Jakob Bächtold

This article deals with the politician Jakob Bächtold. For the literary scholar of the same name, see Jakob Baechtold , for the didactic, culture promoter and dialect curator of the same name, see Jacques M. Bächtold .

Jakob Bächtold (born March 3, 1905 in Schleitheim ; † July 20, 1993 in Bern ) was a Swiss engineer , politician ( LdU ) and environmentalist .

Live and act

engineer

Bächtold attended the canton school Schaffhausen and completed a civil engineering degree at the ETH Zurich , which he graduated with a diploma in 1929. He worked as a lecturer at the evening technical center in Zurich and at the technical center in Burgdorf . From 1930 to 1941 he was an engineer for project planning and construction management at Locher & Cie Zurich. From 1946 to 1954 he was the senior construction engineer at the Oberhasli power station , and from 1954 he had his own engineering office in Bern .

Among other things, Bächtold participated in the planning of various national road sections . He worked as an expert at home and abroad. From 1957 to 1960 he was president of the SIA group of industrial engineers.

Politician

Before the Second World War he worked actively in the Zürcher Landesring together with William Vontobel . From 1957 to 1964 he was the Bernese Grand Councilor ; from 1959 to 1975 and from 1978 to 1979 he was National Councilor .

As an engineer and politician, the “independent independent” Bächtold tried to achieve a synthesis between technology and nature. He approached all questions of transport and energy policy from the point of view of environmental compatibility . He has therefore rightly been called an environmentalist from the very beginning. "

- Peter Stettler: Bächtold, Jakob. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .

"The political activities of Bächtold illustrate how closely the propaganda of the conservationists for the use of atomic energy was linked to their fight primarily against new hydropower plants and secondarily against conventional thermal power plants."

- Patrick Kupper

From 1960 to 1969 he was President of the Swiss Confederation for Nature Conservation . In 1971 he was awarded the Van Tienhoven Prize from the University of Bonn .

Bächtold was a supporter of the Schwarzenbach initiatives .

Jakob Bächtold was the father of the National and Government Councilor Leni Robert-Bächtold .

Works

• Jakob Bächtold: The triangle of tension between building, nature conservation, politics: 1925–1980 . (Life memories). Meier, Schaffhausen 1980, ISBN 3-85801-016-2 .

literature

• Peter Stettler: Bächtold, Jakob. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
• Articles in fact, from 15 September 1962 to 3 March 1975
• Articles in the Federation of September 28, 1979, of March 2, 1985 and of July 29, 1993
• Daniel L. Vischer : Hydraulic engineers and hydraulic engineers in Switzerland: short biographies of selected personalities . Swiss Water Management Association , Baden 2001, ISBN 3-85545-859-6 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Jakob Bächtold in the catalog of the German National Library
• Literature by and about Jakob Bächtold in the bibliographic database WorldCat

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k} Peter Stettler: Bächtold, Jakob. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
2. ↑ Patrick Kupper : Atomic Energy and Divided Society: The History of the Failed Project Kaiseraugst Nuclear Power Plant. Chronos, Zurich 2003, ISBN 3-0340-0595-4 . P. 129.
3. ↑ Erwin Akeret: Experienced Parliament. Frauenfeld 1984, p. 72.