Georg Loewenstein

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Georg Wolfgang Loewenstein (born April 18, 1890 in Breslau ; † May 27, 1998 in Largo (Florida) ) was a German dermatologist , sexologist and social hygienist. During the Weimar Republic he was a city doctor in Nowawes and Berlin-Lichtenberg .

Live and act

His father Julius Loewenstein was an impoverished businessman after speculating on the stock market and his mother Auguste Löwenstein-Klettschoff. Georg Loewenstein attended the Royal Wilhelms-Gymnasium in Berlin as a free student . He studied medicine at the Universities of Rostock and Berlin . During the First World War he was a soldier at the front for 40 months and was seriously injured. The war experiences made him a pacifist and socialist . Among other things, he became a member of the » Association of Socialist Doctors « (VSÄ) and of the Association for the Protection of Women and Young People.

After the end of the war, he completed his medical studies for over six months in June 1920 with the state examination and was approved . At the same time he worked as a medical intern at the gynecologist Ernst Bumm . This introduced him to the dermatologist Alfred Blaschko , who employed him as a private secretary and referred him to Felix Pinkus . Blaschko and Pinkus were active in the "German Society for Combating Venereal Diseases" (DGBG) . Georg Loewenstein edited the "Mitteilungen der DGBG" and gave lectures for society. In addition, from 1919 to 1922 he was a volunteer doctor and later an assistant doctor under Felix Pinkus in the infirmary of the "Städtischen Obdachs" . This work resulted in his dissertation in 1922 , with which he was awarded a Dr. med. received his doctorate . From 1921 to 1933 he was a lecturer at the Kaiserin-Friedrich-Haus and from 1922 to 1933 also at the Kaiserin-Auguste-Viktoria infant home . His main areas of work were sexual education, prostitution and venereal diseases.

From December 2, 1922 to September 30, 1925, Georg Loewenstein was the city doctor in Nowawes . From 1921 to 1922 Max Hodann was his predecessor in this office. Due to persistent differences with a “power-hungry and ambitious” bailiff, with no backing from a “politically colorless” mayor, Georg Loewenstein had to classify his work in Nowawes as “not very successful”.

In 1925 he was elected and employed by the Berlin-Lichtenberg city ​​council as city doctor. On April 1, 1926, he was appointed as a community official for life. Together with the District Mayor Alfred Siggel and the Lichtenberg City Councilor Ernst Torgler , he was able to implement important social and health policy innovations:

  • The organization of a people's feeding in Berlin-Lichtenberg.
  • The establishment of natural economic self-sufficiency in the Lichtenberg hospital.
  • The reorganization of poor and sick care through the employment of professional welfare workers.
  • The establishment of counseling centers for marriage and family problems with extensive recognition of the social indication for termination of pregnancy.
  • The establishment of a school welfare and subsequent welfare for those released from prison.
  • Together with the building authority, the construction of apartments taking into account the latest hygienic findings (air and light).

In Berlin, the 20 city doctors met fortnightly. These meetings were organized by Alfred Korach , the city doctor in Berlin-Prenzlauer Berg . Georg Löwenstein also fondly remembered the collaboration with Richard Roeder , the city doctor in Berlin-Treptow . In contrast, he judged Richard Schmincke , the city doctor of Berlin-Neukölln, as "ruthlessly active ... he looked like an elephant in a china shop."

The tensions between the SPD wing and the KPD wing within the » Association of Socialist Doctors « (VSÄ), which escalated in 1925 , especially the provocative and exaggerated demands of the KPD wing on the SPD members who are mostly in public responsibility, led to the fact that from 1925 he increasingly turned away from the VSÄ.

Loewenstein was involved in drafting the laws to combat venereal diseases and their implementation provisions and worked on a draft for a Reich Preservation Act.

On April 18, 1933, Georg Löwenstein was picked up from his office by the National Socialists, including former Social Democrats, and publicly humiliated and tortured while freeing the lowest instincts, cursing “Jews and Socis”. He was released from office on September 23 . He was succeeded by the school doctor Dr. Runge, who had no qualifications for the office of city doctor. Friends and acquaintances such as the occupational physician Ernst Wilhelm Baader and the social pediatrician Fritz Rott suddenly no longer wanted to know him.

In 1938 he emigrated to England , where he was supported by Quakers . After the First World War he had become a Quaker. After he was expatriated from Germany, he was penniless. A Quaker made his house available to him and through the mediation of the tropical medicine specialist Philip Henry Manson-Bahr (1881–1966) he found a job for tropical hygiene in London .

He received an appointment to New Orleans as Ass. Prof. for Tropical Hygiene. When he got to New Orleans, the position was already filled. Eventually he found a job as a "medical intern" in one of Chicago's two Catholic hospitals . He succeeded in using an exemption, according to which doctors with a doctorate received a limited work permit up to a certain date after successfully passing the language exam. In 1947 Georg Löwenstein considered returning to Germany. At the Swiss border near Stein am Rhein , however, he refrained from this request.

He moved his private practice from Chicago to Dark Harbor in Maine in the late 1950s.

In 1923 he married Johanna Sabat (born July 11, 1898). On August 19, 1924 the children Ruth (Gallagher) and Peter Lu (Lansing) were born. Three of his brothers died in World War I, and another brother and his family were shot dead by a National Socialist in Berlin.

In May 1980 he took part in the Berlin Health Day. In October 2006, Georg-Löwenstein-Strasse in Berlin-Lichtenberg was named after him.

Fonts (selection)

  • Critical considerations and contributions to the statistics of sexually transmitted diseases (1910–1921) . In: Journal for Combating Venereal Diseases , 20 (1922), pp. 138-187 = Diss. Med. Berlin July 27, 1922
  • The German Society for Combating Venereal Diseases , Deutsche Gesellsch. to combat d. Sexually transmitted diseases, Berlin 1923
  • What practical measures can be taken in order to benefit from the regulated system. Override system that d. Justice and Results d. Science better equals: report . FA Herbig, Berlin 1924
  • Sex life and sex diseases . G. Birk, Munich 1928
  • Marriage and marriage counseling . E. Deleiter Publishing House, Dresden 1930

Journal articles (selection)

In: The Socialist Doctor

  • The Act to Fight Venereal Diseases. Volume I. Vol. (1925), Issue 2-3 (July), p. 24, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
  • Critical considerations for the medical opinion. Volume I. Vol. (1925), Issue 4 (December), p. 33.
  • The new law to combat sexually transmitted diseases. Volume II. Vol. (1927), Issue 4 (March), pp. 22-23, Textarchiv - Internet Archive .
  • Health policy demands of the VSÄ. Volume IV. Vol. (1928), Issue 1–2 (August), pp. 29–32, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
  • Health policy demands of the VSÄ. Volume V. Vol. (1929), Issue 4 (December), pp. 153–157, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
  • Guiding principles of the VSÄ for study reform. Volume VI. Vol. (1930), Issue 2 (May), p. 72, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
  • 4th meeting of the Reich Commission on Health Care of the General Association of Employees in Public Enterprises. Volume VI. Vol. (1930), Issue 4 (October), pp. 182-184, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
  • On the problem of preservation. Volume VII. Vol. (1931), Issue 3 (March), pp. 74-75, Textarchiv - Internet Archive

literature

  • Stephan Leibfried, Florian Tennstedt (Eds.):
    • Professional bans and social policy 1933. The effects of the National Socialist seizure of power on the health insurance administration and the health insurance doctors. Analysis. Assault and self-help materials. Memories. (Working papers of the research focus on reproductive risks, social movements and social policy. No. 2. University of Bremen.) Research focus on reproductive risks, social movements and social policy University of Bremen, Bremen 1979, p. 106–128: Professional bans and the »Association of Socialist Doctors« Here: p. 120
    • Georg Loewenstein: Communal health care and socialist medical policy between the German Empire and National Socialism. Autobiographical, Biographical, and Health Policy Notes. (Working reports on buried alternatives in health policy 3) Univ. Bremen, Bremen 1980, pp. 1–30: Memoirs of Dr. med. Georg Lowenstein
  • Georg Loewenstein: Biography of Medicinaldirector ad Dr. George W. Loewenstein:, Germany under Kaiser William II, the first German republic, and life in the beginning of the Hitler regime, the new beginning in USA Clearwater FL 1990 (= Weimar health policy reforms and their destruction: memories of a senior medical officer . In : Working reports on buried alternatives in health policy , Volume 10, Bremen 1987)
  • Rudolf Vierhaus (Ed.): German Biographical Encyclopedia . Volume 6: Kraatz - Menges. 2nd revised and expanded edition. Saur, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-598-25036-3 , p. 528.
  • Werner Röder, Herbert A. Strauss (Eds.): International Biographical Dictionary of Central European Emigrés 1933-1945 , Vol II, 2. Saur, Munich 1983, ISBN 3-598-10089-2 , p. 743

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ charite.de
  2. ^ Critical considerations and contributions to the statistics of venereal diseases (1910–1921) . In: Journal for Combating Venereal Diseases , 20 (1922), pp. 138-187 = Diss. Med. Berlin July 27, 1922
  3. ↑ Alfons Labisch, Florian Tennstedt: The way to the "Law on the standardization of the health system" of July 3, 1934. Lines of development and moments of the state and municipal health system in Germany , part 2, Academy for public health in Düsseldorf 1985, p. 456
  4. ↑ Löwenstein 1980, p. 18
  5. ^ Georg Loewenstein: The law to combat sexually transmitted diseases. In: The socialist doctor , 1st year (1925), issue 2–3 (July), p. 24, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
  6. ^ Georg Loewenstein, Franz E. Rosenthal : The new law to combat sexually transmitted diseases. In: The socialist doctor , 2nd year (1927), issue 4 (March), pp. 22-23, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
  7. ↑ Georg Loewenstein: On the preservation problem. In: The socialist doctor , 7th year (1931), issue 3 (March), pp. 74–75, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
  8. ↑ a b German Biographical Encyclopedia : Volume 6: Kraatz - Menges. Munich 2006, p. 528
  9. ↑ Stephan Leibfried. Occupation bans after 1933. In: Gerhard Baader , Ulrich Schultz: Medicine and National Socialism. A taboo past - unbroken tradition? Documentation of the Health Day Berlin 1980, Volume 1. Verlaggesellschaft Gesundheit, Berlin 1980, ISBN 3-922866-00-X , pp. 165-179
  10. ^ Georg-Löwenstein-Strasse. In: Street name lexicon of the Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein (near  Kaupert )
personal data
SURNAME Loewenstein, Georg
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Loewenstein, Georg Wolfgang (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German physician and city doctor
DATE OF BIRTH April 18, 1890
PLACE OF BIRTH Wroclaw
DATE OF DEATH May 27, 1998
Place of death Largo (Florida)