Petrof Antonín, *15 August 1838 Hradec Králové, †9 September 1915 Nový Hradec Králové, Czech piano builder. He studied with his uncle J. Heitzmann in Vienna. In 1864 he founded a piano factory in Hradec Králové. Thanks to the use of the latest technical and technological solutions (including in 1875, he introduced the first cast metal frames in Austria-Hungary and his own version of the repetitive English double-action mechanics, and in 1876 a steam drive in the factory), he quickly gained wide recognition as a piano manufacturer. In 1880, he started building pianos, and in 1881 keyboards and hammer mechanisms; he also built harmoniums (in the interwar period of the 20th century, pianolas and Neo-Bechsteins). He had branches in Hungary (from 1877), Vienna (from 1895), London (from 1918), and received the title of court supplier to the imperial court. At the turn of the century, the factory employed 250 workers and took over the local companies of H. Loth and J. Vanický, the F. Kalles company in Litomyśl, and even the J. Heitzmann factory in Vienna. By 1915, 30,500 instruments were built in this factory, the largest in the empire at the time. From that year, the company was run by Petrof’s sons – Jan, Antonín and Vladimír, and from 1932 by the next generation – Dimitrij, Eduard and Eugen. In 1948, the company was nationalised, and in 1989, it was taken over again by the Petrof family. The factory is famous for its pianos, which successfully compete on concert stages with instruments from the best companies in the world. They were awarded, among others, at exhibitions in Vienna in 1877, in Barcelona in 1921, in Brussels in 1935 (Grand Prix) and 1958, in Paris in 1937. By 2000, the Petrof company had produced over 500,000 instruments.
Literature: G. Joppig Petrof — der Begründer der tschechischen Klavierbauschule, “Das Musikinstrument” XXXVI, 1987; B. Čižek 300 Years with the Piano, Prague 1999.
