Dobiáš Human Rights Fellowship Established at Law School

OCTOBER 6, 2008—The University of Minnesota Law School recently received an endowment of $100,000 from William E. Drake ('66) to establish the Dobiáš Human Rights Fellowship in honor of Přemysl Josef Dobiáš and his wife Hana Budlovsky Dobiáš.

Dobiáš grew up near Prague and studied in France and England, but after the Munich agreement and subsequent dismantlement of Czechoslovakia, life changed dramatically. Although not Jewish himself, he noted that measures against Jewish citizens "took place almost immediately." In 1938, as a young lawyer and graduate of Charles University in Prague, Dobiáš joined a resistance group smuggling Jews to the relative safety of Italy.

He was arrested for these activities, tortured by the Gestapo, and eventually sent to Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria, site of the infamous granite quarry work that few prisoners survived. Dobiáš was saved by a friend, a Polish prisoner working in the camp office who arranged a transfer out of the quarry, and by his usefulness as an interpreter. (He speaks seven languages fluently.) As Allied forces drew near, the SS abandoned the camp to the police of nearby Vienna, and on May 5, 1945, the prisoners were liberated. Dobiáš has helped historians by recounting his experiences at Mauthausen and has assisted Simon Wiesenthal in bringing concentration camp guards to justice.

Hana and her parents had moved to London before the war and escaped the fate of many family members who remained in Czechoslovakia during the Holocaust. Přemysl, now age 95, and Hana live in London and were Drake's landlords in 1994 when he worked on a graduate degree at the London School of Economics. They became friends, and Drake's generous gift is given in celebration of the remarkable courage of Přemysl and Hana Dobiáš. The Dobiáš Human Rights Fellowship will be used to support a practical human rights experience for a law student or lawyer who will be placed with a human rights organization.

In addition to the ongoing support of William Drake, a dedicated friend of the Law School for the past 42 years, the Law School proudly and gratefully acknowledges a scholarship established by his mother, Ruth Dickson Drake, in memory of his father, who graduated from the Law School in 1933. The Everett A. Drake Scholarship provides financial assistance to a high-achieving law student.