Čech family's mills in Berounka region in the early times of electrification of Bohemian countryside
Abstract
At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the development of Czech miller's craft was strongly influenced by the phenomenon called electricity. In hundreds of Czech mills dynamos were installed to make electricity, which was often supplied to the surrounding areas, too.
Gradually, there were also built so-called electric mills powered by electric motors, which represent the most modern form of mill power. Already at the turn of the centuries, small hydroelectric plants were built, which sometimes pushed out the original production.
Small hydro plants as well as mills producing electricity played a major role in electrification of villages. The reason was that many of them supplied electricity for the street lamps long before the general electrification was introduced.
Single and particular examples show these trends, i.e. in mills in Nezabudice, Slabce and Šlovice, situated in Rakovník region in central Bohemia. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Nezabudice and Šlovice mills were owned and the Slabce one was built by the Čech family.
The mills in Nezabudice and Šlovice lie in the middle part of the 139-km-long Berounka River. In both of them the old technologies (water wheels) were replaced by modern ones (water turbines) in the first two decades of the 20th century.
While the Nezabudice mill still served for its original purpose after that, the water mill mechanism in Šlovice was dismantled in 1919 and taken to another mill. That is why the water mechanism below Šlovice later continued to function only as a small hydro plant.
On December 6th, 1920, this plant became the first one in Rakovník district to supply local electrical network with alternating current. However, electrification of the district town of Rakovník did not start until 1925.
The Šlovice small hydro plant also supplied current to the roller mill in Slabce, which was constructed during the years 1918 and 1919 by Václav Čech, and probably ranks among the oldest electric mills in Bohemia.