Jaroslava Ondrová, née Gartnerová, was born on 26 October 1932 in Ostrava. She attended a Czech elementary school.
Her grandfather, Herman Goldberger, owned an inn on Hlučínská Street which played an important role in the cultural and social life of Jewish families. Her parents joined the resistance, helped family members, refugees from the Sudetenland, and hid people who refused to show up for a deportation transport. In September 1942, the Gestapo arrested them on a tip-off.
Her mother was murdered shortly afterwards in Auschwitz. Jaroslava and her sister Vera were taken by a maid to non-Jewish relatives, to their father's sister in Hodonín, where they lived secretly until the end of the war. The father was eventually released from prison, but for fear that he might endanger them, he did not see his daughters until April 1945.
The interview was recorded on 10 June 1997 in Veselí nad Moravou.