A book has been published about the history of the vanished Klatovská Škodovka

“He works at the Schifauer’s,” I’ve been hearing since childhood, and it was at a time when the factory family Schifauer had long ceased to live in Klatovy and their factory bore completely different names. Nevertheless, people still referred to it as it had been known for a hundred years of existence.
I only knew the factory from that "he works at the Schifauer’s" and from glimpses of the factory walls that had surrounded it for years, behind which rose a disordered jumble of buildings. The chimneys dominated everything, but so did the unmistakable silhouette of the tower-like boiler room in the Art Nouveau style. When, two years ago, the complete demolition of the entire area was imminent, I was not affected by any sentimentality or nostalgia. I was enchanted by the charm of the factory buildings from the early last century and, together with many Klatovans, outraged by the thought of their destruction. I was wounded by the city’s course of action and the arrogance of the company to which the factory belonged at that time.
In this book, I do not deal with the entire history of "Škodovka," but only with several buildings of the original Schifauer Factory for Machines, Boiler Houses, and Foundries of Metals and Iron in Klatovy. I have attempted to document the course of the entire affair, which very adversely affected not just me but a large part of the public. Perhaps some saw the matter in a different light and came to a different conclusion. That is possible. After all, they can also write a book. Here, I present to the kind reader a mosaic of events, opinions, letters, documents, and photographs, as they came to me, with all the risk that I may commit historical inaccuracies, as some facts are already covered by layers of ambiguities, forgetfulness, or my own lack of patience to search more thoroughly for the facts.
The unfortunate affair of "Klatovská Škodovka" divided the citizens into two camps. Those who agreed with the blanket demolition of the area and the construction of a shopping center, and those who expressed their disagreement in various degrees of resistance. Whether it was radical opposition to both the demolition and the construction or simply a call for a more sensitive approach. In this dispute, I tried to invoke interest in several monuments of industrial architecture, believing that preserving these buildings would give the city something valuable. Like others, I was unsuccessful.
And what remains for a person if their opinion has not been heeded, or even considered? What can one do when the feeling of being wronged begins to dangerously flood the mind? There aren’t many options left, but there is one. One can write a book. And that is exactly what I did.

At the beginning of 2007, the Škodovka in Klatovy was demolished. Hypermarkets were built on an area of seven hectares. With the liquidation of all factory buildings, the structures of the original Schifauer machine shop also ceased to exist. Many citizens publicly expressed their disagreement with both the demolition of the area and the project of the landowner to build a large shopping center adjacent to the historic center of the town. The owner did not yield to the civic requests at that time, nor did the overwhelming majority of city councilors.
The book "What They Demolished" describes this affair and documents the positions and opinions of many citizens and experts. The book features contributions from JUDr. Jiří Štancl, who describes the case from a legal perspective, PhDr. Richard Biegel, who emphasizes the significance of the monument in the chapter “The Historian's Perspective,” and Ing. Pavel Domanický from the NPU Plzeň, whose correspondence with the author of the book is published in the chapter “Eighteen Days of Correspondence with the Heritage Protector.”
A large part of the book is dedicated to the history of the Schifauer factory, complemented by a compelling interview with Richard Schifauer, who was thirteen when the factory was taken away from his family. The book is enriched with a large number of photographs.
The author is a sculptor living in Klatovy, and the book is published at his own expense.

The book is available in bookstores in Klatovy
or by order via email: fialavaclav@seznam.cz