Franz Xaver Hofmann

Franz Xaver Hofmann, around 1960

Franz Xaver Hofmann (born August 21, 1921 in St. Gallen ; † February 23, 2003 in Neuhausen am Rheinfall ) was a Swiss geologist and head of the molding laboratory at Georg Fischer AG .

Life

Franz Hofmann was born as the third child of Johann and Sophie Hofmann-Scholl in St. Gallen. After dropping out of his commercial training, he made up his federal Matura and then studied geology at the University of Zurich . In 1949 he presented his dissertation "On the stratigraphy and tectonics of the St.Gallisch-Thurgau Miocene (Upper Freshwater Molasse) and on Lake Constance geology", which was published in 1951. In 1960 he completed his habilitation on sediment petrography of molasse deposits at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich , where he also worked as a lecturer.

From 1951 until his retirement in 1986, Franz Hofmann worked at Georg Fischer AG , where, among other things, he set up the molding material laboratory. Thanks to his geological, petrographic and foundry technological knowledge, he developed various test methods, procedures and production processes in the field of foundry mold materials.

As a part-time job, Franz Hofmann did research in various geological departments and mapped and documented over 800 square kilometers for the geological atlas of Switzerland. In total he wrote over 100 scientific and popular scientific papers. In 1993 he donated his extensive rock collection to the Museum zu Allerheiligen Schaffhausen .

Franz Hofmann was married to Rosi Mosberger and the father of two sons.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Dissertation reference to swissbib
2. ^ Obituary in the communications of the Schaffhausen Natural Research Society
3. ↑ Collection documentation in the iron library
4. ^ Obituary in the Bulletin for Applied Geology