Morawetz-Glaser Family Collection

Richard Morawetz was born in 1881 in the town of Úpice, Bohemia (then part of Austria and called Eipel, today part of the Czech Republic), and was the son of Ludwig and Berta Morawetz. He had two siblings who lived to adulthood, Moritz and Elsa. The family owned a large cotton factory, and Richard eventually took over management of the plant in the town of Hronov. After the death of his father in 1901, Richard went to England for an apprenticeship there. After his return to Hronov, he met and became a friend of Thomas Masaryk, then a professor of philosophy; Masaryk encouraged him to write articles about the cotton industry. Richard Morawetz became a regular contributor to Masaryk's magazine, Naša Doba. In 1904 Richard joined the board of the Czech Textile Manufacturers' Association. That year he also went on a tour of the United States, including meeting President Theodore Roosevelt. The following year Richard and his elder brother Moritz took over the family's jute factory in Úpice. In 1909 Richard established a day care center for the children of the factory's employees. From October 1910-April 1911 he travelled for business through southern and eastern Asia, including visiting Ceylon (today Sri Lanka), India, Burma (today Myanmar), China, and Japan. He would later give lectures about his trip. In 1911 he was appointed to the Industrial Council of Vienna.

In 1914 Richard Morawetz met Frida Glaser, shortly before World War I began. Frida Glaser was born in Velim, also located in Bohemia, the youngest daughter of the chocolate manufacturer Adolf and Hedwig (née Dub) Glaser. Richard and Frida married in January 1915, with a honeymoon spent in Dresden, Nuremberg, and Berlin. Richard had bought an estate, including a castle, in the town of Světla nad Sázavou in 1914, and the family lived there for a number of years. Their eldest son Herbert was born in October 1915, followed by Oskar in 1917, Honza (later John) in 1919, and Sonia (later Sonja) in 1921.

In 1920 the family moved from Světla nad Sázavou back to Úpice, although they would return to Světla in the summers. After the death of his brother Moritz in 1922, Richard became sole owner of the family's Úpice jute factory. The family moved to Prague in the spring of 1926. In 1932 Richard became President of the International Cotton Congress.

After the Munich Agreement in 1938, Richard Morawetz was at first reluctant to leave Czechoslovakia but eventually left with Frida for France on April 1, 1939 after all their children had left. Their son Oskar was studying in Paris since December 1938. Meanwhile, Honza (John) Morawetz had already arrived in England in September 1938. In January 1939 Herbert and Sonja also left for England, with Sonja going to a boarding school in Bristol. Herbert and John went to Belfast, where the family had business connections and where John worked throughout the war. Herbert returned to Czechoslovakia, but left in the middle of March 1939, travelling to Poland and France, where he joined his parents and brother. In May 1939 his parents left for England; Herbert joined them in London a month later. Oskar Morawetz went to Italy. Richard and Frida Morawetz arrived in Canada in September 1939, and settled in Toronto. There Richard Morawetz bought the Hamilton Carharrt Co., a clothing company. Herbert and Sonja left for Canada in December 1939. In April 1940 Oskar Morawetz left Italy by way of the Canary Islands, arriving in the Dominican Republic; he joined the rest of the family in Toronto in June 1940.

Herbert Morawetz studied chemistry at the University of Toronto and the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, and became a professor of chemistry at the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn (now Tandon School of Engineering at New York University (NYU)). He married Cathleen Synge, daughter of the mathematician and physicist J.L. Synge, who herself became a professor of mathematics at New York University. Herbert and Cathleen would have four children. Oskar Morawetz would go on to study music at the University of Canada and became a successful and well-regarded Canadian composer, working with musicians and other composers such as Yo-Yo Ma, Zubin Mehta, and Vladimir Ashkenazy. He was also awarded the Order of Canada and performed at the Prague Spring music festival. Oskar Morawetz married Ruth Shipmann and they had two children. John Morawetz married Maureen McKae, with whom he had five children. Sonja married Richard Sinclair; they had three children.

Richard Morawetz became a notable figure in Toronto's Czech community. He also was the Czechoslovak delegate at the World Labor Conference in New York in 1941, and in 1944 was elected to the governing body of the International Labor Organization in Philadelphia. He passed away in 1965, Frida in 1997.

(Based largely on information from Herbert Morawetz's memoirs and the website about Oskar Morawetz; see: Related Material)