VILIAM ŠIROKÝ A JÚLIUS ĎURIŠ – RODINNÝ PÔVOD, SOCIÁLNE POMERY A ZAČIATKY PÔSOBENIA V KOMUNISTICKOM HNUTÍ

Viliam Široký and Július Ďuriš, who lived in a nationally mixed environment, were convinced communists from their youth. The fact that they came from socially weak backgrounds also influenced their ideological orientation. Široký engaged in the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia from its origin and quickly gained a place among the most important communist functionaries in Slovakia. As a result of his studies, Ďuriš only began his career as a professional revolutionary at the end of his twenties, but in this period he already showed his radicalism. From the beginning of their revolutionary activities, Široký and Ďuriš came into conflict with the state authorities and were forced to live in illegality for some time. During the internal party crisis around the turn of the years 1928-1929, they joined the group around Klement Gottwald and supported the so-called Bolshevization of the CPC. Široký later worked in the apparatus of the Communist Internationale. In 1935 he became a member of parliament. In the mid-1930s, Ďuriš became organizational secretary of the Regional Leadership of the CPC in Slovakia.