Adolf Nill

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Adolf Nill with his chimpanzees Cora and Joko, 1894.

Adolf Nill (born February 22, 1861 in Stuttgart , † January 26, 1945 in Legau ) was a German veterinarian and from 1892 director of the Stuttgart private zoo Nills Tiergarten , which his father Johannes Nill had founded in 1871. The zoo was not only one of the main popular attractions of the Württemberg capital, but also enjoyed nationwide appreciation. In 1906 the zoo was closed for financial reasons.

Life

childhood

Adolf Nill shoots the seriously injured elephant "Peter", 1893.

Adolf Nill was born on February 22nd, 1861 in Stuttgart, the seventh of 9 children. His parents were the master carpenter Johannes Nill (1825-1894) and the carpenter's daughter Friederike Layh (1831-1897). In 1871 his father founded Nills Tiergarten , which was connected to a restaurant. The company was a family business. Johannes Nill ran the zoo, his wife and six daughters ran the restaurant, looked after the baby animals and took part in looking after the animals. Adolf Nill grew up with the animals in his vicinity and also worked on the farm.

education

Soon, Adolf Nill wanted to base his practical experience on a solid theoretical education. After attending grammar school or secondary school in Stuttgart, he began studying veterinary medicine at the Royal Veterinary School in Neckarstrasse 141. The course lasted 7 semesters and consisted of a 3-semester scientific preparatory course and 4 semesters of theoretical and intensive practical training. Around 1882 he completed his studies with a license to practice medicine.

His father placed great trust in his son from an early age. In 1879, while still a student, he sent the 18-year-old to Marseille to transport an elephant to Stuttgart. His son brought this adventure to a happy end, and the elephant "Peter" was a main attraction of the zoo for many years. In 1893, however, Adolf Nill had to shoot the elephant, who had seriously injured himself, with his own hand.

Working life

Adolf Nill taking painting lessons with his chimpanzees Cora and Joko, 1894.

In 1892 Johannes Nill handed the management of the zoo into the hands of his 21-year-old son, who "grew up with the development of the garden from his youth and was inaugurated in its plans through many years of collaboration with his father". After the death of his father in 1894, Adolf Nill took over the zoo on lease from his mother. In 1897 his mother died and he became the owner of the zoo, which he continued to "with great love and skill". The zoo continued to develop under his leadership. His breeding successes in anteaters, which he reported on in Brehms Tierleben and in the journal “Der zoologische Garten”, attracted international attention among zoologists.

On October 11, 1900, he married Berta Bofinger (1875–1947), the daughter of the commercial gardener Wilhelm Bofinger and his second wife Bertha Jedele. Like his sisters, his wife also worked in the family business. After his mother's death in 1897, she took over the management of the restaurant that had been temporarily leased.

Note: For information on Adolf Nill's work as zoo director and the development of the zoo, see Nills zoo .

In 1905 Adolf Nill was forced to give up the zoo for financial reasons. He sold the site to the city of Stuttgart and the animals to other zoos. He had to use a large part of the proceeds to pay off the accumulated debts. After all, he was able to build a stately villa based on plans by Paul Bonatz at Relenbergstrasse 35, where he lived with his family until the bombing in 1944. For a few years he acted as a consultant for the small zoo on the Doggenburg, which was newly founded in 1907 and which also took over some of his animals. He bought the Waldhof excursion cafe in the Feuerbacher Valley, where he also ran a farm and ran a dairy cure facility. In 1931, in his “Memorandum on the Stuttgart Tiergarten Question”, he presented a fully developed model of an urban zoo on the Hasenberg . However, it would be almost two decades before Stuttgart received its public zoo, the Wilhelma . The Lake Constance aquarium in Friedrichshafen, built in 1932 according to the plans of Adolf Nill's son Hans, was given up again in 1935.

  •  

  • The residence and business of the Johannes and Adolf Nill families.

  • Residential building in Nills zoo with warm house on the ground floor (code 4).

  • Residential building in Nills Tiergarten.

Retirement

Grave of the Adolf Nill family.

When Adolf Nill's house at Relenbergstrasse 35 was bombed by air raids in 1944, he and his family found refuge in Legau in the Allgäu. There he died at the age of 84 on January 26, 1945. His wife Berta died two years later on August 4, 1947 at the age of 71. Both were buried in the Prague cemetery in the family grave (section 16), where Adolf's parents, his son Hans with his wife and three of his sisters with their spouses rest.

family

The marriage of Adolf and Berta Nill had a son, Hans Nill (1905–1965), who took up the profession of architect. He married Gabriele Baisch (1908–2007), who gave him a son, Rolf Nill (1937–2015), who also became an architect. From 1979 until his retirement, he was head of the building construction department in Tübingen.

Publications

  • Adolf Nill: The ermine is a welcome guest in the zoo. In: The zoological garden , volume 28, 1887, pages 93–94.
  • Adolf Nill: Scurvy in chimpanzees. In: The zoological garden , volume 31, 1890, pages 353–356, online .
  • Adolf Nill: An elephant killing in Nill's zoological garden in Stuttgart. In: The zoological garden , year 35, 1894, pages 21-27.
  • Adolf Nill: Festschrift for the 25th anniversary of J. Nill's zoological garden: 1871-1896. Stuttgart 1896.
  • Adolf Nill: The reproduction of the great anteater (Myrmecophaga jubara) in Nill's zoological garden in Stuttgart. In: The zoological garden , volume 48, 1907, pages 145–151, online .
  • Adolf Nill: [Breeding the great anteater]. In: Alfred Edmund Brehm (editor); Otto zur Strassen (editor): Brehms animal life: general customer of the animal kingdom. 10: The Mammals; 1. Monotones, marsupials, insectivores, flutter animals, aardvarks, pangolins, xenarthra. Leipzig 1912, pages 535-538.
  • Adolf Nill: Memorandum on the Stuttgart zoo question. Stuttgart 1931.

literature

  • Uwe Albrecht: pleasure and teachings. The history of the bourgeois Stuttgart zoo in the 19th century. Part 2: Nills Zoo (1871–1906). In: The zoological garden , volume 71, 2001, pages 15–56. - With literature list.
  • Julius Bazlen: At the Nill: Memories from the Tiergarten. Stuttgart 1925.
  • Angelika Frisch: The former veterinary school in Stuttgart (1821–1912). Sources and materials for veterinary training in Württemberg. Hanover 2001, online .
  • Hermann Griebel: Local family book of Bodelshausen: 1570 - 1910. Plaidt 2014, number 2014.
  • Carl Benjamin Klunzinger : History of the Stuttgart zoo. In: Annual Books of the Association for Fatherland Natural History , Volume 66, 1910, Pages 167–217, online . - With literature list.
  • Jörg Kurz: From Affenwerner to Wilhelma - Stuttgart's legendary animal shows . Belser-Verlag , Stuttgart 2015, ISBN 978-3-7630-2701-9 , pages 24-57.

Web links

Commons : Tiergarten Nill  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Footnotes

  1. ↑ The main rescue station of the German Red Cross is located on the site of the former veterinary school.
  2. ↑ #Frisch 2001 , page 103.
  3. ↑ #Nill, Adolf 1894 , #Bazlen 1925 , pages 8-11.
  4. ↑ # Klunzinger 1910 , page 26.
  5. ↑ #Lohss 1872 , page 28.
  6. ↑ #Nill, Adolf 1907 , #Nill, Adolf 1912 , #Kurz 2015 , page 32.
  7. ↑ #Griebel 2014 , Family Register Stuttgart, Stuttgart Address Book 1900.
  8. ↑ #Short 2015 .
personal data
SURNAME Nill, Adolf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German veterinarian and zoo director
DATE OF BIRTH February 22, 1861
PLACE OF BIRTH Stuttgart
DATE OF DEATH January 26, 1945
Place of death Legau