Smolková-Keulemansová was born on 27 April 1927, in Prague, the Czech Republic (then Czechoslovakia) to a Jewish family. She had a normal childhood in Czechoslovakia as an only child to her parents Alice and Oskar. She finished primary school and had started grammar school but was taken out of school by her father after anti-Jewish laws started  applying to grammar schools. She was employed at various Jewish workshops after leaving school.