Red-Haired Zora Thematic Trail
This educational and adventurous tour takes you through the history and legend of Zora, a brave girl from Senj who became a symbol of the fight against injustice. The tour starts at Điga, the former marketplace, where Zora defended her friend Stjepan from an attack by high school students. The tour also includes a visit to the Velika vrata, a monument from the Josephine road era, and the Nehaj Fortress, where the Uskoks lived—ancestors of Zora and her friends.
This tour is ideal for families, young people, and anyone who wants to experience Senj through a story of loyalty, friendship, and the fight for justice.
Red-Haired Zora
The novel “Red-Haired Zora and Her Gang” was written by Kurt Kläber under the pseudonym Kurt Held after his stay in Senj before World War II, and it was first published in 1941. The eponymous TV series, consisting of 13 episodes, was filmed in 1978 in Senj as a German-Swiss-Yugoslav co-production.
The story takes place in Senj in the 1930s, and Kurt Held based it on real people and events. Fourteen-year-old Zora is the leader of a gang of orphans who call themselves Uskoks and hide in the Nehaj Fortress above Senj. The gang survives on small thefts, but they only steal from the rich. After 12-year-old Branko loses his mother, the neighbors, after the funeral, send him to his grandmother in the village. The grandmother is a cruel old woman, eccentric, who sends Branko away the next day to fend for himself. Branko soon gets into trouble and ends up in jail, from which Zora rescues him, and he joins Zora’s gang, which includes Nikola, Đuro, and Pavle—all children without parents.
Alongside Branko and Zora’s story runs a subplot about the conflict between local powers—the wealthy peasant Karaman and the corrupt mayor—and the poor fisherman Goriano, the only protector of the orphans.
For those who already know and love Zora, as well as for those who are just discovering her, we have prepared a thematic trail in which the animated character of Red-Haired Zora, in a modernized version, will guide us through the most important locations in and around the town where the series was filmed. In the series, many amateurs from Senj also acted alongside professional actors, including two boys from Senj—Branko and Nikola—who were part of Zora’s gang. Numerous extras from Senj also participated, so while walking through Senj today, you might still encounter some actors or extras from the series…
Let’s revisit interesting scenes from the series and find the locations where they were filmed. Let’s set off with Zora to discover the town under Nehaj!