Albert Plohnke

Albert Plohnke (2005)

Albert Plohnke as an 18-year-old aircraft engineer (1943)

Albert Plohnke (born August 1, 1925 at Gut Carlswalde, Insterburg district , East Prussia ; † January 25, 2009 in Bad Kissingen ) was an aircraft flight engineer and technical operations manager. His life's work was to "build bridges between the blind and the sighted".

Life

Plohnke was the son of a veterinarian from Königsberg (East Prussia). The high school student Albert, who was enthusiastic about aviation - he had long since obtained his ABC glider license - had attended Lufthansa in Königsberg for a technician training course , after graduating from high school in 1942, he received further training as an aircraft flight engineer and was still a student Patent for the development of a new type of friction shift lock for coupling two aircraft engines.

In 1943 he came to the Luftwaffe combat unit in Giebelstadt near Würzburg (Lower Franconia, Bavaria) and, as a flight engineer, was part of the crew of a " Reichsfeuerzeug ", the Heinkel He 177 , whose two engines per wing were built too close to each other and therefore easily overheated and too often caught fire. Due to this design flaw, his pilot had to make an emergency landing on October 30, 1944 while approaching the home base with the engines burning. Plohnke was thrown out of the cockpit and completely lost his eyesight.

For more than a year he was completely blind in the University Eye Clinic in Würzburg with no prospect of restoring his eyesight. The former head of the clinic, Professor Georg Schaltbrand (1897–1979), finally became aware of him. Schaltbrand, who in later decades would even find international recognition as the “ multiple sclerosis pope ”, was only allowed to work as a gardener at his own clinic as a Nazi victim. Nevertheless, the doctor secretly treated Plohnke in his gazebo - with success: after a few more months, the vision finally returned to Plohnke's right eye, but the left eye remained blind throughout his life. In the summer of 1946, after almost two years, Albert Plohnke was released back into the “world of the sighted”.

This experience motivated Plohnke to worry about the blind, visually impaired and other fateful people for the next 60 years.

Although he was already trained engineer, he made during his career in 1960 in addition to and voluntarily nor the master's certificate in mechanics - craft , because this master craftsman was the necessary condition, visually impaired or blind youngsters in special workshops for the disabled to be able to give a technical education. During his vacation time he drove the sick and the old for walks in their wheelchairs.

After working as a technical manager in Erlangen ( Middle Franconia , Bavaria) and Rain near Augsburg (Bavaria), he moved to Bad Kissingen (Lower Franconia, Bavaria) in 1981 . There he immediately began his varied life's work for blind and visually impaired residents and guests of the spa town , which was only to bring him official honors after 20 years. Even as an 80-year-old, when he was already living in the retirement home, Plohnke was the daily contact person for the visually impaired and was in contact nationally and internationally with associations for the blind who wanted to benefit from his experience of 60 years of commitment to the blind.

Albert Plohnke died on January 25, 2009 in Bad Kissingen from the consequences of a fractured femur and an infection.

Life's work

The neutrality of this article or section is disputed. A reason is given on the discussion page . You can get more information here .

Signage in Braille in the "Fragrance and Touch Garden"

All offers for the blind or severely visually impaired are voluntary and purely private and in any case free of charge for the participants.

• In 1981 Plohnke campaigned for the installation of an acoustic traffic light in his new home town .
• In 1983 he invented the “ Week of the Life Artists ” in Bad Kissingen, a series of events for the blind and visually impaired that is still unique in Germany, which Plohnke has been holding every year in spring and autumn with the support of local associations and driving schools as well as the Federal Border Guard : In addition to specially designed city tours, Concerts and riding lessons give blind people the unique opportunity within a few days to drive a car themselves or even to pilot a motorized airplane as a pilot.
• From around 1995 he organized concerts several times a year by the blind musicians from Munich, a self-help company of the Bavarian Association of the Blind and Visually Impaired . A group of nine 20 to 30 year-olds played melodies from swing to classical without ever having seen sheet music or a conductor.
• In 1999, Plohnke was the first in Germany to have a city guide printed in Braille (2 volumes) for blind guests in the spa town ; as a supplement, he created a structured city ​​map for the blind, readable by the blind, for individual city tours.

Plants with Braille lettering
in the "fragrance and touch garden"

• He organized special hikes through the Stations of the Cross on Bad Kissingen's Stationsberg : Bases set into the floor gave blind people the opportunity to feel the high-standing images of saints , and panels in Braille provide the appropriate explanations. As an offer for individual walks through the Stations of the Cross, Plohnke had discussed a CD with the explanations.
• He saw to it that a special " fragrance and touch garden " was set up, in which blind people should expressly touch, rub and smell local plants.
• He led daily city tours for the blind and visually impaired as an offer for clinics, sanatoriums , hotels, but also for individual travelers.
• In selected restaurants in the spa town, he had specially trained the service staff to serve blind guests and prepared menus in Braille.
• At his own expense he lent typewriters for the blind (inventor: Oskar Picht ) and white long sticks to sanatoriums and schools for therapy and teaching purposes.
• Plohnke held information lessons at local schools on the subject: “ What does it mean to be blind? "
• He organized the Christoffel-Blindenmission mission in the Bad Kissingen pedestrian zone.

Orders and decorations

• Citizen Medal of the City of Bad Kissingen (2001)
• Medal of Merit of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (2001)

literature

• Sigismund von Dobschütz: The second life of Albert Plohnke , in: " Main-Post " from November 5, 2005, online