the countless everyday articles made of plastics of all different kinds ever think even once
of the outstanding research scientist to whose scientific work the technical production of all
these materials – which are essential features of modern-day life now – is in the final
analysis attributable? [42]
The fact that Staudinger had never been in the limelight much until then was due
in no small part to his attempts to avoid being in the public eye. The Radio Revue
concluded that he was not a man who drew attention to himself. The WAZ
emphasised that Staudinger’s pupils left “one after another to earn top salaries in
industry, while the old man himself stayed modestly where he was in his institute
making sure his findings were absolutely watertight”. So it is no surprise that
Staudinger was unwilling to believe the rumours which went around for days
beforehand that he would be receiving the Nobel Prize in Chemistry that year.
The news finally came out on 4 November 1953 and spread throughout the world
press. Staudinger himself had still not received official confirmation from the Nobel
Prize committee so, as he revealed later: “I was rather uncomfortable with the
coverage, since all the press releases appeared to me to be somewhat premature.”
This was quite apart from the fact that he was not looking forward to all the interest
in his person that he anticipated and preferred to be evasive for the time being:
‘I thought of my colleague from Freiburg, who received this honour in 1935 – (the
biologist, editor’s note) Dr (Hans, editor’s note) Spemann (1869–1941, editor’s note). He
had a terrible night at the time. I therefore disconnected my phone in the evening and slept
well’ The seventy-two-year-old told this story as if it were a successful practical joke [. . .].
The professor was asleep and did not notice any of the fuss that was being made at the
Freiburg telephone exchange, where the switchboard operators were put under pressure by
phone calls from Rome, Paris, New York and many German towns and cities requesting
connection at long last to number 2874, the one that belonged to the new Nobel Prize
winner. [41]
When he woke up on 5 November, he was therefore very pleased to read the
telegram from Stockholm that has already been mentioned above, as it eliminated
any doubts. “When asked to comment on the award that had been made to him, the
new German winner of the 1953 Nobel Prize in Chemistry said: ‘It is the final
recognition of my work and it is wonderful that I am still here to enjoy it!’” [42]. He
considered the Nobel Prize to be the “culmination of a battle about the controversial
field of macromolecular chemistry, for the scientific recognition of which he had
been forced to fight for many long years” (quoted from Hamburger Echo, 6 November 1953). “The Strasbourg Professor (Charles, editor’s note) Sadron (1902–1993,
editor’s note), who ran an institute of macromolecular chemistry himself, had
explained to him the previous year that he, Staudinger, would probably not have
obtained so many groundbreaking insights into macromolecular chemistry if he had
not been attacked so fiercely from all sides. This conflict with his opponents is what
drove him to do all his hard work and made him a truly great research scientist”, the
Schwarzwa¨lder Bote, to whom the new Nobel Prize winner had given an interview,
wrote on 8 November 1953.
Staudinger was embellishing his past a little to the press here. Because although
he faced resistance from his scientific colleagues initially, industry quickly “took
126
M. Weber and G. Deussing
of the outstanding research scientist to whose scientific work the technical production of all
these materials – which are essential features of modern-day life now – is in the final
analysis attributable? [42]
The fact that Staudinger had never been in the limelight much until then was due
in no small part to his attempts to avoid being in the public eye. The Radio Revue
concluded that he was not a man who drew attention to himself. The WAZ
emphasised that Staudinger’s pupils left “one after another to earn top salaries in
industry, while the old man himself stayed modestly where he was in his institute
making sure his findings were absolutely watertight”. So it is no surprise that
Staudinger was unwilling to believe the rumours which went around for days
beforehand that he would be receiving the Nobel Prize in Chemistry that year.
The news finally came out on 4 November 1953 and spread throughout the world
press. Staudinger himself had still not received official confirmation from the Nobel
Prize committee so, as he revealed later: “I was rather uncomfortable with the
coverage, since all the press releases appeared to me to be somewhat premature.”
This was quite apart from the fact that he was not looking forward to all the interest
in his person that he anticipated and preferred to be evasive for the time being:
‘I thought of my colleague from Freiburg, who received this honour in 1935 – (the
biologist, editor’s note) Dr (Hans, editor’s note) Spemann (1869–1941, editor’s note). He
had a terrible night at the time. I therefore disconnected my phone in the evening and slept
well’ The seventy-two-year-old told this story as if it were a successful practical joke [. . .].
The professor was asleep and did not notice any of the fuss that was being made at the
Freiburg telephone exchange, where the switchboard operators were put under pressure by
phone calls from Rome, Paris, New York and many German towns and cities requesting
connection at long last to number 2874, the one that belonged to the new Nobel Prize
winner. [41]
When he woke up on 5 November, he was therefore very pleased to read the
telegram from Stockholm that has already been mentioned above, as it eliminated
any doubts. “When asked to comment on the award that had been made to him, the
new German winner of the 1953 Nobel Prize in Chemistry said: ‘It is the final
recognition of my work and it is wonderful that I am still here to enjoy it!’” [42]. He
considered the Nobel Prize to be the “culmination of a battle about the controversial
field of macromolecular chemistry, for the scientific recognition of which he had
been forced to fight for many long years” (quoted from Hamburger Echo, 6 November 1953). “The Strasbourg Professor (Charles, editor’s note) Sadron (1902–1993,
editor’s note), who ran an institute of macromolecular chemistry himself, had
explained to him the previous year that he, Staudinger, would probably not have
obtained so many groundbreaking insights into macromolecular chemistry if he had
not been attacked so fiercely from all sides. This conflict with his opponents is what
drove him to do all his hard work and made him a truly great research scientist”, the
Schwarzwa¨lder Bote, to whom the new Nobel Prize winner had given an interview,
wrote on 8 November 1953.
Staudinger was embellishing his past a little to the press here. Because although
he faced resistance from his scientific colleagues initially, industry quickly “took
126
M. Weber and G. Deussing