George Thoms

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George Thoms (* February 12 . Jul / 24. February  1843 greg. In Riga , † November 2 jul. / 15. November  1902 greg. ) Was a Baltic German agricultural chemist . As head of an agricultural research station in Riga, he developed an exemplary fertilization system in the Baltic provinces of the Baltic Sea . He was the first to carry out a systematic assessment of the arable soils of Courland and Livonia .

Live and act

George Thoms, son of a Scottish merchant, attended high school in Riga and from 1864 studied agriculture at the University of Dorpat (today: Tartu). Here he was a member of the Fraternitas Rigensis . In 1866 he finished his studies and worked for one semester each in the chemical laboratories of the University of Heidelberg and the University of Bonn . In 1868 he traveled to North America and together with two young chemists founded a meat extract factory in Texas, which was destroyed by fire. At times he worked as a pharmacist . Homesickness drove him back to Riga in 1871.

In 1872, Thoms was appointed head of the "Agricultural-chemical test and seed control station at the Riga Polytechnic". In 1873 he received the lectureship for agricultural chemistry and in 1878 he was appointed professor . In the meantime he had acquired the academic degrees of a master's degree and a doctorate in agriculture at the University of Dorpat.

From 1872, Thoms devoted all of his work to further expanding the research station he was in charge of. It developed into an integrating center of agricultural experimental activity in the Baltic provinces of the Baltic Sea. Experiments on the optimal use of mineral fertilizers in arable farming were in the foreground. With detailed activity reports on these experiments, articles in specialist journals and through several independent publications, he has brought pioneering, up-to-date knowledge of agricultural chemistry into agricultural practice.

For more than two decades, Thoms worked on the project to assess the arable land in the Russian Baltic Sea provinces of Livonia and Courland . He published the results of this undertaking in a three-volume work entitled On the Appreciation of Soils on a Scientific and Statistical Basis in 1888, 1893 and 1900. This first systematic assessment of such a large region under soil and climatic aspects is considered to be his actual life's work. In 1895 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina .

Main publications

  • About fertilizer control . Lecture given on May 15, 1878 at the 96th meeting of the Charitable and Agricultural Society of South Livonia. Deubner, Riga 1878.
  • The artificial fertilizers. Instructions for the use of these in the Baltic provinces, together with a report on the results of the fertilizer controls in 1879 and 1880 and two papers: 1. Are we overexploiting the use of artificial fertilizers? 2. Comments on domestic fertilization attempts . Stieda, Riga and Dorpat 1881.
  • For the appreciation of the arable soil on a scientific-statistical basis . 3 volumes of communication. Riga 1888; 1893; 1900. - A comprehensive article on this work in: Journal für Landwirtschaft Vol. 44, 1896, pp. 311–332.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ album fratrum Rigensium 1823-1979 . Hechthausen 1981. No. 576.
personal data
SURNAME Thoms, George
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-Baltic agricultural chemist
DATE OF BIRTH February 24, 1843
PLACE OF BIRTH Riga
DATE OF DEATH November 15, 1902
Place of death Riga