15.4 Europe and America, November 1918
to July 1924
In the immediate post-war years, Haber’s royalties were still tied to the
BASF’s fortunes, but as foreign competition increased and hyper-inflation
‘bit’, these were amounting to virtually nothing—especially between 1923
and 1924 when Haber was paid by the BASF in useless paper Marks. There
are traces of a later financial settlement between the BASF and Haber for this
period but as for Robert’s private contract at the time, 40% of nothing would
have amounted to nothing. But the period from November 1919 to March
1924 also saw the migration of fixation technology out of a defeated
Germany, the award of a Nobel Prize to Haber and then to Nernst, the
premature end of Haber’s royalty payments, a ‘spat’ between Robert and
Haber over money, and the end of a weak pre-war trend which had occasionally associated Robert’s name with Haber’s in both a professional and a
‘popular’ sense. But through it all Robert remained very much in ‘Haber’s
shadow’, because events across the world—especially in Germany, the UK,
Sweden and America—led to Haber/Haber-Bosch stories dominating the
history of fixation. For historians and biographers alike, these momentous
events suffocated any memory of Robert’s contribution to fixation, so when
the story eventually came to be told, he was abandoned.
15.4.1 Events in Germany
Even before Robert left Berlin, the French began their occupation of German
territory declaring the occupied region a ‘de-militarised’ zone. But
‘de-militarisation’ was not the only Allied objective, and Carl Bosch realised
that his factories and their secrets could now be regarded as ‘assets’, or even
worse, destroyed completely in an attempt to prevent Germany ever waging
war against her neighbours again. For Haber, the impending occupation of
Ludwigshafen meant uncertainty regarding the payment of his future royalties,
22 and so he generously made a new private contract with Robert to
make a direct payment to him for the year 1918, but this time from his own
funds.
23 Presumably, the contract was again at 40% but whether Robert’s
share of the additional 0.7 Pfennig kg
−1 due to Haber from the BASF
(Chap. 14), was included we simply don’t know as, according to
Szöllösi-Janze (Chap. 14), Haber’s post-war financial matters are utterly
impenetrable. In the event, and probably due to the confusion in Haber’s life
15 The Post-war Years 1919–1930
329
to July 1924
In the immediate post-war years, Haber’s royalties were still tied to the
BASF’s fortunes, but as foreign competition increased and hyper-inflation
‘bit’, these were amounting to virtually nothing—especially between 1923
and 1924 when Haber was paid by the BASF in useless paper Marks. There
are traces of a later financial settlement between the BASF and Haber for this
period but as for Robert’s private contract at the time, 40% of nothing would
have amounted to nothing. But the period from November 1919 to March
1924 also saw the migration of fixation technology out of a defeated
Germany, the award of a Nobel Prize to Haber and then to Nernst, the
premature end of Haber’s royalty payments, a ‘spat’ between Robert and
Haber over money, and the end of a weak pre-war trend which had occasionally associated Robert’s name with Haber’s in both a professional and a
‘popular’ sense. But through it all Robert remained very much in ‘Haber’s
shadow’, because events across the world—especially in Germany, the UK,
Sweden and America—led to Haber/Haber-Bosch stories dominating the
history of fixation. For historians and biographers alike, these momentous
events suffocated any memory of Robert’s contribution to fixation, so when
the story eventually came to be told, he was abandoned.
15.4.1 Events in Germany
Even before Robert left Berlin, the French began their occupation of German
territory declaring the occupied region a ‘de-militarised’ zone. But
‘de-militarisation’ was not the only Allied objective, and Carl Bosch realised
that his factories and their secrets could now be regarded as ‘assets’, or even
worse, destroyed completely in an attempt to prevent Germany ever waging
war against her neighbours again. For Haber, the impending occupation of
Ludwigshafen meant uncertainty regarding the payment of his future royalties,
22 and so he generously made a new private contract with Robert to
make a direct payment to him for the year 1918, but this time from his own
funds.
23 Presumably, the contract was again at 40% but whether Robert’s
share of the additional 0.7 Pfennig kg
−1 due to Haber from the BASF
(Chap. 14), was included we simply don’t know as, according to
Szöllösi-Janze (Chap. 14), Haber’s post-war financial matters are utterly
impenetrable. In the event, and probably due to the confusion in Haber’s life
15 The Post-war Years 1919–1930
329