Kurt Priemel

Kurt Priemel on a plaque in the Frankfurt Zoo

Share of the New Zoological Society of October 31, 1872

Kurt Priemel (born July 22, 1880 in Freiburg in Silesia (today Świebodzice ), † February 21, 1959 in Frankfurt am Main ) was director of the Frankfurt Zoo from 1908 to 1938.

Education

Kurt Priemel studied natural sciences in Breslau and Bern with a focus on geology and paleontology. In 1899 he became a member of the Corps Silingia Breslau .

Zoo director in Frankfurt

On April 1, 1908, Kurt Priemel became scientific director of the Frankfurt Zoo. After the departure of administrative director Victor Goering on October 1, 1913, Priemel was appointed sole director. In 1915 the owner of the zoo, the Neue Zoologische Gesellschaft, went bankrupt and the zoo came under the auspices of the city of Frankfurt. During his thirty years of service, Priemel set trends in the Frankfurt Zoo: from 1924 there was a cinema in which nature films were shown. In 1928 the renovated aquarium was one of the most modern in the world. A sensation was a gorilla in the zoo in 1929, shortly afterwards the monkey house was opened, in which orangutans could also be seen. In 1935 Priemel was elected the first President of the newly established International Association of Directors of Zoological Gardens . For health reasons, Priemel retired on April 1, 1938. He moved to Garmisch-Partenkirchen, from where, allegedly with a certain bitterness about the circumstances of his retirement, he closely followed the further developments in the zoo world.

Society for the conservation of the bison

After the First World War , around 50 biologists, veterinarians and committed amateurs saw the possibility of counteracting the extinction of the bison with the help of zoos . In August 1923, under the direction of Kurt Priemel, they founded the International Society for the Conservation of the European bison in Berlin , the aim of which was the regular breeding and reintroduction of the European bison in protected areas. At that time 54 purebred bison lived in zoological gardens and private enclosures, 12 of which were not related to each other, the wild animals had been exterminated.

In 1923 Priemel wrote: “All work for the great and wonderful idea of ​​nature conservation must remain piecemeal if it does not thrive on the ground of internationality. Today, nature conservation is not only an indisputable requirement of our time, it has also become a science that has won general recognition. "

As the first herdbook for wild animals, the society kept the breeding book for bison, which was able to fall back on the years of work of Kurt Priemel and Ludwig Zukowsky, the scientific assistant at the Carl Hagenbeck Zoo ; In this stud book, data were noted for each bison in order to enable an international exchange of breeding animals and thus to counteract inbreeding. After 1945 the Warsaw Zoo took over the management of the stud book.

Honors

In 1953 Priemel was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit for his services to the breeding of the bison.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Retrieved on September 4, 2016 ( Memento from January 4, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
2. ↑ Anonymous (1959), p. 3.
3. ↑ Scherpner (1983), p. 92.
4. ↑ Erwin Willmann (Ed.): Directory of the old Rudolstädter Corps students. (AH. List of the RSC.) , 1928 edition, No. 3688
5. ↑ Scherpner (1983), p. 92.
6. ↑ Scherpner (1983), p. 98.
7. ^ Heinz-Georg Klös: 100 years of the Association of German Zoo Directors. In: Bongo. Contributions to the zoo. Volume 13, 1987, pp. 3 to 35, ISSN  0174-4038 .
8. ↑ Scherpner (1983), p. 120.
9. ↑ Heindl (2010), p. 21.
10. ↑ Hans Psenner: Chronicle of the Alpine Zoo. Innsbruck 1982, p. 7.
11. ^ Małgorzata Krasińska and Zbigniew Krasiński : The wisent. (= Die Neue Brehm-Bücherei. Volume 74) Westarp Sciences, Hohenwarsleben 2008, ISBN 978-3-89432-481-0 , p. 23.
12. ↑ Wanda Olech: The changes of founders 'number and their contribution to the European bison population during 80 years of species' restitution. In: European Bison Conservation Newsletter. Volume 2, 2009, pp. 54-60.
13. ^ Dieter Backhaus: Hundred Years of the Zoological Garden in Frankfurt am Main. In: Zoological Garden of the City of Frankfurt am Main (Ed.): Hundred-year zoo in Frankfurt am Main. Frankfurt Zoo, Frankfurt 1958.

literature

• Anonymous: Dr. Kurt Priemel [died]. In: You and the animal. German animal illustrated. Volume 11, 1959, No. 4, p. 3.
• Otto Antonius : Kurt Priemel for his 60th birthday. In: The Zoological Garden (NF). Volume 12, 1940, No. 2/3, pp. 89-92.
• Gerhard Heindl: Otto Antonius - A scientist as a zoo gardener. In: Dagmar Schratter and Gerhard Heindl (eds.): Otto Antonius - trailblazer of zoo biology . Braumüller Verlag, Vienna 2010, ISBN 978-3-7003-1677-0 , pp. 1 to 90.
• Christoph Scherpner: From citizens for citizens. 125 years of Frankfurt am Main Zoological Garden. Zoological Garden of the City of Frankfurt am Main, 1983, ISBN 3-9800831-0-1 .