, a girl scout. They got married in 1953. He became a member of the newly formed Old-Scout club in 1968 and he helped in the facilities centre. He co-founded a Scout centre in Napajedla in 1990. In the 1990s, he was a treasurer at the Valašská forest school, where he started the systematic study of historical sources concerning the development of Scouting in Napajedla. He published together with Lubomír Suchdolský-Barva three publications, which summarize the most important developments of the Scout movement in Napajedla since 1923 till the present day. He was a member of Svojsík’s troop since 2001 - the 10th company of Dr. Rudolf Plajner. Scouting is a tradition in Josef’s family - both of his children and four of his grandchildren joined the Scout movement. Both his son and his grandson became directors of Scout centres. He died on August 20th, 2023.
