Filip ČUČEK
“SUDDENLY THE RUSHING TORRENTS CAME FROM ALL SIDES AND FILLED THE SAVINA RIVER SO THAT IT RAN HIGHER THAN EVER BEFORE”
Flood control measures on the Savinja and its tributaries from the mid-19th century to the beginning of river training in the Mozirje – Levec sector (1876)
The Savinja River and its tributaries have been subject to considerable flooding in the past due to snowmelt and heavy rainfall. In the first half of the 19th century, Celje and the Savinja Valley were hit by the worst floods in 1814 and 1824, and in the second half of the century, the worst flooding was at the very beginning, in 1851. If the Celje District Office had been dealing with the river and its tributaries since the beginning of the 19th century, after the flood of 1851 they tried to take a more serious approach to the training of the »mountain« river. But until the systematic training between Mozirje and Levec in 1876-93, work was still rather inconsistent and slow.
Bojana KRALJ
“FIERCELY POPULAR, BUT UNYIELDING ON ISSUES OF PRINCIPLE”
Fran Venturini, versatile musician and teacher of the Basovizza victims
Fran Venturini, as a Slovenian teacher, felt in his life the weight of the struggle for the nation’s survival. He developed a rich musical activity as a teacher in Slovenian schools in Trieste, as a composer of Slovenian art and folk songs, as a choirmaster of numerous choirs, and as an organiser of cultural activities in Trieste and Ljubljana. He was responsible for the renewal of musical and cultural life, for choral literature, and organised and participated in choir conducting courses, in the activities of enlightenment societies and the Musical Matrix in Trieste, and later, during the wars, in Ljubljana. During his exile, he devoted his time to composing and singing choral songs. He was a kind, modest, broad-minded teacher who lived through the fascist regime, the fears and the poverty, which he accepted uprightly and steadfastly. He did not bow to the horrors of war and the regime, but countered them with music. To this end, he wrote compositions dedicated to all those who fell during the wars, and was concerned for the mother tongue and national consciousness of the Slovenes in Trieste.
Bor ZAVRL
ABOUT SOCIAL CARE NURSES, HEALTHCARE, AND THE KARAĐORĐEVIĆ DYNASTY
Support of the Yugoslav royal family for healthcare and nurses
Between the two world wars, a new preventive approach to public health was introduced in the field of medicine. Within this framework, training for a new profession – social care nurses – was also introduced. The Karađorđević royal family was very supportive of this new medical approach and profession and its mission. They were connected to and supported them in various ways. The article discusses some of the connections and forms of support for healthcare, with an emphasis on the Slovenian region.
Davor MLINARIČ
“TAKE ALMA’S BILE!”
Alma M. Karlin and her homes in Celje through archival material
The present article, based on the archival material that has survived and is still known, attempts to answer questions about Alma M. Karlin’s homes in Celje: the villa in Zagrad, the birth house on Ljubljanska cesta and the property in Pečovnik. In addition to the archival material that has been preserved, the words written by Alma herself in her works are particularly noteworthy. From these notes we learn Alma’s side of the story, why she had to leave her birth house. It acquired the White Elephant Villa in March 1939 under a contract of exchange and sold it in August 1949. She bought the property in Pečovnik in August 1933, sold it to Thea Schreiber Gam(m)elin in 1936 and left it in her will in 1948. However, as a foreign national, Thea had no legal basis to become the owner of the house in Pečovnik. In their search for a solution, they trusted the wrong people and were left without ownership. This led to a years-long court battle, where the court finally ruled in Thea’s favour.
Mateja RATEJ
TEREZIJA VAJNGERL – TETKA
A fearless Liberation Front courier in the grip of Cominform
The author focuses on the life of the Maribor housewife Terezija Vajngerl (1913-1997), who was strongly marked by the Second World War, when she proved to be a bold and courageous courier of the Liberation Front for Prlekija and Slovenske gorice, and by the post-war establishment of a new social order, when in 1949 she was subjected to a Cominform (Informbiro) show trial on the charge of inter-war collaboration with the Gestapo. The accusation concerned her contact with the Gestapo interpreter Hans Gerniak, a pre-war Maribor Hitlerite, through whom, as a courier, Tetka protected herself and her relatives after being compromised by the Gestapo, while at the same time obtaining information for the resistance movement. Her case, which resulted in her acquittal after numerous favorable testimonies from former OF collaborators, was closely linked to the prosecution of the main organiser of the resistance movement in Maribor in 1943-44, Dušan Špindler, whose courier she was.
Barbara KOČEVAR
“EVERYONE RECEIVED THE HELP THEY NEEDED FROM US”
The story of a health worker in the war for Slovenia
The article focuses on the period of the Slovenian War of Independence, not from a military or political perspective, but from the point of view of health workers who often risked their lives to help others. The story of Andrej Fink, who at the time was employed as an ambulance paramedic at the Rescue Station of the University Clinical Centre Ljubljana (UKC Ljubljana), and today is the Head of the Health Dispatching Service at UKC Ljubljana, is the main focus of the article. In March 2024, the author of this article recorded an interview with him, in which he shared his memories of the war and revealed many historical details.