This discontinued .22 autoloader is among many rimfire rifles produced by CZ at Uhersky Brod.

The Uhersky Brod facility, completed in 1936, existed a short time as a subsidiary of CZ Prague before Hitler demanded the annexation of Sudetenland. In 1938 Neville Chamberlain capitulated, returning from the Munich conference to boast to the British people of "peace in our time." Unopposed in its brazen bid for this huge chunk of central Czechoslovakia, Hitler promptly snatched it. To no one's surprise east of Berlin, he soon occupied the rest of the country, too.

After the war, Germany relinquished the lands it had seized. Czechoslovakia became, briefly, self-governing. Then in 1948, Communists took control of the country. The new regime declared in essence that CZ would become what Zbrojovka Brno had been: a primary firearms manufacturer. Ceska Zbrojovka in Strakonice resumed handgun production, subsequently building the Model 52 (CZ arms, says Milan, have traditionally been named for the year of design, not introduction). It also turned out motorcycles and drive chains. Uhersky Brod's factory tooled up to make rimfire rifles, air guns and autoloading shotguns. In 1955 the facility separated "in every way" from Strakonice and ceased being a subsidiary. As if to confirm its new independence, CZ announced its first pistol, the Model 50. Pistol production at Strakonice stopped.

Nine years later the government further throttled firearms manufacture at Brno. "Handguns had never accounted for more than 3 percent of sales at Brno," Milan tells me. "While the Brno factory was allowed to build a few rimfire and centerfire rifles after 1964, its production shifted almost entirely to tractors, typewriters and other non-sporting equipment. Because the Brno name was so respected, the government retained it on ZKK, ZKM and 527 rifles of the middle '60s-- though all of them came from CZ Uhersky Brod."

In 1960 the plant here was enlarged considerably. Says Milan, "You can distinguish those newer buildings, as they have flat roofs. Original structures still wear the peaked tile roofs designed to help the factory blend into the town when viewed from the air." In other words, when viewed through a bomb sight.

During the 1970s and '80s CZ Uhersky Brod produced mainly military arms. Toward the end of this period, according to Milan, sporting guns accounted for only 20 percent of sales. The facility shipped a lot of gears for airplanes and power hydraulic devices for tractors.