State Security followed me because of my brother abroad
Stáhnout obrázek
Vlastimil Juppa was born in November 1930 in Javornice in the foothills of the Orlické hory. His father, a former legionary, served in the gendarmerie, his mother worked as an economist. The family lived in Javornice until the end of the Second World War. After the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia, his father was deprived of his service as a legionary and during the war he worked as a labourer. After the war he returned to the gendarmerie, but after February 1948 he was again expelled from the corps. Vlastimil Juppa graduated from the Business Academy in Choceň. In 1949, shortly before graduation, he faced the threat of expulsion from his studies due to the flight of his brother Miroslav abroad. Thanks to the support of his teachers, he eventually graduated, but was advised not to apply for university studies. After his brother‘s escape, the family was evicted from their service apartment in Týniště; they moved to Vamberk. The father was dismissed and employed as a railway worker, while the mother lost her skilled job and had to work as a labourer. After graduating from high school, Vlastimil Juppa found it difficult to find a job, eventually settling in a furniture wholesaler. In 1951 he was drafted into the Auxiliary Technical Battalions (PTP) in the mines of Ostrava. He married in 1953 and left the PTP a year later. After returning to civilian life, he started working in the computer industry. In 1958, due to his „political unreliability“ (designation „E“), he was transferred to a manual position at the ironworks in Vamberk, where he worked in wire production. On the intercession of former colleagues, in 1960 he joined the computer centre in Hradec Králové as a designer and programmer of computer systems. He worked in the company until his retirement. However, because of the „E“ designation, he was not allowed to hold managerial positions. Between the 1950s and 1980s, he was repeatedly contacted by members of the State Security, who tried to get him to cooperate. In connection with his brother, who lived in West Germany and later in the USA, the State Security monitored him for a long time. When the situation relaxed in 1968, he met his brother in Austria and then in Germany. After 1989 Vlastimil Juppa settled in Hradec Králové.
