Obituary of Tivadar Mika, 1919

Since an orchard once stretched originally where the present-day Mika Hotel stands, the first residential building was only completed in 1785. This single-story house was expanded towards the courtyard in 1838 by entrepreneur Franciska Weszely, with designs by architects Lőrinc Zofahl and József Diescher.

After obtaining coffee-brewing rights from the city of Pest, French-born restaurateur Antal Legrand developed this house into a two-story property in 1843 based on the plans of architect József Hild. Following numerous changes in ownership, in 1876, the building came under the ownership of Italian-born salami maker Péter Del Medico, who established one of his meat processing factories here in Budapest.

Born in Klatovy (now Klatovy, Czech Republic), Tivadar Mika (1860-1919) decided in 1879 to settle in Hungary. After earning a great reputation with beer pumps and taps he invented, he founded a factory in Budapest in 1885, and in the same year, he married Klementina Jellinek (1863-1937) from Jičín, Czech Republic.

They had four sons from their marriage. They were: the tragically deceased younger Tivadar (1886-1890) due to tuberculosis at the age of three and a half; Gyula (1888-1937), who fought through World War I as a sailor on the Austro-Hungarian navy's SMS Viribus Unitis battleship; Nándor (1891-1944), who rose to lead the company in the rank of lieutenant, and the youngest son, István (1897-1952).

In 1896, Tivadar expanded his business portfolio. By this time, his factory no longer only produced cast iron and steel pipes, fittings, sprayers, winemaking articles, and beer pumps but also faucets, handles, candleholders, as well as unique decorative and commemorative items.

Thanks to his wealth, he acquired a 554-square-meter house at today's 47 Kazinczy Street to replace it with a two-story Secession-style tenement building planned by Jenő Marton in 1909. The factory's mechanized metalworking and turning shop operated in the back wing of the building.

The company and the house were nationalized by the communist regime in 1949. At that time, the property was occupied by lawyer Sándor Pohl, who was known not only as the advisor and confidant of Prime Minister Count Pál Teleki but also as the mayor of Újpest until 1938, and from 1939 to 1944, as the mayor of Kassa (now Kosice, Slovakia) following the reattachment of the region to Hungary.

The Mika tenement building was planned to be demolished twice. Once during the construction of Madách Boulevard in 1938 and the second in 2010 when its condition deteriorated to a dangerous level. After its renovation, the building was converted into a hotel.