- 12 Vinohradská Street, Praha 2-Vinohrady
Czech Radio
The legendary announcer Zdeněk Mančal said on air in a slightly mocking voice on 5 May. From that moment on, the radio broadcast was exclusively in Czech, which was an enormous encouragement and impulse for the nation scourged by the Nazi dictatorship for six years. People started to pull down German symbols and signs, and Czechoslovak flags appeared in the windows of houses.
The situation is changing dramatically, and German soldiers are attacking the studio. The radio sends its first call for help. In Vinohrady and the surrounding areas, fierce fights rage between the SS units and the insurgents who responded to the call. Despite the grenades shaking the building and the sounds of gunfire, the radio continues to broadcast strategically important information for the awakened uprising. Thanks to the insurgents, joined by the police, gendarmerie, and government armed forces, the building withstood the first day. But the Nazis do not surrender.
The next day, the building came under fire from a German tank’s gun and an air raid in the early evening, which damaged the entrance hall, adjacent rooms, and broadcasting technology. Thanks to the foresight of the radio’s employees and an agreement with the Hussite pastor Arnošt Šimšík, the transmission was relocated to the Hus Congregational House. The battle for the radio continued until 9 May when the transmission in Vinohrady was ceremonially restored.
Czechoslovak Radio in Vinohradská Street, visibly damaged from the fighting during the Prague Uprising. Museum of Prague, photo by Václav Klíma, after 9 May 1945.
The destroyed section of the Czechoslovak Radio building after the bombing. Museum of Prague, unknown photographer, May 1945.
