Johannes Rabnow

Ludwig Johannes Rabnow (born December 30, 1855 in Suchowola , Russian Empire ; † February 27, 1933 in Berlin ) was a German doctor and an important social hygienist of his time.

Johannes Rabnow was a resident doctor in Berlin-Schöneberg from 1892. After working as a doctor for the poor, in 1906 he was appointed department head for social hygiene and head of the lung sanatorium in the then independent city of Schöneberg, a unique position within a city administration. In 1910 he rose to the Schöneberg City Councilor for Local Medicine and Hygiene. From 1920 to 1924 he was elected to the City Medical Council for Greater Berlin. In recognition of his services, he became the city elder of Berlin.

Origin, Education and Assimilation

Johannes Rabnow was of Eastern Jewish origin. However, there are no autobiographical records. Information with his maiden name from the time before his conversion to Christianity was omitted from him and the public. Ludwig Johannes Rabnow was born as a merchant's son Salomon Rabinowicz on December 30, 1855 in Suchawoli near Grodno and Bialystok. Its origins and conversion are documented in the so-called Berlin Jewish register, which the staunch National Socialist Karl Themel had compiled as a Protestant pastor for the Reichssippenamt in the 1930s. For further education Rabinowicz had to have attended the yeshiva or a modern rabbinical seminary. His educational efforts brought him to Berlin around 1878/79.

After Rabinowicz had passed the Prussian Abitur at the Charlottenburger Gymnasium, he enrolled in the subjects of philology and history at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität zu Berlin. This point in time marks the birth of German university anti-Semitism. Among other things, Heinrich von Treitschke (1834-1896), historian and professor at the same university, had contributed to a split within the German student body regarding the “Jewish question”. It also became clear to Rabinowicz that in view of the persecution of Jews in Russia after the assassination of Tsar Alexander II (1818–1881), it was not advisable to return. Since there would be no livelihood for an Eastern Jewish philologist in Germany, Rabinowicz switched to studying medicine and graduated in Jena. During a one-year stay in Hamburg, he registered his dissertation at the medical faculty in Leipzig and submitted a paper on "Aphonia hysterica and its treatment".

Two weeks after taking his doctorate in Leipzig, Rabinowicz converted to Protestantism on May 26, 1889 in the Berlin Holy Spirit Church. He dropped his name Salomon and chose Ludwig Johannes as his Christian first name. Conversion to Christianity was not sufficient for social acceptance. In addition, Rabinowicz applied for Prussian citizenship (called naturalization) and the name change from Rabinowicz to Rabnow. He was declared a citizen on August 24, 1890 by the Potsdam District President and was allowed to use the surname Rabnow from November 4, 1890. Rosa Baumann (1869–1928) also converted on the occasion of her marriage to Johannes Rabnow. They had three children. Hans Heinrich Herrmann Rabnow (1892–1916) died in World War I. Fritz Carl Ludwig Rabnow (1893–1943) and Käthe Martha Mathilde Rabnow (1897–1984) were persecuted because of their non-Aryan origins. In February 1943, Fritz Rabnow's life ended in the gas chambers of the Auschwitz concentration camp. His sister emigrated to the United States in 1936, where she worked as a statistician and died in New York City in 1984 as an American citizen.

The Schöneberg model and Johannes Rabnow's health policy

Rabnow's extensive initiatives for a health system based on social hygiene are presented in standard works on the history of social hygiene. There is evidence of his diverse activities as a Schöneberg city doctor and Berlin city medical councilor. Peter Reinicke judges Rabnow's health policy to be groundbreaking in the professionalization of social medical and social welfare work in the context of tuberculosis control.

Johannes Rabnow formulated a concept of social hygienic health care that explicitly addressed the social injustice and health consequences of the empire. He took a special position within social hygiene by calling for a community health system independent of charity and poor relief and opposing stigmatization and eugenic arguments that, for example, high infant mortality is a social Darwinian selection.

Rabnow's health policy career began after he had made a name for himself as a representative of the Schöneberg doctors in the fight against the high diphtheria mortality at the Lichterfeld district hospital under the direction of Ernst Schwenninger (1850-1924). In 1902 he initiated the committee for the organization of popular medicine lectures . The broadest possible audience and, as Rabnow put it, “people of all population classes” should be addressed for medicine and especially preventive measures. The association to fight tuberculosis in Schöneberg was founded as part of the lecture series in 1904. Tuberculosis and infant care were Rabnow's main areas of responsibility in the first years of his work as a city doctor. He convinced the Schöneberg city administration to create an administrative branch independent of the poor for an urban health system, which was implemented in 1905 as the “Deputation for Welfare Care”.

Since 1906 Rabnow held the title of “City Doctor for Welfare Care” and was employed as a senior civil servant as the head doctor of the home for lung patients in Sternberg (today Torzym / Poland). In 1907 the Prussian minister of education made the appointment to the medical council. In 1910 he became a member of the magistrate and was named “City Councilor for Communal Medicine and Hygiene”. Rabnow's successes in health policy were recognized in the press and specialist literature as the "Schöneberg Model". This included the municipal tuberculosis welfare service since 1904, which ensured the registration and care of tuberculosis sufferers. They were supported with money and food, housed in sanatoriums at the city's expense, or at least isolated in their own homes by providing beds and additional rooms.

Infant care aimed to reduce infant mortality. Mothers should be enabled to breastfeed by providing them with money, food, and household help before and after delivery. A breastfeeding premium was paid into a savings account. Alternatively, perfectly hygienic cow's milk was made available to feed the babies. The "Schöneberg model" also included the fact that all charity organizations were coordinated by municipal welfare and housekeeping was arranged, an official guardian regulated maintenance claims for children born out of wedlock, free dental treatment for all Schöneberg schoolchildren and recreation for children and young people.

The role of socially or medically active women was closely related to these developments. A considerable number of women worked as midwives or nurses. They advised the female population on a large scale and must be named as an essential link and executive body in health policy. They opened up a large part of the local women and children with the intention of encouraging them to adopt a healthy lifestyle and compliance with the prescribed hygienic standards. They wanted nursing and midwifery to become a bourgeois female profession in order to implement proselytizing and sanitizing the population more successfully. In Schöneberg the midwives cooperated willingly with the medical profession; the same applies to the carers. The professionalisation of women’s professions supported by doctors led to a transfer of bourgeois value concepts and state goals such as the reduction of infant mortality. In 1920 and 1921 Johannes Rabnow was a member of the Board of Trustees of the Social Women's School.

In September 1920 Rabnow was elected to the City Medical Council of Greater Berlin. Only after three years of negotiations at various levels was a statute for the new Berlin health system finally adopted in 1923. The main health office in Berlin was established under Rabnow, and a district health office was created in each district, structures that still exist today. By the mid-1920s, there were 26 tuberculosis care centers, 5 school dental clinics, 74 infant and toddler care centers, to which 33 pregnancy care centers were affiliated, and 90 welfare doctors and 184 social workers worked in the city service.

In March 1924, at the age of 69, Johannes Rabnow resigned from his office and was awarded the title of City Elder of Berlin. He died at the age of 77 on February 27, 1933 in his apartment in Schöneberg. Johannes Rabnow was buried on March 9, 1933 in the cemetery on Eythstrasse in Berlin-Schöneberg. It was an urn grave that has not been preserved.

Fonts

• Aphonia hysterica and its treatment, inaugural dissertation, Medical Faculty Leipzig 1888.
• Popular medical lectures in Schöneberg. Medical Reform 10 (1902) / 39, pp. 372-373.
• From the events in the Groß-Lichterfelde district hospital. ST 7 (1902) January 19, 1902, pp. 1-2.
• Abuses in Groß-Lichterfelder Hospital. ST 7 (1902) January 26, 1902, pp. 1-2.
• The Gr. Lichterfeld district hospital. ST 7 (1902) February 2, 1902, pp. 1-2.
• To the Lichterfeld district hospital question. ST 7 (1902) February 22, 1902, p. 3.
• The municipal information and welfare office for tuberculous people in Schöneberg. Medici-nische Reform 14 (1906) / 52, pp. 625–627.
• Schöneberg recreation center near Eichkamp. Tuberculosis 5 (1906) / 6, pp. 235-239.
• About the participation of the midwifery class in the fight against common diseases. Allgemeine Deutsche Midammenzeitung 21 (1906) / 12, pp. 216-218.
• II. Report of the Association for Combating Tuberculosis in Schöneberg for the year 1905. In: Publications of the Association for Combating Tuberculosis in Schöneberg. 1907, pp. 3-8.
• Care for advanced tuberculosis. Hygienische Rundschau, supplement to the Hygienische Rundschau 18 (1908) / 7, pp. 435–442.
• Official welfare offices for people with lung disease. Medicinische Reform 16 (1908) / 38, p. 457.
• Organization of tuberculosis control in Schöneberg. Tuberculosis 8 (1909) / 4, pp. 129-132.
• The rescue service in Schöneberg. Medicinische Reform 17 (1909) / 51, pp. 605-606.
• Organization of tuberculosis control in Schöneberg. Medicinische Reform 17 (1909) / 37, pp. 433-434.
• 17. Health care. A social hygiene. In: Third administrative report of the municipality of Schöneberg April 1, 1903 to March 31, 1908. Schöneberg 1910, pp. 743–757.
• The municipal school dental clinic. Medicinische Reform 18 (1910) / 15, pp. 139-40.
• The rescue service in Schöneberg. Journal for the Samaritan and Rescue Services 16 (1910) / 16, pp. 14–15.
• The municipal baby welfare office in Schöneberg. Medical reform. 18 (1910) / 27, pp. 331-333.
• Some remarks on the state of the art in the fight against tuberculosis. German Medical Wochenschrift 37 (1911) / 20, pp. 934-936.
• Organization of child welfare in Schöneberg. Medicinische Reform 19 (1911) / 9, pp. 159-161. 274 local doctors from Schöneberg. Medicinische Reform 19 (1911) / 1, p. 7.
• Childcare in Schöneberg. Schöneberg 1911, 39 pp.
• Children's recreation home of the city of Schöneberg in Boldixum on Föhr. Journal of School Health Care (1911), pp. 33–41.
• The apartments of the tuberculous in Schöneberg. Archives for Social Hygiene 6 (1911) / 4, pp. 428–435.
• Case report on the question of pulmonary tuberculosis and pregnancy. German Medical Weekly 37 (1911) / 22, pp. 1019-1021.
• Isolation and identification of infectious tuberculous. German medical weekly publication 38 (1912) / 38, pp. 1793-1794.
• Combating tuberculosis in Berlin-Schöneberg. Berlin-Schöneberg 1913, 73 pp.
• How do the welfare offices respond to the question: pulmonary tuberculosis and pregnancy? Tuberculosis Care Sheet 1 (1913) / August 13, 1913, pp. 17-18.
• Municipal housing maintenance and housing supervision in Berlin-Schöneberg. Medicinische Reform 21 (1913) / 19, pp. 351-354.
• About the housing inspection in Berlin-Schöneberg and some remarks on the Prussian housing law draft. Quarterly for Forensic Medicine XLVII Volume 1914, pp. 173–186.
• About the change in the way of working in the welfare offices. Tuberculosis Care Sheet 2 (1915) / 7, pp. 77-78.
• Community care for tuberculous people during the war. Tuberculosis welfare sheet, 2 (1915) / 14, pp. 155–157.
• Open infant care in the war. Berliner Klinische Wochenschrift 53 (1916) / 39, pp. 1088-1091.
• Development of the newborn in the second year of the war. German Medical Weekly 42 (1916) / 45, p. 1388.
• The lessons on baby care in the elementary schools of Berlin-Schöneberg. German Medical Weekly 42 (1916) / 22, p. 673.
• Annual medical reports on the Berlin-Schöneberg elementary schools. Medicinische Reform 25 (1917) Part 1 Book 6, p. 45f, Part 2 Book 7, p. 57f, Part 3 Book 8, p. 65f.
• Tuberculosis Control in Turkey. German Medical Wochenschrift 44 (1918) / 16, pp. 438-439.
• Social hygiene and welfare. In: Alfred Peyser (Hrsg.): The family insurance in its effect on the public health and activity of the doctor. Leipzig 1919, 167 pp. 115–125.
• For Greater Berlin. Six contributions to the incorporation question. I. Social hygiene, communal practice. Wochenschrift für Kommunalpolitik und Gemeindesozialismus 19 (1919) / 9, pp. 121–124. 275
• The health system in the future Greater Berlin. German medical weekly publication 45 (1919) / 27, pp. 749-750.
• The fight against lice in Berlin-Schöneberg. Berliner Klinische Wochenschrift 56 (1919) / 20, pp. 467-468.
• Organization of health care in the municipalities. Journal for social hygiene, welfare and hospital systems 2 (1920) / 2, pp. 33–39.
• Berlin after October 1st, 1920, City Medical Councilor Dr. Rabnow: Health Care, Municipal Practice. Central organ of the Social Democratic Party of Germany for local politics and community socialism 20 (1920) / 42, pp. 914–926.
• Report of the municipal infant welfare office in Berlin-Schöneberg. Berliner Klinische Wochenschrift 57 (1920) / 19, pp. 448-450.
• Report on the 1st German Health Care Day in Berlin. Berlin 1921, 48 pp.
• The economic crisis in the hospitals. Journal for social hygiene, welfare and hospital systems 3 (1922) / 12, pp. 351–359.
• The health system in Berlin. German Medical Weekly 50 (1924) / 33, pp. 1122-1123.
• Tasks of the municipal welfare offices. German Medical Weekly 53 (1927) / 31, pp. 1313-1314.
• Some principles of health care. German Medical Weekly 54 (1928) / 33, pp. 1384-1385.
• Organization and development of the health system in the context of the municipal administration with special consideration of Berlin conditions. Announcements of the German Association of Cities 22 (1928) / 10, pp. 1285–1291.

literature

• Peter Reinicke : Rabnow, Johannes , in: Hugo Maier (ed.): Who is who of social work . Freiburg: Lambertus, 1998 ISBN 3-7841-1036-3 , pp. 485f.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} Alfons Labisch and Florian Tennstedt: The way to the "Law on the Unification of Health Care" of July 3, 1934. Volume 2.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g} Roßberg, Siri: Johannes Rabnow. Pioneer of the Berlin health system 1902–1924, Berlin 2016.
3. ↑ ^{a b} Evangelical Regional Church Archive in Berlin, Church Book Office Alt-Berlin, TK 3455, Rabinowicz, Salomon. Manfred Gailus: For God, People, Blood and Race - The Berlin Pastor Karl Themel and his contribution to the persecution of the Jews. In: Die Zeit, issue 44 of October 25, 2001.
4. ↑ Kampe, Norbert: Students and "Jewish question" in the German Empire. The emergence of an academic backing of anti-Semitism. Göttingen 1988, p. 24f.
5. ↑ Rabinowicz, Salomon: "Aphonia hysterica and their treatment", Inaugural dissertation Medical Faculty Leipzig 1888. University Archives Leipzig UAL, Med. Fac. Doctoral book 1889-1891, sheet 26 as well as Med. Fac. Prom. 8029, doctoral certificate.
6. ↑ Schabel, Elmer: Social Hygiene between Social Reform and Social Biology. Fritz Rott (1878–1959) and infant care in Germany. Husum 1995, 439 p., Here p. 88, 432.
7. ^ Stürzbecher, Manfred: From the Berlin city medical councils, city medical directors and senate directors for health care. Berliner Ärzteblatt 94 (1981), pp. 789-790, 937-941.
8. ^ Weder, Heinrich: Social hygiene and pragmatic health policy in the Weimar Republic using the example of the social and industrial hygienist Benno Chajes (1880-1938). Husum 2000, 454 p., Here p. 86, 106, 224ff, 434.
9. ^ Weindling, Paul: Hygiene policy as a socially integrative strategy in the late German Empire. In: Labisch, Alfons and Reinhard Spree (ed.): Medical interpretive power in the social change of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Bonn 1989, 239 pp. 37-55.
10. ↑ Peter Reinicke: Rabnow, John. In: Hugo Maier (Ed.): Who is who of social work . Freiburg im Breisgau 1998, p. 85f.
11. ↑ Nadav, Daniel: Julius Moses and the politics of social hygiene in Germany. Tel Aviv 1985, 339 pp., Here pp. 144f, 159, 192, 205.
12. ↑ John Rabnow: Popular medical lectures in Schöneberg. Medical Reform 10 (1902) / 39, pp. 372-373.