Hans Bernhard Jacobi

Memorial stone for the head of the Forestry Office Jacobi on the banks of the Frankfurt Jacobi pond

Hans Bernhard Jacobi (born October 17, 1886 in Weimar ; † May 25, 1940 in Frankfurt am Main ) was a German forester . From 1927 until his death he headed the municipal forestry office in Frankfurt am Main. The head forester made important contributions to the transformation of the Frankfurt city forest into a modern local recreation area .

Career

Jacobi, son of a monastery preacher, attended the secondary school in Weimar and passed the school leaving examination in 1906. He then studied at the Grand Ducal Saxon Forest Academy in Eisenach , which he graduated in 1909. After his military service as a one-year volunteer , he studied forest science at the Ludwigs-Universität Gießen in 1911/12 . He also used a section from his critical book The Displacement of the Deciduous Forests by the Coniferous Forests in Germany (1912) as a dissertation with the title Influence of the use of wood on the displacement of hardwood , with which he received his doctorate in 1912 at the University of Giessen . From 1912 to 1914 he taught forest history, plan drawing and forest surveying at the Forest Academy in Eisenach. After his state examination in forestry, he entered the civil service as a forestry assessor in autumn 1913. His military service in World War I was interrupted by an activity in the forest inspection department in Czenstochau in occupied Poland from January 1916 to September 1918. On September 22, 1917 he was awarded the Iron Cross, 2nd class.

In October 1918 he returned to the army as vice sergeant in the reserve, but was released from the army by the Eisenach workers 'and soldiers' council on November 9, 1918, the day of the November Revolution . He then returned to the state forestry service of the Free State of Saxony-Weimar-Eisenach , but on April 15, 1919 he switched to the service of the neighboring Free State of Saxony-Meiningen , where he was head forester in the Wasungen forest district . From June 20, 1920 he was a member of the first Thuringian state parliament for the DVP .

Banks view of the Jacobi pond in the Frankfurt city forest

On September 30, 1920 Jacobi resigned from the Thuringian civil service and at the same time resigned from his state parliament mandate. He became head forester in Hameln . On September 1, 1927, he was appointed head of the municipal forest office in Frankfurt. He was the one who initiated the construction of the Goethe Tower . He found a sponsor for the construction costs in the Jewish merchant Gustav Gerst , persuaded the Frankfurt magistrate to provide the timber free of charge, and selected it himself in the city forest.

Furthermore, the Maunzenweiher and 1931/32 the Jacobiweiher, later named after him, on the Oberschweinstiege in the Frankfurt city forest were built under his direction from 1928 to 1931 .

Jacobi was not a member of the NSDAP and was exposed to all kinds of hostility, especially in the early days of the Nazi regime. On the other hand, a memorial stone was placed on the Jacobi pond for him just one year after his death. The name was also given on this occasion.

Publications

• The displacement of the deciduous forests by the coniferous forests in Germany in 1912. 8 °, 187 p.
• My messenger , poems. Eisenach, undated, 8 °, 48 p.

literature

• Jochen Lengemann : Thuringian state parliaments 1919–1952. Biographical handbook (= publications of the Historical Commission for Thuringia, large series, vol. 1, part 4). Böhlau, Cologne / Weimar / Vienna 2014. pp. 365f.

Web links

• Jacobiweiher at par.frankfurt.de , the former website of the city of Frankfurt am Main