The Academy of Sciences in Vienna 1938 to 1945 Austrian Academy of Sciences Johannes Feichtinger, Herbert Matis, Stefan Sienell, Heidemarie Uhl (Eds.)
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JOHANNES FEICHTINGER, HERBERT MATIS, STEFAN SIENELL, HEIDEMARIE UHL (EDS.) THE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES IN VIENNA 1938 TO 1945 AUSTRIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES JOHANNES FEICHTINGER, HERBERT MATIS, STEFAN SIENELL, HEIDEMARIE UHL (EDS.) The Academy of Sciences in Vienna 1938 to 1945 together with Silke Fengler Translation from German: Nick Somers, Cynthia Peck-Kubaczek Translation of the exhibition catalog Johannes Feichtinger, Herbert Matis, Stefan Sienell, Heidemarie Uhl (eds.) Die Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien 1938 bis 1945. Katalog zur Ausstellung (Vienna 2013). ISBN 978-3-7001-7367-0 Illustrations on the cover: Background: ÖNB, Bildarchiv, Sign. L32608C Seal: AÖAW, Siegelsammlung British Library Cataloguing in Publication data A Catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library Printed on chlorine-free bleached cellulose, acid free, non-ageing paper Alle Rechte vorbehalten / All rights reserved ISBN 978-3-7001-7537-7 Copyright © 2014 by Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften / Austrian Academy of Sciences Wien / Vienna Gesamtherstellung / produced by: Ferdinand Berger & Söhne Ges.m.b.H., A-3580 Horn http://hw.oeaw.ac.at/7537-7 http://verlag.oeaw.ac.at Printed and bound in the EU Table of Contents Table of Contents Preface to the English edition (The Editors).................................................... 7 Preface (Helmut Denk) .................................................................................. 9 I. THE “ANSCHLUSS” AND NAZI RULE .............................................. 11 The “Anschluss” and Nazi Rule. Austria 1938–1945 (Arnold Suppan) . 13 The initial reactions to the “Anschluss” in the Academy of Sciences (Stefan Sienell) ..................................................................................... 21 I. 1. THE PROTAGONISTS ........................................................................... 27 The Presiding Committee of the Academy during the Nazi Era (Herbert Matis) .................................................................................... 27 Heinrich (von) Srbik (1878–1951) and the Academy of Sciences (Martina Pesditschek) ........................................................................... 35 The two careers of Fritz Knoll. How a botanist furthered the Nazi Party’s interests after 1938 – and successfully lived it down after 1945 (Klaus Taschwer) ................................................................. 45 I. 2. CONSEQUENCES OF THE “ANSCHLUSS” ................................................. 53 Exclusion of members (Herbert Matis) ................................................ 53 Filling of vacant positions following the exclusion of ordinary members (Stefan Sienell) ..................................................................................... 61 Consequences for the academic staff. The case of Leo Hajek (Marlene Wahlmüller) .......................................................................... 69 Administrative staff (Stefan Sienell) ...................................................... 77 The revision of the Statutes (Herbert Matis) ......................................... 87 I. 3. NEW PROGRAMMATIC AND STRUCTURAL ORIENTATION ............................ 93 Speeches by Academy President Heinrich (von) Srbik at the Ceremonial Sessions (Herbert Matis) ................................................... 93 Expelled, burnt, sold, forgotten, and suppressed. The permanent destruction of the Institute for Experimental Biology and its academic staff (Klaus Taschwer) ................................................ 101 Transformations in research policy (Johannes Feichtinger) ................... 113 Science “in the service of the German people” (Johannes Feichtinger) .. 123 6 Table of Contents I. 4. NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL INTERCONNECTIONS ............................. 133 The “national honor” of German Academies. The Vienna Academy caught between national and international academic cooperations (Felicitas Seebacher) ............................................................................. 133 “Increase the achievements of German science by all available means”. The National Socialist Project of the Reich Academy of German Sciences (Felicitas Seebacher) ............................................................... 141 II. DEALING WITH NatiONAL SOCIALISM AFTER 1945 ................ 149 Tasks and areas of responsibility of the new Presiding Committee (Johannes Feichtinger/Dieter J. Hecht) ................................................ 151 Denazification at the Academy of Sciences (Johannes Feichtinger/Dieter J. Hecht) ................................................ 163 1945 and after. One break and two continuities (Johannes Feichtinger/Dieter J. Hecht) ................................................ 181 Centennial anniversary of the Academy of Sciences 1947. Austrian identity – new positioning in the international scientific community – suppression of the Nazi era (Heidemarie Uhl) ................. 191 III. SHOrt BIOGRAPHIES .................................................................... 201 IV. APPENDIX .......................................................................................... 251 Abbreviations ........................................................................................ 253 Bibliography ......................................................................................... 254 Table of figures ...................................................................................... 263 Index of names ...................................................................................... 265 Notes on contributors ........................................................................... 270 Preface to the English edition Some preliminary remarks are necessary to ensure the correct use and better under- standing of the English translation of the German edition published in March 2013. The use of quotation marks (“ ”) denotes a quote taken from a published source or a citation from a scholarly work, for which a footnote indicating that source will always be given. Quotation marks will also be used for specific National Socialist expressions and jargon. In as far as these terms are already widely understood in (American) English, they will be printed in normal script, otherwise in italics. Furthermore, all quotes from unpublished primary sources will be italicized. All quotations, be they from scholarly works or from unpublished texts, have been translated into English, even though the original texts were, as a rule, in German! The term “Academy of Sciences” as the translation for “Akademie der Wissen- schaften” appears frequently in the text. The editors are aware of the fact that the English term “sciences” is generally used to denote the natural sciences only, whereas the German term “Wissenschaften“ also includes the “Humanities and Social Sciences.” However, since the (albeit inadequate) English designation “Austrian Academy of Sciences“ is well established for the “Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften,” this has been adopted in the present volume. The translation “full member” for “wirkliches Mitglied” and “ordinary member” for “ordentliches Mitglied” is ambivalent insofar as both the two German terms and the two English terms can be used synonymously. Their difference lies only in that with the so-called “Vorläufige Satzung” (Provisional Statutes) of July 1938, the term “ordinary member,” then in force in the German Reich, was adopted in favor the Austrian term “full member“ used until that point. With the reinstitution of the Academy Statutes of 1922/1925, the term “full member” was once again used in Vienna from 1945 on. For the translation of specific National Socialist terminology, Robert A. Michael and Karin Doerr’s Nazi-Deutsch. An English lexicon of the language of the Third Reich = Nazi German (Westport/Conn., 2002) was consulted. The editors would like to thank Nick Somers and Cynthia Peck-Kubaczek for the translation as well as Joanna White for copy-editing. The Editors Preface The “Anschluss” of Austria with the National Socialist German Reich in March 1938 signified a profound break for the Academy of Sciences in Vienna. On 18 March 1938 the longtime Academy President Oswald Redlich resigned; on recommenda- tion of the remaining members of the Presiding Committee, the Academy General Assembly of 25 March requested corresponding Academy member Fritz Knoll to safeguard “the interests of the regional administration of the Nazi party in Austria with regard to the Academy of Sciences until the final regulation of the Academy Statutes.” The botanist Knoll was an illegal Nazi and, on 15 March, had become the commissarial rector of the University of Vienna. “Meritorious” Nazis were immediately appointed as directors of the Academy institutes. Under the newly elected President Heinrich Srbik, the Academy of Sciences was “enthusiastically and dutifully at the exclusive service of the Greater German Volksstaat [people’s State],” as Srbik declared in his inaugural speech in November 1938. The scholarly activities should stand – as stated programmatically in the new Statutes – in “the service of the German people.” With the Nazis’ seizure of power, Academy members and staff members were forced to leave the Academy for political and “racial” reasons. They were persecuted and expelled; they died in Nazi concentration camps. Not only were human tragedies connected to this, but also irretrievable losses for Austrian scholarship. Academy Organizations like the Institute