Ancestral Villages - Kozlany Museum

After visiting the church, we walked next door to the old school, which is now a museum. There we met the first two new cousins!

According to the information provided by Olga from conversations with local Zeteks (they spell it with one T), Josef Zetek had three sons: Vaclav (1921-1983), Karel (1922-1986), and Josef (1926-1968).

Two of Vaclav's children came to Kozlany to meet us. On the left is Jitka Zemanova (born Zetkova), who lives in Rakovnik, not far from Kozlany. Next is her brother, Miloslav Zetek, who lives in Plzen with his wife, whose name I unfortunately didn't get. That's me on the right.

Miloslav brought a copy of his wedding photo and one of his family on a recent vacation. I've asked to have the people identified. I think the man on the right is his brother Karel.
Inside the museum, we signed the guest book. That's Jitka, George, and me again. I have cousin Martin to thank for many of the photos in this blog entry. I was too stunned by meeting two new cousins that the camera wasn't a priority.

One of the exhibits highlighted Kozlany's main industry: ceramics. This room showed a local potter at work with some of his products on the shelves. This wax dummy was so realistic that it was almost creepy. The guide told us it was made from castings of the real town potter. Neverthless, it was a nice exhibit of local craftsmanship.
Here is Lloyd with another display of finished pottery showing some of the styles turned out by the ceramics factory. Lloyd teaches ceramics at Missouri Valley College, so he was particularly interested in visiting ceramics studios.

An old schoolroom is one of the museum displays.
Most of the museum space is devoted to a national hero, Edvard Beneš, the second Czech president. He was born in Kozlany in 1884. He was one of the founders of the independent Czechoslovakia in 1918 and a foreign minister in the first government of president Thomas Masaryk. He succeeded Masaryk as president in 1935 and served until 1948, when the Communists took control of the country. More information about him can be found on Wikipedia.
A few Beneš mementos on display:
A large photo of Beneš and his wife (and Lloyd)
A life-sized statue of Beneš on display in the small town square in Kozlany.
Next entry: Hedčany, the birthplace of many Zeteks.