A long time ago people knew how to make things. So after World War I ended, arms maker Frantisek Janecek had to fill his hand grenade and bazooka factory. How about motorcycles, young men that should be in the army pass their time on them. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
On this stamp issue remembering Czech motorcycles, two of the stamps honored Jawa motorcycles. Given the era, (1975) they chose two models that had a worker bent. This stamp showed the Jawa 175 from 1935, a new smaller and cheaper bike that tripled production. Then they showed a Jawa 250 from 1945, when the country was able to get back to motorcycles, this time without outside help or even it’s founder.
Todays stamp is issue A172 a 60 Haleru stamp issued by Czechoslovakia on September 25,1975. It was a six stamp issue in various denominations. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents whether mint of used.
Frantisek Janecek was born in Bohemia in 1878. After engineering training in Berlin, he was employed by industrialist Emil Kolben first in Prague and later as a plant manager in the Netherlands. When bicycling to work, Dutch style, he was hit by a car and was rendered first aid by his future wife, a passenger in the car. Army Service for Austria Hungary on the Italian front during World War I turned his attention to arms. Soon he was running his own factory making his designs for hand grenades, bazookas, and a devise that allowed cannons a longer time between servicing.
The changes of the 1920s saw the factory well below capacity. There was also opportunity. The motorcycle arm of German maker Wanderer was in receivership and Janecek was able to acquire a license to manufacture their design. He called the new operation Jawa from the first two letters of Janecek and Wanderer. He recruited a British motorcycle racer and later arms designer George Patchett. The line was successful and widely exported especially after the cheaper Jawa 175 from the stamp was introduced. It had a 5.4 horsepower two stroke engine and a top speed of 50 miles per hour.
The Nazi takeover saw George Patchett depart and Janecek turn his attention back to arms manufacturing. Janecek died in 1942. He left behind a design for a new motorcycle the Jawa 250, which went into production post war. This era saw Jawa’s greatest success, and they boasted being sold everywhere from California to New Zealand. Jawa became the first motorcycle maker to offer an automatic clutch. This device was quickly copied by Honda and Jawa quickly started a successful lawsuit to assure license fees from the giant Honda.
It seems that every stamp industry story ends the same way. In the 1990s Jawa motorcycle production slowed to a trickle and the firm became a tiny subsidiary of a larger Czech conglomerate. In 2018, Mahindra in India introduced a line of motorcycle that resemble the Jawa motorcycles made in India from the 1950s-1990s. Remember Mahinda also continues to make Jeeps that resemble the 1940s Willys Jeep.
Well my drink is empty but I get to have more when I toast Mr. Janesek and Mr. Patchett. Motorcycles and bazookas seem an unlikely combination that they both shared. Come again soon for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.