Wilhelm Rudorf

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Wilhelm Hermann Friedrich Rudorf (born June 30, 1891 in Rotingdorf ; † March 26, 1969 in Herrsching am Ammersee ) was a German plant geneticist , breeding researcher and university professor .

First years, studies and career entry

Wilhelm Rudorf was the son of the farmer Hermann Rudorf. He finished his school career at the secondary school in Bielefeld and after graduating from high school he began to study languages ​​at the Universities of Göttingen and Münster . From October 1913 he did military service as a one-year volunteer and from 1914 took part in the First World War as a soldier . From July 1918 he was in French captivity, from which he was released to Germany in March 1920. Then he worked on an agricultural estate.

From 1921 he completed a degree in agriculture and botany at the agricultural universities of Münster and Berlin, which he completed in 1923 as a qualified farmer. He then worked as an assistant at the Institute for Plant Cultivation and Plant Breeding at the University of Halle and passed the test to become a seed breeding manager in 1925. In 1926 he was promoted to Dr. sc. nat. PhD . He then worked in Teutschenthal in the administration of Carl Wentzels, a large agricultural company, as 2nd chief inspector. During the Weimar Republic he belonged to the paramilitary organization Stahlhelm until 1929 . He completed his habilitation in Halle in 1929 for plant cultivation and plant breeding. From 1929 to 1933 he was director of the Instituto Fitotécnico de Santa Catalina of the Universidad Nacional de La Plata in Argentina .

Period of National Socialism - University professor and KWI director

When he returned to Germany, he briefly took on a teaching position at the University of Halle and from 1934 to 1936 he held the chair for plant cultivation and plant breeding at the University of Leipzig .

In April 1936, Rudorf was appointed director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Breeding Research in Müncheberg by sponsors from the Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of the Interior . This appointment was made against concerns of the appointment committee of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society , which had proposed the institute employee Hans Stubbe for this position. Rudorf was due to his new job at the University of Berlin umhabilitiert , where he was a full professor of plant breeding.

At the beginning of May 1937 Rudorf joined the NSDAP ( membership number 5,716,883). He later became a supporting member of the SS . In 1937 he published the work "The political tasks of plant breeding". He also acted as a deputy chairman of the Reichsarbeitsgemeinschaft Pflanzenbau .

Second World War - Eastern expansion of breeding research

During the Second World War he was a member of the six-member scientific advisory board of the board of trustees led by Herbert Backe from the Institute for Agricultural Labor Sciences of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, founded in 1940/41 . After the attack on the Soviet Union in autumn 1941, Erich Koch, the Reich Commissioner of the Reich Commissioner for Ukraine , put him in charge of the Ukrainian breeding institutes. From this point on, he undertook several business trips, particularly to this agriculturally important region. However, he mainly performed his duties there from Müncheberg, where he remained mainly active. His employees traveled to the German-occupied Ukraine not only to take over and inspect the research facilities, but mainly to confiscate scientific material and assortments of plants. In addition to Rudorf, his long-time employee Klaus von Rosenstiel is a key figure in these activities .

In the course of rubber research , which was important for the war effort , it was decided in February 1944 to relocate the relevant research from Münchberg to the Auschwitz concentration camp , where the agricultural scientist and SS Oberführer Joachim Caesar headed a plant research station ( Koksaghyz cultivation for rubber production ). The relevant basic research was led by Rudorf and coordinated on site by his colleague, SS-Sturmbannführer Richard Werner Böhme (1903–1945).

Due to the war, the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Breeding Research under Director Rudorf was relocated to Voldagsen in the spring of 1945 .

Post-war period - director of the MPI for Breeding Research

After the end of the war, Rudorf was able to continue his career and remained in office with the support of the British occupation authorities. His staff at the institute remained largely constant. He was accused of employing many former party members, particularly Klaus von Rosenstiel . In mid-1946 Rudorf was denazified in Göttingen without any further consequences . The Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Breeding Research, headed by Rudorf, was renamed the Max Planck Institute for Breeding Research ( Erwin Baur Institute ) in 1951. In 1951/52 there was a scandal as part of a planned employment of the former institute employee and emigrant Max Ufer. In the preliminary talks about the employment of Ufers, Rudorf asked him not to reside with his Jewish wife and daughter like the other employees on the institute premises. Instead, he asked Ufer to move to Hamelin with his family in order to spare his wife "inconvenience". Ufer then broke off negotiations, complained to the MP general administration and moved to Brazil with his family . In 1955 the institute was relocated to Cologne-Vogelsang . Until then, Rudorf held lectures at the University of Göttingen and then at the University of Cologne as an honorary professor. He retired in 1961 . He was then a scientific member of the Max Planck Institute for Breeding Research.

Rudorf was married twice, he was the father of three children. In 1948 he was married to Margot, nee Lauritzen, in his second marriage.

Fonts (selection)

  • Variation statistical studies on varieties and lines of oats , Parey, Berlin 1926 (also: Naturwiss. Diss., Halle 1926)
  • Contributions to the breeding of immunity against Puccinia glumarum tritici (strip rust of wheat) , habilitation thesis at the University of Halle in 1929
  • The political tasks of German plant breeding , blood etc. Boden Verlag, Goslar 1937
  • Handbook of Plant Breeding , 5 vols., Berlin 1938–50 (co-editor)
  • On the history and geography of old European cultivated plants , Berlin 1969

literature

  • Alfred Lein, Klaus von Rosenstiel , Fritz Wienhues: The analysis of the yield components in wheat as a plant cultivation-breeding problem. Dedicated to Wilhelm Rudorf on the occasion of his 60th birthday . Agricultural and domestic evaluation and information service (AID). Frankfurt am Main 1952.
  • Susanne Heim : calories, rubber, careers. Plant breeding and agricultural research at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes 1933–1945 , Wallstein, Göttingen 2003, ISBN 3-89244-696-2 .
  • Susanne Heim (Ed.): Autarky and eastward expansion. Plant breeding and agricultural research during National Socialism (= history of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society during National Socialism. Vol. 2). Wallstein, Göttingen 2002, ISBN 978-3-89244-496-1 .
  • Susanne Heim: The pure air of scientific research . Research program "History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism", results 7, Berlin 2002 online version (PDF; 349 kB)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Who is who? : The German Who's Who, Arani, 1967, Volume 15, p. 1635
  2. ↑ Klaus Müntz , Ulrich Wobus : The Gatersleben Institute and its history. Springer, Berlin and Heidelberg 2012, ISBN 978-3-642-28648-3 , p. 6
  3. ^ Susanne Heim, Hildegard Kaulen: Müncheberg - Cologne: The Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research, in: Places of thought: Max Planck Society and Kaiser Wilhelm Society, Breaks and Continuities, Sandstein-Verlag, Dresden 2011, ISBN 978- 3-942422-01-7 , p. 354 ( online ; PDF; 2.4 MB)
  4. ↑ a b Wilhelm Rudorf in the professorial catalog of the University of Halle
  5. ^ A b Rüdiger Hachtmann : Science Management in the "Third Reich". History of the general administration of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society . Volume II. Göttingen 2007. p. 1114
  6. ^ Ernst Klee: Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 512f.
  7. ^ Rüdiger Hachtmann: Science management in the "Third Reich". History of the general administration of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society . Volume II. Göttingen 2007. pp. 699f.
  8. ↑ Susanne Heim: Calories, Rubber, Careers. Plant breeding and agricultural research at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes 1933–1945 , Göttingen 2003, p. 42f.
  9. ↑ Susanne Heim: Calories, Rubber, Careers. Plant breeding and agricultural research at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes 1933–1945 , Göttingen 2003, p. 45
  10. ^ Susanne Heim: Research for Autarky: Agriculture at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes during National Socialism . In: Susanne Heim (Ed.) Autarky and Eastern Expansion. Plant breeding and agricultural research during National Socialism (= History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society in National Socialism, Vol. 2). Edited by Susanne Heim, Wallstein Verlag Göttingen 2002, p. 163
  11. ↑ Thomas Wieland: The political tasks of German plant breeding - Nazi ideology and the research work of academic plant breeders . In: Susanne Heim (Ed.) Autarky and Eastern Expansion. Plant breeding and agricultural research during National Socialism (= History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society in National Socialism, Vol. 2). Edited by Susanne Heim, Wallstein Verlag Göttingen 2002, p. 51ff.
  12. ↑ a b Susanne Heim: Calories, Rubber, Careers. Plant breeding and agricultural research at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes 1933–1945 , Göttingen 2003, p. 237
  13. ↑ Reinhard Rürup, with the participation of Michael Schüring: Fates and Careers: Memorial Book for the Researchers Expelled from the Kaiser Wilhelm Society by the National Socialists , Wallstein, Göttingen 2008, p. 337f.
  14. ↑ Michael Schüring: An "unpleasant process". The Max Planck Institute for Breeding Research in Voldagsen and the failed return of Max Ufer. In: Susanne Heim (Ed.) Autarky and Eastern Expansion. Plant breeding and agricultural research during National Socialism (= History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society in National Socialism, Vol. 2). Edited by Susanne Heim, Wallstein Verlag Göttingen 2002, p. 299
personal data
SURNAME Rudorf, Wilhelm
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Rudorf, Wilhelm Hermann Friedrich (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German plant geneticist, breeding researcher and university professor
DATE OF BIRTH June 30, 1891
PLACE OF BIRTH Rotingdorf
DATE OF DEATH March 26, 1969
Place of death Herrsching am Ammersee