Christmas in Brno, prewar
Michaela and Antonin dressed as angels, singing for the camera beside the Christmas tree in 1939. INTs, a decorated Christmas tree at the Eckstein home in Brno. Children in costume pose and touch the dangling ornaments. They kneel beside the ornamental manger under the tree, hold their hands in prayer and sing for the camera. Pan up, star on top of the tree. 01:02:21 Toys. The children, in different outfits, perform a skit for the camera in a different room. Back beside the tree, the nanny guides them through a song and helps them place more ornaments on the tree. She entertains them with a doll. End 01:04:24
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Record last modified: 2022-07-28 21:56:25
This page: https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn718945
Also in Antonie Eckstein-Bloch Collection
A collection of eighteen 8mm family films by Antonie (Toni) Eckstein-Bloch who documented everyday situations of family life in Brno and the Czech countryside before World War II. Toni married a Jew, Michael Eckstein, in 1934. After the German occupation, Michael divorced his Catholic wife and moved away in order to protect the family. He maintained correspondence with Toni and children, and kept a diary until he was deported to Terezin where he died in August 1942. Toni, and their two children, Michaela and Antonín, survived the war at the family’s summer cottage in nearby Veverská Bítýška.
Date: 1938-1942
Family activities at the house in Bítýška; friend in uniform; children get haircuts
Film
“The last visit in Bítýška at the yard” in September 1938. Baby Elizabeth Shenk with newspaper. 01:00:39 Michael in shorts with tall socks. Cousins from Prague visit the summer cottage: Felix Landsmann (school-age boy in striped suit, b. 1930, died in Auschwitz) with his mother Lilli (niece of Michael Eckstein) in the foyer. Lilli in trenchcoat plays table tennis with her husband Hans (b. 1898, died in Auschwitz) and her son Gustav (b. 1926, died in Auschwitz). Michaela plays in the yard with stroller; Felix on a tricycle. Michael Eckstein (on left) with his brother Jakob Eckstein (in dark suit) watching the children. Toddler Antonín sits upright in the carriage. Nannies playfully toss Michaela in the air, she laughs. 01:03:21 The Ecksteins say farewell to their visitors, shiny Packard (same as in film #6): Hans (in hat) shakes hands with uncle-in-law Michael, the boys shake hands with their Uncle Jakob, Hans hugs his boys, and a well-dressed unknown woman in suit and hat says goodbye. They get into the Packard and the driver (chauffeur) takes off. A housekeeper closes the gate. Gustav plays with the dog in garden at Bítýška. Gustav and Felix sit on a blanket and play cards and wrestle in the grass. 01:06:24 Michaela on the tricycle; Antonín gets a turn. They pose for the camera and have a meal outdoors with their father, Michael. They play in a playpen indoors and read books. Antonín in a stroller. 01:11:16 In Brno at Hlínky 35, a young man in uniform, possibly nephew Stefan Freudenfeld (son of Berta) visits Jakob and Michael in the outdoor garden. They talk. He salutes and poses for the camera. The babies are fed by the nannies. Michaela dances indoors with her uncle Jakob. Antonín crawling and pulling himself up to walk.The children get haircuts. Antonín holds a balloon in his playpen.
Easter holidays in Brno
Film
April 1938. In yard of family home in Brno (regional capital of Moravia), Hlínky 35, young Michaela (age 3) and her brother Antonín (age 2) hunt for Easter eggs in 1938. They are dressed similarly in checkered jackets. They play in the garden, with the toys. 01:01:01 Michael Eckstein stands beside a nanny, and Michaela pulls the wheeled animal toys. 01:01:13 Side view of Antonín kneeling with the toy bunny in the grass. 01:01:37 Michael walks hand-in-hand with his son Antonín. More of the family in the garden celebrating the Easter holidays. Cut. 01:02:12 Michaela holds a doll and plays with her brother Antonín outdoors on the balcony (probably Miki’s 3rd birthday). She tries to get him to smell a tulip. They play with toys and take turns sitting in a toy car. A nurse lifts Antonín out of the car. End 01:04:23
Family visits cottage in Veverská Bítýška
Film
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
Children play in their room in Brno
Film
November 1938. Antonín with a knit cap and suitcase on the gravel walkway in the garden of the family home in Veverská Bítýška (Note from Antonin: “October 1938 departure from Bítýška”). INT, Antonín and Michaela play indoors in the children’s room in Brno, putting the dolls to bed. Dark shots, Antonín plays with a toy car on the floor. 01:01:54 More INTs of children’s room, with projected lights. Antonín and Michaela ride on toy stuffed animals. 01:02:16 Antonín in the vestibule with jacket and hat, he carries postmail and a newspaper. Michaela washes and hangs laundry in a sunlit room. She gets help with her hat and paces in the vestibule. End 01:04:27.
Silent animated film
Film
Titles: Gemeinnutziger Kulturfilm-Vertrieb zeigt" “Der Löwe und die Maus” [Boy in Circus]. An animated short film. Ends 01:05:13
Ice skating in Brno
Film
An older boy, the son of the family Klein - the Eckstein’s housekeeper, ice skates with Michaela in Brno in January 1941. Boys play ice hockey in the BG. The Klein boy twirls and skates and tries some tricks. A nanny helps Antonin and Michaela on the ice. They rest on a bench. The older boy shows off again. More shots of ice hockey and ice skating. End 01:04:23
Children get haircuts and play indoors
Film
April 1939. The children walk outdoors with the nanny. Indoors at their home on Hlinky 35 in Brno, the children get haircuts. Their room is filled with toys and is decorated with cars/robots on the wall. Michaela kisses her brother Antonin; he hugs her. Michaela gets her hair trimmed by the young male stylist. 01:02:07 The children play and laugh in their room. Antonin is lifted up and down by his nanny. He rides a red tricycle. The nanny puts mittens on his hands, and he spins around a few times for mother (behind the camera). The two children, dressed in different clothing, pose for the camera on the balcony. Very brief shot of father, Michael. End 01:04:05
Eckstein family in Summer 1939
Film
August 1939. Nannies swing Michaela and Antonin in a sheet in the garden of the family home in Brno, filmed probably from the balcony of the home. Pan of the grand outdoor space. 01:01:04 A woman practices somersaults beside the pools for the children; Antonin and a nanny playfully slap her and she laughs. The children play outdoors. 01:01:34 Father Michael joins them. 01:02:06 Children snack outdoors at the table with other unknown children and their female caretakers. They chase each other in the grass beside the family home and occasionally pose for a portrait. Michael follows the kids in the garden, smoking a cigar, and smiling for the camera at 01:02:58. The kids run around, do somersaults, and take a walk along a wooded path with the extended Eckstein family and the nannies. 01:04:00 Uncle Jakob with Michaela and Antonin (and their nannies), resting on a bench. End 01:04:14
Summer 1942 in Veverská Bítýška: gardening and canoeing
Film
Summer 1942 in Veverská Bítýška, Michaela and Antonín outdoors in a vegetable garden, corn stalks, gardening. Shows an elderly couple (friends of father Michael Eckstein from Brno, probably a lawyer with his wife) and the family of the Czech housekeeper, Milan Jubánek (born in 1935) and his younger brother Laďa Jubánek (born 1942, the baby at 01:07:18). Michaela and Antonín walk on a log with a little dog. Ducks. Michaela, Antonin, the elderly man, and the nannies walk along a dirt road. Cows. The group hikes, climbs over rocks, in the forest. The nanny tosses a handbag in the air and feeds a goat. The group canoes on a small lake. Pan of the country property, the children play. 01:07:15 Mrs. Klímová (a housekeeper for the Bloch family since 1917), the grandmother, holds baby Laďa Jubánek. Michaela and Antonín are tossed up and down in a canoe; Milan splashes nearby, laughing. The older boy takes a turn. Higher angle shots of the makeshift pool of water with the kids playing in the canoe. Ends 01:09:41
Eckstein children play at home in Brno
Film
May 1938. Michaela plays on the balcony of her home in Brno, Hlínky 35, with flowering plants next to the toy kitchen, red toy car, dolls, and books. Michaela holds an umbrella, and walks toward the camera. Her brother Antonín joins and they snack on pretzels. 01:02:12 Antonín and Michaela with sun-hats smile and play outdoors in the yard at Hlínky 35. Spring flowers in bloom. Michaela pushes a toy baby carriage along the gravel walkway. Antonín crouches and digs with a trowel in the sandbox (father Michael sits on the white bench behind and smokes a cigar). 01:02:57 Dark-haired woman in red dress and another nurse supervise the children at play. 01:03:17 Michael sits on the bench and trades toys with his son. He walks with the children along the path smoking a cigar. End 01:04:19
Children ride a carousel and play in the gardens
Film
The children ride the carousel in June 1941. They lounge outdoors on the porch at Bítýška and pose for the camera. 01:02:13 Ducks wade in a small stream on the property. Michaela and Antonin watch with the boy, Milan Jubánek, the (grand)son of the housekeeper’s family in Bítýška. 01:02:35 They sit on a wall together and smile for the camera. EXTs, grounds of summer cottage at Bítýška and the home. The children play in outdoors and pick flowers. Two dogs join the kids, CUs of the German shepherd. End 01:04:24
Sledding in Brno
Film
January 1939. Sledding in the snow near home in Brno on the street v Hlinkách (Hlínky 35). 01:00:11 CU Antonín bundled up in the sled with nanny in a checkered jacket. They pass a wine cellar, she waves to the camera, both children pulled in sleds. Poster; restaurant. A lady skis by the family. 01:00:47 Michael Eckstein looks at the camera walking in the snowy streets of Brno, he watches the children race down the street and play in the snow. Snowballs. Quick view of sign for Vystaviště. End 01:02:05 01:02:10 HAS, Playing in the snow at the empty fairground / exhibition area in Brno (Vystaviště). The children take turns sledding down snowy hills, waving to the camera. 01:03:47 Packard automobile with M-1034 plate. MS, quick pan of snowy fairgrounds without people. End 01:04:19
The Eckstein family at a fair and playing in their garden
Film
June 1939. The children in striped jackets outdoors in their garden in Bítýška. Greenhouse. 01:01:13 Pan of the family home at Vev. Bítýška. 01:01:20 The children ride the carousel with the nanny in a checkered jacket. 01:01:54 Michael helps Antonín off the carousel. 01:02:00 The family and nanny pose for a portrait in the funhouse mirror (notice mother Toni with the camera standing at right behind her son Antonín). Very brief shot of only the couple, Toni and Michael, at 01:02:08. [These are the only images of mother Toni across the films]. Antonin and Michaela play in piles of hay in their garden at the cottage in Bítýška. They grab rakes and do yard work. An older boy waters the plants. A gardener trims the lawn by hand. End 01:04:20
Children play in the snow
Film
Sledding in snow in Brno in February 1940 in front of their home. Antonin and Michaela take turns on the sled in the streets of Brno with their nanny. They play in the snowy gardens behind the home, shoveling snow in toy wheelbarrows, and trudge through the deep snow. 01:01:14 The camerawoman and mother, Toni, films from indoors, note the window pane at the bottom of the frame. On the streets, a nanny throws a snowball at the children, “Benzol” advertisement in the BG. 01:02:56 A man sweeps snow on the roof of the family’s three-story house, showing a rare view of the house from the frontside. Sign: “Kavarna Restaurace…” The children play in the snow. 01:03:25 The man tosses snowballs from the roof. Good MS of the Michaela and Antonin in the snowy mounds. They walk along the shoveled sidewalk. End 01:04:30
Playing outdoors in early summer 1938
Film
June 1938. Antonín and Michaela in the garden in Brno, Hlínky 18, bright red tulips. Michael on the balcony of the family home. Michaela pulls her brother in a toy car, the nanny helps. The children play with a toy castle doll-house with the red/white flag. 01:02:00 A woman walks from the house along the garden path. Garden furniture. The children play outdoors. Slow pan of the gardens. Woman (possibly the sister of Michael, Berta Freudenfeld, or her daughter, Lilli?) and teenage boy in dark suit (grandson of Berta, Gustav Landsmann, died in Auschwitz) closes the garden gate. 01:03:12 Veverská Bítýška, at their summer cottage: Michaela and Antonín play with toy trains in the sandbox, explore the meadow and a pile of hay. The children sit and pose on top of the hay. End 01:04:13
Prewar summertime activities
Film
July 1939. Children on a swing in the garden at the Eckstein family home in Brno in summer. Pan of the garden, the home, and the ornate balcony. Blossoming bushes, outdoor furniture. Michaela and Antonin run around and play with garden tools in the sandbox and take dips in the baby pool. The nanny lays a sheet in the grass for the kids to rest; she makes a sun-hat for Michaela; she splashes them with pool water. End 01:04:09
Michaela and Antonin eat a meal and dance
Film
Michaela pushes a doll in a toy stroller in the yard of their home in Brno in 1940. The children take a walk in the city and run toward the camera in matching sweaters (probably Spring 1940 - note the bare trees). They climb up and down a set of stairs. Indoors, the children eat a meal. They smile and eat. 01:02:14 (splice) In the children’s room, Antonin (age 4) and Michaela (age 5.5) dance together (note the cross hanging on the closet door in their room). They crouch and sing and play (possibly November 1940). End 01:04:23
