Place:Poprad, Poprad ve Spišské Sobotě, Slovensko, Czechoslovakia

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NamePoprad
Alt namesDeutschendorfsource: Wikipedia
Poprádsource: Wikipedia
TypeCity or town
Coordinates49.05°N 20.2°E
Located inPoprad ve Spišské Sobotě, Slovensko, Czechoslovakia
Also located inPrešov, Slovakia    
source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names
source: Family History Library Catalog


the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Poprad (; German: Deutschendorf) is a city in northern Slovakia at the foot of the High Tatra Mountains, famous for its picturesque historic centre and as a holiday resort. It is the biggest town of the Spiš region and the tenth largest city in Slovakia, with a population of approximately 50,000.

The Poprad-Tatry Airport is an international airport located just outside the city. Poprad is also the starting point of the Tatra Electric Railway (known in Slovak as Tatranská elektrická železnica), a set of special narrow-gauge trains (trams) connecting the resorts in the High Tatras with each other and with Poprad. Main line trains link Poprad to other destinations in Slovakia and beyond; in particular, there are through trains running from Poprad to Prague in the Czech Republic.

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

The territory was since the Migration Period inhabited by Slavic settlers. The first written record dates from March 16, 1256 in the deed of donation of the Hungarian King Bela IV. It was colonized in the 13th century by German settlers and became the largely German town Deutschendorf meaning 'Germans' village'. From 1412 to 1770, as one of the Spis towns, Poprad was pawned by the Kingdom of Hungary to the Kingdom of Poland, resulting in a strong Polish influence on the city's further development. In the 17th century, the number of Germans began to decline. In January 1919 this territory was placed under the control of Czechoslovakia.

Poprad itself was for 690 years (up until 1946) just one of several neighbouring settlements, which currently make up the modern city. The other parts of the current municipality are Matejovce (German: Matzdorf; Hungarian: Mateóc, first reference 1251), Spišská Sobota (German: Georgenberg; Hungarian: Szepesszombat, 1256), Veľká (German/Hungarian: Felka, 1268), and Stráže pod Tatrami (German: Michelsdorf; Hungarian: Strázsa, 1276). The most significant of these original towns was Georgenberg, now Spišská Sobota, which preserved its dominant position in the area until the late 19th century.

In 1942, during World War II, most of the transports of Jews to ghettos and concentration camps in German-occupied Poland were sent from the Poprad railway station. The first transport of about 1,000 Jewish girls and young women left Poprad on March 25, 1942 for Auschwitz-Birkenau. By the end of 1942, when the deportations stopped, over 58,000 Jews had been deported from Slovakia to Poland via Poprad.

Poprad was liberated on January 28, 1945 by troops of the Soviet 18th Army. The German population was expelled afterwards.

After the war, with the development of winter sports, Poprad became the starting point for expeditions to the High Tatras.

In 1999, Poprad put in a bid to host the 2006 Winter Olympics, but lost to Turin, Italy.

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This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Poprad. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.