Vaclav George Vostrez

When Vaclav was 17, his father was mobilized into the army so Vaclav kept the family farm going. Because the farm was too small for two growing boys Vaclav applied for a course in Prague about the raising of livestock and genetics. The farmers union hired him as an instructor and inspector in animal production for 12 districts in north east Bohemia.

In the meantime he was also involved in the establishment of an agricultural school in the town of Opocno where he went to elementary school. As well as being a teacher in the school, he was one of the main examiners and signed the diplomas. When he visited the Czech Republic in 1989, he met some former students who showed their diplomas that had been signed by him.

He developed contacts all over Czechoslovakia and became more and more involved in the anti-Communist movement. The Communists watched, followed, and controlled all of his contacts with his family and friends from the 1940’s into the 1980’s. For many years his family did not know if he was alive or his whereabouts

He did not tell his parents of his plans but in January 1949 he fled Czechoslovakia by walking from Cheb across the forest and fields to Germany. The German police who met him at the border sent him to Tishenreit the biggest refugee camp run by Americans. His paperwork at the camp described him as a “cow man first class or cowboy”. After that first screening he was sent to a more permanent camp.

A farmer in Turnerville (Chatham) Ontario sponsored him and Vaclav arrived in Canada in 1950. He worked as a farmhand but also worked getting other local farmers to sponsor Czech farmers that were still in the refugee camps in Germany. Helping Eastern European refugees and immigrants became his life long passion.

While in the Chatham area, he became involved with the local Czech church and after his move to the Hamilton area, he became involved with the Slovak Church and then the Czech church in Burlington.

Vaclav moved from Chatham to work at a farm in Waterdown (Hamilton) The Waterdown farmer also sponsored Czech families in the refugee camps in Germany but after a few months the farmer decided to quit farming so in 1951 Vaclav got a part time job at National Steel Car in Hamilton and supplemented his income picking tobacco in the Chatham area as well as construction work in Hamilton.

Vaclav worked for 35 years at National Steel Car. His part time job turned full time after he took many courses related to his job and was noticed by the management of the company. He was put on various boards such as the Compensation board and the Pension board.

Vaclav remained involved with various refugee and multicultural organizations and also the Roman Catholic Church and kept a voluminous correspondence at his own expense throughout his life related to the various organizations. For many years he had a Gestetner to run off bulletins, mailings, etc. His mailing list totalled about 600 peoples all over the world. His last mass mailing was at age 99.5 and he hand addressed the 200 envelopes

Initially Vaclav was a member of the Progressive Conservative party but when Ellen Fairclough of Hamilton became minister of immigration and tightened up immigration rules, he switched parties and joined the Social Credit Party.

He established a good network with Ellen Fairclough and Ontario Premier William Davis. He was also known to Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona who sparred with John Kennedy.

When the Social Credit party saw his connections and friends they elected him Vice President of the party. In 1963 Vince ran under the Social Credit banner against John Munro in the federal election in Hamilton east but lost the election. He stepped down from the Vice Presidency of the party in 1968, a year after he got married.

After 1980 when communism in the Czech Republic was on the wane he accepted the presidency of the Social Credit Party in Ontario. In 1984 he was nominated to run against Sheila Copps in east Hamilton but lost that election as well.

He joined the Knights of Columbus in the mid 1950’s as well as the Alhambra and started many Knights of Columbus chapters in the Hamilton area. He and Cesia enjoyed going to the Knights of Columbus conventions that were held in various cities in the U.S. He was also a 40 year member of Orzel – “owl” - an organization for gymnasts based in Chicago. He organized and led tour groups to the shrines of Our Lady of Fatima and also to Majore.

He had three underlying goals in his life.

Dream number one was attained when communism in the Czech Republic fell in 1989 and he was able to visit the homeland that he fled in 1949.

As for dream number two, for many years Vaclav was in charge of collecting funds from Czech exiles all over the world to pay for the reconstruction of the Marian Column that dated to the 1600’s but was torn down in 1918. Vaclav was very honoured when his name was mentioned at the end of the dedication of the Column in its original location in the Old Town of Prague in August 2020.

Then being as goal oriented as he was, he waited until the general election in the Czech Republic in late 2021 to get a list the most current elected officials but also high ranking clergy (many of whom he knew for many years) to do a last slow mailing about his third project – to get President Beran exhonerated. Vaclav was pleased when he got a positive reply to that mailing on how this could be achieved.

His lasting legacy was the sending of his personal papers to the Libris Prohibiti in Prague and books and periodicals in the Czech language published all over North America to the Museum of Exil in Brno, Czech Republic.

Vaclav inherited about 2,000 books from his Czech Canadian friends. These were books that had been printed in the 1930’s onwards copies of which had been destroyed by the Communists. Vaclav repatriated these books to the Czech Republic.

He married Polish widow Czeslawa Ryszawy who had a teenage daughter in 1967 and Cesia was his partner and support until her death in 2017. The house and reading material were in Polish, Czech and English as were the conversations. They invited many immigrants to live with them until they could be established in Canada. Guests at their house for luncheons and dinners included clergy often visiting from various countries of Europe.

In his 80’s Vaclav became an official Czech-English translator but quit as a translator on his 90th birthday when he was slowing down his driving distances.

He is survived by his stepdaughter in Burlington and by his nieces and their families in the Czech Republic.

Visitation at MARKEY-DERMODY FUNERAL HOME, 1774 King Street East (at Kenilworth) on Monday August 15 from 7:00-9:00 pm with Rosary at 8:30 pm. Mass will be at St. Stanislaus Church on Barton Street (8 Ann Street) Hamilton on Tuesday August 16 at 11:00 am. Entombment to follow at Bayview Mausoleum at 740 Spring Garden Rd. in Burlington where he will rest with his Cesia.