Anton traffic jams

Anton Staus (born September 5, 1872 in Heidelberg -Handschuhsheim, † July 21, 1955 in Pullach near Munich ) was a German mechanical engineer and astronomer .

Staus studied mechanical engineering at the Technical University in Karlsruhe . In 1904 he received his doctorate there as Dr.-Ing. and then worked as a lecturer. In 1899 he became a chief engineer . In 1914 he followed a call to the State Engineering School in Esslingen am Neckar . Due to the outbreak of the First World War , traffic jams were initially unable to take up this position. He served with the rank of lieutenant as a balloon observer on the Western Front. He was only able to take up his professorship in Esslingen in November 1918 . Here he occupied himself a. a. with heat engines . He was retired in 1930 as a result of an ailment sustained during the war. In the same year he moved to Pullach.

In addition to mechanical engineering, traffic jams worked intensively on astronomy and the improvement of telescopes and telescope mounts. As a high school student, through a family friendship, he met the astronomer Max Wolf , who had set up his own observatory in Heidelberg and was engaged in the photographic discovery of asteroids .

Staus discovered the asteroid (335) Roberta on a photographic plate on September 1, 1892 . It was the twelfth asteroid that was discovered by photographic means.

In 1905, Staus set up a private observatory in Karlsruhe-Rüppurr , the main instrument of which was a telescope with an opening width of 20 cm . He supported Max Wolf in the construction of the "Bruce Telescope" for the State Observatory in Heidelberg-Königstuhl . After moving to Pullach, he also set up an observatory there. Due to his extensive knowledge of the construction of telescopes, he was often visited by professional and amateur astronomers and asked for advice. So he gave z. B. the impetus for Anton Kutters development of the Schiefspiegler . He published his experiences in the book Telescope Mountings and Their Protective Structures for Star Friends , which was published in 1952 and has inspired numerous amateur astronomers to build them to this day.

Web links

• A. Kutter: Anton Staus. Communications of the Astronomical Society, Vol. 9 (1958), p. 5. (Obituary)