Emanuel Šlechta, engineer and entrepreneur in the First Republic of Czechoslovakia

Anotace: This article traces the political, economic, and technical activities of Professor Emanuel Šlechta in the pre-war period and just after 1945. The aim is to answer the question: “What were Emanuel Šlechta’s activities during the First Republic and how did they help him in his later role as Czechoslovak Minister of Technology?” The text covers in chronological order the period between the two world wars, when Šlechta completed his technical studies in Prague and completed an internship in industrial factories in the USA, then gained crucial experience in the Bata concern, and gradually developed into an important national economist and expert in the field of labour organisation. This led to his appointment as a minister after World War II.