Tatra Technical Museum

Tatra is the world's third oldest car maker after Daimler and Peugeot.  The company was founded in 1850 as a wagon and carriage manufacturer.

It's name comes from the nearby Tatra mountains in Slovakia.

The Tatra Technical Museum is located in Kopřivnice, a small town of 25,000 people, located in the north east part of the country.  It is about 35 km (22 miles) from Ostrava.  It's about 2,5 hours from Brno by train.


The museum does a great job showing the more than 160 years of the company.  If you're an old car lover then this is the place for you.

The Präsident

In 1897, the Präsident was the first motor car produced in Central Europe.  Of course back then it was Austria-Hungary.  Czechoslovakia didn't become a country until 1918.

T-57

The T-57 sport convertible was known as the Hadimrška.  It was produced from 1931 to 1936.  Notice the right-hand drive?  Czechoslovakia drove on the the left side of the road until 1938.  The Nazis forced the change when the land was under the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia.

The company stopped producing passenger cars in 1999.  What a shame because from a design perspective they were producing some very stylish rides.  At least until the Nazis and communists took things over.

Tatra still produces all-wheel-drive trucks.

The 815 GTC 6x6 expedition vehicle traveled around the world from 1987 to 1990.  In 37 months it traveled almost 150.000km (93,206 miles), through 68 countries, on five continents.

Here's a bit about Tatra from a 1993 episode of the BBC's show Top Gear that I found on YouTube.

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