The Town-hall
Besides
the churches the most important building in a Western European town is
"das Rathaus" or "l'Hôtel de Ville" - the centre of the local goverment.
As opposed to these centuries old historic buildings the majority of Hungary's
towns can only pride themselves on hardly 100 or 150-years-old town-halls.
The last decade of the 19th century brought new achievements for our bourgeois
civilization. In 1859, after hardly seven years of common governing Tata
and Tóváros (Lake-town) became independent again. Both of the communities
had to be content with ramshackle town-halls, in spite of their - mainly
Tata's - conspicuous progress. Demolishing the old town-hall of Tata became
inevitable by the end of the 1880s. The site in Market Squre seemed to
be convenient, so it became the basis for the tenders. Antal Geschrey,
a member of a dynasty of architects, whose family had come from Sárvár
but lived in Budapest at that time won the competition. After an "auction",
typical of its era, entrepreneur Wenczel Witauschek was entrusted with
the execution in May, 1885. He was pressed for time: the "subtenancy" was
not favourable for office work.
The town-hall "at present the only appropriate building in our town besides
the castle" was inaugurated in March, 1886.
