Fritz Knoll

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Fritz Knoll (actually Friedrich Josef Knoll; born October 21, 1883 in Gleisdorf , Styria , † February 24, 1981 in Vienna ) was an Austrian botanist and National Socialist rector of the University of Vienna . Its botanical author abbreviation is " Knoll ".

Life

Private

Knoll's parents were court adjunct Friedrich Jakob Joseph Knoll (* July 13, 1849 in Schleinitz near Marburg / Drau; † August 3, 1891 in Gleisdorf) and Maria Katharina Karl (* December 7, 1860 in Leoben; † October 11, 1953 in Gleisdorf ).

On November 5, 1923, Knoll married Sophie Maria Heisegg (born October 9, 1886, Preßburg, † April 1979) in St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna. In 1924 the daughter Friederika Maria Sophia (called Friedl) Knoll was born, who, as a doctor of botany and a teacher at a girls' high school, was to follow the example of her father. Her death on August 23, 1953 as a result of a fall from Traunstein hit Knoll hard. Knoll's son Johann Baptist Friedrich Josef (called Hans) Knoll was born in 1928, but died in 1930.

Scientific career

Fritz Knoll attended the humanistic state grammar school in Graz , where he passed his school leaving examination in 1902. He then began studying natural sciences with a focus on botany and zoology at the Philosophical Faculty of the University of Graz . In 1903 he became a demonstrator at the Botanical Laboratory and received his doctorate in 1906 with a comparative anatomical study on the stinging hairs of milkweed plants .

In 1906 and 1908/09 he worked as an assistant at the Botanical Institute of the University of Vienna under the management board Gottlieb Haberlandt and worked on the construction, development and water balance of cap mushrooms . In between, he did military service as a one-year volunteer in Pula and Kotor in the fortress artillery in 1907/08 . During this stay in the Mediterranean, he observed the pollination processes in rock roses and arum plants (Araceae). These findings together with the first publications on the honeybees' sense of color aroused his interest in flower ecology, which was to become the focus of research in his further career.

He gained further practical experience in 1909/1910 as an assistant at the Agricultural State Teaching and Research Institute in St. Michael an der Etsch in South Tyrol and from 1910 to 1912 as an assistant and in 1913 as an adjunct at the State Research Institute for Food in Graz. In 1912 he completed his habilitation in anatomy and physiology of plants at the University of Graz. In 1913 Richard von Wettstein appointed him again as an assistant at the Botanical Institute of the University of Vienna. This appointment was followed in 1914 by the habilitation for systematics and ecology of plants at the University of Vienna.

From 1914 to 1918 Knoll did military service in the Kotor naval port as a reserve officer, most recently as a first lieutenant. Again he found time here to deal with flower-ecological observations and flower-biological field work. The interactions between plants and animals during the pollination of angiosperm flowers (bedecktsamer) became the focus of his further work.

After the war he returned to the Botanical Institute of the University of Vienna. He stayed there as an assistant until he was first awarded the title of extraordinary professor at the University of Vienna in 1922. This was followed in 1922 by the appointment as a real associate professor and director of the Botanical Institute and Gardens of the German University in Prague (today Karl Ferdinand University ). In 1926 he was appointed full professor in Prague and in 1930 he was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Natural Sciences at the German University in Prague. Knoll returned to Vienna in 1933 - here too he was appointed full professor of systematic biology. Following a unanimous proposal from the Philosophical Faculty of the University of Vienna, he succeeded Wettstein as director of the Botanical Institute and the Botanical Garden of the University of Vienna . He held these positions until 1945.

Fritz Knoll and National Socialism

Knoll had been a member of the then banned Austrian NSDAP since 1937 . He was also a member of the National Socialist German Lecturer Association , Gaudozentenführer and from 1938 chairman of the Reich Association for Biology. Even before March 12, 1938 , he is said to have given lectures in SS trousers.

His closeness to National Socialism can serve as an explanation for why on March 15, 1938, by means of a service slip from the national leadership of the NSDAP Austria, he was commissioned to “take care of the interests of the regional leadership at the University of Vienna with immediate effect”. Also on March 15, the Federal Ministry of Education instructed Knoll to take over the rectorate of the University of Vienna. On March 16, Knoll took over the official business from the previous rector Ernst Späth and was thus appointed "acting rector". This approach is unique to this day.

The mandate to protect the interests of the national leadership of the NSDAP also coupled the responsibility of the rector's office to a clear political and ideological mandate. With this in mind, Knoll immediately began with the “reorganization of university relations” by first filling the dean's positions “so that the faculties would be in a contemporary state”. The list of the new deans was published on March 19, 1938. This was followed by the massive dismissal of Jewish and politically unpopular lecturers: by April 23, 1938, i.e. within five weeks, no fewer than 252 faculty members had been dismissed.

With the beginning of the winter semester 1938/39, three of the most important features of National Socialist university policy had been implemented: reshaping of the teaching staff through "purge" and political recruitment practice, recruiting a student body loyal to the Nazis and reshaping the university constitution according to the "Führer principle". Accordingly, Knoll declared for the first National Socialist student year: “The way is now free for a new course of study and for the necessary structure”.

In 1939 he was appointed the real rector. Knoll held this office until 1943. On May 15, 1943, the ceremonial inauguration of his successor, the former dean of the medical faculty, Eduard Pernkopf as rector of the University of Vienna took place.

On March 25, 1938, at a general meeting of the Academy of Sciences, the decision was made to ask Knoll to take over the interests of the National Leadership of the NSDAP for the time being. Knoll's appointment was confirmed by the NSDAP on March 29, 1938, and Knoll held it until March 1939. In November 1938, Knoll was also elected a full member of the academy in a relatively quick process.

As an example of Knoll's work in 1938/39, his anti-Semitic behavior towards Hans Leo Przibram , the head of the biological research institute of the Academy of Sciences, can be cited, in whose robbery he took an active part after Przibram's removal from office.

After 1945

In June 1945 Knoll was dismissed from the public service due to his membership in the NSDAP by decree of the State Office for Public Enlightenment, Education, Education and Cultural Affairs. He was also excluded from membership in the Austrian Academy of Sciences in 1945.

In December 1947, Knoll received a certificate stating that he was classified as a person with a lower exposure in accordance with Section 17, Paragraph (3) of the Prohibition Act 1947 . Because of this, his release was converted into a retirement. He also became a full member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences again.

From 1947 he worked primarily at the Academy of Sciences. He was chairman of various commissions, was elected secretary of the math and science class in 1957 and secretary general of the academy in 1959. His areas of responsibility included work in the commissions, the responsible office, administrative and financial management as well as advising the biological stations in Lunz and Wilhelminenberg . For the academy, Knoll also published the two volumes "Österreichische Naturforscher und Techniker" (1950) and "Österreichische Naturforscher, Ärzte und Techniker" (1957), to which he also made several contributions of his own. Several outstanding Jewish researchers are suppressed in the books.

Fritz Knoll died on February 24, 1981 at the age of 97. He was buried at Rodaun Cemetery .

Awards and honors

  • 1906 Unger Prize from the Philosophical Faculty of Graz
  • 1929 Reiner Medal of the Zoological-Botanical Society in Vienna in recognition of scientific achievements.
  • 1942 War Merit Cross, 2nd class for military service at the University of Vienna.
  • 1943 Officer's Cross of the Romanian Order for Cultural Merit.
  • 1961 Award of the rector's commemorative mark of the University of Vienna by the academic senate “in recognition of [the] honorable and courageous administration in difficult times”.
  • 1965 Austrian Cross of Honor for Science and Art, 1st class.
  • 1967 Awarded the Bene merito (silver) medal for special services to the Austrian Academy of Sciences.

Memberships in scientific associations and institutions

  • 1924 Appointment as a full member of the German Society of Sciences and Arts in Prague.
  • 1934 Appointment as a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences in Vienna.
  • 1936 Appointment as a member of the Imperial-Leopoldine-Carolinian German Academy of Natural Scientists in Halle ad Saale (today the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina ).
  • 1938 appointment as a full member of the Royal Swedish Society of Sciences in Uppsala.
  • 1938 election as a full member of the Vienna Academy of Sciences.
  • In 1941 he was appointed honorary member of the Romanian Academy of Sciences in Bucharest.
  • 1942 Appointment as a foreign member of the Academy of Sciences in Bologna
  • 1956 Elected honorary member of the Zoological-Botanical Society.
  • 1958 Appointed adjunct for Austria (member of the Senate) by the German Academy of Natural Scientists in Halle ad Saale.
  • 1961 appointment as honorary member of the natural science association for Styria.

Fonts

  • Insects and flowers. Experimental work to deepen our knowledge of the interrelationships between plants and animals, 3 volumes, Vienna 1921/1922/1926.
  • Knowledge and education. Speech given at the ceremonial opening of the Klagenfurt University Weeks on October 22, 1941, Klagenfurt 1941.
  • Science in New Germany. Lecture given as part of the lectures of the German Scientific Institute in Bucharest on May 23, 1941, Vienna 1942.
  • The ceremonial inauguration of the Rector of the University of Vienna, 1943, Vienna 1944.
  • Academy of Sciences (Ed.): Austrian Natural Scientists and Technicians, Vienna 1950.
  • (Ed.): Austrian natural scientists, doctors and technicians, Vienna 1957.

literature

swell

  • Fritz Knoll's estate in the archive of the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
  • Personal file Fritz Knoll in the archive of the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
  • Personal file Fritz Knoll in the archive of the University of Vienna .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Three deaths on the Traunstein. A rain-soaked wall brought down a rope team . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna August 25, 1953, p. 4 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
  2. ↑ Klee: Personenlexikon, p. 320.
  3. ↑ Knoll: Rektoratsinauguration, p. 12.
  4. ↑ Knoll: Rektoratsinauguration, p. 12f.
  5. ↑ Klaus Taschwer: The Two Careers of Fritz Knoll , derstandard.at , March 1, 2013, accessed on October 6, 2017
  6. ↑ Cf. Lichtenberger-Fenz, Brigitte: Austria's universities and colleges - victims or pioneers of the National Socialist tyranny? (Using the example of the University of Vienna) in: Heiß u. a. (Ed.): Willing Science, p. 3.
  7. ↑ Yearbook of the German Student Union at the Ostmarkdeutsche Universities 1938/39, p. 60.
  8. ^ Klaus Taschwer: The two careers of Fritz Knoll , derstandard.at , March 1, 2013, accessed on March 3, 2013; A tragic hero of Austrian science? , derstandard.at , February 5, 2014, accessed on February 6, 2014.
  9. ^ Friedrich Knoll grave site , Vienna, Rodaun Cemetery, Group A, No. 676.
personal data
SURNAME Knoll, Fritz
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Knoll, Friedrich Josef
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian botanist
DATE OF BIRTH October 21, 1883
PLACE OF BIRTH Gleisdorf
DATE OF DEATH February 24, 1981
Place of death Vienna