Clock tower transformation underway in Czech Village

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa — Work has begun to transform the National Czech & Slovak Museum & Library clock tower into a Prague-style astronomical clock.

A dozen hand-crafted figurines recently arrived from Slovakia to be installed in the tower, along with fully digitized clock workings from the Czech Republic.

Clockmaker Vítězslav Špidlen, his son, Radim Špidlen, and Jiří Lev and Robert Holeček, worked on the astrolabe — the complex astronomical and clock mechanism — on Monday, Sept. 9, 2024, to prepare it for installation.

Their arrival from the Czech Republic coincided with the delivery of the 12 figurines that will be added on carousels on the clock tower to reflect immigrant stories, with a farmer, a coal miner and other sculptures representing those who came to the United States from Czech, Slovak and other lands.

The figurines will rotate on the hour to the music of Czech composers Antonín Dvořák and Bedřich Smetana.

According to the museum, the 42-inch figures were carved from white oak by sculptor Andrej Haršány,
based in Borová, a village near Bratislava, Slovakia. In July 2024, the statues were honored by the villagers and government dignitaries with a farewell party, then carefully prepared for the journey to Cedar Rapids.

Later this month, Czech President Petr Pavel and Slovak President Peter Pellegrini plan to be in Cedar Rapids for the dedication of the museum’s Buresh Immigration Tower, as the clock will be known.

More: Museum plans reprise of presidential visit

The dedication will take place at noon Sept. 27. An invitation also has been extended to former President Clinton, who attended the museum’s dedication in 1995, along with Czech President Václav Havel and Slovak President Michal Kováč. Havel died in 2011 and Kováč in 2016.

The museum is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.

See photos and learn more about plans for the clock tower.

Read more from the museum:

Cecilia Rokusek, the museum’s president and CEO, noted that the famous Prague astronomical clock, or orloj, and most other orlojs around the world, have only one side displaying a clock. The museum’s has four. It is one of only eight similar orlojs in the world, and the only one of its kind in North America.

The project was led by Dr. Dalibor Mikulas, COO, who worked with Library Director
David Muhlena and Board Trustee/Architect Bruce Hamous. Together, they researched
histories and images of actual Czech and Slovak immigrants. They worked directly with
the sculptor to create specifications for period-correct figurines.

“These are amalgams — homogenous mixes of several characters,” Hamous explained. “We call them ‘the 12.’”

Mikulas noted that the statues were specifically designed to withstand Cedar Rapids,
Iowa, and its “special weather.” Each has 5-6 layers of different paint and protective
substances to preserve each statue for years.

A special group of engineers from Prague traveled to Cedar Rapids. They will stay for three weeks to install the clock mechanism for the orloj’s astronomical clock. The sculptor is expected to arrive on September 15 to install the figurines.

Once the tower is operational, the windows will open, and they will appear as they rotate on two carousels, every hour on the hour. Their movement will be accompanied by the music of Czech composers Dvorak and Smetana.

“May we always remember what the immigrants did for building this nation,” Rokusek said. “That is what we’ll see in this tower. Democracy in action.”

Find more information about the dedication and other events planned to commemorate
the anniversary year at ncsml.org.