Czech engineers

Milán Václavík (28 March 1928 – 2 January 2007) was a Slovak-origin Czechoslovak military officer with the rank of colonel general. He served as defence minister from 1985 to 1989, being the last communist-era defence minister of Czechoslovakia.

Paul Hatschek (March 11, 1888 – May 15, 1944) was a Czech engineer of optical and film technology and a member of the German Resistance against Nazism during the Third Reich. He was involved with Robert Uhrig and then became a leading member of the resistance group, the European Union. According to Robert Havemann, Hatschek was under Gestapo surveillance for years. He was arrested in 1943 and subjected to intensive interrogation, resulting in him giving the Nazis numerous names of fellow resistance members. His daughter and his wife were among those arrested. All three were brought before the Volksgerichtshof and sentenced to death. He was executed at Brandenburg-Görden Prison in May 1944; his wife and daughter were executed at Plötzensee Prison, his daughter in May 1944, his wife in December 1944.

František Janeček was the founder of Jawa motorcycles and an important figure in the development of the Czech motorcycle industry. He died on 4 June 1941.

Adolf Herz (1862–1947 in Lucerne), an Austrian Mechanical Engineer was born in 1862 in Nový Jičín (German: Neutitschein), Moravia, now part of the Czech Republic, as son of a well-to-do brewery owner. After completing the Realschule in Brno, Moravia, he studied mechanical engineering at the k&k Technische Hocshschule in Vienna, where he eventually settled down and obtained "das Bürgerrecht". He opened a werkstatt to produce some of his inventions, mainly related to automobiles, which then were in their infancy. He invented a much improved sparkplug, and a more effective shock absorber.

Miroslav Hajn (21 September 1894 in Žamberk, Austria-Hungary – 6 September 1963 in Prague, Czechoslovakia) was a chief designer at ČKD-Praga, one of the largest engineering companies in the former Czechoslovakia and today's Czech Republic.

Karl Arnstein (March 24, 1887, Prague – December 12, 1974, Bryan, Ohio) was one of the most important 20th century airship engineers and designers in Germany and the United States of America. He was born in Prague, Bohemia (now the Czech Republic) to Jewish parents. He developed stress analysis methods that have been incorporated into bridges, airships and airplane materials. Before his involvement in airships he was one of the main engineers in building the Swiss Langwieser Viaduct.

Emil Kolben (1 November 1862 in Strančice – 3 September 1943 in Terezín) was an engineer and entrepreneur from Bohemia. The large engineering company ČKD bears his name. He died in the Theresienstadt concentration camp.

Mirek Topolánek (born 15 May 1956) is a Czech politician and business manager who served as Prime Minister of the Czech Republic from 2006 to 2009 and Leader of the Civic Democratic Party (ODS) from 2002 to 2010. Between 2006 and 2009, Topolánek was the member of the Chamber of Deputies (MP) and Senator from Ostrava from 1996 until 2004. After leaving the politics in 2010, Topolánek has been active in the electric power industry.

František Pitra (born 13 November 1932 in Chroustovice) was the Prime Minister of the Czech Socialist Republic (then part of Czechoslovakia) from October 11, 1988 through February 6, 1990. Like his four predecessors, he was a member of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. Pitra attended an agricultural engineer in the years 1951-1955 graduated from the University of Agriculture in Brno. He obtained his degree in agricultural engineer from the University of Agriculture in Brno (today Mendel University Brno).

Emil Ritter von Škoda (18 November 1839 – 8 August 1900) was a Czech engineer and industrialist, founder of Škoda Works, the predecessor of today's Škoda Auto and Škoda Transportation.