August gardener

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August gardener

August Gärtner (born April 18, 1848 in Ochtrup ; † December 21, 1934 in Jena ) was a German medical officer, hygienist and university professor.

Life

August Gärtner was the eldest of three sons of the surgeon Johannes Gärtner and his wife Jenny geb. Dahme. He initially attended the boys' pension of Joseph Knickenberg (1814-1884) in Telgte and then the high school in Münster . After he had passed the Abitur in the fall of 1867, he continued his training at the Medicinisch-Surgical Friedrich Wilhelm Institute in Berlin. In 1868 he became a member of the Pépinière-Corps Suevo-Borussia. As a field assistant doctor he went to the Franco-German War . He took part in the Battle of Gravelotte , the Battle of Sedan and the Siege of Paris . In 1872 he passed the Rigorosum magna cum laude , the state examination cum laude . With a doctoral thesis on pressure ulcers , he was awarded a doctorate in Berlin on January 27, 1872. med. PhD .

Promoted to assistant doctor on January 24, 1873, he served a year in Wesel with the 57th Infantry Regiment and was then transferred to the Imperial Navy for twelve years . He spent two and a half years in East Asia and two and a half years in South America. On July 24, 1877 he became a medical officer. From January 1, 1884 to April 1, 1886 he was assigned to the Imperial Health Department . Here he worked under the direction of Robert Koch . On June 22, 1886 he resigned from his military duties as a naval staff doctor.

On May 10, 1886, he accepted an appointment as associate professor at the University of Jena . On June 27, 1887 he was given the chair of hygiene. With that he became director of the Hygiene Institute in Jena, but found extremely primitive conditions there. He described them as follows:

“Now I was a professor of hygiene, but how! There was no hygienic institute. I was allowed to give my lectures in the lecture hall of Prof. Rossbach's internal clinic. In the hall there was a small kitchen cabinet leaning proudly against the back wall, on which the students had written in chalk: Hygiene Institute. "

In 1888, Gärtner identified the pathogen responsible for mass meat poisoning , which has since borne his name: Bacillus enteritidis Gärtner . In the summer semester of 1893 he became rector of the Salana , worked as a member of the Reich Health Council and was a member of the councilor of the Imperial Biological Institute for Agriculture and Forestry. Although Gärtner got into this professorship without a habilitation, he was quite effective. He helped organize the epidemic and hygiene policy of the then small states of Thuringia, dealt with solutions for faeces and waste management and campaigned for a modern sewer system in Jena. With his knowledge of hygiene, Gärtner was always at the side of the citizens of his hometown of Ochtrup with advice and assistance. On April 1, 1915, he was retired . However, a large area of ​​responsibility remained for the hygiene professor. With the outbreak of the First World War, Gärtner became the hygienic advisory board for all military hospitals of the XI. Army Corps . He organized the hygiene issues in prisoner-of-war camps. Gärtner was released from the German army on December 31, 1918 . He was buried in the north cemetery (Jena) in a grave of honor (Grabfeld 21, Grab 53).

Act

At the end of the 19th century, hygiene was seen as a borderline science that encroached on various areas of daily life. Above all, however, the increasing industrialization left a lot of residues in the water and soil in the environment of that time. They were a breeding ground for the most varied of bacterial cultures and caused health problems for various individuals. Gärtner was well versed in almost all areas of hygiene, but water hygiene was a particular concern of his. Well known for his expertise in this field, he was involved in the planning of the water supply and sanitation of numerous municipalities at home and abroad. That is why Gärtner's scientific work was very varied. Gärtner wrote over 90 scientifically printed works that deal with all areas of hygiene, for example ship, city and apartment hygiene, water and food hygiene, as well as war hygiene. He also wrote scientific papers on wastewater , disinfection and bacteriology .

One of Gärtner's best-known books is The Hygiene of Water , then also known as the “Water Bible”. As a water specialist, he was not only in demand in Germany, but was also consulted as an expert across the borders. Gärtner worked in Luxembourg , Saint Petersburg , Moscow , Belgrade and Cairo , among others . August Gärtner discovered the paratyphus pathogen named after him , also known as the “Gärtner bacillus”.

family

Grave of August Gärtner in the north cemetery in Jena

August Anton Hieronymus Gärtner married Caroline (Lilly) Auguste Josephine Maria Pross on October 23, 1878 in Münster. Lilly (born September 25, 1857, † October 20, 1921) was the daughter of the Münster merchant and city councilor Friedrich Wilhelm Proß . Friedrich was the son of the mayor (1814 to 1831) of Ochtrup, Clemens Alexander Ignatius Maria Proß (1777–1834). From the marriage comes the son Wolfgang Gärtner (born June 26, 1890 in Jena, † December 10, 1921 in Russia) and the daughter Anne-Marie Gärtner (born October 26, 1893 in Jena, † June 23, 1982).

Honors

Gärtner received numerous honors, which he did not care much about: "In thick medals, the entire geography of Thuringia is shown on my bosom."

Works

  • Ventilation conditions on board SMS Moltke. In: Quarterly Public Health. 1881.
  • Instructions for health care on board merchant ships. Berlin 1888.
  • Hygiene guide: for students, doctors, architects, engineers and administrators. Berlin 1892, 1896, 1899, 1905, 1909, 1914, 1920, 1923.
  • Ceremonial speech given in the University Church of Jena for the presentation of the academic prizes on July 8, 1893, the day of the fortieth anniversary of the reign of His Royal Highness the Grand Duke Carl Alexander. Jena 1893.
  • About methods, the possibility of judging the infection of a water. Berlin 1895.
  • The hygiene of drinking water. Berlin 1897.
  • The sources in their relationship to groundwater and typhus. Jena 1902.
  • The hygiene of the water . Vieweg, Braunschweig 1915. ( digitized version ), Braunschweig 1916.
  • Water and soil. Leipzig 1919.
  • The water supply and sewage disposal in the Rhenish-Westphalian industrial area. Munich 1927.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kösener Corpslisten 1960, 61, 20
  2. ↑ Royal University Library Berlin: Directory of Berlin University Writings, 1810–1885. P. Weher, Berlin, 1899, p. 520, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
  3. ^ Marc C. Winter: Institutionalized hygiene in Germany under the conditions of the war 1914–1918: people, problems, ideologies. (= Modern history of medicine and science: sources and studies , 35). Centaurus-Verlag, Freiburg im Breisgau 2013.
  4. ↑ August Gärtner on his 70th birthday. In: German Medical Weekly , April 18, 1918, p. 439. (online)
  5. ↑ Tomb in the handicapped guide
  6. ↑ German Order Almanac. (OA) Berlin, 1908/09, column 429 (digitized version)
personal data
SURNAME Gardener, August
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Gardener, August Anton Hieronymus (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German physician and microbiologist
DATE OF BIRTH April 18, 1848
PLACE OF BIRTH Ochtrup
DATE OF DEATH December 21, 1934
Place of death Jena