Family visits cottage in Veverská Bítýška
Creator(s)
- Antonie Eckstein-Bloch (Camera Operator)
- Antonín Eckstein (Subject)
- Michaela Kilianová (Subject)
- Gustav Landsmann (Subject)
- Jaroslav Kilian
- Felix Landsmann (Subject)
Biographical History
Antonie (Toni) Eckstein-Bloch was adopted by Františka Kapoun (1873–1931), a Catholic housekeeper for the Bloch family. Toni’s first husband Emerich Schmeer (married in 1917) was killed in WW1 when he had to return to the battlefields. After the death of her step-father, Leopold Bloch, in March 1933, Toni became the successor of the Bloch properties in Brno and Veverská Bítýška. She married Leopold's close friend, Dr. Michael Eckstein, a Jew who was nearly 20 years her senior in March 1934. Toni and Michael lived primarily in two homes: Hlínky 35 (a prestigious boulevard with tram connections to the center of Brno in a bourgeois neighborhood) and the summer residence at Veverská Bítýška [Eichhorn-Bitischka] 238. Both properties are prominently pictured in Toni's films. Toni and Michael had two children, Michaela (born April 27, 1935) and Antonín (born October 19, 1936). Michael chose to move away from his Catholic wife, Toni, and the children on August 14, 1940 in order to protect the family. They officially divorced on September 19, 1940. In the last years of war Toni and the children stayed in Veverska Bityska, where they survived.
Felix Anotn Landsmann, 16. 11. 1930, Praha – murdered in Auschwitz - https://www.holocaust.cz/databaze-obeti/obet/103979-felix-landsmann/
Gustav Petr Landsmann, 4. 12. 1926, Praha – murdered in Auschwitz https://www.holocaust.cz/databaze-obeti/obet/103981-gustav-landsmann/
Scope and Content
September 1938. Veverská Bítýška, at the family’s estate: School-age boys outdoors near a fish pond (Felix Landsmann (b. 1930) and Gustav Landsmann (b. 1926), died in Auschwitz).The Landsmann boys, with their cousins Michaela and Antonín, play in the meadow. 01:00:26 Woman in a patterned jacket (probably the boys’ mother Juliane (Lilli) Landsmann, died in Auschwitz) greets the children and waves to the camera. Antonín tumbles in the grassy hill. Michaela eats an apple. The toddlers play outdoors in a basin of water. Beautiful view of the raging river Bílý potok (following the flood of September 1938), possibly at Práchovna near Veverská Bítýška. At the family home, Michaela hauls a box of toys and sits in the wooden trolley cart. She gets help with her jacket and plays in the sandbox. End 01:04:22
Note(s)
Kodak box says “Dr Ekstein Brunn Flurgasse 18 4.9.38"
Refer to the files for digital copies of the tragic correspondence and diary entries written by Michael Eckstein after he separated from his wife and children in August 1940 and moved into the apartment at Zeile 12,
Subjects
- TOYS
- CZECHOSLOVAKIA
- FAMILIES
- CHILDREN
Places
- Veverská Bítýška, Czechoslovakia
Genre
- Film
- Amateur.