Gustav Drechsler

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Gustav Drechsler

Gustav Adolph Wilibald Drechsler (born June 18, 1833 in Zellerfeld (Harz), † October 14, 1890 in Greifswald ) was a German agricultural scientist .

Live and act

Youth and studies

As the son of a forest official , he began an apprenticeship as a pharmacist after passing his school-leaving exam . However , he was far more enthusiastic about the practical work as a farmer on his father's estate in Crimderode near Nordhausen (Harz). He broke off his apprenticeship and from 1855 studied agriculture in Jena and Munich . In Munich he also heard Justus von Liebig's lectures . In 1855 he became a member of the Teutonia Jena fraternity . In 1859 he took over the management of his father's farm in Crimderode.

Following advice from the agricultural scientist Julius Kühn , Drechsler decided to embark on a scientific career in 1865. He went to the University of Halle / Saale and received his doctorate in 1866 with a dissertation still written in Latin on the "history of statics in agriculture". Just nine months later, in April 1867, he completed his habilitation at the University of Göttingen with an extended treatise on his dissertation topic for the entire field of agriculture.

Founder of the Agricultural Institute at the University of Göttingen

In 1867 he was commissioned by the curator of the Göttingen University to reorganize the agricultural studies carried out at the Agricultural Academy in Weende near Göttingen and to reintegrate it into the university. Following the example of the Agricultural Institute founded by Julius Kühn in Halle / Saale in 1863, Drechsler had a teaching and research institute with appropriate premises built in Göttingen on a building site initially purchased with his own funds and a test field set up. In 1872 the Agricultural Academy in Weende was dissolved and Drechsler, now a full professor, was appointed director of the new Agricultural University Institute.

In just a few years, Drechsler created the external requirements for optimal agricultural training at the University of Göttingen. At the same time he tried to improve the scientific demands of the agricultural studies. The memorization he always considered research results merely as a collecting dead knowledge. Only if the student critically examines the subject matter of knowledge will he learn scientific thinking and the ability to successfully apply knowledge in agricultural practice.

Pioneering fertilization attempts

In his habilitation thesis, Drechsler had already argued that the crops to be cultivated should only be fertilized according to their actual needs, i.e. H. to measure the amount of fertilizer according to the expected yield. This thesis was in complete contrast to the ideas of the "soil statisticians", which were widespread at the time, according to whose doctrine the soil should be supplied with the amount of nutrients that had been withdrawn from the previously cultivated crops.

After evaluating many years of field tests , Drechsler was able to prove the correctness of his thesis. The fertilization theory he developed contained all essential aspects of our current fertilization concept. Drechsler already distinguished between soil fertilization (stock fertilization) and plant fertilization and coined the term fertilizer need . He published most of his research results in the "Journal für Landwirthschaft", which he published together with Wilhelm Henneberg . A continuous fertilization experiment that he set up in 1873 was continued for almost ninety years under the name "Göttinger E-Feld".

Drechsler paid particular attention to the methodology of the field tests . He was the first to draw attention to the numerous sources of error that can arise from unskilled test personnel. His suggestions to reduce or completely avoid the errors occurring in the establishment and supervision of field tests became groundbreaking for the further development of field tests.

Research in the field of agricultural management

Drechsler's activity was not limited to plant cultivation. In line with his personal inclinations, he also devoted himself to business administration in teaching and research. His prize publication on the agricultural lease contract , which was crowned in 1871, became a standard work , a book in which he convincingly shows that the lessor and lessee do not form two opposing interest groups, but rather a community of interests. One of his business principles was the notion that every farm should be viewed as a closed organism.

Gut Crimderode (2014)

Since Drechsler himself had cultivated his own estate for years, he maintained close contact with agricultural practice throughout his life. He was particularly interested in agricultural associations. He was a member of the main agricultural and forestry association in Göttingen, and from 1884 to 1889 also its president. In spring 1890 he left Göttingen and took over the office of curator at the University of Greifswald . A few months later he died of a stroke. He found his final resting place in the family cemetery in the forest near his Crimderode estate.

MP

Drechsler was politically active at the municipal level as a member of the district council in the Ilfeld district, in the Culmberg-Grubenhagen knighthood and landscape as well as on a supraregional level. From 1886 to 1890 he was a member of the Prussian House of Representatives and in the legislative period of 1887/1890 he was a member of the Reichstag for the constituency of the Province of Hanover 13 (Goslar / Zellerfeld / Ilfeld).

Fonts

literature

  • Carl Leisewitz:  wood turner, Gustav . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 48, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1904, p. 78 f.
  • Otto Tornau:  wood turner, Gustav. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 4, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1959, ISBN 3-428-00185-0 , p. 105 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Helge Dvorak: Biographical Lexicon of the German Burschenschaft. Volume I: Politicians. Sub-Volume 1: A-E. Winter, Heidelberg 1996, ISBN 3-8253-0339-X , pp. 219-220.
  • JH Esser: Gustav Drechsler . In: Journal für Landwirthschaft vol. 38, 1890, pp. 491–501 (with picture).
  • Hans J. Herpel: The development of agricultural studies at the University of Göttingen . Göttingen 1932.
  • Wolfgang Böhm : Gustav Drechsler (1833-1890). Founder of the Agricultural Institute at the University of Göttingen . In: Niedersächsisches Jahrbuch für Landesgeschichte vol. 56, 1984, pp. 223-235 (with picture).
  • Wolfgang Böhm: Göttingen crop scientist. A bibliography . Regensburg 1988 (with a complete list of all writings by and about Gustav Drechsler, pp. 9-19).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Helge Dvorak: Biographical Lexicon of the German Burschenschaft. Volume I Politicians, Part 1: AE. Heidelberg 1996, p. 219.
  2. ^ Mann, Bernhard (edit.): Biographical manual for the Prussian House of Representatives. 1867-1918 . Collaboration with Martin Doerry , Cornelia Rauh and Thomas Kühne . Düsseldorf: Droste Verlag, 1988, p. 112 (handbooks on the history of parliamentarism and political parties: vol. 3); for the election results see Thomas Kühne: Handbook of elections to the Prussian House of Representatives 1867–1918. Election results, election alliances and election candidates (= handbooks on the history of parliamentarism and political parties. Volume 6). Droste, Düsseldorf 1994, ISBN 3-7700-5182-3 , pp. 551-554.
  3. ^ Fritz Specht, Paul Schwabe: The Reichstag elections from 1867 to 1903. Statistics of the Reichstag elections together with the programs of the parties and a list of the elected representatives. 2nd Edition. Carl Heymann Verlag, Berlin 1904, p. 126.
personal data
SURNAME Wood turner, Gustav
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Drechsler, Gustav Adolph Wilibald (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German agricultural scientist and politician, MdR
DATE OF BIRTH June 18, 1833
PLACE OF BIRTH Zellerfeld
DATE OF DEATH October 14, 1890
Place of death Greifswald