Mr. Praga Emil Příhoda celebrates 90 years. Now he is losing his collection to Prague
The world’s third largest collection of single-brand cars owned by one person is inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. It currently contains exactly one hundred vehicles and 400,000 documents.
Emil Příhoda, nicknamed “Mr. Praga” in the Senate building of the Parliament of the Czech Republic, celebrated his 90th birthday in the company of a number of important politicians, veterans and friends. Among the gifts, however, was missing the one he would like the most – new spaces for his collection, ideally in the capital.
“Praga cars simply belong to Prague. It is a completely unique thing that a car manufacturer was established in our country, which was named after the capital and, moreover, the cars were manufactured directly in Prague,” explained Mr. Příhoda.
You can see some parts of his collection in our annotated photo gallery.
At the moment, the overwhelming part of his collection is located in various buildings in Chomutov, where a new Prague museum was established according to several years of old plans. He had to move out of the old one in the former farm in Zbuzany near Prague two years ago. Since 2015, it has been closed to the public due to inheritance disputes following the death of Mr. Příhoda’s son, and the building was subsequently sold to a foreign owner.
While the former management of the Ústí Region was interested in building interest, the new political department at the Regional Office in Ústí nad Labem claims that it does not currently have enough funds for a demanding project that would require the reconstruction of former industrial buildings on the outskirts of Chomutov.
Will the historical collection of the Praga brand be saved? The museum already has a covered logo
Mr. Příhoda sought to make the Prague Museum right in the capital more than five years ago, when it was already clear that he would have to move out of Zbuzan. The then mayor Adriana Krnáčová also promised to help him. However, in the end, the negotiations did not lead to any result.
The premises in Vysočany, where the car manufacturer Praga used to be, and where the cultural and social space Pragovka is now, also seemed to be an ideal location for some time. “I have some signals that there is now interest in locating the museum in some of the halls here,” a well-informed source from Mr. Příhoda’s neighborhood told us.
The first museum was created 65 years ago
Representatives of the City Hall, with whom Mr. Příhoda is also currently negotiating, did not answer the questions of the Deník and Automix.cz editors despite the urgency. So far, we can only speculate which objects would be considered for the new Prague Museum, and when the project should be implemented.
The overwhelming part of the collection will therefore remain hidden from the public for at least a number of months. However, some of the Praga fire trucks have the opportunity to see the Museum of Firefighting Technology from Zbiroh, a few copies are needed in the private museum in Mníšek pod Brdy.
Mr. Příhoda established the first Prague Museum 65 years ago in Sobín in the district of Prague-West. However, the local building soon ceased to be sufficient for the growing collection, and so he found the mentioned homestead in Zbuzany.
Mr. Příhoda’s Prague Museum is already moving to Chomutov! Meanwhile, the trucks have left
Years ago, in an interview with the author of this article, Mr. Příhoda recalled the beginnings of his passion for the Praga brand as follows: I soon realized that even this relatively simple car is a great proof of how high the Czechoslovak automotive industry was already in 1924, when this car entered, and how it played a role in the technical world, “he says.
Gradually, this brand fell through and thanks to the well-known Pragováks, who at that time met regularly in the Svět café in Liben, but often also due to the happy circumstances, he expanded the collection.
He still remembers the acquisition of the Praga Grand, which the Office of the President of the Republic used during the so-called First Republic. “I was alerted to her by a student at a driving school, where I taught technology at the time. He mentioned that she was owned by her aunt, who inherited it from her late husband.
In the following years, his collection was expanded by other examples of cars that are associated with celebrities, such as another Prague Grand, which belonged to the family of Václav Havel’s ancestors, the Golden Prague, which was owned by President Beneš, or VOS (government armored special) . The first communist presidents of the Czechoslovak Republic used it for a change.
The premises of the Prague Museum have come to life after years. However, the former owner’s vehicles are gradually disappearing
Thanks to the acquisition of some specimens, he was able to organize hardly imaginable events for the conditions of socialist Czechoslovakia. For example, when he found in a remote area of Slovakia the wreck of a very old Prague V, probably from 1912. The problem was that it was stored among mature trees, which the landowner in no way wanted to have cut down. So he had to get a special crane and transport the car to the trailer over the tops of the trees.
Perhaps even more valuable than cars, which also include unrealized prototypes of various trucks, is the almost complete archive of the Praga brand, which used to be the most important car manufacturer in Czechoslovakia until the late 1930s. It also contains documentation according to which it is possible to produce replicas of entire cars or their individual parts.