Starting this month, in our series dedicated to the year 1968 we will also bring a short selection of news published by the press of that time. This will illustrate that people at that time were not only immersed in politics. Their worries were similar to those that we have nowadays, even though they lived in different times and in a completely different context.
Czechoslovakian Radio – station Praha presents new programmes: “Veřejná bezpečnost žádá, radí, informuje” (Public Security news) and a cycle “Otisky v lidské paměti” about people whose life was connected with the life of the Communist Party. Czechoslovakian Television launched a French course and a series called “Sňatky z rozumu” (Convenience Marriages) by the director František Filip (see article on the series). Journalism came to life again. A programme called “Jménem republiky” (On Behalf of the Republic) as a part of the cycle “O čem se hovoří” (What is being discussed) was broadcast. It dealt with judicial rehabilitations.
On June 5th 1968 whole world was shocked by the news of an attempt on the American senator and presidential candidate Rober Francis Kennedy’s life to which he later succumbed. It happened only two months after the murder of Martin Luther King. Coincidentally Kennedy was the very person who stood up the day after the afro-american leader’s death and held a speech on the meaninglessness of violence.
The beginning of July seemed like a happy time for summer holidays, but all that changed in the middle of the month. The letter by five representatives of five socialistic countries was an omen of the hot August that was to come...
Readers’ fever, which started sometime in February 1968, was rising. Queues in front of newsagents’ were a commonplace that spring and many eyewitnesses recalled this after 1989, when newspapers sold like hot cakes. This was the result of the new relaxed ways of Czechoslovakian press, which dealt with affairs and cases that a few weeks before would have not had a chance to be published and people were worried to talk about them loud in public. Journalism was again what it should be like!
Of course first of all they wrote about the First May Day Procession where everything was different this time – the place where the platform was located, spontaneous ovations that were showered upon politicians and also scanned mottos.
© 2006 – 2009 Magistrát hl. m. Prahy
