Shortly after the Nazis seized power in 1934, the Dean of Freiburg University
and famous philosopher Martin Heidegger, new member of the Nazi party and
at that time deeply impressed by the Nazis, denounced Hermann Staudinger. He
proposed the immediate dismissal of Hermann Staudinger by claiming without any
proof that Staudinger would be an opponent and was only pretending in public to
support the Nazi movement [15]. Staudinger was summoned by the secret police
(Gestapo) and questioned for many hours. They forced him to sign his own
dismissal request without dating it, threatening him that they would immediately
seize him as soon as he opposed the regime. The Nazis imposed on him a ban on
foreign travel, which massively disabled his scientific activities. Staudinger understood this clear message. In public he demonstrated his obedience and his Naziconforming attitude. However, his application for Nazi party membership was
rejected. Although Staudinger tried hard to acquire the reputation of an antiSemite, expressing his concerns about the presence of too many non-Aryans in
academia, in his institute he helped his half-Jewish assistants like Gerhard Bier to
survive. He pointed out to the Nazi government their important contributions to the
German war effort, thus enabling them to carry on their work in his institute.
Among others, Hermann Staudinger’s coworker Elfriede Husemann also suffered
under the Nazi rule. Her career was delayed on purpose because the Nazis saw the
primary role of women in motherhood but not in academic careers [20]. On
November 27, 1944 the Allied bombing destroyed a large part of the city of
Freiburg, including Staudinger’s laboratory and the entire chemical laboratory.
Although his institute was rebuilt, the difficult situation and shortages typical of
the German postwar period severely impaired Staudinger’s research.
6 Staudinger and His Institute of Macromolecular
Chemistry
For many years, Staudinger’s macromolecular chemistry was an unloved and alien
daughter of organic chemistry. Since most industrial polymers have fairly broad
molecular weight distributions and frequently ill-defined composition, comprising
complex multicomponent and multiphase systems, most hard-core organic chemists
considered polymer chemistry to be Schmierenchemie (goo chemistry). Soon,
Hermann Staudinger realized that a new platform was in urgent need to foster
interdisciplinary research on polymer sciences, train students, and communicate
research results. In 1940, Staudinger founded the Institute of Macromolecular
Chemistry in Freiburg as the first European research center devoted exclusively
to research on polymer sciences. At the beginning, his institute was embedded in
the organic chemistry department, but became an independent research institution
of the state of Baden in 1945. Then, in 1956, it was integrated as an independent
institute into the University of Freiburg. Figure 3 shows an artist’s contemporary
view of a Staudinger laboratory in the 1950s.
28
H.-J. Cantow and R. Mu ¨lhaupt
and famous philosopher Martin Heidegger, new member of the Nazi party and
at that time deeply impressed by the Nazis, denounced Hermann Staudinger. He
proposed the immediate dismissal of Hermann Staudinger by claiming without any
proof that Staudinger would be an opponent and was only pretending in public to
support the Nazi movement [15]. Staudinger was summoned by the secret police
(Gestapo) and questioned for many hours. They forced him to sign his own
dismissal request without dating it, threatening him that they would immediately
seize him as soon as he opposed the regime. The Nazis imposed on him a ban on
foreign travel, which massively disabled his scientific activities. Staudinger understood this clear message. In public he demonstrated his obedience and his Naziconforming attitude. However, his application for Nazi party membership was
rejected. Although Staudinger tried hard to acquire the reputation of an antiSemite, expressing his concerns about the presence of too many non-Aryans in
academia, in his institute he helped his half-Jewish assistants like Gerhard Bier to
survive. He pointed out to the Nazi government their important contributions to the
German war effort, thus enabling them to carry on their work in his institute.
Among others, Hermann Staudinger’s coworker Elfriede Husemann also suffered
under the Nazi rule. Her career was delayed on purpose because the Nazis saw the
primary role of women in motherhood but not in academic careers [20]. On
November 27, 1944 the Allied bombing destroyed a large part of the city of
Freiburg, including Staudinger’s laboratory and the entire chemical laboratory.
Although his institute was rebuilt, the difficult situation and shortages typical of
the German postwar period severely impaired Staudinger’s research.
6 Staudinger and His Institute of Macromolecular
Chemistry
For many years, Staudinger’s macromolecular chemistry was an unloved and alien
daughter of organic chemistry. Since most industrial polymers have fairly broad
molecular weight distributions and frequently ill-defined composition, comprising
complex multicomponent and multiphase systems, most hard-core organic chemists
considered polymer chemistry to be Schmierenchemie (goo chemistry). Soon,
Hermann Staudinger realized that a new platform was in urgent need to foster
interdisciplinary research on polymer sciences, train students, and communicate
research results. In 1940, Staudinger founded the Institute of Macromolecular
Chemistry in Freiburg as the first European research center devoted exclusively
to research on polymer sciences. At the beginning, his institute was embedded in
the organic chemistry department, but became an independent research institution
of the state of Baden in 1945. Then, in 1956, it was integrated as an independent
institute into the University of Freiburg. Figure 3 shows an artist’s contemporary
view of a Staudinger laboratory in the 1950s.
28
H.-J. Cantow and R. Mu ¨lhaupt