Václav Klofáč

Václav Klofáč (in the 1930s)

Václav Jaroslav Klofáč (born September 21, 1868 in Deutschbrod (Německý Brod), † July 10, 1942 in Dobříkov ) was a Czech politician and journalist.

Life

Klofáč was the son of a tailor and graduated from high school in Deutschbrod. Since he did not have the means for further studies after passing his Matura, he first became an assistant teacher before he began studying philosophy at the Czech department of Charles University in Prague in 1897 . Between 1890 and 1898 he worked in the editorial department of the Národní listy and soon rose to become a prominent figure in Czech political circles.

From about 1893 onwards, Klofáč was politically active in the progressive Czech movement and sought support for the young Czechs in the workforce. After the Czech Social Democrats opposed constitutional law and the language regulations of 1897, he intensified his efforts to attract nationally minded workers, which in 1898 resulted in the Česká strana národně sociální (ČSNS; Czech National Social Party). Klofáč became its first chairman and remained in this position until 1938. In 1901 he founded the daily newspaper České slovo ("Czech word"), which served as the organ of the Czech National Social Party and was the owner of a printing house in Prague.

He was considered a tribune of the people and was able to gain a following among the petty-bourgeois classes. Klofáč belonged to the Austrian House of Representatives between 1901 and 1918 and was a member of the Bohemian Landtag from 1908 to 1913 . He was a critic of Austro-Hungarian foreign policy and advocated active cooperation with Russia as early as 1904. After the outbreak of World War I , Klofáč was imprisoned on suspicion of high treason. After his dismissal he became Vice President of the Czech Union in the Imperial Council , and in 1918 Vice President of the Prague National Committee . In Czechoslovakia , he served as the first Czechoslovak Minister for National Defense from 1918 to 1920 and as Vice President of the Senate of the Czechoslovak Republic until 1938. From 1925 to 1926 he was even its president. Klofáč voted in 1938 for the liquidation of his party, which was subsequently incorporated into the aligned Strana národní jednoty ("Party of National Unity").

Since the 1920s he lived in Dobříkov, where he had the Klofáč villa built on the castle stables next to the forester's house. In 1927 Klofáč bought the dilapidated scrap wood church from Cholmovec in Carpathian Russia for 16,000 Czechoslovak crowns and had it moved to Dobříkov in 1930.

Klofáč was married twice, his first wife was named Amalie, his second wife was her sister Růžena. Klofáč had three children, Jaroslav (1892-1917), Milena (1894-1919) and Zdenek (* 1895).

A memorial for Klofáč was established in 1997 in the Dobříkov Forest House.

Awards

• Honorary citizen of Prague (and other Czech places)
• Order of the White Eagle 1st class

literature

• Československo - biography. Praha 1936–1941 (Czech-German)
• Fritz Freund: The Austrian House of Representatives. A biographical-statistical handbook, 1911–1917, XII. Legislative period. Publishing house Dr. Rudolf Ludwig, Vienna, p. 241
• Klofáč, Václav. In: Austrian Biographical Lexicon 1815–1950 (ÖBL). Volume 3, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 1965, p. 418.

Web links

Commons : Václav Klofáč  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files