Richard Falck
Richard Falck (born May 7, 1873 in Landeck in West Prussia , † January 1, 1955 in Atlanta , United States ) was a German mycologist . His botanical-mycological author's abbreviation is " Falck ".
After training as a pharmacist in Königsberg and then as a food chemist in Göttingen, he studied at the University of Breslau under Oscar Brefeld from 1900 until his doctorate in 1902. In 1905 he was his successor, and in 1910 he was appointed professor of technical mycology at the Hannoversch Münden Forest Academy . In the same year he married the mycologist Olga Schenkalowski.
As a Jew and a democrat, he had been subject to considerable anti-Semitic hostility and boycott measures from students and colleagues in the Weimar Republic since 1920, who led the Prussian Minister for Agriculture, Domains and Forests, Heinrich Steiger , until the obligation to read was lifted in 1929 . In 1921, a second mycologist, Eduard Jahn , was appointed against his position . A first attempt to escape after the National Socialists came to power failed on March 28, 1933 when the authorities were forbidden to leave the city. His house was monitored by students, his assistant Otto Reis was arrested and later deported. Even before his official leave of absence on May 3, 1933 and dismissal as a civil servant on August 24, 1933, he emigrated to Palestine via Rome in 1933 . 3 years later he took a position as a scientific advisor to the Polish state forest administration and had to flee from Warsaw to the Soviet Union after the outbreak of war . His stations there were Lemberg, Kiev and Chimski near Moscow. After the war spread to the Soviet Union, he fled on to Tashkent and Ashchabad. In 1944 he was able to return to Moscow, where his wife died. In 1945, after much effort, he managed to enter Palestine, where he met his daughter. In 1946 he found employment in Tiberias , 1948 in Haifa and from 1950 until his death in Atlanta. The German reparation proceedings began in 1947 with the reinstatement of an emirated professor in Göttingen, but the payment of the remuneration due to him was delayed until 1954. On January 1, 1955, he died in Atlanta.
Richard Falck did a lot to combat dry rot . Fungicides like xylamone were based on his research. In 1923 he and Edgar Wedekind found an early antibiotic, more precisely the fungistatic sparassin, a methyl ester of evernic acid, in cultures of Sparassis ramosa, a fungus similar to the frilled mother hen .
Fonts (selection)
- The culture of the oidia and their return to the higher fruit shape in the Basidiomycetes . From the Plant Physiological Institute of the University of Wroclaw. Nischkowsky, Breslau 1902 (dissertation, University of Breslau, June 14, 1902).
- 12 booklets dry rot research. 1907–1937 (main work).
- Ernst Späth, Karl Jeschki: About the Sparassol. In: Reports of the German Chemical Society (A and B Series). 57, 1924, pp. 471-474, doi : 10.1002 / cber.19240570320 . (Literature review)
literature
- Richard Falck. In: Uta Schäfer-Richter, Jörg Klein: The Jewish citizens in the Göttingen district, 1933–1945: A memorial book. 2nd Edition. Wallstein, Göttingen 1993, pp. 64 f., ISBN 3-89244-048-4 ( online ).
- Theodor Schmucker : Falck, Richard. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 5, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1961, ISBN 3-428-00186-9 , p. 3 f. ( Digitized version ).
- Joseph Walk (ed.): Short biographies on the history of the Jews 1918–1945. Edited by the Leo Baeck Institute, Jerusalem. Saur, Munich 1988, ISBN 3-598-10477-4 .
- Aniko Szabo: Expulsion, Return, Reparation: Göttingen University Lecturers in the Shadow of National Socialism , Wallstein, Göttingen 2000, p. 485ff
Web links
Individual evidence
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Falck, Richard |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German mycologist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 7, 1873 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Landeck in West Prussia |
| DATE OF DEATH | January 1, 1955 |
| Place of death | Atlanta , United States |