Doing Medicine Together: Germany and Russia Between the Wars 0802091717, 9780802091710

Of the many interwar connections between Germany and Russia, one of the most unusual - and least explored - is medicine

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Doing Medicine Together: Germany and Russia Between the Wars
 0802091717, 9780802091710

Table of contents :
Contents
List of Illustrations
Preface
Contributors
Introduction: Germany, Russia, and Medical Cooperation between the Wars
Part One: 'Choosing' Scientific Friends
1. German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925: Between Racial Expansion and National Coexistence
2. Partners of Choice/Faute de Mieux? Russians and Germans at the 200th Anniversary of the Academy of Sciences, 1925
3. Leftists versus Nationalists in Soviet-Weimar Cultural Diplomacy: Showcases, Fronts, and Boomerangs
Part Two: Scientific Entrepreneurs across Borders
4. How to Win Friends and Influence People: Heinz Zeiss, Boundary Objects, and the Pursuit of Cross-National Scientific Collaboration in Microbiology
5. 'Creating Confidence': Heinz Zeiss as a Traveller in the Soviet Union, 1921-1932
6. Infertile Soil: Heinz Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography to Russia, 1922-1930
7. The Scientist as Lobbyist: Heinz Zeiss and Auslandsdeutschtum
Part Three: Bilateralism and Internationalism
8. Castor and Pollux in Brain Research: The Berlin and the Moscow Brain Research Institutes
9. Eugenics, Rassenhygiene, and Human Genetics in the Late 1930s: The Case of the Seventh International Genetics Congress
Part Four: Scientific Migration to 'the Other'
10. Home Away from Home: The Berlin Neuroanatomist Louis Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia
11. Crossing Over: The Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians to the Soviet Union after 1933
Index

Citation preview

DOING MEDICINE TOGETHER: GERMANY AND RUSSIA BETWEEN THE WARS

GERMAN AND EUROPEAN STUDIES General Editor: James Retallack

Doing Medicine Together Germany and Russia between the Wars

Edited by Susan Gross Solomon

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS Toronto Buffalo London

www.utppublishing.com © University of Toronto Press Incorporated 2006 Toronto Buffalo London Printed in Canada ISBN-13: 978-0-8020-9171-0 ISBN-10: 0-8020-9171-7

Printed on acid-free paper

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Doing medicine together : Germany and Russia between the wars / edited by Susan Gross Solomon. (German and European studies) Includes bibliographic references and index. ISBN-10: 0-8020-9171-7 ISBN-13: 978-0-8020-9171-0 I. Medicine - Research - Germany - History - 20th century. 2. Medicine Research - Soviet Union - History - 20th century. 3. Medicine - Research International cooperation. 4. Medicine - Research - Government policy Germany - History - 20th century. 5. Medicine - Research - Government policy - Soviet Union - History - 20th century. I. Solomon, Susan Gross II. Series. R854.G3D63 2006

610.72'43

C2006-901986-X

University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance to its publishing program of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council. University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial support for its publishing activities of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP).

For Peter and for Raphael and Rachel

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Contents

List of Illustrations Preface

ix

xi

Contributors

xv

Introduction: Germany, Russia, and Medical Cooperation between the Wars 3 SUSAN GROSS SOLOMON

Part One: 'Choosing' Scientific Friends 1 German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925: Between Racial Expansion and National Coexistence 35 PAUL W E I N D L I N G

2 Partners of Choice/Fawfe de Mieux? Russians and Germans at the 200th Anniversary of the Academy of Sciences, 1925 61 MARINA SOROKINA

3 Leftists versus Nationalists in Soviet-Weimar Cultural Diplomacy: Showcases, Fronts, and Boomerangs 103 MICHAEL DAVID-FOX

Part Two: Scientific Entrepreneurs across Borders 4 How to Win Friends and Influence People: Heinz Zeiss, Boundary Objects, and the Pursuit of Cross-National Scientific Collaboration in Microbiology 159 ELIZABETH HACHTEN

viii Contents

5 'Creating Confidence': Heinz Zeiss as a Traveller in the Soviet Union, 1921-1932 199 WOLFGANG ECKART

6 Infertile Soil: Heinz Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography to Russia, 1922-1930 240 SUSAN GROSS

SOLOMON

7 The Scientist as Lobbyist: Heinz Zeiss and Auslandsdeutschtum

291

SABINE SCHLEIERMACHER

Part Three: Bilateralism and Internationalism 8 Castor and Pollux in Brain Research: The Berlin and the Moscow Brain Research Institutes 325 JOCHEN RICHTER

9 Eugenics, Rassenhygiene, and Human Genetics in the Late 1930s: The Case of the Seventh International Genetics Congress 369 NIKOLAIKREMENTSOV

Part Four: Scientific Migration to 'the Other' 10 Home Away from Home: The Berlin Neuroanatomist Louis Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 407 ULRIKE EISENBERG

11 Crossing Over: The Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians to the Soviet Union after 1933 462 CAROLA TISCHLER

Index

501

Illustrations

1. Banquet to celebrate the founding of Deutsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift, 1925 4 2. Co-editors of the Deutsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift, 1925 Berlin 6 3. The Russian part of the editorial board of Russko-nemetskii meditsinskii zhurnal, with German guests 10 4. The Week of Russian Natural Science in Berlin, 1927 15 5. Portraits of prominent figures in German-Soviet medical relations at the Week of Russian Natural Science in Berlin, 1927 18

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Preface

Of the rich and tangled connections between Germany and Russia in the wake of the First World War, one of the most fascinating - and least explored - was that in medicine and public health. Physicians in the two countries had ties that extended back to the late nineteenth century, but the context of the 1920s and early 1930s gave their 'connect' new meaning - and urgency. Hobbled by the economic devastation that followed the war and revolution and treated as outcasts in the international arena, Germany and Russia struggled both to keep scientific activity alive and to reclaim 'place' in international science. Their links to each other held out the possibility of compensating for the loss of scientific infrastructure, standing, and contacts. Like the political, military, economic, and cultural ties, the medical connection between Germany and Russia in the interwar years has been an uneasy subject for historians. Much touted by participants at the time, these ties were off the scholarly agenda until the late 1950s. In the first three decades that followed, historians in Germany and Russia proceeded gingerly, retrieving individual stones in the edifice of cooperation, but avoiding examination of the significance of that cooperation for each of the partners and for the landscape of postwar Europe. With the opening of the archives in Russia and the former German Democratic Republic in the 1990s, historians gained access for the first time to vast amounts of material previously unavailable (and often unsorted) that documented the close links between the two nations. This new embarrassment of riches has made it vital not only to frame the relationship between Russian and German medicine, but also to interpret its significance. These challenges animate the essays in Doing Medicine Together.

xii Preface

Like the scientific cooperation that is its subject, Doing Medicine Together is a transnational effort. It brings together scholars from a variety of countries, approaches to the retrieval of history honed in different national settings, and primary evidence gathered from an array of archival repositories and collections scattered throughout Europe and North America. Such a transnational venture would not have been thinkable, much less possible, without generous support from a variety of sources, which I acknowledge with pleasure. This book had its origins in an international conference on GermanSoviet Medical Relations between the Wars, held at the University of Toronto in May 2000. The Conference was supported by the Stalin Era Research and Archives Project (SERAP) under the Major Collaborative Research Initiatives program of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada; the Joint Initiative in German and European Studies, University of Toronto; the Office of the Vice-President (International Research), University of Toronto; and the Office of the Principal, Scarborough College, University of Toronto. The Toronto meeting was the culmination of six years of annual symposia on Soviet-German medical relations held in Berlin every May between 1992 and 1997, with the financial support of the Hannah Institute for the History of Medicine (Canada). Rolf Winau, director of the Institut fur Geschichte der Medizin of the Free University in Berlin, made his institute the informal home of the 'May meetings.' Charter members of the group included Paul Weindling, with whom the first symposium was planned, Michael Hubenstorf (now director of the Institut fur Geschichte der Medizin, Vienna), Jochen Richter (Berlin), Ingrid Kaestner (Institut fur Geschichte der Medizin, Leipzig), and Peter Schneck (Institut fur Geschichte der Medizin, Humboldt University). The Berlin meetings created an international scientific network for the exchange of ideas, sources, and intellectual perspectives. Over the course of the 1990s, the network broadened and changed. The earliest participants were German scholars, from the former east and west, who met eagerly to sift the issue of the German relation to Soviet Russia. Over the course of the 1990s, the network expanded to include historians of medicine and archival researchers from Russia. The annual meetings afforded members of the group the first real opportunity to look at documents together, to debate issues of meaning, and to identify conventions of interpretation that differed from one country to the other. With the Toronto conference in 2000, a number of scholars from North America joined the group, which had the effect of putting the Soviet-German dyad in international perspective.

Preface xiii

The chapters in Doing Medicine Together were specially commissioned. Some were presented in outline form at the Toronto meeting; two entirely new chapters - by Nikolai Krementsov and Jochen Richter - were solicited as the volume took shape. The Editorial Board of the University of Toronto Press series German and European Studies endorsed the volume early on. Len Husband of the University of Toronto Press provided valuable advice, as did Nikolai Krementsov and the anonymous readers of the manuscript. The costs associated with publication of the volume were generously borne by the Transatlantic Cooperation in Research Program (Transcoop) of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, as part of a joint project I had with Wolfgang Eckart (Heidelberg). The volume benefited immeasurably from the scrupulous editorial eye and sure hand of Edith Klein (University of Toronto) and Matthew Kudelka. Thanks go to Jochen Richter, Janet Hyer, and Maren Kasulke for assistance with transliteration, to Masha Bloshtein (Toronto), Patricia Szobar, and Nancy Joyce (Berlin) who made sure that nothing was 'lost in translation/ and to Jochen Richter for making available photographs from his collection. I am grateful to the contributors who endured, with good humour, what may have seemed at times my relentless red pencil. Finally, profound thanks go to my husband, Peter, for his unwavering encouragement and support not only of the May meetings, but also of the years of scholarly activity required to bring Doing Medicine Together to fruition. This book is dedicated to him and to our two best joint ventures, Raphael and Rachel.

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Contributors

Michael David-Fox is associate professor, Department of History, University of Maryland, and an editor of Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History. He is the author of Revolution of the Mind: Higher Learning among the Bolsheviks (Cornell University Press, 1997) and the editor of two volumes of Amerikanskaia rusistika: Vekhi istoriografii poslednikh let (Samara University Press, 2000 and 2001). He is currently writing a book on the reception of foreign intellectuals who visited the Soviet Union in the 1920s and 1930s. Wolfgang Eckart is professor of the history of medicine and director of the Institute for the History of Medicine at Ruprecht-Karls-University, Heidelberg. His major publications include 100 years of organized cancer research = 100 Jahre organisierte Krebsforschung (G. Thieme, 2000); Medizin und Kolonialimperialismus (Ferdinand Schoningh, 1997); and Deutsche Aerzte in China, 1897-1914: Medizin als Kulturmission im ZweitenDeutschen Kaiserreich (Fischer, 1989). He is writing a book on medicine and the First World War. Ulrike Eisenberg, who studied medicine in Marburg and Berlin, is a consultant in neurosurgery at the Werner-Forfimann Hospital in Eberswalde. In 2005 she received her doctorate in medicine at the Institute for the History of Medicine, Center for Humanities and Health Sciences, Free University and Humboldt University, Berlin. Her dissertation was titled The Expulsion of Berlin Neurology: Louis Jacobsohn-Lask (18631940) and His Contribution to Neuroanatomy/ Elizabeth Hachten is associate professor of history and chair of the

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Contributors

Department of History at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. Her publications include 'Science in Local Context: Interests, Identities, and Knowledge in the Construction of Russian Bacteriology/ Voprosy istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki 3 (2001) and In Service to Science and Society: Scientists and the Public in Late Nineteenth-Century Russia/ Osiris 17 (2002). She is writing a book on the history of bacteriology and public health in the late Imperial and early Soviet periods. Nikolai Krementsov is associate professor, Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology, University of Toronto. His publications include Stalinist Science (Princeton University Press, 1997); The Cure: A Story of Cancer and Politics from the Annals of the Cold War (University of Chicago Press, 2002); and International Science between the World Wars: The Case of Genetics (Routledge, 2005). He is co-author of 'State Limits on International Science: A Comparative Study of German Science under Hitler, Soviet Science under Stalin, and U.S. Science in the Early Cold War/ Osiris 20 (2005). Jochen Richter received his doctorate in history and philosophy of science from the Academy of Sciences of the GDR. From 1970 to 1991 he was a historian in that academy's Institute for Theory, History and Organization of Science, focusing on the history of neurosciences and the history of German-Soviet medical relations in the Weimar Republic. His most recent publications are Rasse, Elite, Pathos: Eine Chronik zur medizinischen Biographie Lenins und zur Geschichte der Elitegehirnforschung in Dokumenten (Centaurus, 2000); and 'Pantheon of Brains: The Moscow Brain Research Institute 1925-1936,' Journal of the History of the Neurosciences (forthcoming). Sabine Schleiermacher is reseach associate, Department of Contemporary History, Institute of History of Medicine, Center for Humanities and Health Sciences at the Free University and Humboldt University, Berlin. She is the author of Sozialethik im Spannungsfeld von Sozialund Rassenhygiene: der Mediziner Hans Harmsen im Centralausschuss fur die Innere Mission (Matthiessen, 1998) and co-editor of Der 'Generalplan Ost': Hauptlinien der nationalsozialistischen Planungs- und Vernichtungspolitik (Akademie Verlag, 1993). She is now working on medical education in postwar Germany and the Rockefeller Foundation. Susan Gross Solomon is professor of political science, University of Toronto. Her recent publications include 'Die Reisetagebuch als Quelle

Contributors

xvii

fiir die Analyse binationaler medizinischer Unternehmungen/ in J. Richter, ed., Lues, Lamas, Leninisten (Centaurus, 1996); Vergleichende Volkerpathologie oder Rassenpathologie, ed. with J. Richter (Centaurus, 1998); and 'Giving and Taking across Borders: The Rockefeller Foundation and Russia, 1919-1928/ Minerva 3 (2001), with N. Krementsov. She is writing a comparative study of the relation of American and German foundations to Russia between the wars. Marina Sorokina is senior researcher in the Archives of the Russian Academy of Sciences. She received her PhD in historical archives from the Federal Research Institute for Documents and Archives. A specialist in the social history of Russian science, she has collected, annotated, and published a number of volumes of archival manuscripts on Russian scholars, including most recently A.S. Lappo-Danilevsky, Politische Ideen im Russland des 18. Jahrhunderts: ihre Geschichte im Zusammenhang mil der allgemeinen Entwicklung der russischen Kultur und Politik (Bohlau, 2005) and Liudi i subdy: biobliograficheskii slovar vostokovedov-zhertv politicheskogo terrora v sovetskii period (1917-1991) (Peterburgskoe vostokovedenie, 2003). Carola Tischler taught history at Humboldt University in Berlin from 1995 to 2000. Her publications include Flucht in die Verfolgung: Deutsche Emigranten im sowjetischen Exil (Lit., 1996); Inventar der Quellen zum deutschsprachigen Rundfunk in der Soivjetunion (1929-1945): Bestande in deutschen und ausla'ndischen Archiven und Bibliotheken (Verlag fiir BerlinBrandenburg, 1997); and 'Funk in Fesseln: Der deutschsprachige Rundfunk aus Moskau zwischen revolutionarem Anspruch und staatlicher Reglementierung (1929-1941),' in Hrsg. von K. Eimermacher and A. Volpert, eds., Stiirmische Aufbriiche und enttauschte Hoffnungen: Russen und Deutsche in der Zwischenkriegszeit (Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 2006). Paul Weindling is Wellcome Trust Research Professor in the History of Medicine in the School of Humanities, Oxford Brookes University. Among his publications are Health, Race and German Politics between National Unification and Nazism (Cambridge University Press, 1989); Epidemics and Genocide in Eastern Europe, 1890-1945 (Oxford University Press, 2000); Nazi Medicine and the Nuremberg Trials: From Medical War Crimes to Informed Consent (Palgrave Macmillan, 2004); and an edited volume International Health Organisations and Movements, 1918-1939 (Cambridge University Press, 1995).

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DOING MEDICINE TOGETHER: GERMANY AND RUSSIA BETWEEN THE WARS

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Introduction: Germany, Russia, and Medical Cooperation between the Wars SUSAN GROSS SOLOMON

A photograph taken in Berlin in 1925 at a banquet to celebrate the founding of the bilingual German-Russian medical journal DeutschRussische Medizinische Zeitschrift I Russko-nemetskii meditsinskii zhurnal shows several dozen German and Russian scientists and government officials resplendent in evening dress and smiling broadly for the camera.1 As with all photographs, the angle of the lens determines what is captured and what eludes our gaze. The connoisseur of photographic art may focus on the composition and aesthetic of the picture itself; for the historian, the photograph is a document to be set in a narrative frame and interpreted. Of what story, we may ask, is the photograph a part and how is that story best told? The patent ease with one another of those assembled for the photographer marks the occasion as part of the so-called era of Rapallo (1922-33).2 The First World War had suspended a dense and rich fabric of relations between Russia and Germany,3 but within a year of the last meetings of the Paris Peace Conference, steps were already being taken to normalize ties between the two countries. In May 1921 the two states signed a provisional trade agreement, which also mentioned the exchange of political representatives.4 In April 1922, in the midst of a thirty-four-nation 'economic summit' in Genoa aimed at the economic and political reconstruction of Europe,5 representatives of Russia and Germany slipped away to the nearby town of Rapallo, where - to the surprise and distress of the Allies - they signed a treaty that provided for the resumption of full diplomatic and consular relations, the development of economic cooperation, and a complete waiver of debts and reparations. In signing this treaty, Russia was signalling that it would not be content to depend on the West, and Germany was indicating

Banquet to celebrate the founding of the Deutsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift, 1925. (top row) Dr Strauss, Dr Beyer Professor Schindler; (second row) Professor Neufeld, Dr Asnes, Priv.-Doz. Zondek, Dr Brussilovskii, Professor Brugsch' Prof. Rost, Prof. v. Drygalski, Dr Binger; (third row) Dr Doxiades, Prof. Czerny, Prof. Thomas, Dr Goldenberg, Ambassador Krestinskii, Geheimrat R. Bumm, Prof. F. Kraus, Prof. Lubarsch, Dr Antrick; (bottom row) Dr Doxiades, Dr Goldenberg Dr Brussilovskii, Dr Semashko, Prof. Stern, Dr Krestinskii, Prof. N.A. Semashko. Source: DRMZ 1 (1925) Nr 2.

Introduction 5

that it regarded relations with Russia as its own domain.6 Although the Rapallo treaty did not eliminate all political distrust between the two nations, it did clear the way for renewed - and intensified - GermanSoviet activity in a variety of economic7 and cultural spheres.8 One area that benefited almost immediately from the 'spirit of Rapallo' was research in medicine and public health. Well before the turn of the last century there were strong links between German and Russian physicians and public health researchers. Many prominent Russian medical scientists had trained in Germany, which until the First World War had been the undisputed leader in medical research. Like their counterparts in other countries, the Russians had developed bonds with German researchers and institutions, which they took care to preserve when they returned home.9 The war did not completely rupture those links; indeed, after the guns fell silent, the two scientific communities resumed their relations. The eagerness of Russia and Germany to pick up the threads was no doubt a function of the fact that in the wake of the war and the October Revolution, Russia and Germany found themselves treated as pariahs, excluded from international scientific meetings and congresses. That exclusion was especially painful given the renewed emphasis on scientific internationalism that marked the 1920s. The war had battered deeply held beliefs about 'internationalism' in science.10 Scientists from combatant nations had formed themselves into 'hostile camps';11 even more startling, science itself, once touted for its contribution to world peace, was revealed as powerless to avoid war and upheaval.12 After the war, scientists and politicians spared no effort in trying to revive not only the practice but also the bruised ethos of scientific internationalism.13 With heightened activity in the international arena, the two outcast nations wasted little time resuming their bilateral relations. As early as 1923, Russian and German medical and public health researchers were participating in scientific conferences and jubilees in each other's countries and publishing some of the results of their research and practical work in each other's journals. By the mid-1920s, both countries were beginning to reclaim their place in international medicine and health; meanwhile, bilateral undertakings between Russia and Germany were continuing to multiply. In 1925 the bilingual medical journal DeutschRussische Medizinische Zeitschrift was founded, with a blue-ribbon editorial board drawn from both countries. In the half-decade that followed, Soviet and German medical researchers collaborated in a series

6 Susan Gross Solomon

Co-editors of the Deutsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift in Berlin, 1925. Prof. F. Kraus (left) and Dr N.A. Semashko. Source: DRMZ 1 (1925) Nr 3.

of research expeditions, all on Soviet soil.14 The jewels in the crown were the joint institutional ventures: the Brain Research Institute, with its twin bases in Berlin (Buch) and Moscow; and the German-Russian Laboratory for Racial Pathology, which opened in Moscow in 1927.15 The joint undertakings - which in at least some cases produced work of scientific merit - were mutually beneficial. German physicians and public health researchers obtained access to patient populations and diseases unavailable to them as a result of Germany's postwar loss of her colonies; Soviet physicians secured access to German skills and technology.

Introduction 7

The Soviet-German research expeditions and joint publications were not grassroots ventures. The agreements that established them were negotiated during high-level bilateral meetings among science administrators and politicians, with prominent scientists often in attendance.16 The German side was represented by such figures as Friedrich Schmidt-Ott, the head of the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Association for German Science) and Ulrich von Brockdorff-Rantzau, the German Ambassador to Moscow between 1922 and 1928.17 At the table for the Russians were figures such as Nikolai Aleksandrovich Semashko, the Russian Commissar of Public Health; Nikolai Petrovich Gorbunov, head of the Department of Scientific Institutions of the Council of People's Commissars; and Sergei Ol'denburg, the Permanent Secretary of the Russian Academy of Sciences from 1904 to 1927, whose special responsibility after 1917 was relations between science and government.18 More often than not the agreements were signed with considerable ceremony and feasting. In both countries the joint undertakings were funded and supported by governmental19 or quasi-governmental agencies.20 One Connection, Two Views The German-Soviet connection in medicine has intrigued historians for more than half a century. The subject began to command attention in the 1960s, when the taboo on discussing the Soviet-German friendship of the Weimar period began to lift. After some tapering off in the 1980s, interest resurfaced with vigour in the 1990s, when the newly opened Russian and East German archives began to yield up their secrets.21 As one might expect research on the German-Russian joint ventures of the Rapallo era has spawned two different traditions of interpretation. For more than four decades, German historical writing (both East and West) on the Rapallo-era arrangements in medicine and public health rested on two premises. The first of these was that Germany enjoyed a relationship with Russia that was special in both its intensity and its significance. The idea of a special relationship (Sonderverhaltnis) with Russia ran deep in German diplomatic circles during the Weimar years. Some viewed the relationship with Russia as a function of a shared destiny (Schicksalsgemeinschaft) whereas others conceived it as a tie born of necessity (Zweckbiindnis).22The relative weight of the two conceptions shifted over time. In the first years after Rapallo the idea of a shared destiny, advanced by the first German Ambassador to Moscow, Graf von

8 Susan Gross Solomon

Brockdorff-Rantzau (1922-8), captured the imagination of many Germans; as the decade wore on, the 'romantic' image ceded place to the argument from necessity, which was strongly favoured by von Brockdorff-Rantzau's successor, Herbert von Dirksen (1928-33).23 The second article of faith among German historians was that German-Soviet scientific interactions (like cultural interactions generally) were a spillover from foreign policy, if not indeed a tributary of it. The argument was this: absent the possibility of wielding political or military might, culture and especially science (Wissenschaft) became a substitute for military and political power (Machtersatz). Among Germans, the idea of science as a substitute for power had a long lineage, going back to the days of Humboldt.24 After the First World War, the idea acquired institutional reality. In March 1920 the newly reorganized German Foreign Office created a cultural division (Kulturabteilung) charged with overseeing international scientific exchange, the movement of scientific work across borders, international scientific meetings, and the foreign travel of German scholars.25 This institutional configuration was a signal that the Foreign Office considered cultural relations (including science and the arts) with the outside world a subset of diplomatic relations. The German idea of science as Machtersatz differs in important ways from the concept of culture as a source of 'soft power' formulated recently by Joseph Nye.26 While Nye's soft power is wielded by a strong nation to expand and bolster sympathies abroad for its positions,27 the Germans saw Machtersatz as a stratagem uniquely appropriate to a nation that was unable to flex its muscles. Furthermore, while Nye's soft power succeeds to the extent that it renders a nation's values and ideals appealing to others, the German notion of science as a substitute for power required that science be strong - that is, an unequivocal demonstration of the intellectual superiority of the nation. Taken together, the two premises articulated above supported the view that cultural relations between Germany and Russia were, as one historian put it, 'as exclusive' as political relations between the countries.28 Since the early 1960s, German historians of science and medicine have written the story of the Rapallo-era medical connection with Russia largely within this framework.29 Different assumptions underpinned the reading by Soviet historians of their nation's scientific links to Germany. Russian historians made no reference to a Sonderverhaltnis with Germany. On the contrary: in the 1960s and 1970s and again in the 1990s they went to great lengths to demonstrate that while Russia may have had close (and sometimes the

Introduction 9

closest) relations with Germany, it actively cultivated ties with as many countries as possible.30 A recently published collection of documents on the Rapallo period makes it clear that within Russian diplomatic circles, the relationship with Germany was the subject of debate: Minister of Foreign Affairs Georgi Chicherin gave priority to Germany, but his successor, Maxim Litvinov, favoured the 'Anglo-Saxon orientation/31 Second, in contrast to their German counterparts, Soviet historians did not depict Rapallo-era scientific relations with Germany as a substitute for foreign policy. While they did not deny that science and politics intersected, they presented Russian scientific connections to Germany indeed, to all countries - as evolving within the general contours of the Soviet approach to scientific and cultural exchange.32 The historians insisted that if the 1930s saw the emergence of an infrastructure to govern, plan and direct all Soviet scientific activity,33 the 1920s supported multiple (and often unconnected) Soviet lines of scientific relations with foreign countries. A remarkable variety of agencies - governmental (the Russian Commissariats of Enlightenment and of Public Health,34 the Council of People's Commissars,35 the Supreme Council of the National Economy36), non-governmental (the All-Union Society for Cultural Ties Abroad or VOKS37), and scientific (the Russian Academy of Sciences38) - were engaged in cross-national scientific contacts, arranging foreign trips for scientists and intellectuals,39 hosting visiting delegations, supporting joint research projects, or managing purchases of foreign books and equipment. Each of these agencies had its own agenda and goals; that said, the overriding concern of all agencies was to ensure the recovery of Soviet science after its near destruction as a consequence of seven years of war and revolution. The picture painted by the Soviet historians was not one of exclusively top-down activity. While they credited the political leadership (principally Lenin) with recognizing the importance of 'opening' to the world, they took care to underscore the role played by prominent scientists, who lobbied for that opening on the grounds that international contacts were indispensable to scientific recovery.40 A focus on initiatives from both above and below has been the hallmark of Russian historical scholarship on the Rapallo-era scientific connections with Germany (and with other countries).41 As depicted by Russian historians, the German-Russian connection is an uneasy fit with the two models of transnational scientific cooperation that dominate present-day writing: the 'non-governmental' (or 'pure') model, brought into being by scientists working in different countries and undertaken to advance scientific problem solving; and the 'inter-

10 Susan Gross Solomon

The Russian part of the editorial board of Russko-nemetskii meditsinskii zhurnal, with German guests. (Back row) Professors N.N. Burdenko, D.D. Pletnev, A.I. Abrikosov, Dr L. la. Brussilovskii; (front row) Professors L.A. Tarasevich, F. Kraus, N.A. Semashko, O. Foerster, G.I. Rossolimo. Source: Biulleten' narodnogo kommissariata zdravookhraneniia (1926) Nr. 8.

governmental' or 'state-sponsored' model, put in place by state actors, sustained by governmental policies, and directed at the goal of increasing political or national prestige.42 Notwithstanding their clear differences, German and Russian readings of the two countries' scientific relations in the 1920s share two features. First, in neither body of history writing was the story told as part

Introduction 11 of the tale of scientific development. The emphasis tended to be on macrolevel goals, whether these involved substituting science for power politics or prevent the atrophy of science. But a focus on macrolevel goals cannot account for the pattern of scientific interaction between the two countries. Why were relations between German and Soviet medical researchers more developed in some fields than others? Why were some collaborations more productive than others? Why were some scientific entrepreneurs more successful than others in crossing the scientific borders between the two countries? To explain these variations - which are the very stuff of the story of German-Russian connection in medicine and health - we need to look below the level of the nation-state, at the intellectual agendas, disciplinary contacts, and institutional settings of the scientists involved in the cross-national relations. We need to tell the story of cross-national scientific relations as part of the story of scientific development in both countries. A second feature of both traditions of historical scholarship has been the tendency to analyse German-Russian scientific ties (in formal institutions and/or informal networks) in isolation from the ties that the partners had (or sought to develop) with colleagues in other countries. The density and range of the Soviet-German connection in medical and public health research leaves little question that the bilateral relationship was significant. But how significant? To infer from the richness of the German-Soviet ties that for each the link to the other was of primary importance is to foreclose inquiry. It is at least possible that for some German or Soviet scientists, the 'other' was not the partner of first choice, but rather a partner faute de mieux. Historians have documented the pre-First World War involvement of Germany and Russia with a range of other partners: Germany had links to China and Japan, and Russia had developed interests with France and America.43 We know that scientific networks have real staying power; there are no grounds for us to expect them to have disappeared in the case at hand. To understand the importance of the links of Soviet and German medical researchers to one another, we must analyse those links in comparative perspective. Refraining the Connection The contributors to this volume depart from the conventional approach to studying the German-Russian connection. They move beneath the macrolevel goals of the bilateral arrangement to examine the impact of

12 Susan Gross Solomon

the connection on how science was 'done' - on how research agendas were elaborated, fieldwork was conducted, networks were built, and relations with patrons and audiences were crafted. The contributors acknowledge the richness of the German-Russian ties, but they also explore how important 'the other' was for the partners, what alternatives to 'the other' the partners identified, and how they weighed those alternatives. The new approaches generate new sites of inquiry. This book foregrounds four important facets of the German-Russian connection in medicine that have received little attention to date: the process of choosing friends across borders, the role of scientific entrepreneurs in uncharted terrain, the nexus of bilateral and international science, and the migration of scientists across borders. 'Choosing' Scientific Friends Almost without exception, historians of science who study GermanRussian relations in medicine and public health begin from the 'connection' as an established fact, paying little if any attention to the processes whereby scientific friends across borders are actually chosen. In sharp contrast, diplomatic historians have chronicled in minute detail the calculations underlying the building and preservation of the German-Russian alliance.44 But choice there was. Both Germany and Russia had multiple scientific constituencies within the 'other' from which to select working, talking, or even jousting partners. Nor did choice end here: there were also options beyond the bilateral umbrella. On what basis (political, ideological, scientific) were 'friends' chosen? What choices did the Rapallo partners in medicine have? And, to borrow a leaf from the book of the historian Niall Ferguson, what options did they think they had?45 In his chapter, Paul Weindling explores the coexistence of and tension between the multiple motives - military, political, and scientific for Germany's opening to Russia after the First World War. The political gains from providing medical, scientific, and technical assistance to Russia were acknowledged across the German political spectrum. For the German medical officials and physicians who went to Russia as part of international relief efforts,46 interest in spreading and developing German science rapidly eclipsed humanitarian goals. But was scientific cooperation with Russia seen by German scientists as valuable in itself? For the German bacteriologist Heinz Zeiss, whose activity

Introduction 13

animates Weindling's chapter, scientific cooperation was inextricably linked to the goal of serving German cultural policy. Whether the intersection of motives weakened or strengthened German commitment to scientific relations with Russia remains an open question. Michael David-Fox unpacks the challenges of identifying 'friends' across national borders. Drawing on the archives of the Ail-Union Society for Cultural Ties Abroad (VOKS), a key vehicle of Soviet cultural diplomacy in the 1920s and early 1930s, he follows the debates over the relative benefits of courting leftist sympathizers as opposed to bourgeois allies in Germany. In the 1920s, VOKS hedged its bets, even as its potential partners in Germany were making similar calculations. At the decade's end, VOKS found itself connected to Arplan, the far right-wing German Society for the Study of the Soviet Planned Economy. As David-Fox notes, justifying the choice of friends proved to be complicated, because the line between the 'external' and the 'internal' was blurred: policies crafted in the international arena 'boomeranged' at home; foreign ties 'showcased' at home reverberated abroad. Marina Sorokina's chapter examines the store set by the Rapallo partners on 'the other.' Her site is the 1925 celebration of the two-hundredth anniversary of Russian Academy of Sciences, an event conventionally seen as cementing the German-Russian connection in medicine and health. The archives of the Academy of Science and the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs reveal intense politicking with regard to the list of foreigners invited to the celebrations and the speaking order at the banquet. Eager to open themselves to new partners, Russian academicians issued the largest number of invitations to Americans; the largest number of acceptances came from Germans. The Russians persevered, allocating to the 'Anglo-American group' the plum position in the banquet speaking order, with the German delegates a distant third. But the Germans proved resolute suitors: they arrived in Leningrad with concrete proposals for collaborative work - proposals that proved irresistible. Scientific Entrepreneurs across Borders

In the past decade, historians of science have paid increasing attention to the enterprise of building new research fields across disciplinary borders, liana Lowy has examined the role of 'loose concepts' in the formation of new disciplines; Susan Star and James Greisemer have written about the role played by 'boundary objects' in creating working relations among scientists from different social worlds. Peter Galison has

14 Susan Gross Solomon

introduced the concept of 'trading zones' where researchers from radically different scientific cultures can combine their activities locally, even while retaining their differences with regard to the global meaning of what they are doing; and Robert Kohler has explored the notion that borders between disciplines are broad zones rather than hard lines.47 The literature on how science is done when the borders being crossed are geographic rather than disciplinary is less developed. There is solid work on the circulation of ideas, the transmission and adaptation of institutional arrangements, and the creation of transnational networks,48 but we are just beginning to explore the role of those cultural intermediaries or cross-border entrepreneurs who facilitate cross-border movement.49 The dense German-Russian interaction on Russian soil that followed the signing of the Treaty of Rapallo privileged a group of German scientific entrepreneurs, who facilitated the arrangement, expanded its range, and established their own research through it. Working 'far from home' building networks, institutions, and fields - often without specific mandates - these entrepreneurs enjoyed unparalleled leeway in shaping cross-border science. As Ulrike Eisenberg points out in her chapter, these entrepreneurs were a varied lot. Some, like Ludwig Aschoff, the pathologist who in 1927 co-founded the German-Russian Laboratory for Racial Pathology in Moscow, had achieved prominence well before Rapallo; for them, the opening to Russia was an opportunity to gain access to new venues, new patient samples, and new populations. Others, like Karl Wilmanns, the neuropsychiatrist who travelled to Buriat Mongolia to examine endemic syphilis, and Oskar Vogt, the neuroanatomist who was invited to study Lenin's brain, had well-established scientific reputations, but used the opportunity to work in Russia to test scientific hypotheses or launch lines of scientific work that had not found favour in Germany.50 Among the German entrepreneurs, by far the most enigmatic figure was Heinz Zeiss, the German bacteriologist arrested by Soviet troops in 1945 and accused of having spied for Germany during his more than ten-year sojourn (1921-32) in Moscow. Zeiss, to whom four chapters in this volume are devoted, was not well known as a scientist when he went to Russia in 1921. He made his reputation through his activities on behalf of the Russian-German connection in medicine and through his ubiquitous presence at meetings of Germans and Russians. While many aspects of Zeiss's 'cultural' activity in Russia remain shrouded in mystery, an analysis of the network he created provides a unique window

The Week of Russian Natural Science in Berlin, 1927. Some of the attendees include (front row) Prof. Vogt, Lunacharskii, Schmidt-Ott, Semashko; (behind) Ambassador Krestinskii, Professors, Abrikosov, Einstein, Fersman, Ipatiev, Lazarev, Count Arco, Borissiak, Nikiforov, Schmalhuasen. Source: Das Neue Rutland 4, No. 7/8 (1927), 78.

16 Susan Gross Solomon

on the impact that a single individual can have on how science is 'done' across borders. Elizabeth Hachten's chapter examines how Zeiss bridged the different social worlds inhabited by German and Russian scientists. Drawing on the records of the Tarasevich Institute, she shows how Zeiss manipulated a series of 'boundary objects' - a drug to combat camel disease, a microbial collection, and a museum. These objects carried different meanings in the social worlds from which Russian and German scientists came, but at the same were plastic enough to draw scientists together. One such object - the Mechnikov biography, based on materials lodged in a museum - became a site of rivalry between Germany and France over the intellectual debt of Mechnikov to foreign science.51 This suggests that entrepreneurs can manipulate 'boundary objects' to serve not only the goal of inclusion, but also that of exclusion. Wolfgang Eckart trains his gaze on Zeiss's fieldwork in Russia, which mixed scientific and political agendas. In the extensive travel reports that Zeiss filed from the hinterlands (Saratov and Uralsk), where he had gone to study camel disease and to demonstrate the utility of the German pharmaceutical Naganol, Eckart identifies a 'civilizational critique' of the local population that smacked of a colonial mentality. Intriguingly, Zeiss confined his cultural observations of the Volga Germans to the internal reports he sent to his German patrons; his German and Russian publications contained only his careful observations of camel disease. In some ways, this combination of veterinary and anthropological observations resembles the approach to fieldwork of a 'pre-professional' era, when scientists travelled to foreign parts and recorded in diaries and letters the range of observations they made 'on site.'52 Susan Gross Solomon examines how Zeiss used 'talk' to build support for the transport of medical geography from Germany to Russia. Zeiss conducted two distinct conversations, one with his German patrons and colleagues, the other with his patrons and colleagues in Russia. In conducting simultaneous conversations with colleagues in several countries, Zeiss was hardly unique. In the twentieth century a number of scientists moved between 'homes,' leaving one, sojourning in another, and then returning or not returning to the point of origin.53 But Zeiss managed these conversations with great care. He told his Russian audiences only what he thought they needed to know. To Berlin went the full record of his thinking, with its flights of fancy. Did Zeiss's tailoring of 'talk' make his agenda more acceptable in Russia or Berlin? Sabine Schleiermacher examines the impact of Zeiss's politics on his

Introduction 17

research agenda, both during his Russian stay and after his return to Germany, when he laid out the field of geomedicine, with its noxious mix of racial biology, population policy, and geopolitics. Zeiss brought to Russia a political commitment to the ethnic Germans living outside Germany (Auslandsdeutsche) - a commitment intensified by his trips to the Volga German Republic. From his Russian perch, Zeiss appealed (unsuccessfully) to his German patrons to create in Russia an institute for research on the Volga Germans - their blood groups, the epidemics to which they were prone, and their racial characteristics. In the 1920s, Zeiss's aspirations for the Volga Germans (increased autonomy and national consciousness) fit Soviet nationality policy. By 1930, when Soviet government priorities had shifted,54 his advocacy would have been seen as outside interference. Bilateralism and Internationalism The post-Rapallo era saw the dawn not only of internationalism in science, but also of what one historian of the period has termed a 'brave new world' in international public health. Building on the international humanitarian relief work undertaken to alleviate the ravages of war, pioneering health statesmen and activists galvanized international agencies (such as the Health Organization of the League of Nations), volunteer organizations (such as the International Red Cross), and philanthropic organizations (such as the Rockefeller Foundation) with the prospect of building a cooperative order that would heal the fractures of 1914-18.55 As former players in the world order who now found themselves marginalized, Germany and Russia were understandably keen to reclaim place in the emerging international order in medicine and public health. The literature on scientific internationalism is animated by an antinomy between internationalism and nationalism - an opposition that highlights scientists' conflicting allegiances to nation and to transnational knowledge.56 The existence of a tight bilateral connection between Russia and Germany complicated the well-worn opposition between the national and the international by adding another potential level of allegiance. To what extent and in what circumstances was the international arena the relevant intellectual frame of reference for German and Russian scientists? How did the Germans and Russians balance the competing pulls between the bilateral connection (that is, to each other) and the broader international stage?

18 Susan Gross Solomon

Introduction

19

Jochen Richter's study of the celebrated cooperation between the Brain Research Institute in Moscow and the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research in Berlin raises the question of whether the bilateral connection was a substitute for the international arena. The neuroanatomist Oskar Vogt, whose research agenda shaped both institutes, originally aspired to create an international association of brain research institutes to share the tasks of studying brain anatomy. When that plan failed, he designed an institute in Moscow to complement the strengths of the Berlin institute: Berlin would provide technical and theoretical expertise; Moscow would supply a collection of elite and racial brains. 'Mutual traffic' between the institutes did not materialize in the way Vogt had hoped. The Russians focused only on the study of elite brains; the Germans were interested in studies of both racial and elite brains. Moreover, 'Object #1' (Lenin's brain) carried different meanings in the two institutes. The recourse to 'international science' by both Germany and Russia is writ large in the strange saga Nikolai Krementsov tells of the Vllth International Genetics Congress, planned for Moscow for 1937, cancelled in late 1936, reinstated for 1938, and finally held in Edinburgh in August 1939. To allay fears that the congress would provide a forum for Nazi racial theories, Soviet geneticists played 'on two tables,'57 dealing with their domestic patrons in the Communist Party and at the same time soliciting help from the international genetics community to prevent cancellation of the congress. For their part, leading German political figures, worried that the congress might provide a venue for bashing German science, flirted with organizing an international boycott of the meeting. Ultimately, as Krementsov's chapter makes clear,

(Opposite) Portraits of prominent figures in German-Soviet medical relations at the Week of Russian Natural Science in Berlin, 1927. Professor Semashko (no. T), People's Commissar for Public Health, the head of the delegation, expresses gratitude for the welcome. The Russian Ambassador Krestinskii (no. 2), sketches the history of German-Russian intellectual relation connections. His Excellency Schmidt-Ott (no. 3), head of the Society for the Study of Eastern Europe, organized the Russian Natural Science Week. Professor Borisiak (no. 4), opens the list of talks with a presentation on the progress of Russian paleontology. Professor Fersman (no. 5), founder of Moscow Free University, talks about the movement of elements in the earth's crust. Artist: E. Korn. Source: Die Umschau (1927).

20 Susan Gross Solomon

the international genetics community carried the day: the International Organizing Committee of the congress pulled the plug on the Moscow meeting. Scientific Migration to 'the Other'

The close ties between Germany and Russia in the 1920s facilitated the movement across borders of scientists, ideas, tools, and techniques. To what extent did mobility enhance knowledge of 'the other'? How much did each partner know about how science was done in the other's country? The accuracy of the images the partners had of each other would be tested in a small, but significant, migration of Jewish scientists from Germany to Russia in the 1930s. The literature on the emigration of scientists from Nazi Germany is voluminous, so much so that it can be broken down by scientific specialty, by place of origin, and by the destination of the refugees.58 That literature privileges a number of issues: the treatment of German Jewish scientists as the 'unacceptables' or unwanted;59 the gains and losses for scientific fields of the forced migration of Jewish scientists from Germany;60 and the difficulties that immigrant scientists faced in adapting to their new environments.61 A destination that does not figure in this literature is Russia; indeed, a recent book on the forced migration of scientists lists Russia as a 'sending' country.62 But receive German refugees Russia did: she took intellectuals, communists, and Jews, albeit all in limited numbers. As a receiving country, Russia raised certain hurdles for Germans. The Russian language was not one with which most German intellectuals were familiar, and Soviet-style communism was not an ideology with which most German emigres were comfortable. Two chapters in this book examine the migration of German physicians and medical researchers to Russia in the mid-1930s. That migration falls outside the medical 'connection' that is the subject of this volume, not only by virtue of its timing but also - and more importantly - by virtue of its non-voluntary nature. The migration to Russia was not a normal instance of the 'circulation of elites' or of the movement of scientists to foreign terrain to test new theories. This movement of German emigre-physicians to Russia took place in a context different from that which characterized the movement of German 'unacceptables' to other destinations. To begin with, the migration to Russia followed a decade of close and productive scientific connections between Russia and Germany. Some German medical researchers

Introduction 21

and physicians with close ties to Soviet colleagues immigrated in the 1930s. What, we may ask, did these ties lead them to expect about their reception in Russia? Ulrike Eisenberg's chapter tells the story of the German anatomist Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, who immigrated to Soviet Russia in 1936 when he was seventy-three. By the time he left Germany, Jacobsohn-Lask's approach to neuroanatomical research was marginal in German neurology. He had been well received as an occasional visitor to Russia before he immigrated there. His family papers suggest that he believed his long-standing professional and friendship relations with Russian neurologists would facilitate his integration in Russia. Initially, his Jewishness and his persecution at the hands of the Nazis did tell in his favour in his new 'home/ But political symbolism was trumped by professional factors. Jacobsohn-Lask's scientific work turned out to be no more mainstream in Russia than in Germany. Lacking the 'star' status of some emigres, he found no intermediaries to smooth his acceptance into the Soviet scientific system.63 The Soviet-German connections of the 1920s were heavily publicized in both Germany and Russia. Travel reports were often published in journals and pamphlets; conference proceedings were summarized in journals in both countries; joint expeditions were reported in professional journals. To what extent, we may ask, did German readers take the part for the whole? Did they assume that the reality for Soviet physicians was not much different from the celebrated collaborations and partnerships? Carola Tischler examines the immigration to Russia between 1933 and 1937 of some sixty German Jewish physicians. The Soviet decision to accept this group of physicians - few of whom were communists owed much to the lobbying of the Commissariat of Public Health for more physicians to serve the Soviet population and to the good offices of Agrojoint, an independent organization founded in 1924 by a Jewish-American organization that assisted Soviet Jews. The German emigre physicians, most of whom were sent to the hinterlands, proved not entirely sanguine: letters to the Moscow office of Agrojoint contained 'civilizational critiques' of the conditions in which Soviet physicians worked. The newcomers' surprise suggests that the press reports by German physicians who visited Russia during the 1920s did not accurately reflect Soviet reality.64 Of course, those visitors had been exposed selectively to conditions in Russia, at a time when the German press was thirsting for good news about Germany's Rapallo-era partner.

22 Susan Gross Solomon By the mid-1930s there was little good news to be had. The receptivity to contact with the outside world that had nourished the links between Germany and Russia during the Rapallo era was coming under fire in both Germany and Russia. The German-Russian connection - of which the 1925 photograph was a symbol as well as a record would turn out to be a unique moment in time, poised between the postwar isolation of Germany and Russia in international science and new forms of isolation that were being imposed on German and Soviet scientists by their own countries. NOTES 1 Deutsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift I , no. 2 (1925). The journal was published between 1925 and 1928. Articles by German researchers appeared in Russian; pieces by Russians were published in German. The journal had a high-profile editorial board drawn from both countries. 2 Historians have provided a variety of end points for 'the Rapallo era.' Here we have chosen 1933 as the end point because after that year, there were no new cooperative ventures between Soviet Russia and Germany and the joint undertakings ceased to function, petering out sometimes without official notification. 3 E.H. Carr, German-Soviet Relations between the Two World Wars, 1919-1939 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1951), 48-67. For the deep cultural connections, see the series of edited volumes titled Nemtsy v Rossii: russko-nemetskie nauchnye i kul'turnye sviazi, published in St Petersburg in 1998 and 1999 by the publishing house Dmitri Bulanin, and in 2000 by the Russian Academy of Sciences. For the long-standing economic ties, see Heinz Lemke, ed., Deutsch-russische Wirtschaftsbeziehungen 1906-1914: Dokumente (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1991). 4 For the manoeuvring that preceded the signing of the provisional trade agreement in 1921, see the memoir by Gustav Hilger, who was part of the German diplomatic corps in Russia from 1920 to 1933. Gustav Hilger and Alfred Meyer, The Incompatible Allies: A Memoir-History of German-Soviet Relations, 1918-1941 (New York: Macmillan, 1953). 5 The designation of Genoa as the 'world's first economic summit' can be found in Harmut Pogge von Strandemann, 'Rapallo - Strategy in Preventive Diplomacy: New Sources and New Interpretations,' in Volker Berghahn and Martin Kitchen, Germany in the Age of Total War (London: Croom Helm, 1981), 123-46. For new perspectives on Genoa, see Carole

Introduction 23

6

7

8

9

10

11

Fink et al., edsv Genoa, Rapallo and European Reconstruction in 1922 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). For a discussion of the voluminous literature on Rapallo and its implications, see Stephanie Salzmann, Great Britain, Germany and the Soviet Union, Rapallo and After, 1922-1934 (Bury St Edmunds: St Edmundsbury Press, 2003), 1-6. For the surprise of European nations at the secret political and military negotiations that preceded the signing of the treaty, see Carr, German-Soviet Relations; Fink et al., eds., Genoa, Rapallo and European Reconstruction. Werner Beitel and Jiirgen Notzold, Deutsch-sowjetische Wirtschaftsbeziehungen in der Zeit der Weimarer Republik: Eine Bilanz im Hinblick auf gegenwartige Probleme (Baden-Baden: Nomos, 1979). In the German business community and among specialists in foreign policy, trade with Russia was seen as essential to German postwar recovery. See Salzmann, Great Britain, Germany and the Soviet Union, 103-5. Giinter Rosenfeld, Sowjetunion und Deutschland, 1922-1933 (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1984), 183-223; Karl Schlogel, Berlin, Ostbahnhof Europas (Berlin: Seidler, 1998); Jiirgen Notzold, 'Die deutsch-sowjetischen Wissenschaftsbeziehungen/ in Rudolf Vierhaus and Bernhard vom Brocke, eds., Forschung im Spannungsfeld von Politik und Gesellschaft: Geschichte und Struktur der Kaiser-Wilhelm-Max-Planck-Gesellschaft(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags Anstalt, 1990) 778-800. Ingrid Kastner and Regine Pfrepper, eds., Naturforschung. Experiment und Klinik: Deutsch-russische Beziehungen in der naturwissenschaftlichen Medizin des!9. Jahrhunderts (Aachen: Shaker, 2002); Ingrid Kastner and Regine Pfrepper, eds., Medizin und Pharmazie im 18. und 19. Jahrhundert: Beitrage zur Geschichte der Wissenschaftsbeziehungen zwischen Deutschland und dem Russischen Reich (Aachen: Shaker, 2000); Ingrid Kastner, ed., Deutsch-russische Beziehungen in der Medizin des 18. und 19. Jahrhunderts: Vortrage des Symposiums vom 27. und 28. Marz 1999 am Karl-Sudhoff-Institut fur Geschichte der Medizin und Naturwissenschaften, Medizinische Fakultat der Universitat Leipzig (Aachen: Shaker, 2000). Brigitte Schroeder-Gudehus, Tas de Locarno pour la Science/ Relations Internationales 46 (1986): 173-94; Brigitte Schroeder-Gudehus, 'Challenges to Transnational Loyalties: International Scientific Organizations after the First World War/ Science Studies 3 (1973): 93-118; Brigitte SchroederGudehus, Deutsche Wissenschaft und Internationale Zusammenarbeit: Ein Beitrag zum Studium kultureller Beziehungen in politischen Krisenzeiten (Geneva: Dumaret & Golay, 1966). Daniel Kevles, 'Into Hostile Camps: The Reorganization of International

24 Susan Gross Solomon Science in World War I/ Isis 62 (1971): 47-60; Roy M. MacLeod, 'Scientific Advice in the War at Sea, 1915-1917: The Board of Invention and Research/ Journal of Contemporary History 6, no. 2 (1971): 3^0; Elisabeth Crawford, 'Internationalism in Science as a Casualty of the First World War/ Social Science Information 27 (1988): 163-201; Brigitte Schroeder-Gudehus, Les scientifiques et la paix: La communaute scientifique Internationale au cours des annees 20 (Montreal: Presse de 1'Universite de Montreal, 1978). 12 Robert M. Yerkes, ed., The New World of Science and Its Development during the War (Freeport, NY: Libraries Press, 1920). Also Schroeder-Gudehus, Les Scientifiques et la paix. 13 For this distinction, see Catharina Landstrom, 'Internationalism between the Two Wars/ in Aant Elzinga and Catharina Landstrom, eds., Internationalism and Science (Goteborg: Taylor Graham, 1996), 46-77. 14 Within the space of only three years, there were expeditions to study camel disease in the Urals (1926-7), tuberculosis in Kirgizia (1927), and syphilis in Buriat Mongolia (1926-8). For the camel expedition, see the chapter by Elizabeth Hachten in this volume; for the syphilis expedition, see Susan Gross Solomon, The Soviet-German Syphilis Expedition to Buriat Mongolia, 1928: Scientific Research on National Minorities/ Slavic Review 52, no. 2 (Summer 1993): 204-32. The tuberculosis expedition has not been studied in any detail. 15 For the Brain Research Institute, see Jochen Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos: Fine Chronik zur medizinischen Biographie Lenins und zur Geschichte der Elitegehirnforschung in Dokumenten (Herzbolzheim: Centaurus, 2000); for the Laboratory for Racial Pathology, see Susan Gross Solomon and Jochen Richter, eds., Ludwig Aschoff: Vergleichende Volkerpathologie oder Rassenpathologie. Tagebuch einer Reise durch Russland und Transkaukasien (Herzbolzheim: Centaurus, 1998). Paul Weindling, 'German-Soviet Cooperation in Science: The Case of the Laboratory for Racial Research, 1931-1938,' Nuncius 1 (1986): 103-9. 16 For the negotiations, see Susan Gross Solomon, 'Vergleichende Volkerpathologie auf unerforschtem Gebiet: Ludwig Aschoffs Reise nach Russland und in den Kaukasus im Jahre 1930,' in Solomon and Richter, eds., Ludwig Aschoff, 1-50; Susan Gross Solomon, 'Das Reisetagebuch als Quelle fur die Analyse binationaler medizinischer Unternehmungen/ in Jochen Richter, ed., Lues, Lamas, Leninisten: Tagebuch einer Reise durch Russland in die Burjatische Republik im Sommer 1926 (Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus, 1995), 1^12. 17 For Schmidt-Ott's memoirs of this period, see Friedrich Schmidt-Ott, Erlebtes und Erstrebtes, 1860-1950 (Wiesbaden: F. Steiner, 1952), 174-89, 217-46. For Brockdorff Rantzau, see Christiane Scheidemann, Ulrich Graf Brockdorff-Rantzau (1869-1928) (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1998).

Introduction 25 18 For S.F. Ol'denburg, see M.Iu. Sorokina, "'Molchat' dolee nel'zia," (iz epistoliarnogo naslediia S.F. Ol'denburga)/ VIET 3 (1995): 109-19; B.S. Kaganovich, 'Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk v 1920-nachale 1930-kh gg. (po materialam arkhiva S.F. Ol'denburga)/ in M. Khaineman and E. Kolchinskii, eds., Za zheleznym zanavesom (St Petersburg: IET RAN, 2002), 56-71. For Gorbunov, see B.V. Levshin, ed., Vospominaniia, stat'i, dokumenty N.P. Gorbunova (Moscow: Nauka, 1986), 5-41. 19 The Bolshevik regime halted all private funding of science almost immediately after the seizure of power. For the variety of Russian (later Soviet) sources of funding for science, see Nikolai Krementsov, Stalinist Science (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997), 18-19. The total outlay was considerable: in 1918, with the economy in ruins, the fledgling Bolshevik regime spent four times the amount on science that the Tsarist government had in 1917. Organizatsiia nauki v pervye gody Sovetskoi vlasti (19171925) (Leningrad: Nauka, 1968), 5. 20 Germany had a long tradition of private (industrial and philanthropic) funding of science, which continued into the Weimar years. Gerald D. Feldman, The Politics of Wissenschaftspolitik in Weimar Germany: A Prelude to the Dilemmas of Twentieth-Century Science Policy/ in Charles S. Maier, ed., Changing Boundaries of the Political: Essays on the Evolving Balance between the State and Society, Public and Private in Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 255-85. Rainer Miiller, ed., Formen ausserstaatlicher Wissenschaftsforderung im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert: Deutschland im europaischen Vergleich (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1990). The German-Russian joint ventures, however, were supported by the Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft, which received its funding from the German government but made its granting decisions on the basis of peer review. Brigitte Schroeder-Gudehus, The Argument for the Self-Government and Public Support of Science in Weimar Germany/ Minerva 10, no. 4 (1972): 537-70; Ulrich Marsch, Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft: Grundung und friihe Geschichte 1920-1925 (Frankfurt am Main: Lang, 1994); Kurt Zierold, Forschungsforderung in drei Epochen: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft Geschichte, Arbeitsweise, Kommentar (Wiesbaden: F. Steiner, 1968). From time to time, the Foreign Office contributed to the funding of the joint ventures. 21 For the impact of the opening of the archives on the writing of Soviet history, see 'Post-Post Historiography, or the Trends of the "Naughts/" Kritika 5, no. 4 (2004): 645-50; 'Archives et nouvelles sources de 1'histoire sovietique, une ree valuation/Assessing the New Soviet Archival Sources/ Cahiers du monde russe 40 (1999): 1-2. 22 For the conflicting images, see Hilger and Meyer, The Incompatible Allies;

26 Susan Gross Solomon J.R.C. Wright, Gustav Stresemann: Weimar's Greatest Statesman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). 23 See Scheidemann, Ulrich Graf Brockdorff-Rantzau; Herbert von Dirksen, Moscow, Tokyo, London (London: Hutchinson, 1951). 24 Feldman, 'Wissenschaftspolitik,7 267. See also Riidiger vom Bruch, Weltpolitik als Kulturmission: Auswartige Kulturpolitik und Bildungsbiirgertum in Deutschland am Vorabend des Ersten Weltkrieges (Paderborn: Schonigh, 1982), 26-41. 25 Kurt Diiwell, Deutschlands auswartige Kulturpolitik 1918-1932 (Cologne: Bohlau, 1981), 78-104; Kurt Diiwell, 'Die Griindung der Kulturpolitischen Abteilung im Auswartigen Amt 1919/1920 als Neuansatz/ in Kurt Duwell and Werner Link, eds., Deutsche auswartige Kulturpolitik seit 1871 (Cologne: Bohlau, 1981), 46-60. 26 Joseph S. Nye, Jr, Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics (New York: Public Affairs, 2004). 27 Nye draws a distinction between the use of cultural resources as soft power and the deployment of propaganda. Ibid., 101-3. The tendency to equate cultural diplomacy with propaganda is most common among those scholars who base their work on the Soviet case. For the classic statement, see Frederick Barghoorn, The Soviet Cultural Offensive: The Role of Cultural Diplomacy in Soviet Foreign Policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1960), 28-60. Ironically, as one Soviet historian recently pointed out, the equation of cultural diplomacy with propaganda was prevalent in Soviet parlance in the 1930s. See A.V. Golubev, Vzgliad na zemliu obetovannuiu (Moscow: Institut Rossiiskoi Istorii RAN, 2004), 85. 28 Edgar Lersch, 'Die kulturellen Beziehungen zwischen Deutschland und der Sowjetunion 1918-1932,' in Duwell and Link, eds., Deutsche auswartige Kulturpolitik, 104. 29 See Erhard Pachaly, Giinter Rosenfeld, Horst Schiitzler, and Harald Wollgast, 'Die kulturellen Beziehungen zwischen Deutschland und der Sowjetunion,' in Alfred Anderle and Ernst Laboor, eds., Die Grosse Sozialistische Oktoberrevolution und Deutschland (Berlin: Dietz, 1967), 443-514. Jiirgen Notzold, 'Die deutsch-sowjetischen Wissenschaftsbeziehungen/ in Vierhaus and vom Brocke, Forschung im Spannungsfeld. For a work that does not cast German-Russian relations in the frame of a Sonderverhaltnis, see Wolfgang U. Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik der Republik von Weimar - Deutschland und die Sowjetunion 1920-1932,' Medizin, Gesellschaft und Geschichte (1993): 107-44. 30 Citing evidence of Russian relations with France, Britain, and the United States, the prominent historian of Soviet internationalism in science,

Introduction 27

31

32 33

34

35

36

37

38

Aleksandr Evseevich loffe, put it this way: 'Although less actively than with Germany, Soviet scientific institutions developed contact with scholars in other European countries.' A.E. loffe, Internatsional'nye nauchnye i kul'turnye sviazi Sovetskogo Soiuza (Moscow: Nauka, 1969), 126,129ff. In the same vein, see V.A. Shishkin, Sovetskoe gosudarstvo i strany zapada v 19171932 gg. (Leningrad: Nauka, 1969). Even in areas of science where the relation to Germany was the 'only game in town/ Soviet historians invariably presented the Russian-German ties as part of international science. See S.P. Strekopytov, 'Iz istorii mezhdunarodnykh nauchno-tekhnicheskikh sviazei SSSR (1921-1925),' Istoriia SSSR 5 (1976): 147-56. Dukh Rapallo: Sovetsko-germanskie otnosheniia, 1925-1933 (Ekaterinburg and Moscow: Nauchno-prosvetitel'skii tsentr 'Universitet/ 1997), 5-8. For the pull in German political and scientific circles between Ostpolitik (Eastern policy) and the resumption of relations with 'the West,' see Pamela Spence Richards, The Movement of Scientific Knowledge from and to Germany under National Socialism/ Minerva (1990): 403. The looseness of the link between scientific relations and foreign policy, implicit in previous studies, is spelled out in A.V. Golubev, Vzgliad, 5. Ibid., 85-118. V.I. Fokin, Mezhdunarodnyi kul'turnyi obmen i SSSR v 20-30 gody (St Petersburg: Izdatelstvo Sankt-Peterburskogo universiteta, 1999), 137-66. Both commissariats established departments (originally bureaux) for foreign relations. The Commissariat of Public Health actually stationed representatives abroad. In 1921, at the request of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Council of People's Commissars (SNK) organized a commission of the academy to go to Europe to buy books. Fokin, Mezhdunarodnyi kul'turnyi obmen, 139. In 1918 the Scientific and Technical Division of the Supreme Council of the National Economy (VSNKh) opened the Bureau of Foreign Science and Technology (BINT) in Berlin. Strekopytov, Tz istorii mezhdunarodnykh'; Fokin, Mezhdunarodnyi kul'turnyi obmen, 139. According to Michael David-Fox, VOKS's designation as a 'society' rather than an arm of the Soviet state was a useful fiction. In practice VOKS was 'oriented around' the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, but, at least de jure, it did not have a single powerful oversight agency. David-Fox, 'From Illusory "Society" to Intellectual "Public": VOKS, International Travel and Party-Intelligentsia Relations in the Inter-War Period,' Contemporary European History 11, no. 1 (2002): 7-32. For the treatment of VOKS as part of Soviet cultural diplomacy, see Golubev, Vzgliad, 103-18. The academy began to push for foreign contacts almost immediately after

28 Susan Gross Solomon

39

40

41

42

43

44

the Civil War. lu.A. Pantsyrev, ed., Mezhdunarodnye nauchnye sviazi Akademii nauk SSSR 1917-1941 (Moscow: Nauka, 1992), 38-41. In 1922 the Bureau for Foreign Book Exchange was organized in the academy. Fokin, Mezhdunarodnyi kul'turnyi obmen, 140. Soviet scientists seeking to travel abroad for work were required to have the travel vetted by a special Departure Commission, which was established in 1924 in the Central Committee of the Communist Party to approve and monitor all foreign travel. Susan Gross Solomon and Nikolai Krementsov, 'Giving and Taking across National Borders: The Rockefeller Foundation and Russia, 1919-1928,' Minerva 39 (2001): 276. The granting or withholding of such visas seems to have been tied more to the reliability of the individual scientist and to the likely value of the trip than to the vagaries of foreign policy. As early as July 1918 the Permanent Secretary of the Academy of Sciences, the Orientalist Sergei Ol'denburg, wrote to the Commissariat of Enlightenment to stress the importance for Russian science of international contacts. Organizatsiia nauki v pervye gody sovetskoi vlasti (1917-1925) (Leningrad: Nauka, 1968), 8. loffe, Internatsional'nye nauchnye i kul'turnye sviazi. For an overview of the literature, see S.R. Sukhorukov, 'Sovetsko-germanskie otnosheniia 19171933 v osveshchenii sovetskoi istoriografii/ Ezhegodnik germanskoi istorii 1971 (Moscow: Nauka, 1973), 397-420. M.S. Kuz'min, 'Noveishaia literatura o mezhdunarodnykh nauchnykh i kul'turnykh sviaziakh SSSR v 1917-1932 gg.,' Voprosy istorii 3 (1977): 147-53. For the two models in distilled form, see Aant Elzinga, 'Introduction: Modes of "Internationalism/" in Elzinga and Landstrom, Internationalism and Science, 3. See also Zyoyue Wang, 'U.S.-China Scientific Exchange: A Case of State-Sponsored Scientific Internationalism during the Cold War and Beyond/ in Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 30, pt 1 (1999): 251. For German links to China, see Wolfgang U. Eckart, Deutsche Arzte in China, 1897-1914 (Stuttgart: Fischer, 1989), 140-98; for Soviet connections to America, see Solomon and Krementsov, 'Giving and Taking across Borders/ 265-98; for Russian links to France, see Sophie Cceure, La grande lueur a I'Est: lesfranqais et I'Union sovietique, 1917-1939 (Paris: Seuil, 1999). See Harvey Dyck, Weimar Germany and Soviet Russia, 1926-1933 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1966); Hilger and Meyer, The Incompatible Allies; Gerald Freund, Unholy Alliance: Russian-German Relations from the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk to the Treaty of Berlin (London: Chatto & Windus, 1957); Carr, German-Soviet Relations between the Two Wars; Kurt Rosenbaum, Community

Introduction 29

45 46

47

48

49

50

51

of Fate: German-Soviet Diplomatic Relations, 1922-1928 (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1965); Rosenfeld, Sowjetunion und Deutschland. Niall Ferguson, Virtual History: Alternatives and Counterfactuals (New York: Basic Books, 1999). For German relief efforts, see Paul Weindling, Epidemics and Genocide in Eastern Europe, 1890-1945 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). For the medical relief effort that jump-started the efforts in international health, see Bernard Patenaude, The Big Show in Bololand: The American Relief Expedition to Soviet Russia in the Famine of 1921 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2002). liana Lowy, The Strength of Loose Concepts - Boundary Concepts, Federative Experimental Strategies and Disciplinary Growth: The Case of Immunology/ History of Science 30 (1992): 372-96; Susan Leigh Star and James R. Greisemer, 'Institutional Ecology, "Translations," and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-1939,' Social Studies of Science 19 (1989): 387-420; Peter Galison, 'Computer Simulation and the Trading Zone,' in Peter Galison and Donald J. Strump, eds., The Disunity of Science: Boundaries, Contexts, and Power (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1996); Robert E. Kohler, Landscapes and Labscapes: Exploring the Lab-Field Border in Biology (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002). John Harley Warner, The Selective Transport of Medical Knowledge: Antebellum American Physicians and Parisian Medical Therapeutics/ Bulletin of the History of Medicine 59, no. 2 (1985): 213-31; Loren R. Graham, The Formation of Soviet Research Institutes: A Combination of Revolutionary Innovation and International Borrowing/ Social Studies of Science 5 (1975): 303-29; Mark B. Adams, Networks in Action: The Khrushchev Era, the Cold War, and the Transformation of Science (Trondheim: Trondheim Studies on East European Cultures and Societies, 2000). For some of the best work, see Kapil Raj, 'Connexions, croisements, circulations. Le detour de la cartographie britannique par 1'Inde, XVIIIe-XIXe siecles/ in Michael Werner and Benedictine Zimmermann, eds., De la Comparaison a I'Histoire Croisee (Paris: Seuil, 2004), 73-98; Michel Espagne, Les transferts culturels franco-allemands (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1999), esp. 153-79. For Ludwig Aschoff, see Solomon, 'Vergleichende Volkerpathologie auf unerforschtem Gebiet'; for Karl Wilmanns, see Solomon, 'Das Reisetagebuch'; for Oskar Vogt, see Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos. The rivalry between Germany and France was well known. Anne Hogenhuis Seliverstoff, 'French Plans for the Reconstruction of Russia: A History

30 Susan Gross Solomon and Evaluation/ in Fink et al., eds., Genoa, Rapallo, and European Reconstruction, 131-48. 52 Henrika Kuklick, 'After Ishmael: The Fieldwork Tradition and Its Future/ in Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson, edsv Anthropological Location: Boundaries and Grounds of a Field Science (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 195. James Clifford, 'Spatial Practices: Fieldwork, Travel and the Disciplining of Anthropology/ in ibid., 47-65. For fieldwork and its boundaries, see also Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson, 'Discipline and Practice: The "Field" as Site, Method, and Location in Anthropology/ in ibid., 1-46. 53 The population geneticist Theodosius Dobzhansky had two seemingly distinct scientific careers, the first in Russia and the second in America. Dobzhansky maintained an extensive correspondence with Russian colleagues even after he had decided not to return to Russia. Mark B. Adams, The Evolution of Theodosius Dobzhansky Essays on His Life and Thought in Russia and America (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994). For that correspondence, see E. Kolchinskii and M. Konashev, U istokov akademicheskoi genetiki v Sankt Peterburge (St Petersburg: Nauka, 2002). 54 Terry Martin, The Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union, 1923-1939 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2001); Helene Carrere d'Encausse, The End of the Soviet Empire: The Triumph of the Nations (New York: Basic Books, 1993); Nikolai Fedorovich Bugai, 'Mobilizovat' nemtsev v rabochie kolonny -1. Stalin: Sbornik Dokumentov (1940-e gody) (Moscow: Gotika, 1998). 55 The term 'brave new world' was used by Paul Weindling, ed., International Health Organizations and Movements, 1918-1939 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 3. The essays in Weindling's volume indicate the range of activities undertaken in the interwar period. 56 For an overview of this debate, see Nikolai Krementsov, International Science between the Wars: The Case of Genetics (London: Routledge, 2005), 1-11; Brigitte Schroeder-Gudehus, 'Nationalism and Internationalism/ in R. Olby et al., eds., Companion to the History of Modern Science (London: Routledge, 1989), 909-19; Paul Forman, 'Scientific Internationalism and the Weimar Physicists: The Ideology and Its Manipulation after World War I/ Isis 64 (1973): 151-80. 57 R. Putnam, 'Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The Logic of the Two-Level Game/ International Organization 42, no. 3 (1988): 427-60. 58 For a review of this literature, see Mitchell Ash and Alfons Sollner, eds., Forced Migration and Scientific Change: Emigre German-Speaking Scientists and Scholars after 1933 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 1-22.

Introduction 31

59

60 61

62

63 64

See also Wolffram Fischer et alv eds., Exodus von Wissenschaften aus Berlin (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1994). See the essays in Giuliana Gemelli, The Unacceptables: American Foundations and Refugee Scholars between the Two Wars and After (Brussels: P.I.E. Lang, 2000). See the essays in Ash and Sollner, eds., Forced Migration, 1-22. For an example of this vein of literature, see the essays in Jarrell C. Jackman and Carla M. Borden, eds., The Muses Flee Hitler: Cultural Transfer and Adaptation, 1930-1945 (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1983). Ash and Sollner, 'Forced Migration and Scientific Change after 1933,' in Ash and Sollner, Forced Migration, xi. See Karl Schlogel, ed., Russische Emigration in Deutschland 1918 bis 1941 (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1995); Elisabeth Crawford et al., eds., Denationalizing Science: The Contexts of International Scientific Practice (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1993); Marc Raeff, Russia Abroad: A Cultural History of the Russian Emigration, 1919-1939 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990). For the role of intermediaries, see Ash and Sollner, 'Forced Migration and Scientific Change after 1933.' Christine Bottcher, Das Bild der sowjetischen Medizin in der arztlichen Publizistik und Wissenschaftspolitik der Weimarer Republik (Herzbolzheim: Centaurus, 1998).

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PART ONE 'Choosing' Scientific Friends

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1 German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925: Between Racial Expansion and National Coexistence PAUL W E I N D L I N G

The Medical Gaze Eastward German medical activity in Russia reveals a complex interplay of scientific ambitions and political agendas. In the crisis of defeat after the First World War, German medical officials polarized into two political camps - those seeking coexistence with the post-Versailles constellation of new states and supporting the Weimar Republic, and a rival group of Weimar imperialists, who fulminated at the 'unnatural' Versailles settlement. Both groups, each for its own reasons, clamoured for medical, scientific, and technical assistance for their eastern neighbours. Given that the Soviet Union was not party to the hated Treaty of Versailles, German medical influence in Russia was valued as opening up a range of resources for a depleted Germany, including research opportunities for clinical testing of new pharmaceuticals. The German-Soviet medical collaboration of the Weimar years was remarkable for its scale. Conventional wisdom has portrayed WeimarSoviet cultural relations as a monopoly of the German radical left, but there were also in Germany strong nationalist forces that supported the link to Soviet Russia. Indeed, one of the points of origin of GermanSoviet medical and cultural rapprochement was the German Lebensraum theories of Erich Ludendorff's Vaterlandspartei, which even before the disintegration of November 1918 was advocating German annexation policies in the east. The enduring influence of the Lebensraum theories explains at least in part the link to Soviet Russia, at a time when Germany was settling into an era of democratic normalcy on the basis of the Versailles settlement, which was predicated on ethnically homogeneous nation-states. After Operation Barbarossa, the Germans'

36 Paul Weindling

devastating invasion of the Soviet Union, launched in June 1941, the apparently bizarre endeavour to fuse ideological antagonisms on the basis of medicine would again lead to Germanization schemes. The mix of politics and science that underpinned Soviet-German relations during the Weimar years is evident in the work of the German bacteriologist Heinz Zeiss (1889-1949). Zeiss spent more than a decade in Soviet Russia, working initially for the German Red Cross Mission and later for the Tarasevich Institute for Experimental Therapy and Serum Control. His political evolution is not without interest. He began as a revanchist imperialist; his later shift to Nazism in reaction to Stalinization suggests a distinctive set of concerns with race and Lebensraum. Indeed, Zeiss had a racial and political agenda, and he showed a marked predilection for supporting ethnic German 'colonists' in Russia. In 1933, after the Nazis came to power, he would be rewarded with the Chair of Hygiene at Friedrich-Wilhelm-University in Berlin; from that lofty position, throughout the Second World War, he would continue to promote research into what he called the 'Geomedicine of the East.'1 The activities of a Zeiss, intriguing though they are, prompt the historian to ask broader questions about the twists and turns of German medical Ostpolitik: What were the hidden agendas on the German side? Were they military espionage and intelligence gathering? Rearmament? Clinical trials on coerced subjects? Racial expansion? And what were the international incentives that shaped German policy? As we shall see, from 1917 onward, each phase in the efforts to promote German medicine as a cultural bridge to the East was framed by distinctive political circumstances. Sanitary Ostpolitik German-Soviet medical collaboration predated both the Weimar Republic and the Soviet Union. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk of 1918 brought into common use the term 'Ostpolitik,' which linked the notion of Lebensraum with cooperation with Eastern vassal states. Demographers and eugenicists demanded Lebensraum and saw deurbanization as a means of regenerating the Volk. The medical subplot was to contain Russia as an 'Asiatic' and barbarian state by transforming the frontier into a cordon sanitaire.2 Russia's frontiers were to be rolled eastward; once this happened, Germany would occupy an area stretching from the Baltic to the Black Sea, with Austria-Hungary taking a belt of land stretching to the Sea of Azov. Lands to the west - especially the newly

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 37

independent Ukraine - were to be a vast German reservoir of muchneeded grain and cattle. The overtures to Russia began early. In March 1918 the German military mission in St Petersburg dispatched medical assistance to German prisoners of war, who were being held in remote areas such as Tashkent.3 German medical experts were drafted into Germany's shortlived eastern empire of vassal states - Crimea, Georgia, and Ukraine to contain epidemics, consolidate German influence, and secure grain and oil. Germany's military tentacles stretched beyond Crimea to strategic outposts such as Baku, bringing with them a network of field hospitals and lazarettes, which were filled with patients suffering from dysentery, malaria, cholera, and later on influenza. Martin Hahn, a liberal-minded bacteriologist with long-standing links to the Nobel oil company in Baku, was in Crimea and Ukraine in March 1918, and the Berlin internist (and rabid nationalist) Wilhelm His, Jr, was in Ukraine from July until September 1918.4 The hospitals of ethnic Germans in Russia were given renewed support. That same year, the German military expedition established a field hospital in Tiflis; after the German troops withdrew, the lone military doctor remained, with the result that the hospital became the nucleus for subsequent German intervention.5 The Secretary of the Billroth Foundation for German Medicine Overseas, Rudolf Fricke, who had accompanied a military expedition to Georgia, believed that German physicians could gain influence and build up good will for Germany in the 'Halbkulturlander' (semicultured lands) of the East.6 Along with the positive view of Russia came a loathing of newly independent Poland. German bacteriologists accused the Poles of destroying the German epidemiological defences - and of mounting a crude form of human biological warfare - by deporting into Germany ethnic Germans who were infected with typhus without making any effort to delouse them. German medical officers stigmatized Poland as a country saturated with typhus, and expressed alarm that the shift westward of the Polish border was bringing the threat of typhus close to the heart of Germany.7 Aggrieved at the loss of their medical installations, and trying to defend their starving and war-exhausted nation from epidemics carried by of refugees from the east, German medical officials denounced the new international order as jeopardizing German health and demanded a Seuchenschutzivall (a protective sanitary wall). For the anti-Polish Germans, the next stage would be sanitary assistance to Russia as Poland's eastern enemy.

38 Paul Weindling

The 'iron curtain' discourse on disease provided the rationale for sanitary policies aimed at containing pestilence; in effect, this meant that people who were carrying disease should be kept in place. Containment accorded with notions of national self-determination and helped justify the hardening of border controls against migrants from the east. Sanitary assistance and food aid were part of efforts to combat epidemics at their source. This was a novel characteristic of sanitary policies, and fit with German posturing with respect to the post-Versailles political order. Humanitarian Relief When Maxim Gorky telegraphed the dramatist Gerhart Hauptmann on 12 July 1921 asking for 'bread and medicines' for 'the land of Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Mendelev, Pavlov, Mussorgsky and Glinka/ his overture opened the way for both material aid and what Hauptmann called 'ideelle Hilfe' - that is, the provision of German medical expertise on how to suppress infections. Germany, after all, was the land of Koch and von Behring; added to this were overtones of German medicine as a spiritual enterprise reverberating with holistic ideals. The new medical Ostpolitik became a rallying point for medical officials, diplomats, scientists, industrialists, and nationalists. On 22 July 1921 the German government approved a relief expedition with the covert support of the Foreign Office and the Reich Ministry of the Interior, which was responsible for domestic anti-epidemic measures.8 The German medical response opened opportunities for a variety of commercial enterprises. The Hamburg pharmaceutical company, Queisser, planned shipments of medicines to Russia, and on 23 July it contacted the entrepreneurial Ludolf Brauer, a former associate of Behring and director of the privately financed Research Institute for Clinical Pharmacology at Hamburg's Eppendorf Hospital. Brauer explained to Hauptmann that he regarded German medicine as a means of spreading German culture, that the success of this effort might prepare the ground for political change in Russia, and that he was planning a Russian edition of a German medical journal.9 Since the 1890s, we may note, Hamburg had been the centre of German tropical and colonial medicine; in this context, a number of leading bacteriologists now saw opportunities in the east for extending German cultural and political influence. Through Hauptmann a crucial link was forged between Russian relief measures and the medical researchers associated with the Hamburg Tropical Institute.

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 39

On 24 July 1921, with the approval of the Foreign Office, Hauptmann replied to Gorky in a tone both allegorical and apocalyptic. In his view, the postwar world was in an unnatural, inhumane, and divided condition and that the German people stood on the edge of an abyss 'after the earth has drunk the nation's blood.' He welcomed Gorky's plea as a noble mission, even if a solution to Russia's woes was beyond all human powers. He expressed hope that the German people, despite their own misery, would be able to assist the Russians in their struggle against hunger and disease.10 Gorky's appeal provided an opportunity for Germany to nurture its relations with the Soviet government as a prelude to the formal partnership expressed in the Treaty of Rapallo between Germany and the Soviet Union signed in 1922.11 To assert German national identity in the face of the new and forceful Soviet power, the Germans were willing to support the Soviet political hierarchy. But working with the Soviet government would require considerable skill. Gustav Hilger, the German delegate to Moscow charged with repatriating prisoners of war and interned civilians, succeeded in gaining Soviet support at high political levels.12 On 29 August 1921, he signed an agreement with Lev Borisovich Kamenev for German medical aid to the Soviet Union. The Germans avoided working under the Norwegian Fridtjof Nansen's multilateral arrangements for famine relief, so they were able to gain the confidence of such Soviet leaders as Georgi Chicherin (the Commissar for Foreign Affairs), his deputy Maxim Litvinov, and Trotsky.13 Hilger, who had lived most of his life in Russia, and who was an engineer by training (like Herbert Hoover, who organized the vast American Relief Administration), was the ideal man to forge this relationship. Because the POW repatriation office was part of the Reich Finance Ministry, he had good official contacts. He had links with the International Committee of the Red Cross and the League of Nations. The Reich government mobilized the German Red Cross as an official but non-governmental body; it had been formed only recently, in 1921, from a number of voluntary welfare and nursing organizations.14 As the official delegate of the German Red Cross based in Moscow, Hilger promoted medical assistance with the goal of furthering Germany's strategic aims. The specifically medical aims of the Red Cross expedition included providing drugs, vaccines, and disinfectants against infectious diseases to prevent their spread to Germany, and gaining reliable 'epidemic intelligence.' Peter Miihlens of the Hamburg Tropical Institute was appointed to head the expedition: a dedicated imperialist, he promoted the expedition as a cultural mission, one that would also assist ethnic Germans living in Russia.15 While launched

40 Paul Weindling

ostensibly for humanitarian relief and for the political purpose of peaceful coexistence, the German relief expedition was also an opportunity to plant in the Soviet Union advocates of Lebensraum. The pervasiveness of typhus served as a pretext for establishing new cultural links, which were seen as the first steps towards a new political alliance between Weimar Germany and the Soviet Union. At the same time, many German doctors were pursuing an unspoken racist agenda. Confronted with an international scientific boycott, nationalist German scientists welcomed Soviet invitations: German doctors emphasized the strategic interests their country shared with the USSR, especially the need to contain Poland and undermine the Treaty of Versailles. The Germans aimed to restore the prestige of German culture among Russian doctors, to counter French and Anglo-American relief work, and to benefit from diplomatic contacts with the Soviet state. Miihlens himself regarded the expedition as a 'political gesture/ and hoped to impress the Russians that the Germans were the first to provide aid. He had the backing of a steering committee whose members already had experience in military epidemic prevention. These men included Gottfried Frey, who had once been in charge of the German health administration in occupied Poland; Richard Otto, the former typhus commissioner in Vilnius; and Viktor Schilling from the Prussian Institute for Infectious Diseases, who had served with the Ottoman forces and who, along with Zeiss, would have witnessed the massacre of the Armenians. With the support of the Billroth Foundation, these physicians equipped the expedition with medicines, sera, and laboratory equipment. A German hospital ship, the Triton, arrived in Petrograd on 17 September 1921. The Germans on board intended to reoccupy the German Hospital, run an outpatient clinic for children, inoculate the citizens against cholera and smallpox, establish a central laboratory, cooperate with public health authorities, and mount famine relief and medical campaigns within the city. After this, they intended to do the same in Moscow and relieve starvation among German 'colonists' - a task that Miihlens described as 'his long-desired aim of helping German brothers/16 However, the sanitary conditions they encountered in Petrograd and Moscow were better than they had expected; there was no plague, and less cholera than German reporting would have lead them to believe. In November 1921 the German physicians attended to the plight of 23,000 Volga German refugees in Petrograd. An effort was made to dis-

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 41

infect them and their clothing on arrival; however, the freezing water and lack of soap and washing facilities meant that they remained in a diseased and louse-infested condition.17 The relief team included bacteriologists, a chemist, a sanitary engineer, and twenty nurses.18 They distributed pharmaceutical supplies and children's dietary supplements to Soviet medical institutions, and they diagnosed and treated infectious and sexually transmitted diseases. The German-equipped sanitary train of twenty-four coaches with a bacteriological laboratory, a pharmacy, disinfection and delousing facilities, a kitchen, an office, an operating theatre, and sanitary engineering equipment (including a hundred pumps) was dispatched to tackle the epidemic at its source. Despite the fanfare, the German mission was less effective than had been hoped. It lacked food supplies other than children's dietary supplements, and the German doctors found their medical equipment of little use. Attempts to set up a hospital, where the infectious might be diagnosed and then transferred to other hospitals, failed. The Germans were appalled by the extreme poverty, the filth, the damp, crowded, and freezing living conditions, and the immense numbers of starving refugees. All of this exposed the impotence of the German mission, at a time when well-equipped American and Workers' Relief teams were dispensing more than two million meals a day to children.19 To complicate matters, the Russians proved reluctant to grant the German relief team freedom of movement. In 1921 the relief train eventually reached Kazan in the Tatar Republic.20 It seems that the Soviet authorities were deflecting the Germans from their goal, which was to reach the Volga German 'colonists.' The Contested Volga Germans

Behind the scenes of the public tragedy of the Russian famine, deeper plots were being laid by German diplomatic agents. The German authorities were seeking to undermine the Treaty of Versailles by promoting Ostpolitik; at the same time, they were projecting themselves as victims of the extortionate terms of that treaty. Although the Volga Germans had joined the White Russian and peasant resistance to the Bolsheviks' food requisitions, the German government had adopted a covert pro-Bolshevik policy. Many German bacteriologists contended that the 'colonists' merited assistance as a group of high racial value. However, Reich and Prussian authorities debated whether Volga Germans should be allowed to re-

42 Paul Weindling

enter Germany, which they regarded as already deluged by refugees as a consequence of the partition of Silesia from Poland. The Reich Ministry of the Interior insisted that the Volga Germans had left Germany so long ago that they had forfeited all rights of re-entry. One proposed solution was that these German 'colonists' be treated as a group in transit to the United States. Since they were perceived as a health hazard, they were closely guarded in a sealed camp. Tainted by their semi-Asiatic origins, the Volga Germans were treated like earlier waves of eastern European transmigrants. The Interior Ministry considered the Volga Germans stranded in Poland a threat to German internal security; the fear was that if granted entry to Germany, they might import communism.21 The German Foreign Office was more supportive, and the German ambassador in Warsaw, Wilhelm Eduard von Schoen, felt that the Volga German refugees should be granted assistance, as further German hesitation might prompt the Poles to close their borders to German citizens stranded in the east. The Warsaw embassy described the Volga refugees as proper Germans in appearance and attitude.22 The embassy was against abandoning the Volga Germans to the mercy of the Poles, as this might undermine the ethnic German minority in Poland.23 German antiSemites believed that the Volga German refugees were being exploited by Jewish agents in Poland, who were doing good business smuggling refugees across the German border. Meanwhile, the Germans were criticizing the Poles as incapable of organizing effective delousing, let alone proper feeding and accommodation.24 After the borders were closed, national identity became a matter of individual expediency: German 'colonists' pretended they were Polish in order to obtain a Polish passport and then switched back to German identity in order to enter Germany. The Polish-Soviet Treaty of Riga of March 1921 stated that no more than four thousand prisoners of war should cross the frontier, but these arrangements broke down during the famine.25 Attempts were made to reactivate the system of epidemiological monitoring and delousing stations that the Germans had imposed. The point of this 'barrier' of delousing stations was to seal the European heartlands against lethal epidemics from the East. In April 1922 the Reich Health Office announced in the Reichstag that 'an epidemic prevention wall' running from East Prussia to Silesia had been put in place, with facilities for quarantine, disinfection, and observation.26 What amounted to an epidemiological 'iron curtain' - a phrase later popularized by Goebbels - demarcated the new European

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 43

order from Soviet communism.27 It was in the interest of the West to eradicate epidemics at their source. The possibility that epidemics might destabilize the fragile new structures of bolshevism was an incentive for the British, French, and Americans to re-enter Russia now that military aid to the White Russian counter-revolutionaries had failed. In contrast, German officials saw it as in their interest to prevent a weakening of the Soviet Union, however distasteful they found communism. Balancing National and International Goals In dealing with epidemic control in Russia, the Germans were walking a fine line between advancing their own aims and accommodating the goals and purposes of international agencies. In September 1921 the League of Nations sent a special commission to Moscow and to tour the famine areas in Ukraine and the Caucasus, in order to gauge the prevalence of typhus and malaria. The commission also distributed laboratory equipment and supplies of quinine and other surplus drugs, which the British army had provided.28 The American and League of Nations sanitary commissioners coordinated their efforts while hostile to the central Soviet authorities. In July 1922 the seconded British Ministry of Health medical officer, W.E. Haigh, wrote to the Polish director of the Epidemic Commission, Ludwik Rajchman, from Minsk: The communist element is established fully so that no confidence can be placed in anything.'29 Haigh resented the fact that the Soviet authorities 'would not allow any distinction between the non-political, technical, epidemiological side and the other League • • • /^f) activities. At times the British and French commissioners seemed more alarmed at the activities of the German relief teams than at the disastrous health conditions. Haigh denounced the Germans for supporting the Communist authorities in Ukraine: The German Red Cross introduction of literature, and the absence of all real contact with other parts of Europe must be balanced if any real international outlook is to be maintained in Russia in the future of medicine.'31 Haigh told Rajchman in July 1922 that a key official by the name of Gurevich 'is essentially German in outlook, very ambitious, hated by the Ukraine doctors as doing more harm than good, very autocratic, and a narrow communist, has no real knowledge of Public Health but talks of sending Marzieff to Germany later on to acquire ideas, also to go himself.'32

44 Paul Weindling

The epidemic commissioners were deeply hostile to the German medical alliance with the Communists. Even so, Rajchman adopted a policy of building up good relations with these erstwhile foes. Contending that Poland was being overwhelmed by infectious diseases from the East, the Polish government called on the League of Nations to hold an international conference. The European International Health Conference, to which all European states were invited, convened in Warsaw from 20 to 28 March 1922, with the aim of tackling Russian typhus. Non-member states such as Germany, Ukraine, and Russia were invited, and their participation represented a turning point in the efforts to rehabilitate German and Russian medical scientists internationally.33 Russian typhus was depicted as a European problem. The participants agreed that medical emergencies justified supranational action; unresolved, however, was whether the resulting measures were to override those of the concerned states or be accountable to those states. Brazenly nationalistic, German doctors condemned Polish public health as unreliable and extolled their own achievements in combating epidemics. They welcomed the possibility of international support for intervention in Russia, so as to eradicate the epidemic at its epicentre. The conference delegates inspected the Polish 'defence system' of quarantine stations, epidemic hospitals, and reserve hospitals, and gathered information about the distress of infested refugees carrying typhus and relapsing fever. Haigh reported that in White Russia (present-day Belarus) and Ukraine the refugee situation was out of control with unknown numbers living wild in the forests.34 He demanded rigorous disinfection and delousing facilities, bathing trains, and quarantine stations at the railway junctions of Minsk and Smolensk. The lack of disinfection procedures in Moscow was declared to be a major cause of infested refugees arriving in the West. In Ukraine the spread of disease had been slowed by the cold weather and poor train service; at the same time, though, refugees were crowding into the train stations, and this was producing severe sanitation problems.35 Miihlens warned of 'the terrible danger' of an exodus of starving and infected populations as the famine spread.36 The delegates concluded that in such horrendous conditions, the increases in cholera and in mass migration from faminestricken areas were 'combin[ing] to constitute an immediate danger to the rest of Europe.' Delousing was prescribed for all refugees as a passport to civilized European society; but the priority would be to prevent migration by eradicating the source of the epidemic. The conference

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 45

extended the policy of 'sanitary defence' to include most of European Russia, with the goal of attacking the epidemics at their source.37 From Relief to Medical Research By the mid-1920s, scientific cooperation had replaced German medical assistance to Russia; the defendce of German racial stocks from the ravages of epidemics and famine had given way to futuristic schemes for advanced research in genetics and pathology. Nationally-minded German scientists were collaborating with Soviet medical planners on joint research projects and expeditions. Having been excluded from international congresses and from academic and medical associations, German doctors, professors, and medical students seized the opportunity to regain their international standing and displayed an intensified cultural militancy.38 They called for a counter-boycott of international science and demanded nationalist solidarity in medicine. German policy led the drive to regain international respect through technical and scientific achievements: in 1920 the German Foreign Office formed a department for cultural affairs, which coordinated scientific visits, research expeditions, and support for hospitals and sanatariums overseas with the goal of buttressing diplomatic and strategic activities.39 A number of German physicians took advantage of the opening to the East. Few were as enigmatic and as determined as the bacteriologist Zeiss. He converted the German Red Cross Mission - intended to be a temporary German expedition - into a permanent medical presence in Russia. To secure recognition for German medicine, he opened a German medical information centre in Moscow - a move that he saw as a way to restore the prestige of German medical science and to strike a blow against the British and French. Zeiss had qualified in medicine in Freiburg (a crucible of German eugenics) in 1913; while a student, he had developed an interest in anthropology and Lebensraum.40 As Wolfgang Eckart details in chapter 5, during the war Zeiss served in Turkey, where he encountered imperialist bacteriologist Ernst Rodenwaldt, with whom he later co-authored a textbook of hygiene and collaborated in medical geography. In 1919 Zeiss protested against the international boycott of German medical science.41 He extolled the strategic value of medical intervention in the Soviet Union as a means of lifting what he called - in a prescient use of the phrase - the 'iron curtain of war' that had separated

46 Paul Weindling

the German and Russian people. As Sabine Schleiermacher discusses in her chapter, Zeiss channelled his racism into efforts to save the lives of the million-and-a-half ethnic Germans in Russia.42 After he succeeded Miihlens as director of the expedition in May 1922, he hotly pursued his racial strategy. Zeiss brought together the concepts of sanitary assistance, bacteriological monitoring, and research on the geographical distribution of diseases. His work reflected the ways in which the ideology of Lebensraum served as a driving force behind the German scientific approach to famine relief. He argued in terms of imperialist geopolitics: just as the French had encircled the Mediterranean with Pasteur Institutes, so the German bacteriological station in Moscow could serve as an early warning station for epidemic threats to Europe, besides providing an entry point for German cultural and trading interests with Afghanistan, Baluchistan, and Persia.43 In Zeiss's view, Germany shared a common political destiny with Russia; furthermore, Germany's surplus population ought to be settled in areas where close contact with the homeland could be maintained.44 These nationalist sentiments inspired Zeiss to organize a range of medical activities that went far beyond the task of preventing epidemics. In October 1921, when the Red Cross mission that had brought him to Moscow came to an end, he established the Central Bacteriological Laboratory in Moscow as 'a nursery of German science/ for the purpose of gaining an overview of medical conditions throughout the USSR. In Moscow, medical inspections of schoolchildren were carried out, and a German medical reading room was much used. Zeiss's laboratory dispatched mobile field laboratories to Petrograd, Minsk, Saratov, and Astrakhan to study epidemics.45 Zeiss himself was particularly interested in studying tuberculosis and sexually transmitted diseases, using stocks of Salvarsan, which was in short supply.46 Zeiss's practical assistance and medical research were linked to the Lebensmum ideology in several ways. When Germany lost her colonies, she was deprived of facilities for clinical observations and medical experiments in tropical medicine. The mass starvation and epidemics of the Soviet Union turned it into a proxy or Ersatz-territory for medical research, which became linked to racial priorities. Medical experiments were carried out on typhoid victims. Teams tested rehydration therapy for cholera, and injections of Novasanol and Argflovine were tried against typhus (both drugs were probably useless against the disease).47 The newly developed Zyklon gas was used to disinfect railway facilities and passengers' effects, by exterminating lice and cockroaches.48 The

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 47

testing of experimental drugs was followed by efforts to open outlets for German pharmaceutical products. At this time, the Hamburg Institute of Tropical Medicine was experimenting with malaria therapy for tertiary syphilis - a dangerous procedure resulting in fatalities.49 Miihlens and Zeiss undertook clinical trials of the Bayer drugs Germanin (Bayer 205) for sleeping sickness and Naganal for the camel disease trypanosomiasis. Russia provided an experimental arena for work begun by Koch in the German East African concentration camps for testing Atoxyl. The Moscow embassy relayed supplies of drugs, and the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Fund for German Science) provided financial support. The Bayer corporation financed Zeiss while he was at the Moscow bacteriological station until 1924.50 The agreement of 29 August 1921 between the Germans and the Russian famine relief committee had banned political activities; even so, the former had clear political and strategic aims.51 A priority of the expedition was to 'conquer a permanent position in St Petersburg/ Financial restrictions were forcing the Russians to close hospital laboratories, and this provided favourable opportunities to the Germans.52 In June 1922 the pathologist Carly Seifert took over a hundred beds in the Alexander Hospital (previously a German hospital) in Petrograd on behalf of the German Red Cross, intending to restore its character as 'a purely German hospital/ His aims were various: to oversee the port medical facilities and address the needs of refugees leaving by sea; to prevent typhus; to organize experiments for typhoid treatment; and to provide outpatient treatment for sexually transmitted diseases.53 Zeiss's activities in Moscow gained the support of influential Soviet scientist-politicians. N.A. Semashko, the Russian Commissar of Public Health, hoped that Zeiss would contribute to Soviet serum research.54 N.P. Gorbunov, an influential geographer and engineer, praised Zeiss for his contributions to the scientific and technical education of Russian physicians, as did D.P. Solov'ev of the Central Committee.55 But above all, Lenin endorsed Zeiss's activities - and documenting this endorsement became essential to Zeiss as he clung to his position. When Zeiss was later appointed director of the German Red Cross expedition, he explained to Gorbunov that he was ready to assume tasks as directed by Lenin.56 In deference to the German strategy of supporting the Soviet state, Gorbunov urged Zeiss to stay and enter the Russian health service.57 Zeiss understood the strategic significance of laboratories. In December 1921 he explained to Russian public health experts that the Moscow bacteriological laboratory of the German Red Cross could be

48 Paul Weindling

in a key position in a front opened up by the League of Nations against the great parasitic diseases from the east. More to the point, Zeiss persuaded the League of Nations delegates, Hans Zinsser and Norman White, that he would be the ideal plenipotentiary to coordinate public health training in Russia.58 Zeiss's efforts were largely successful. The German central laboratories rapidly developed amicable relations with Russian doctors and medical scientists. By September 1921 Miihlens was arranging supplies of German medical literature to satisfy the 'book hunger' of ethnic German and Russian doctors. He invited Bernhard Nocht to preside over this scheme, emphasizing its urgency in order to combat the influence of other powers (notably France, with its rival Pasteurian tradition). The Reich Ministry of the Interior arranged a conference with German medical publishers on 22 October 1922, financed by the Billroth Foundation.59 As a result of that meeting, Semashko and Solov'ev backed a scheme for a bilingual German-Russian journal, to be titled Folia medica, to supplement the array of German medical journals that Zeiss was supplying to Russian medical institutes.60 At a Russian bacteriological congress in May 1922, Zeiss declared that German-Russian scientific solidarity was fundamental to the reconstruction of Europe.61 The German authorities reprimanded Zeiss for exceeding his brief, which was to carry out anti-epidemic measures, and for concocting plans to extend the role of the central bacteriological station. But when Reich officials suggested that Zeiss be transferred to Germany's rolledback eastern border, to one of the new bacteriological institutes, Miihlens defended him, pointing out that his activities in Moscow were important for German national prestige.62 The conflict over the scope of the German Red Cross expedition led to a disagreement in October 1922 between the German Interior and Foreign Ministries over funding. By this time, many of the survivors in Minsk were returning to the Volga region, where the food situation had improved, and plans for German hospitals in Petrograd and Moscow were far advanced.63 In January 1923 the Foreign Office noted that if it publicly took responsibility for German medical activities in Russia, those activities would lose their non-political character. The Foreign Office proposed a system of secret subsidies, concealed under the category 'heating and lighting expenses' for the Moscow embassy, where the German Red Cross could have a representative. The German diplomats pressed the Ministry of the Interior to continue to finance the expedition as this would guarantee its humanitarian and medical status. The Finance

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 49

Ministry believed could transfer the budget to the Foreign Ministry while concealing this manoeuvre from outside scrutiny.64 The Germans saw the cultivation of German-Russian medical relations as the counterpart of military cooperation between the Red Army and the Reichswehr. The connections were tangled and dense and generated interesting synergies. The medical exchanges provided both camouflage and support for various German acivities. Zeiss's Moscow clinic catered to visiting Germans; after 1923 it also provided medical services for the Junkers aircraft factory at Fili near Moscow. Zeiss also established contacts with military medical officers in the Red Army.65 The strategic thinking of General Hans von Seeckt - namely, that the German-Russian axis had to be restored - resonated with the views of the German medical cohort.66 Just after Gustav Hilger engineered the sanitary agreement in August 1921, the Reichswehr and the Red Army launched the Junkers aircraft factory.67 Zeiss's grandiose ambitions ran to establishing influence in Afghanistan as a matter of strategic importance to Germany.68 Oskar von Niedermayer, who had organized a military expedition to Afghanistan, headed the secret Moscow office of the German War Ministry's 'Special Group R' under the pseudonym 'Herr Neumann.'69 By February 1922, Zeiss saw his laboratory as the nucleus for a 'German research station' in Moscow.70 The whole enterprise of disease mapping had strategic relevance. The extensive activities (outlined above) of a group of racially minded medical experts were shaped by ideologies of Lebensraum and geopolitics; however, this right-wing nationalism stopped short of Nazism: Ludendorff's call in autumn 1921 for an anti-Bolshevik crusade in conjunction with Britain and France was profoundly embarrassing to the German Red Cross expedition.71 Among the western agencies providing famine relief, only the Germans were keen to remain in Russia. A new spirit of reciprocity had been kindled between the Soviets and the Germans. In 1923 the Russian Red Cross made donations to alleviate deprivation in the occupied Ruhr.72 In January 1923, Semashko told the League of Nations Hygiene Organization that he welcomed foreign medical aid provided that there was cooperation with Soviet sanitary authorities. He drew attention to shortages of medicines, laboratory equipment, anti-diphtheria serum, and soap, and he emphasized that assistance was needed in the campaigns against infant mortality and malaria.73 Meanwhile, the German Red Cross continued to support the Volga Germans, supplying them with seeds and equipment, such as motor-

50 Paul Weindling

ized ploughs.74 But at the same time, the Soviet authorities exerted pressure to regain the hospitals in Simferopol and Georgia from the Germans. An agreement of February 1923 placed the Tiflis hospital under the German Red Cross while ensuring substantial injections of funds from the militaristic Billroth Foundation.75 Over time, German strategies shifted. As the threat of epidemic diseases dissipated, Zeiss defended the German laboratory in Moscow. His intention was to develop clinics and a small hospital, and if possible stations in Minsk and Saratov.76 The normalization of conditions led to plans for German Red Cross involvement in an anti-malaria campaign on the Volga as well as efforts by the tropical medical specialists Otto Fischer and Zeiss to strengthen German schools.77 Although the German medical teams had been less effective than other relief contingents at providing famine relief, they had been able to establish what they hoped would be a permanent base for medical research in Russia. The Russian adventure deepened the sense of racial mission among a phalanx of ultranationalist German bacteriologists. Zeiss played a crucial role in sustaining German-Soviet medical cooperation. In 1923 the Russians pressured him to terminate the autonomous German Red Cross hospitals and networks of supply; meanwhile, Reich medical officials no longer saw the need for an epidemic early warning station in Moscow.78 Zeiss had hoped that the central bacteriological laboratory in Moscow - which he had developed into a poly clinic offering a range of medical services and tests, including Wassermann testing for syphilis - would continue after the German Red Cross had withdrawn. Such medical activities provided a cover for assisting German 'colonists' and for health care at the newly established Junkers aircraft factory. But this German military and technological bridgehead ran into financial difficulties when Soviet orders for aircraft did not materialize.79 Zeiss's hopes proved overoptimistic. His plans for developing the Red Cross clinic into a German medical research institute in Russia would receive no funding from the pharmaceutical industry.80 His idea was that German scientists would supply - and test - German pharmaceutical products and monitor the incidence of infectious diseases. When he failed to convince German pharmaceutical companies to support Moscow's Central Bacteriological Laboratory, Semashko arranged for him to enter into Soviet employment - a macabre situation for a right-wing nationalist. In October 1924, Zeiss outlined to Semashko a plan to assemble an encyclopaedic collection of strains of human pathogens, bacteria causing plant and animal diseases, and agriculturally

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 51

important bacteria.81 Zeiss cooperated with Russian scientists on projects relating to therapy for and control of diseases conducted at the Chemical and Pharmaceutical Institute of the Supreme Council of the National Economy and at the Moscow Pasteur Institute, where he was in charge of the microbiological collection.82 The Central Bacteriological Laboratory was given an expanded role with the establishment of the All-Russian Microbiological Collection (whose operations figure prominently in Elizabeth Hachten's chapter). Zeiss collected specimens from Russian colleagues and organized exchanges of bacteria cultures with other reference collections in Germany and the United States. He distributed the equipment of the German bacteriological laboratory to ethnic Germans at the medical faculty and the microbiological institute in the German Volga Republic ciy of Saratov, and to the central bacteriological laboratory of the Red Army. Hilger and Department VI of the German Foreign Office supported his 'medical and cultural' activities, thus transforming Zeiss into an arm of the ministerial advocates of Ostpolitik. Once official contacts had been ratified by the Berlin Treaty of Neutrality and Friendship, concluded between Germany and the Soviet Union in April 1926, a steady stream of funds flowed to Zeiss from the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft.83 The president of this body, Freidrich Schmidt-Ott, believed fervently in Germany's historical and cultural mission in the east and provided powerful backing to German-Soviet scientific ventures. Although Zeiss became fluent in Russian and was a Soviet employee, he maintained an ostentatiously German lifestyle and was unofficial medical attache to the German Embassy.84 He had a wide network of Soviet contacts and enjoyed greater freedom of movement than a diplomat. He reported to his embassy on health conditions, changes in Soviet medical education, the pernicious influence of French doctors, and the medical implications of the first Five Year Plan.85 As Susan Solomon discusses in her chapter, Zeiss skilfully supported the German national agenda even while providing the Soviets with medical information and resources. In this way he laid the foundations for a wide-ranging program of cooperation in medicine and the life sciences. Dismantling the German Presence By the mid-1920s, sporadic invitations to German medical scientists had developed into a concerted program, as the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft broadened its interests to include the rebuild-

52 Paul Weindling

ing of international academic relations. This organization argued that German science was 'spatially constricted' and would benefit from Soviet research.86 Yet throughout the period of coexistence, there was a haunting ultranationalist phantasm that the 'colonists' were an outpost for any future German securing of Lebensraum in the east. The crisis of collectivization exacerbated mass misery among ethnic German peasant farmers. Ultimately, as Wolfgang Eckart will detail in chapter 5, a combination of Soviet xenophobia and the strengthening of Stalinist ideology that was part of the turn of Soviet society inward in the late 1920s forced Zeiss out of the Soviet Union in 1931. He demanded that attention be drawn to what appeared to be the imminent destruction of the 'colonists.' Once back in Germany, with other Volga German propagandists he joined the ranks of the NSDAP, because it seemed to be the one political force in Germany that took the plight of scattered Auslandsdeutschen seriously. Zeiss retained an interest in the 'Geomedizin des Ostraumes.' Under the Nazis there were sporadic efforts to rekindle German-Russian medical relations, not least in the era of the Hitler-Stalin pact. During the war, a Zentrale fur Ostforschung, established in 1942, sought to recruit Germanophile Russians, especially in medical research.87 Its activities were overshadowed by the genocidal Operation Barbarossa, and by the forced resettlement and extermination policies of General Plan Ost. This was when Zeiss and his associates (notably Richard Bieling, the bacteriologist and co-author with Zeiss of a remarkable biography of the bacteriologist von Behring, whose Nobel Prize winning achievements were analysed in terms of a geopolitical would view) offered advice on suppressing epidemics in Ukraine. They implemented the takeover of Soviet vaccine plants and made plans to safeguard the health of the Volga Germans. At the end of the Second World War, Zeiss, although incapacitated by Parkinson's disease, continued in office at the Berlin Hygiene Institute, and looked forward to resuming collaboration with the Soviet authorities. When he contacted Henry Sigerist, a fellow historian and erstwhile medical observer of the Soviet Union (but someone who at the crossroads of the early 1930s turned decidedly to the political left), to resume their cooperation, he did not see that there was no prospect of rekindling relations with Soviet medicine. Far from it - the incipient Cold War meant that Soviet medicine was to develop in the new Soviet power bloc.

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 53 Zeiss was excluded from the Berlin Medical Faculty in July 1945. In the autumn he was arrested and deported to the Soviet Union, where he was prosecuted for having been a spy between 1921 and 1932.88 The Soviets accused him of having organized a network of agents for germ warfare.89 Zeiss's death in 1949 while imprisoned at Vladimir marked the end of an era in Soviet-German medical relations. From now on, collaboration would develop in the context of shared socialist endeavours, while nationalist Germans in the West - notably the Hamburg professor of public health, Hans Harmsen - took up the geomedical agenda and critically monitored medical conditions behind the Iron Curtain.90 Zeiss's story illuminates the intersection of the institutional and ideological alignments at each stage in German-Soviet medical relations. The medical collaboration as represented by the activities of Zeiss was submerged by the brutalities that accompanied Barbarossa and later by the ideological polarities of the Cold War. Seen through the lens of changing political circumstances, the German-Soviet medical collaboration was less an aberration than a complex dynamic of scientific and national agendas, driven more by antiBolshevism (of a highly complex sort) than by anti-Semitism. Indeed, as I have argued elsewhere, medical assistance to the Soviet Union ultimately provided a highly distinctive route for many bacteriologists and German Ostforscher (researchers on the East) to join the ranks of the Nazis.91 NOTES This paper derives from three separate presentations at the Berlin workshops organized at the Institut fur Geschichte der Medizin by Susan Solomon. I wish to thank Susan for insightful comments on this chapter and for her invaluable advice over many years. I am especially grateful to her for generously making available copies from the Archives of the Russian Federation. The research was supported by the Wellcome Trust. 1 Paul Weindling, 'Heinrich Zeiss, Hygiene and the Holocaust/ in D. and R. Porter, eds., Doctors, Politics and Society: Historical Essays (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1993), 174-87. Paul Weindling, 'German-Soviet Medical Co-operation and the Institute for Racial Research, 1927-ca. 1935/ German History 10 (1992): 177-206.

54 Paul Weindling 2 Woodruff D. Smith, The Ideological Origins of Nazi Imperialism (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986), 192-4; Klaus Schwabe, Wissenschaft und Kriegsmoral (Gottingen, Zurich, and Frankfurt am Main: Musterschmidt, 1969), 167; John Wheeler Bennett, Brest-Litovsk, the Forgotten Peace: March 1918 (London: Macmillan, 1938). 3 Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz (henceforth GSTA), Rep. 76,VIIIB, Nr 2996 Gumbinnen, fol. 313. Lebenslauf Ernst Josef Gottlieb Reissland. Reissland was in Russia from 1915 until repatriation in 1920, eventually being appointed at Gumbinnen as compensation for his interrupted career. 4 Paul Weindling, From Bacteriology to Social Hygiene: Handlist of the Papers of Martin Hahn (1865-1934) (Oxford: Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, 1985); Wilhelm His, Die Front der Arzte (Bielefeld, Leipzig: Velhagen & Klasing, 1931), 226-42; Ronald Grigor Suny, The Baku Commune, 1917-1918 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1972), 280-7. O. Schjerning, Handbuch der aerztlichen Erfahrungen im ersten Weltkrieg (Leipzig: n.p., 1922). 5 Wolfgang U. Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik der Republik von Weimar-Deutschland und die Sowjetunion 1920-1932,' Medizin, Geschichte und Gesellschaft 10 (1993): 105-42. Hans Werner Neulen, Feldgrau in Jerusalem: Das Levantekorps des kaiserlichen Deutschlands (Munich: Universitas, 1991). 6 Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik/ For the contemporary heroization of Billroth, see Robert Gersuny, Theodor Billroth (Vienna and Berlin: Rikola-Verlag, 1922). For the military background, see Winfried Baumgart, Deutsche Ostpolitik 1918: Von Brest-Litowsk bis zum Ende des Ersten Weltkrieges (Vienna and Munich: Oldenbourg, 1966), 181. 7 Bundesarchiv Abteilung Koblenz (henceforth BA Koblenz) R 86/1040 Bd 6, Report Berlin 6 April 1919 concerning 'Flecktyphus als polnisches Kampfmittel.' G. Frey, 'Das Gesundheitswesen im Deutschen Verwaltungsgebiet von Polen in den Jahren 1914-1918,' Arbeiten aus dem Reichsgesundheitsamt 51 (1919): 654. 8 'Eine deutsche Hilfsaktion fur Russland/ Tagliche Rundschau, Nr 338 (22 July 1921), also in Vossische Zeitung, Nr 341 (22 July 1921). 9 Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz Berlin, Gerhart Hauptmann Nachlass, Br NL B V Russlandhilfe, letters of Queisser and Co. to Brauer 23.VII.21; Brauer to Hauptmann 24.VII.21. 10 Hauptmann Nachlass, Briefe, Telegramm Maxim Gorki and Gerhart Hauptmann (original and abbreviated typescript); 1921 Antwort Gerhart Hauptmanns auf das Telegramm Maxim Gorkis. 11 Hildegard Bohme, Die organisatorischen Grundlagen des Roten Kreuz (Berlin:

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 55

12

13 14

15 16 17 18

19

20 21 22

23

Deutsches Rotes Kreuz, 1925); F.W. Brekenburg, Das deutsche Rote Kreuz (Berlin, 1938); Horst Seithe and Frauke Hagemann, Das Deutsche Rote Kreuz im Dritten Reich (1933-1939). Mit einem Abriss seiner Geschichte in der Weimarer Republik (Frankfurt am Main: Mabuse-Verlag, 1993). Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii, Moscow (henceforth GARF), /. 3341, op. 6, d. 316, /. 153-5 for the text of the agreement. /. 3341, op. 6, d. 316, /. 152, ratification of treaty by DRK Berlin 8 November 1921. Bundesarchiv Berlin (hereafter BA Berlin), 15.01 Nr 9398, fol. 96-7. Letter from Hilger, 5 November 1921. Staatsarchiv Hamburg (henceforth STAH), 352 8/9, Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, 23, Bd 1. Miihlens report no. 3,3 October 1921. Gustav Hilger and Alfred G. Meyer, The Incompatible Allies: A Memoir-History of German-Soviet Relations (New York: Macmillan, 1953), 40-8. Hauptmann papers, letter of Schlesinger to Hauptmann 19 July 1921. STAH, 352 8/9 Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, 23, Bd 1; Miihlens to Nocht 14 July 1922; Miihlens report no. 21. STAH, 352 8/9, Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, 23, Bd 1. Letter from Muhlens to Nocht 14 July 1921. Muhlens report no. 21. BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 9398, fol. 190-196. 'Bericht iiber Besichtigung von Unterkunftsstatten fur Wolgafliichtlinge in Petersburg' 17 November 1921. The doctors included Peter Muhlens, O. Fischer, Ernst Nauck, and Heinrich Zeiss from the Hamburg Tropical Institute; Siitterlin, a bacteriologist; Wolfgang Gartner, a Privatdozent in hygiene at Kiel; G. Hellmann, a Berlin neurologist; Dr H. Karstens, a Sanitatsrat; Dr Mertens, an ophthalmologist from Wiesbaden; and Sauer, a surgeon from Hamburg. Martin Hahn also went to Crimea, where he had extensive experience in cholera prevention. Gartner died in Kazan. The chemist was Josef Halberkann. See Wolfgang Giithoff, Zur Epidemiologie und Bekampfung der Seuchengeschehens in Sowjetrussland von 1918-1924 (Berlin: med. Diss., Humboldt-Universitat zu Berlin, 1986), p. 71. BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 9398. Muhlens report no. 14,15 December 1921. Stefan Wulf, Das Hamburger Tropeninstitut 1919 bis 1945 (Berlin: Reimer-Verlag, 1994), 15. Gartner was not the only doctor to die on the expedition. Ernst Nauck, 'Von der Tatigkeit in Kasan/ Blatter des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes Sonderheft (1922): 14-15. BA Koblenz, R86/2401 Bd 1. 'Besprechung betr. die Riickwanderung deutschstammiger Wolgafliichtlinge' 17 December 1921. GSTA, Rep 76, VIIIB, Nr 3569 RMdl, 10 December 1921. Auswartiges Amt 14 December 1921. Von Schoen, German Embassy Warsaw 18 January 1922. GSTA, Rep 76, VIII B, Nr 3569, German Embassy Warsaw 14 February 1922.

56 Paul Weindling 24 BA Koblenz, 86/2401, Bd 1, RMdl, conference on 20 February 1922, comments by Hasbach, a German national representative to the Polish Sejm. 25 Cecil William Hurt, International Hygiene (London: Methuen, 1927), 26-7. 26 Carl Hamel to the Reichstag, 204. Sitzung 6 April 1922, p. 6968. 27 A Choleraraion was also established on the border with China. Alexandra Rachmanowa, Studenten, Liebe, Tscheka und Tod: Tagebuch einer russischen Studentin (Bonn: Buchgemeinde, 1933), 430. 28 League of Nations, Minutes of the Fifth Session of the Health Committee (Geneva, 1923), 7-8. Minutes of the Sixth Session of the Health Committee (Geneva, 1923), 67-71. Reginald Farrar contracted typhus and died. Haigh established a Moscow office. In August 1922 a commissioner, Pantaleoni, was sent to Kharkov in Ukraine, and took over the Moscow office from September 1922 until September 1923. 29 League of Nations Archives Geneva (henceforth LNA), R 824/12B/ 26009X/15255, Haigh to Rajchman, 7 July 1922. 30 Ibid., Haigh to Rajchman, 22 April 1922. 31 Ibid., Haigh to Rajchman, 17 February 1922. 32 Ibid., Haigh to Rajchman, July 1922. 33 Only Albania and Portugal did not send delegates. As this was a governmental conference, the LRCS had not been able to send a delegate; however, it contributed £5,000 to the conference costs. (Minutes of the Third Session of the Health Committee [May 1922], 64.) Although the conference report was published by the Health Secretariat of the League of Nations, this secretariat could only take note of its recommendations; it could not accept these as binding. 34 European Health Conference (Geneva, 1922), 18-23. 35 Ibid. 36 Ibid., 24. 37 Ibid., 12. 38 Brigitte Schroder-Gudehus, Deutsche Wissenschaft und Internationale Zusammenarbeit 1914-1928, ein Beitrag zum Studium kultureller Beziehungen in Krisenzeiten (Geneva, 1966). 39 Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik.' 40 Paul Weindling, Health, Race and German Politics between National Unification and Nazism, 1879-1945 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989). 41 H. Zeiss, 'Der Kampf der feindlichen Wissenschaft gegen Deutschland/ Suddeutsche Monatshefte (November 1919): 157-62. 42 James William Long, The German-Russians: A Bibliography (Santa Barbara and Oxford: ABC Clio, 1979); Jean-Frangois Bourret, Les allemands de la Volga: Histoire culturelle d'une minorite, 1763-1941 (Lyon: Universite de

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 57

43

44 45

46 47 48 49 50 51 52

53 54 55 56 57 58

Lyon, 1986); F.C. Koch, The Volga Germans in Russia and the Americas, from 1763 to the Present (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1977); Ingeborg Fleischhauer and Benjamin Pinkus, The Soviet Germans: Past and Present (London: Hurs, 1986). Among propagandistic studies are Robert Miiller-Sternberg, Deutsche-Ostsiedlung, eine Bilanzfiir Europa (Bielefeld: Gieseking, 1969); Karl-Heinz Ruffmann, Die Russland-Deutschen. Schicksal und Erben (Munich, 1989); Klaus-Dieter Schulz-Vobach, Die Deutschen im Osten: Vom Balkan bis Sibirien (Hamburg: Hoffmann & Campe, 1989). LNA, R 825,12B/29911X/15255, Zeiss on 29 December 1921. BA Potsdam 15.01 Nr 9398 fol. 307-9, Zeiss report, 29 December 1921; Michael Burleigh, Germany Turns Eastwards: A Study of Ostforschung in the Third Reich (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988). STAH, 352 8/9 Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, 23, Bd 1, Billroth Stiftung to Nocht, 13 October 1921. GARF,/. 3341, op. 6, d. 334, /. 53 'Die Tatigkeit der Bakteriologischen Zentrale des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes in Moskau' 16 September 1923. H. Zeiss, 'Die bakteriologische Zentrale des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes in Moskau,' Blatter des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes, Sonderheft (1922): 11-12. The Astrakhan laboratory was run by A.K. Reichardt under the supervision of Zeiss, GARF,/. 3341, op. 6, d. 334, /. 67, Zeiss, 5 October 1923. BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 3999, fol. 327-32. P. Miihlens, 'Die Hunger- und Seuchenkatastrophe in Russland,' Munchner Medizinische Wochenschrift (1922): 1444. See the illustration in Blatter des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes 2 (1921): 31. Ludger Wess, 'Menschenversuche und Kolonialpolitik, Das Hamburger Institut fur Schiffs- und Tropenkrankheiten 1918-1945' (1992): 13-17. BA Koblenz, R 73/221. Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft. BA Berlin, 09.02/350, fol. 316. STAH, 352 8/9, Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, 23, Bd 1. Miihlens report no. 7 23.X.21. Ingrid Kastner and Natalja Decker, 'Der Leipziger Arzt Paul Carly Seyfarth (1890-1950) und die Rot-Kreuz-Expedition nach Russland in den 20er Jahren,' Schriftenreihe fur Geschichte der Natunvissenschaften, Technik und Medizin (NTM) 5 (1997): 43-54. BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 9400, fol. 255, concerning the Alexander-Spital. On Seifert, see Kastner and Decker, 'Der Leipziger Arzt Paul Carly Seyfarth.' BA Koblenz, R 73/221. Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft. GARF,/. 3341, op. 6, d. 336, /. 4. Solov'ev to Zeiss, 13 October 1923. GARF,/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 4. Zeiss to Gorbunov, 6 June 1922. GARF,/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 10. Zeiss to Gorbunov, 4 March 1925. LNA, R 825,12B/29922X/15255. Bernstein (physician at the German

58 Paul Weindling

59

60

61

62 63 64 65

66

67 68 69 70 71

Embassy Moscow) to Zinsser, 30 July 1923, including Zeiss's report on meeting of November 1921 with Solov'ev and Tarasevich; LNA, R 825 12B/34273X/15255, Zeiss to N. White, 19 January and 26 February 1924. BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 9398, Bl. 56. Letter of Nocht, 13 October 1921; fol. 86. Meeting 22 October 1921; STAH, 352 8/9, Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, 23, Bd 1. Miihlens to Nocht, 4 October 1921. GARF,/. 3341, op. 6, d. 334, /. 88 2 December 1923, on negotiations with Semashko and Brauer in June 1923. /. 3341, op. 6, d. 334, /. 5300 'Die Tatigkeit der Bakteriologischen Zentrale des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes in Moskau,' 16 November 1923. The journal was due to appear 1 January 1924, see GARF,/. 3341, op. 6, d. 334, /. 63. For the supply of medical journals, see Zeiss to Semashko, 17 April 1925,/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 14-13. The journal was the counterpart to the Revista medica de Hamburgo established in 1919. Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, Archivordner Tropeninstitut 1921-3, Zeiss to Nocht, 29 November 1922. STAH, 352 8/9, Bernhard-NochMnstitut, 23, Bd 1. Miihlens report no. 25, 6 May 1922. Meetings were also held with Semashko in April 1922, and there was a beer evening with the Moscow and St Petersburg medical faculties on 6 May 1922. BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 3999, Bl. 327-32. Meeting in RMdl, 27 May 1922. BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 9400, Bl. 400-2. Meeting in RMdl, 5 October 1922. BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 9401, Bl. 70-3. Meeting in RMdl, 3 January 1923. GARF,/. 3341, op. 6, d. 334, /. 5405 'Die Tatigkeit der Bakteriologischen Zentrale des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes in Moskau' 16 November 1923; f. 3341, op. 6, d. 334, /. 70; BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 9398, fol. 303. Report by Zeiss 29 December 1921; STAH, CC VI, No 11, Bd 1, Fasc. 64. Letter of G. Gerber, Hilger and Zeiss in support of funding application of 29 July 1922. Hilger and Meyer, Incompatible Allies, 191. M. Kitchen, 'Militarism and the Development of Fascist Ideology: The Political Ideas of Colonel Max Bauer, 1916-1918,' Central European History 8, no. 3 (1975): 199-220; Olaf Groehler, Selbstmorderische Allianz. Deutsch-russische Militarbeziehungen 1920-1941 (Berlin: Vision Verlag, 1992), 36-7; Manfred Zeidler, Reichswehr und Rote Armee 1920-1933 (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1993). Hilger and Meyer, Incompatible Allies, 194. BA Berlin, 09.02/394, Bl. 10-14. Zeiss letter of 7 November 1923. Hilger and Meyer, Incompatible Allies, 195-6. STAH, 352 8/9, Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, 23, Bd 1. Miihlens report no. 16, 19 February 1922. STAH, 352 8/9, Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, 23, Bd 1. Miihlens report no. 7, 23 October 1921.

German Overtures to Russia, 1919-1925 59 72 GARF,/. 3341, op. 6, d. 334, /. 73. DRK President to Russian Red Cross, 27 October 1923. 73 'La situation en Russie: Expose du Dr Semashko/ League of Nations, Minutes of the Fifth Session of the Health Committee, 31-3. 74 BA Berlin, 09.02/350, fol. 248. DRK letter 26 November 1924, concerning the seizure of two German-owned motorized ploughs in Ukraine. 75 GARF,/. 3341, op. 6, d. 336, /. 15-19. 'Das deutsche Krankenhaus Tiflis/ BA Berlin, 09.02/ 350, fol. 189,265. Letter 14 November 1924 from German consul Tiflis. Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik.' 76 STAH, CC VI, No 11, Vol 1, Fasc. 64. Letter from Zeiss to Pfeiffer 29 July 1922. 'Denkschrift iiber das bakteriologische Zentrallaboratorium des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes in Moskau/ 29 July 1922. 77 BA Berlin, 15.01, Nr 9401, fol. 38-9,0. Fischer, 'Die Verhaltnisse in den deutschen Schulen an der Wolga.' 78 STAH, 352 8/9, Bernhard-Nocht-Institut, 23, Bd 1, Russland Hunger-Hilfe. Letter of Hilger to Miihlens, 6 January 1923. 79 BA Berlin, 09.02/349, Bl. 216,227; Zeidler, Reichswehr und Rote Armee, 54-7, 89-91. 80 BA Berlin, 15.01 / 9398, Reichsministerium des Innern. Akten betreffend: das Hilfswerk des deutschen Roten Kreuzes fur Russland, Bd 1 vom 19. August 1921 bis 31. Marz 1922, fol. 496-7. Zeiss, 'Die Notwendigkeit eines deutschen medizinischen Forschungsinstitutes in Russland/ January 1922, BA Berlin, RMI, Nr 9398, Bd 1,496-509. 81 Archiv der Humboldt-Universitat zu Berlin (hereafter AHUB), Zeiss papers, box 4, Zeiss to Semashko, 19 May 1925, offering services to the Red Army; GARF,/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 34-25. Zeiss, 'Die kriegshygienischen Aufgaben einer medizinischen Topographic in Russland in Verbindung mit der Allrussischen Mikrobiologischen Sammlung'; GARF,/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 18 and 45. Zeiss to Gorbunov, 26 April 1925 and 15 May 1925. See also GARF,/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 58. Zeiss to Gorbunov, 24 September 1925, for the sending of publications on Russian epidemiology. 82 GARF,/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 10. Zeiss to Gorbunov, 4 March 1925;/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 15-13. Zeiss to Semashko, 17 April 1925; BA Koblenz, R 86/ 744, fol. 25-30. Zeiss Lebenslauf. 83 Gerd Voigt, Otto Hoetzsch (1876-1946). Wissenschaft und Politik im Leben eines deutschen Historikers (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1978), 321. Letter of Hoetzsch to Schmidt-Ott, 1 November 1926, on Zeiss as 'wissenschaftlich und national so wertvoll'; BA Koblenz, R 73/ 223, fol. 104-108. Zeiss to German Embassy Moscow, 1 July 1931. 84 Herwig Hamperl, Werdegang und Lebensweg eines Pathologen (Stuttgart: Schattauer, 1972), 116.

60 Paul Weindling 85 BA Berlin, 09.02/ 420, fol. 218-228. Zeiss on medical education, 3 September 1931; fol. 267, Zeiss on paratyphus; fol. 276-283, Zeiss on maternal and infant welfare, 4 April 1931; fol. 286-301, Zeiss on prevention of epidemics; fol. 303, Zeiss on history of medicine. 86 Siebenter Bericht der Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft (Berlin: K. Siegismund, 1928). 87 Paul Weindling, Epidemics and Genocide in Eastern Europe, 1890-1945 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). 88 AHUB, Medizinische Fakultat, Sitzungsprotokolle 1943^5,13 July 1945, decision to exclude Karl Gebhardt, Paul Rostock, and Zeiss. Paul Weindling, Nazi Medicine and the Nuremberg Trials: From Medical War Crimes to Informed Consent (Basingstoke: Palgrave-Macmillan, 2004), 200,214. 89 Weindling, Epidemics and Genocide, 384,408. 90 Hans Harmsen, Zur Entwicklung und Organisation des Gesundheitswesens in Sowjetrussland, in osteuropaischen Volksdemokratien und in Mitteldeutschland (Hamburg: Akademie fur Staatmedizin, 1955). 91 These themes are explored more fully in my Epidemics and Genocide.

2 Partners of Choice / Faute de Mieux? Russians and Germans at the 200th Anniversary of the Academy of Sciences, 1925 MARINA SOROKINA

You are silly and old-fashioned And your reasoning is askew A samovar's trickle is mistaken For a waterfall by you. Daniil Kharms, A Comedy of the City of Petersburg (1931)

Academic anniversaries were never commemorated as frequently or as lavishly as during the Soviet era. The 200th anniversary of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) / Academy of Sciences of the USSR (AS USSR) was celebrated for ten days, from 5 to 14 September 1925, in both Leningrad and Moscow, and was the first in a series of such celebrations.* In contrast to other Soviet scientific rituals (such as public discussions, public critiques and self-critiques, and courts of honour), which were borrowed from party-state culture,1 the tone of the anniversary performance was a child of pre-revolutionary times.2 The 'Anniversary Canon,' formed over the nearly two centuries of existence of the Imperial Academy of Science, had a strong public aspect. It called for the attendance of the tsar himself at the ceremonial General Assembly of

The original name of the institution was the Imperial Academy of Sciences in St Petersburg. In 1914, St. Petersburg was dropped from the name; in 1917, the term 'Imperial' was dropped from the name. In 1925 the Academy was renamed the Academy of Sciences of the USSR.

62 Marina Sorokina

the Academy; the attendance of the top secular and religious representatives of the empire and of the diplomatic corps; the announcement of new honorary and foreign members of the academy; and the 'august' granting of orders, medals, buildings, and so forth to the academicians. The soviet authorities retained and even increased the significance of the anniversary ritual for the scientific community, and this led to a proliferation of anniversary celebrations. Alongside the 'traditional' anniversaries, all sorts of intermediate dates began to be celebrated in the USSR (the 220th anniversary in 1945, the 275th anniversary in 1999, and so on). In the twentieth century, the founding year of the academy was shifted back, from 1726 to 1724.3 Before the 1917 Revolution, the anniversary performance was always held within the Imperial Court and its immediate circles. In contrast, the new Soviet rituals were choreographed as mass public festivals; they enlisted the most prominent artists of the Russian theatrical and political avant-garde and were much more visible. These celebrations were moved from palaces to city squares, plants, and factories; the participants now included not only the academicians but also the 'workers of science' and the working masses. The 'carnivalesque' served as propaganda packaging for major changes in the status of the academicians and of the entire Russian scientific community. By a special resolution of the government of the USSR passed on 25 July 1925, the 200th anniversary of the academy was proclaimed a state holiday.4 For the first time since the era of Peter the Great (the official founder of the academy), Soviet political leaders announced publicly that science was a matter of state interest, priority, and prestige. On 27 July the Academy of Sciences - which was under the aegis of the most impoverished ministry, the People's Commissariat of Education (Narkompros or NKPros) of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) - was granted new status through a joint resolution of the highest organs of the executive powers of the USSR - the Central Executive Committee (TsIK) and the Council of the People's Commissars (Sovnarkom or SNK) of the USSR. The academy was now positioned as the highest scientific institute of the government of the USSR,5 and its personnel and budget were doubled.6 This change in status fundamentally altered the position of the RAS both in the emerging 'Stalinist' system of scientific organization and in the social structure of Soviet society as a whole. From that moment on, the former Imperial Academy of Sciences became the principle strategic partner of the Bolshevik party-state in the field of science, and aca-

200th Anniversary of the Academy of Sciences 63

demicians themselves - 'the most important class of scholars' - were recognized as part of the Soviet state elite, holding a privileged position in the development of international scientific connections. The academicians, so recently regarded as 'holdovers from the past/7 were now feted by the entire country. During the anniversary celebrations, the RAS received more than two thousand congratulatory addresses and messages from Soviet and foreign organizations. Some top Soviet government leaders (M.I. Kalinin, L.B. Kamenev, L.B. Krasin, and A.V. Lunacharskii, among others) took an active part in the celebrations. At numerous banquets, the 'creme de la creme of Communism and Science' (in the words of one newspaper reporter8) sat side by side at the same table, visually embodying the Biblical image of a communal feast as a symbol of community, trust, brotherhood, and forgiveness. The portraits of three grey-haired elders - the president of the RAS, A.P. Karpinskii, the vice-president, V.A. Steklov, and the permanent secretary S.F. Ol'denburg - graced the covers of the popular journals, and the image of the anniversary celebration as a national holiday was repeatedly emphasized by the Soviet press. The international significance of the RAS's anniversary celebration was a function of the fact that it was the first large international scientific forum to be held in Russia since 1914. Russia was now opening its doors to the global scientific community, affording entire delegations as well as individual scientists the opportunity to visit the country and to judge for themselves the state of Russian science and the prospects for cooperation. This openness was both a challenge of sorts and an offer of equal partnership. All the Soviet organizers of the celebrations, from heads of state to academicians, repeatedly declared that science was 'international' in character, and emphasized their readiness to support all steps that would 'lead to an unhindered and extensive international communication among scientists.'9 The Soviet press declared the academy's anniversary a 'celebration of scientists of the entire world.' Never had the pages of the Soviet press contained so many of the almost forgotten 'pre-revolutionary' accoutrements, such as the tuxedos, bow ties, decorations, and monocles worn by the European guests attending the anniversary celebrations. The visual image of the 'international celebration of science' was completed by a display of the exotic costumes worn by the oriental guests. Rhetoric notwithstanding, of the several hundred foreign guests who had been invited, only ninety-eight scientists from twenty-four countries actually arrived.10 Famous scientists such as Albert Einstein,11

64 Marina Sorokina

Ernest Rutherford, and Marie Curie, and many others, including foreign honorary and corresponding members of the RAS, chose not to participate in the celebrations. By default, the largest international delegation at the anniversary turned out to be the German one; as a result, the RAS's anniversary celebrations acquired a pronounced German cast. The links to Germany had substance. On 7 September, the third day of the celebrations, a Soviet-German meeting took place in Leningrad, at which the hosts were represented by the top Soviet functionaries present at the anniversary celebrations: Kalinin, Ol'denburg Lunacharskii (the People's Commissar of Education), and N.P. Gorbunov (the head of administration of SNK USSR). The German side was represented by Friedrich Schmidt-Ott, the president of the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Association for German Science) and the Deutsche Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas (German Society for Study of Eastern Europe), the secretary of the Berlin Academy of Sciences, Max Planck, and Heinrich Luders and Eduard Meyer. For the foreign guests at the celebrations, the presence of high-level Soviet officials, the predominance of German scientists, and the very fact of such a bilateral meeting all gave rise to the impression that there were a Germanophile tendencies in Soviet state and scientific-administrative and state circles.12 The strong development of Soviet-German scientific contacts in the first half of the 1920s and the early 1930s, along with the public celebration in Germany in 1927-8 of both the Week of Russian Science and the Week of Soviet Historical Science, could be taken as indisputable proof of the continuation of the traditional pro-German orientation of Russian academicians and their state patrons.13 It is telling that the only studies that refer to the 200th anniversary were written by historians of the former East Germany, who interpreted the anniversary as a key event in the rebirth of traditional Russian-German scientific connections.14 Yet a closer study of the preparations for the celebration of the RAS's 200th anniversary makes it clear that the 'German emphasis' of the anniversary celebrations was not intended by either the Russian academicians or their powerful patrons. Indeed, that extravaganza was a product of several different 'scenarios,' some planned in advance, others clearly improvised. The manoeuvrings of a number of obvious and not so obvious 'players' - whether based in leading Soviet governmental and social structures or in the countries of Europe and the United States - resulted in substantial changes to the academic 'script,' which consisted of several independent 'acts.' Once assembled, these 'acts'

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resulted in a performance that lacked a clear cause-and-effect structure and that had an unexpected conclusion, as in the experimental plays of Vsevolod Meyerhold.15 In this chapter I argue that the anniversary celebrations of the Academy of Sciences were aimed at the Soviet scientific community as much as at Western scientific and public opinion. From the perspective of Stalin, who was consolidating his position, the event's success ensured for academic anniversaries a significant role for years to come. This marked an about-face in Soviet scientific politics.16 The preparations for and execution of the 200th anniversary of the RAS have received little detailed study. Generally, historians of Soviet science underscore the significance of the event for the establishment of the Soviet organization of science, the formation of a new relationship between science and the Bolshevik government,17 and the development of international connections for Soviet science, which had been isolated since the First World War I.18 The understanding of this 'threshold' event as a 'starting point of new relations' from both perspectives - the internal and external - was formulated as far back as 1925 by Ol'denburg, the Permanent Secretary of the RAS.19 The 'New Centres of New Science' were supposed to correspond to the Bolshevik doctrine of the 'New Man' of 'our own, New World.' The story behind the preparations for the academic anniversary celebrations serves as a lens through which I will show how the internal and external perspectives of a 'New Science in a New Country' were envisioned by various parties. Who prepared the launching pad for this 'New Science' in the USSR, and how was it done? Why was it that the 'old' academicians became the key partners of the 'new' government? Which foreign scientists were invited to the anniversary celebrations, and why? Which national delegations had priority? Who lobbied individuals and organizations at the personal and state levels? What was the international impact of the anniversary? Addressing such questions will help delineate the role of the RAS's anniversary celebrations both as a turning point in the development of the international connections of Soviet science generally and as an 'opening demarche' in Soviet-German scholarly ties. Status Imperiled The ground for the 200th anniversary of the Academy of Sciences was being prepared well before the revolution. As early as 1912, the historian

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E.F. Shmurlo, the academy's correspondent in Rome, had proposed in a special note that the forthcoming anniversary be celebrated by the publication of a number of studies about the epoch of Peter the Great.20 On 2 December 1917, at a general meeting of the RAS, Permanent Secretary Ol'denburg revived the idea of the anniversary celebrations. In January and February 1918 all the departments of the academy elected their own representatives to the All-Academy Anniversary commission.21 The first meeting of the commission, however, took place only after the Civil War ended, in May 1922.22 In fact, the commission never did begin its work; its third and last meeting took place on 22 June 1923.23 The quiet demise of the first All-Academy Anniversary Commission was directly tied to plans to reorganize the Academy of Sciences. This reorganization was begun by the academic 'troika': the mathematician V.A. Steklov (1863/64-1926); the Indologist Ol'denburg (1863-1934); and the geochemist A.E. Fersman (1883-1945).24 This troika, which was the nucleus of the future all-powerful academic apparatus, the Presidium of the RAS,25 managed all the internal and external activities of the academy in the first post-revolutionary decade. Rank-and-file academicians were excluded from participation in decision making. The impetus for the reforms was the obvious decline in influence of the academy in state and scientific circles. Almost immediately after the October Revolution, the RAS, which united forty-six academicians in its three departments (Physics and Mathematical Sciences, Historical Sciences and Philology, and Russian Language and Literature),26 began to engage actively with the new government. The initiators of the rapprochement with the Bolsheviks were those academicians who were natural scientists. 'Life will be founded now on new principles,' wrote Academician A.N. Krylov to Academician P.P. Lazarev as early as in January 1918, 'and everyone should assist in its speediest establishment. We should strive to have science assume its rightful place, and this is most easily achieved by mutual cooperation - not by disregard.'27 Soon afterwards, Ol'denburg began to negotiate directly with the new authorities. The academicians' new approach to the authorities rapidly bore fruit. NKPros RSFSR released a document titled 'Provisions for the Project of the Mobilization of Science for the Needs of State Building' (8 February 1918), which defined the basis for cooperation between science and the state. The lead agency for this cooperation was to be 'the Special Commission Attached to the Academy of Sciences,' on which would sit representatives of other scientific establishments and societies.28 The

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document was rather vague; however, it noted that the program of scientific work would have to be realized 'by means of comprehensively organized collective research based on attracting scientists of all levels throughout the country.' The provisions also called for an 'inventory' of Russian scientists and scientific resources. In short, the document suggested the very same program the academy had proposed before 1917 in order to reorganize Russian science. Leading members of NKPros, lacking their own model for scientific development, were betting on the plan devised within the walls of the academy: the creation of a state network of scientific research institutes. This project, which had been shelved under the tsarist regime, turned out to be immediately useful to the Bolsheviks. The agreement on the basis of which relations between the new government and the Academy of Sciences were to be developed was formulated by a special Academic Commission, which included practically all the leading scientists of the RAS: 'In response to the demands of life and the state the Academy is always ready to undertake feasible scientific and theoretical development of the specific tasks posed by the needs of state-building, while serving as a centre that both organizes and attracts the scientific resources of the country.'29 In return for this cooperation, the state recognized the key position of the RAS in the scientific life of the USSR. This formula, fashioned in February 1918, was to be the basis of the union of the party-state and the scientific elites throughout the following seven decades of Soviet history. By the end of the Russian Civil War (1921), this agreement - so promising for the academy - was being threatened. The RAS continued to operate under the authority of NKPros RSFSR, which attempted to control its ties with both Soviet and foreign partners. At the same time, the RAS was experiencing an exodus of those academicians (the authors or 'inheritors' of many projects of research institutes) who preferred to conduct their projects anywhere but within the impoverished academy. This exodus of researchers, which began during the First World War, was becoming a flood. Scientific research that depended on capital investment was quickly relocating to those areas where material resources were concentrated - to the dynamically developing departmental science structures of the Supreme Council of the National Economy (VSNKh), the People's Commissariat of Health (Narkomzdrav), the People's Commissariat of Agriculture, and others.30 Thus the academy had 'autonomy' but no financial support - a recipe for scientific stagnation. While nominally still 'a leading scholarly

68 Marina Sorokina

estate/ the RAS had effectively lost its influence over research. This fact was noted in January 192431 by the 'manager' and main opponent of the RAS - NKPros RSFSR. The RAS had outlived its usefulness and needed to establish a new institutional identity. Despite differences in their social origins, scientific careers, and political views, the leaders of the academy who had risen to prominence during the Civil War years (Steklov, Fersman, Ol'denburg) agreed that the RAS's future depended on good relations with the authorities. To regain the RAS's lost status, they proposed that the government itself (SNK RSFSR/USSR) become its main patron. But there were few available arguments that would incline the Bolsheviks to such a decision. The argument that scientific research had practical benefits - so consonant with the Bolshevik doctrine of the revolutionary rebuilding of the world, and so well understood by Party members at all levels - was already being exploited by the departmental sciences. Almost the only plugs remaining for the RAS were the image of the academy as a 'traditional authority' representing the interests of the entire Russian scientific community, and its great international prestige. But then, in the numerous notes and addresses sent by the Academy of Sciences to the government in the early 1920s, academicians succeeded in creating and sustaining 'the myth of the academy.' Doggedly and persistently, they replaced the title 'Academy of Sciences' in official documents with the expression 'science and scientists'; the scope of the RAS's activities was invariably referred to as 'All-State'; the academicians constantly emphasized that the interests of the RAS coincided with those of the top state organs of the RSFSR/USSR and that only they could ensure the effective development of scientific research as one of the means to 'give birth' to a new Russia and restore the nation's international prestige.32 This tactic of rhetorical myth making turned out to be effective. In the spring of 1922, Steklov succeeded in bringing about the creation of a Special Temporary Committee of Science (OVKN), attached to SNK RSFSR; with its help, he hoped to transfer state credits to the RAS and alter its departmental status. This goal was also behind the organization of the 200th anniversary of the RAS, which Steklov began to plan in 1922 through the OVKN.33 He writes candidly in his memoirs that he 'exploited the idea about the forthcoming ... anniversary of the RAS (in 1924 or 1925, it is possible to celebrate it in either year, there are historical dates to support both)' and that he planned the program of the celebrations on an 'international scale,' offering at the same time to

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make it a 'national holiday/34 The political significance of the forthcoming anniversary event for the international prestige of the USSR became the chief selling point to top state and party functionaries. 'New Centres of New Science' The academicians began to prepare for the international component of the anniversary celebrations in the winter of 1921-2. France was the first country to receive an invitation from the academy.35 At the same time, the academicians took important first steps towards organizing the anniversary within the Soviet structures of power. On 19 December 1922, Academician Steklov addressed a meeting of the OVKN with a report that outlined the required preparations for the RAS anniversary.36 The committee approved Steklov's program, which included a long list of measures to repair the academy's buildings, reequip its museums, organize of exhibits, and publish scholarly and popular/scholarly journals. It also passed a resolution on the invitation of foreign scholars and created a special Anniversary Commission which included Steklov, Ol'denburg, and representatives from the Petrograd Provincial Executive Committee (B.M. Pozern) and the Petrograd Scientific Department of the People's Commissariat of Education (M.P. Kristi). This decision - fundamentally a positive one for the academy left its organizational activities to the local municipality. It was two years before the academicians succeeded in raising the anniversary question to the All-Union/State level. On 18 February 1925, Academicians Steklov and Ol'denburg sent a 'note'37 to the chairman of SNK USSR, A.I. Rykov, asking the government of the USSR to grant the RAS anniversary the status of a state celebration with an invitation of foreign scholars.38 The academicians cast their 'note' in the language of political rhetoric. They dodged the problem of financing, emphasizing instead the political significance of the anniversary and the celebration's international significance as a demonstration of the Soviet state's interest in science and scientific workers. This, they argued, would put an end to false rumours about the 'barbarization' of the country. Citing the examples of international scholarly congresses and celebrations hosted by various governments in pre- and post-war Europe, Steklov and Ol'denburg saw the anniversary celebration as an opportunity to take advantage of the favourable attitudes in foreign scholarly circles 'for the benefit of the scientific cause and for the considerations of state foresight.'

70 Marina Sorokina

By 1925 the problem of the place and the role of the USSR on the map of the post-Versailles world had shifted for the Bolsheviks to the level of practical politics. The defeat of the Soviet republics in Hungary and Bavaria (1919), and the fiasco of the 'German October' (1923) quashed all hopes for an immediate 'global revolution/ The obvious need for external resources forced the Bolsheviks to choose between continuing their attempts to provoke a 'global revolution' through the Comintern (G.E. Zinoviev) and strengthening their diplomatic ties with the West through the People's Commissariats of External Affairs (G.V. Chicherin) and External Trade (L.B. Krasin). At the same time, the successes in the revival of the Soviet economy within the framework of the New Economic Policy led to the gradual establishment in 1924-5 of the StalinBukharin conception of the 'building of Socialism in one country' as the official doctrine of state building. Faced with the need to overcome their economic and diplomatic isolation, the Bolsheviks - like the leaders of Weimar Germany - attempted to mobilize their scholarly, educational, and cultural contacts as a means of wielding international influence.39 The battle for regions of 'cultural impact' and 'the capture of new countries under Russia's cultural influence'40 were listed among the most important practical concerns of the proletarian government. The notion of 'cultural attack' was quite compatible with the aspirations of Russian scholars, including the academicians. By the early 1920s, many disciplines in Russia had formed their own scholarly societies with their own professional infrastructures;41 Russian science began to feel constricted within its national boundaries, and aspired to expand its geographic and institutional space. Russia's defeat in the First World War had demonstrated that its technological backwardness was a key reason why it had lost its geopolitical significance; this prompted both government and society to take a new look at the potential of Russian science and the need for the state to support it.42 The idea of a state network of institutes of scientific research, with a similar network of Russian scientific institutes in the various global centres - London, Paris, Berlin, Cairo, Washington, Buenos Aires, Peking, and Sydney - was beginning to be developed within the framework of the Commission for the Study of the Natural Productive Forces of Russia, created at the Academy of Sciences as early as 1915.43 This expansion of institutional space, the newly revived international ties, and the aggressive pursuit of new contacts bolstered the international presence of Russian science. The election of international

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members to the Petrograd Academy of Sciences was one of the instruments used to consolidate the Soviet foothold on world science. Between 1900 and 1917, thirty-four German, twenty-eight French, sixteen British, and eleven Italian scholars were elected as honorary and corresponding members of the Academy of Sciences; this indicated a shift in the academicians' orientation away from their historical Germanocentric ties towards the Anglo-Romano-American world. The first important elections after the First World War of international honorary members and corresponding members of the RAS, held in 1924 and 1925 (which were also effectively the last free elections), reinforced this tendency. In electing sixty foreign scholars in 1924, and thirty more in 1925, the academy doubled its foreign membership in just two years. By enlarging the numbers and broadening the geographical distribution of its membership, the academicians carefully retained the balance of national representation. The numbers of elected French and German scholars were essentially the same - thirteen of each in 1924, six and eight respectively in 1925. At the same time, the elections demonstrated a new tendency in the development of international contacts by the academicians: in 1924, the RAS elected seven American scholars - a record for the entire 'Soviet' period of the academy.44 This would not be the first time that academicians cooperated with political leaders. In fact, the first academic institute - the Russian Archaeological Institute - was created at the end of the nineteenth century in Constantinople (1894) through the efforts of the Byzantinist F.I. Uspenskii and the Russian ambassadors to Turkey, A.I. Nelidov and LA. Zinoviev, under the banner of disseminating the 'cultural influence of Russia in the East'; in 1924 the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs (NKID) and the RAS tried to recreate it.45 Furthermore, the Orientalists Ol'denburg, F.I. Shcherbatskoi, and V.V. Bartol'd (all of them academicians) cooperated as experts with the pre- and- post-revolutionary Ministries of Foreign Affairs.46 Similarly, the historian S.F. Platonov participated in the talks with Poland (1920). 'We were guided by it [the RAS1 in our peace talks with neighbouring countries,' admitted Lunacharskii, the People's Commissar of Education.47 His deputy, M.N. Pokrovskii, a well-known antagonist of the Academy of Sciences who headed the Commission of Foreign Travel of NKPros, not only refrained from hindering the travels of the academicians outside the country, but even acted as their Party guarantor.48 Between 1918 and 1924 alone, 103 employees of the RAS travelled outside the Soviet Union.49 The academicians' travels to the West are described in a number of articles and books. Academician P.P. Lazarev described with open

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admiration the 'other world' of American institutes and laboratories, of the funding and the grandiose investments available for science in the United States. He warned that hegemony in science could easily be transferred from Europe to the United States50 - a conclusion with which Academician Steklov fully agreed in his 1925 book V Ameriku i obratno (To America and Back). In contrast, Ol'denburg described France and Germany, the former pillars of prewar scientific Europe, as 'in a state of crisis/51 In his book, New Centres of New Science, Fersman directly contrasted the vibrant scientific activity in the Scandinavian countries with the petrified scientific life in Germany: 'I found myself in a country, where science could not give me anything new... Neither new ideas, nor untrammelled thought, nor new museums, nor new scientific institutions.'52 The clear subtext was that Russia was one of the 'new centres/ The ideology of 'scientific creativity as a national affair/53 galvanized by the First World War and by postwar political and cultural isolation, became quite widespread in the Soviet academic environment. Fersman wrote: 'I firmly understand and believe in strictly a national [Russian] science and it was the Bolsheviks who taught us nationalism/54 During the preparations for the 200th anniversary, Academician Ol'denburg rejected 'outside' help for the academy, including the assistance of the Rockefeller Foundation.55 The strategy of self-sufficiency that had been enunciated by Bolshevik politicians in the mid-1920s was welcomed and supported by academics, as it created an ideological basis for their future intensive cooperation with the state. Patrons and Opponents On 24 February, only days after receiving the 'note' from Academicians Steklov and Ol'denburg, A.I. Rykov, the chairman of the government of the USSR, forwarded it for the 'highest' decision of the Politburo of the Central Committee (TsK) of the All-Russia Communist Party (VKP[bl), with the request that this issue be included on the agenda during the meeting of the very next day (25 February). 'I believe/ wrote the SNK's chairman, 'that this whole celebration should be given an imposing character/ In 'Sovietese/ this meant that 'the entire plan of the celebrations will be confirmed by us/ that 'the speeches and addresses of the Academicians will have to be approved by us/ and that 'we can include scientists from the colonial countries and the dominions in the lists of those invited/56 In the protocol of the Politburo meeting, the issue was titled 'On the Anniversary Celebrations of the Academy of Sciences/57 But the regis-

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tration card of the 'Materials for the Protocols of the Politburo' transformed the project into an 'issue of the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs/ and, consequently, the anniversary itself into an international political action of the Soviet state.58 Rykov's co-presenters at the Politburo were the People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs, G.V. Chicherin, and the two TsK members: the Ambassador to France, L.B. Krasin, and the Ambassador to England, Kh.G. Rakovskii. The Politburo sanctioned the arrival of the foreign scientists and delegated to the SNK USSR to the task of assigning the funds necessary to organize the anniversary celebrations.59 The fact that the resolution on the anniversary celebrations made its way so quickly and decisively through the highest party-state departments, bypassing the more immediate 'supervisors' of the academy that is, NKPros RSFSR and SNK RSFSR60 - indicates that the timing of the academicians' approach to Rykov and the strategy of getting the 'note' to the very 'top' echelons were not accidental - indeed, that the project was supported by highly influential Party members. Behind the Politburo's decision stood Krasin, the People's Ambassador,61 and Gorbunov, the Executive Secretary of SNK USSR. As a member of the OVKN, Krasin knew about and supported the 'anniversary celebration' plans of the academicians.62 In the autumn of 1924 he had been named the USSR's first Ambassador to France, and he was working hard to foster scientific contacts with that country. In their 'note' to Rykov on the celebrations, the academicians noted Krasin's information that French scholars were interested in the anniversary.63 In lanuary-February 1925, as proof of this, the Soviet press wrote about the good will of the French scientists towards the science of New Russia and their readiness to attend the celebrations.64 All the organizational aspects of the anniversary celebrations, from the necessary legalities, to the invitations to scholars, to the press coverage, were attended to by Gorbunov, whose star had by this point risen quite high.65 The founding of the Soviet Union in December 1922 had fundamentally altered the structure of intrastate connections; as a consequence, the creation of a system of All-Union vertical links (including scientific ones) had become a top priority. In this climate of change, Gorbunov supported the RAS in its quest for All-Union status. With the active assistance of the scientists, he soon became the patron of a broad network of All-Union scientific institutions, including the scholarly empires of AS USSR and the All-Union Academy of Agricultural Science. Throughout March 1925, Gorbunov worked to secure state credits for

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the anniversary celebrations.66 He also began to assemble a committee to arrange them. At the suggestion of the RAS, he named the following people to the Anniversary Committee of SNK USSR: Rykov (Chairman), Lunacharskii, M.M. Litvinov (the Deputy People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs), G.G. lagoda (the Deputy Chairman of OGPU SSSR), G.E. Zinoviev (Chairman of the Comintern and of Lensovet), G.E. Evdokimov (Zinoviev's deputy), Academicians Steklov and Ol'denburg, G.M. Krzhizhanovskii (Deputy Chairman of Gosplan SSSR), Revolutionary Military Council member A.S. Bubnov, and himself.67 At the committee's first meeting on 8 May, a resolution was passed to create two subcommittees, for Leningrad and Moscow respectively; these were to organize the specific work that needed to be done. At this level, the committee memberships were balanced between the academicians and the bureaucrats; significantly, neither committee included any open antagonist of the RAS. The Leningrad and Moscow programs of celebrations were identical and consisted of the usual elements designed to impress: many grand meetings, banquets attended by Soviet government representatives; concerts and shows; and tours of scholarly institutions (the academy in Leningrad; and in Moscow, the Physics Institute, the Commission for the Study of the Natural Productive Forces of Russia, the Central Aerodynamic Institute, and the Institute of the People's Health).68 The 'technology of hospitality' perfected during those years would continue to work perfectly for many decades to come. The only innovation suggested by the Moscow subcommittee was that a demonstration be held on Red Square; this was rejected by the Politburo.69 At the academy itself, opinions on the anniversary and on its academician organizers were highly diverse. The organizers were specialists in the humanities; they knew full well that Steklov, a mathematician, had contempt for their work, and they disliked him for that reason. Since Steklov, who was vice-president of the academy, believed in getting the job done and avoiding unnecessary talk, he included the issue of the anniversary celebrations on the agenda of the General Assembly of the RAS only twice (on 13 May and on 1 August 1925), and even then the academicians were allowed to listen only to his addresses.70 Ol'denburg was viewed by many as an opportunist and a careerist ever since he served as a Minister of Education in the provisional government (July-August 1917). He knew that many of his colleagues had a negative opinion of him, so he relied exclusively on those in the cen-

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tral office of the academy whose loyalty he trusted, and on his colleagues and subordinates in the Asia Museum of the RAS, which he headed.71 During times of crisis, the struggle for personal and institutional survival made the already difficult relations among the academicians even more strained.72 The new RAS Anniversary Committee was established by the RAS Presidium in April 1925. Besides Steklov and Ol'denburg, its members included A.P. Karpinskii (President of the RAS), the Arabist Liu. Krachkovskii (an academician and a secretary of the Department of History and Philology), B.N. Molas, D.N. Khalturin, and G.N. Sokolovskii (senior officials of the conference and of the board).73 The tradition of equal representation of all the departments of the RAS in the general academic committees was violated: the Department of Russian Language and Literature - the 'Slavic' Department - did not have its own representative; after the anniversary it would be abolished altogether. The executive pyramid developed by Gorbunov and the academicians remained in place until 2 July 1925. After Rykov's report, the Politburo decreed the creation of a 'Commission of the Politburo for the Supervision of the Celebration of the Anniversary of the Leningrad AS/ with Lunacharskii and Evdokimov as members. The task of finding a third member was entrusted to the CC Secretariat,74 which proposed that Vladimir Pavlovich Miliutin (1884-1938) be appointed the commission's chair.75 Miliutin was a second-rate Soviet bureaucrat, a mere member of the Collegium of the People's Commissariat of Worker and Peasant Inspection, but he was a deputy of M.N. Pokrovskii, who chaired the Presidium of the Communist Academy.76 On 9 July, Miliutin was appointed to head yet another commission of the Politburo: Tor the Organization of the All-Union Academy of Sciences.'77 In the course of a single week, the organization of the celebration had been practically upended. The RAS found the Communist Academy, its main competitor, appointed as its Party controller in place of its state patron (the chairman of SNK USSR).78 At the end of July, Miliutin and Pokrovskii also joined the Anniversary Commission of SNK USSR.79 Of course, it would have been impossible to bring about such a turnaround solely through the efforts of even highly placed bureaucrats in NKPros RSFSR and the Communist Academy, which had quite limited influence in the top party-state structures. The real ally of the Communist Academy in the battle against the sudden ascendancy of the Academy of Sciences turned out to be the Union Republics of the Soviet

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Union. The first Constitution of the USSR, adopted in January 1924, had assigned exclusive jurisdiction to the republics in the realms of culture and education, allowing the Union only the power to establish general principles in these areas. The assigning of all Ail-Union significance to the anniversary of the RAS and then to the academy itself generated considerable displeasure within the People's Commissariats of Education and the Central Executive Committees in the Union republics; both interpreted these moves as infringement on their jurisdiction.80 In January 1925, the third conference of the Scientific Departments of the People's Commissariats of Education of the Union republics came out in favour of the concentrating of all scholarly and research work exclusively at the level of the republican Commissariats of Education and argued against creating any All-Union organs of control over science under either TsIK USSR or SNK USSR. This was an attempt to monopolize the direction of science within the republics' organs. The political struggle between the federation and the republics would be an extremely important factor in the history of those scholarly structures that aspired to an All-Union character. Playing on the differences in interests between the federal and the republican bureaucrats, the academicians succeeded in obtaining All-State status for the academy. But they had yet to understand that anyone who wanted to belong to the government elite in the USSR was invariably tested on the basis of ideological 'purity.' And such tests were invariably conducted by the 'Communist' academicians. But for the time being, the involvement of the leaders of the Communist Academy, Pokrovskii and Miliutin, in the Anniversary Committee of SNK USSR was barely noticeable;81 the commission was still unofficially called 'Gorbunov's Commission/ The Trojan Horse' of the Communist Academy would play its role only later, between 1926 and 1929, when a new charter was being prepared and elections to AS USSR were being called. Procedures and Precedents The February resolution of the Politburo initiated the procedure for compiling the lists of foreign guests for the anniversary celebrations. This involved the vetting of lists compiled by the Academy of Sciences through NKPros, NKID, and, most important of all, the OGPU (the political police). The initial lists drawn up by Ol'denburg in January and February of

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1925 reflected a rather formalistic approach. Personal invitations were forwarded to all the RAS's foreign honorary members and to its corresponding members; of these, there were 180 in all.82 Collective invitations were sent to those academies and universities with which the academy had ongoing contacts; these institutions were to choose their anniversary delegations independently. At the same time, the national distribution of the invitees testified eloquently to the past and future international priorities of the academicians and of the RAS itself. The personal invitations reflected, first of all, academicians' past contacts: sixty-six were forwarded to Germany, forty-three to France, twenty-six to England, twenty-one to Italy, and twenty to the United States. In contrast, the institutional invitations reflected the new interests of the academic community: forty-one were issued to the United States, thirty-six each to Germany and France, twenty-nine to Italy, and sixteen to England. The academicians wanted so much to balance the European contacts with those from 'overseas' that even in August after it became clear that French and American scholars were ignoring the invitations, and that the Germans would be the largest national delegation - the speaking order at the anniversary banquet was still set according to the original priorities. The representative of the 'AngloAmerican group' was scheduled to be the first of the international delegates to speak, followed by the 'Romance' group, and only after that, the German group; the Slavic and the Asiatic delegates were at the end of the list.83 Ol'denburg's lists were later forwarded to Gorbunov, who, from February 1925 onward, worked to get them approved by the other Soviet institutions, keeping the academicians abreast of the problems arising on that front. A serious concern was the personal selection of foreign scholars, which involved ideological censorship, or 'filtering,' as that procedure was referred to by the academicians. The Russian academicians knew that the Scientific Department of NKPros was 'inciting' the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs against some of the visiting scholars on political grounds. Also, they were worried that if their foreign colleagues found out they were being 'screened' on political grounds, they might not come at all. A sharp decline in foreign guests might reflect negatively on the position of the RAS itself. 'If there aren't enough foreign guests at these academic celebrations/ Ol'denburg's wife wrote in her diary, 'the government might think that no one outside of the Soviet Union either needs or is interested in the RAS, and then all kinds of complications will ensue. Glavnauka will finally triumph and

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interfere in the RAS's life. The same thing might happen to the RAS as happened with the universities, that is, it will fall apart and perish/84 Thus, the academicians and the Soviet/Party patrons were equally interested in keeping the internal procedures completely secret from their foreign colleagues, and especially from Western public opinion. But the academicians' fears turned out to be premature. In the end, invitations were sent out to 315 foreign institutions in 47 countries and to 340 individual scholars - nearly double the number initially proposed by the RAS.85 All the organizers wanted the celebration to succeed as propaganda and to maximize the number of foreign participants. It seems that Lunacharskii, the People's Commissar of Education, who received the academicians' lists immediately after the Politburo resolution, did not even review them, knowing that they had already been approved 'on the highest level.' On 2 March he confirmed officially that he had no objections.86 The role of OGPU's Foreign Department was also minimal; it approved the RAS's lists in the beginning of May, recommending only that the Polish slavist M. Rozvadovskii be dropped.87 Relations were shaping up quite differently between the RAS and NKID. Within the latter, the 'anniversary affair' was being overseen by the Deputy People's Commissar Maxim Litvinov (1876-1951), who by reputation was a Tarty' diplomat oriented towards Western social democracy (in contrast to the 'state-oriented' Chicherin and Krasin).88 The academicians had already encountered Litvinov's reliance on the opinions of his German allies. In the spring of 1925, articles appeared in the German social democratic press that criticized the election in December 1924 of the Islamist Karl Becker (1876-1933), the 'reactionary' Prussian Minister of Education, as a foreign corresponding member of the RAS. Litvinov immediately informed NKPros about 'the unpleasant impression' created by 'the latest appointments made by the Academy of Sciences in Leningrad,' and asked whether these appointments had been approved by the commissariat.89 NKPros informed the influential deputy of Chicherin - whom many considered the real boss of NKID - that the academy elected its international members autonomously and that any changes to this procedure would have to be through the joint efforts of NKPros and NKID.90 In contrast to OGPU and NKPros, NKID had studied the RAS's lists closely. The list of proposed guests was forwarded for review to the foreign departments of NKID, which approved it.91 Only the subdepartment for Balkan countries raised objections, declaring the visit of three Slavists - V.N. Zlatarskii and L. Miletich (Bulgaria) and A. Belich

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(the Kingdom of Serbs and Croats) 'absolutely undesirable/92 In the second half of April, NKID's collegium approved the RAS's lists in their entirety. At the beginning of May, however, the collegium passed three important amendments to the April resolution: (1) The lists were to be submitted to Soviet embassies, along with a request that they propose additional candidates.93 (From the conversation that took place between Steklov and Litvinov, it was now clear that NKID would not allow invitations to be sent to foreign scholars before the references had arrived from the embassies).94 (2) The Bulgarian, Romanian, and Swiss scientists were to be struck off the lists.95 (3) Mongolian representatives were to be added to the lists.96 NKID's position regarding the extension of the list was supported by the Anniversary Committee of SNK USSR. The 'troika' of Litvinov, lagoda, and Gorbunov was entrusted with the final version of the list.97 The sudden prospect that the number of foreign guests would be increased led to heavy manoeuvring within the RAS Anniversary Committee, with every academician attempting to increase the representation of his own discipline. Steklov proposed the inclusion of more than twenty institutes of natural science, including seismological, geological, and meteorological institutes, as well as the Carnegie Institute and three universities in Canada, which he had recently visited. In response, the Academician-Secretary of the Department of Historical Sciences and Philology, Liu. Krachkovskii, proposed his own list, consisting of more than twenty Eastern museums, libraries, and universities.98 The opinion of the Department of Russian Language and Literature did not interest anyone at all, neither at the RAS nor at the SNK. In the end, the conflict between Steklov and Krachkovskii over having 'their own' represented turned out to be over nothing, because both men's lists were fully included by NKID in the roster of invitees. Towards the end of May, the responses from the embassies began coming in. In its request to the embassies, NKID had formulated specific criteria for candidate appraisal in order to ensure that no 'scholar on the list was known for actively speaking out against the Soviet state or bearing demonstrable hostility to it.'99 The Ambassador to Germany, N.N. Krestinskii, described V. Nernst, M. von Laue, and A.E. Lagorio as 'reactionaries and conservatives,' but emphasized that they had never made any statements against the Soviet regime. The Ambassador to Norway, A.M. Kollontai, wrote that all the evidence on the listed scholars cast them 'in the best light': V.M. Gol'dshmidt, though not a member of the Party, did have certain leanings towards the Labour Party;

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'nothing needed to be said' about F. Nansen; and so forth.100 The Ambassador to Denmark, E. Rubinin, noted that 'with the exception of N. Bohr, who is known for his radical views, the others are not active in politics at all/101 In the end, it was established that virtually none of the foreign members of the RAS was known for having spoken out against the Soviet state. The sole victim of NKID's investigation was Olaf Brok, the elected representative of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences, who was not forgiven for his book criticizing the USSR.102 The reaction of the embassies coincided with the general evaluation of the invitees, as expressed by the Counsellor to the Embassy in Italy, A.M. Makar: 'The named invitees are quite acceptable according to the inquiries made, but, of course, there are not enough of them/ Almost as if he knew what was happening in the RAS, Makar added: 'Even though we are a Soviet state, we should not limit the invitations to the celebration to the mathematicians ("Socialism means Accounting") and the Semitologists/103 The diplomats suggested that the lists of the invitees be supplemented by 'genuine' friends, starting with societies of 'New Russia/ 'Friendship with the USSR,' and so forth. VOKS (Vsesoiuznoe obschestvo po kul'turnym sviaziam s zagranitsei, or the AilUnion Society for Cultural Links with Foreign Countries), which was attempting to involve itself in the organizing of the RAS's anniversary festivities, lobbied these friends through its foreign representatives, many of who were embassy workers.104 At the time, Soviet international relations were decentralized; also, the system was oriented towards its own foreign audience. In this climate, VOKS answered to and was championed mainly by the leftist intelligentsia. But it was the well-known political engagement of the creatures of VOKS that resulted in the academicians' worst fears: their long-time foreign colleagues began to decline the invitations or to ignore them entirely. Rumour had it that a delegation of the Czechoslovak Society for the Rapprochement with New Russia, together with its chairman, the leftist professor Z. Needly, was coming to Leningrad; as a result, only four of the more than twenty invited Czech scholars would actually attend the festivities. For all the correspondence with the embassies throughout the summer of 1925, Soviet diplomats had very little impact on the final numbers of guests or the composition of the foreign guest lists. Most of the Soviet embassies had been active in their respective countries for only a year or two and were poorly informed about local scientific and cultural life. The final versions of the lists contained only two significant

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changes from the originals: the lists provided by Steklov and Krachkovskii were included in their entirety; and at the suggestion of the embassies, representatives from institutions of science and learning in a number of Asiatic countries (first among them, Japan and Mongolia) were added. At the same time, VOKS's repeated attempts to interfere with the process of assembling the foreign scholarly delegations had a directly negative effect - one that went against the wishes of both the RAS and the Soviet state that as many foreign scholars as possible attend the celebrations. Making New Contacts In contrast to their Russian colleagues,105 some European scientists did much to influence the lists of those travelling to the USSR, by cooperating energetically with their own governments, the Soviet embassies, and the RAS. The Soviet embassies in Berlin and Rome regularly received letters from German and Italian scientists regarding the need for their trips to be subsidized by the Soviet government,106 and the Soviet Ambassador to Italy, P.M. Kerzhentsev, wrote directly to O'ldenburg that the Italians would have to be funded if they were to join the celebration.107 It was well understood in the USSR that even though 'rapprochement' was a Very spiritual' notion, it could not be achieved without the expenditure of material resources.108 At first, Gorbunov did not even consider financing European scientists; subsidies were set aside only for scholars from the Asiatic countries,109 who were to be reimbursed for their travel expenses from the reserve fund of Council of the People's Commissars of the USSR.110 However, as the celebrations drew nearer and it became clearer that there would be no 'influx' of guests, the organizers redoubled their efforts to make attendance financially attractive for all potential participants. The People's Commissariat of Foreign Trade issued an order about customs exemptions for foreigners;111 the Sovnarkom issued a resolution calling for free entry visas for the participants and free travel in sleeping cars and first-class cabins; and foreigners were to be given reduced rates for international long-distance calls and for postal services within the USSR.112 Towards the end of August, SNK grants for the guests were established: $500 for those from 'distant' (Asiatic) countries, and $300 for those from 'nearby' (European) countries.113 The list of scholars who

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received subsidies has not been found, but the fragmentary data that to exist allow us to grasp the broad outlines of the process. Scholars from the East - a priority for the Bolsheviks - were all fully subsidized; subsidized scholars from 'nearby countries' tended to be those with personal ties to Academician Steklov, first and foremost the Italians.114 In Italy, under Mussolini, national scientific institutions were being revived and were receiving government support. Italian scholars who wanted to travel to the USSR were able, with little effort, to raise this question at the national level and to arrange an invitation to the USSR for the Italian Minister of Culture (the request was made in a private letter to Steklov by the University of Turin professor G. Fubini).115 F. Severi, the Dean of the University of Rome, discussed this same invitation with P.M. Kerzhenetsev, the Soviet Ambassador.116 The joint demarche of Steklov and his Italian colleagues succeeded: although the Italian minister did not come to the USSR, the entire Italian delegation was granted a subsidy by the Soviet government and did attend the celebration. In contrast, the French Minister of Culture, A. de Monsi, made an attempt to represent the French scholars himself. During a meeting with Krasin, he declared that he was personally insulted by the fact that the invitation was never forwarded to him as a minister; he added that many French scholars would decide against attending the celebrations because they would view the failure to invite him as an attempt to circumvent the French government.117 De Monsi's statement masked the competition among several groups of French scientists for pride of place in the French-Soviet scientific relationship.118 Following a request by Krasin, the NKID board approved the decision 'about the invitation to the anniversary celebrations of the Ministers of Culture of all countries.'119 The French ignored the anniversary celebrations of the RAS,120 and instead conducted a loud campaign in the press that accused Ol'denburg and Fersman of being Germanophiles and Bolsheviks. Accusations of lack of patriotism were highly explosive ones to make in Europe after the First World War, and none of the French scholars, with the except for two personal friends of Ol'denburg, the Indologist S. Levi and the Sinologist P. Pellio, wanted to risk becoming involved with publicly discredited 'Soviet' academicians who happened to bear German last names. German scholars took a stand directly opposed to that of the French. As formulated by Schmidt-Ott, they were attending the anniversary celebrations mainly in order to 'establish new contacts and to solve new tasks of German scientific researchers who are always immobi-

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lized by German boundaries/121 At the same time, some German scholars understood the desirability of attending the festivities, citing the need to support the 'German party/ which was trying to maintain its positions in the RAS.122 The image of the RAS as a reactionary 'German' or 'pro-German' faction with anti-Russian tendencies - tendencies that and which ran counter to the 'democratic' science of the universities - had been widespread in Russian popular opinion since the nineteenth century. This perception was actively exploited in campaigns against the academy.123 In reality, this reputation was absolutely groundless. 'At the head of the "German" party in the Academy of Sciences stood K. Veselovskii, and the head of the "Russian" party was Baron Rosen/ commented V.I. Vernadskii with a deep sense of irony.124 Nonetheless, the view that Russian academicians had a 'German orientation' remained current among both Soviet functionaries and their foreign colleagues. In the 1920s that view was strengthened by efforts by German scientists to re-establish their lost positions in Russia. Right after the signing of the Treaty of Brest Litovsk, (March 1918), German scientists resumed contacts with their Russian colleagues.125 Offers to establish contacts with the RAS were constantly arriving from Germany;126 these were amplified by the Bolshevik leadership, whose political, ideological, and economic interests at the time were closely tied to those of Germany. Russia and Germany, isolated politically in the international arena by the terms of the Treaty of Versailles were growing closer by necessity. In April 1922 in Rapallo the two countries signed a bilateral treaty; this marked the official resumption of relations between the former opponents. In February 1922, even before the Treaty of Rapallo was signed, Ol'denburg was appointed by the Presidum of the Collegium of NKPros RSFSR to negotiate the 'establishment of ties' between the RAS and the five German academies.127 The RAS's leaders aspired to speak for Russian science, and for their academy to become a member of the International Research Council,128 so they were quite careful when it came to establishing direct official contacts with the German academies. For their part, the administrators of German science attempted to expand their contacts with all Soviet institutions, including scientific, social, and diplomatic ones. When the Society for the Study of Eastern Europe (in Berlin) learned that it had not received an invitation to the anniversary, its representatives approached the Soviet Embassy. According to A. Shtange, the embassy's secretary and a representative of VOKS, it was well known that the Society 'conducts a policy favourable to us and has rendered us services on a number of occasions ... not

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to mention its general activity, which is useful to us.'129 The society's special status among all the German connections with the Soviet Embassy and VOKS was emphasized in a letter from O.D. Kameneva, the chairperson of VOKS, to Ol'denburg: 'Even at the time of political conflict last year, this Society continued to work toward bringing Russian and German scientific-cultural work closer together.'130 In the same letter she listed the names of the society's members who ought to be issued personal invitations immediately: Professors O. Hoetsch, F. Schmidt-Ott, and E. Haenish. It may well be that Schmidt-Ott, who would head the German delegation to the RAS anniversary, paid his own way to the Soviet Union and, in a meeting of 7 September, proposed that he and his organization serve as chief intermediary in Soviet-German scientific contacts. I could not locate a single document in the Russian archives containing even indirect evidence that this Soviet-German 'top level' meeting was planned by the Soviets. That meeting was probably improvised or concocted by the German guests - most likely by Schmidt-Ott himself. A typical example of such 'improvisations' can be found in a story told by Academician S.F. Platonov, who reported that H. Jonas, secretary of the Society for Eastern Europe, asked him to place Schmidt-Ott at the head table together with the academy's presidium and the guests of honour.131 This story seems quite plausible in light of Schmidt-Ott's 'Eastern orientation.' Many German scientists were eager to visit the Soviet Union and reestablish their ties with Russia. Even though the German Foreign Ministry exercised tight controls over the travel preparations of the universities - going so far as to forbid the processing of visas to the USSR132 by mid-July the Leningrad office had received fourteen acceptance letters from individual scientists and seventeen from institutions.133 After Germany signed the Treaty of Locarno (October 1925), which marked her return to the community of Europe, the Bolshevik government monitored the responses of the German Foreign Ministry and German scientists to the invitations issued by the RAS, for any signs that Germany was growing cool towards the USSR. In this vein, Chicherin, the People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs, informed all the members of the Politburo and the Collegium of the NKID that German professors - the Dean of the University of Berlin, Karl Holl, on 6 and 24 July, and Max Planck and H. Liiders on 22 July - had visited the Soviet Embassy in Berlin a number of times.134 The German Foreign Ministry had persuaded these professors to link their visit to Russia to a verdict of 'not guilty' for the three German 'student-fascists' who had been accused of plotting the assassination of Stalin and Trotsky.135

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Against the wishes of the German Foreign Ministry, and to the surprise of the Russian academicians, Schmidt-Ott ended up heading the largest national delegation at the anniversary celebrations. Germany sent twenty-eight scholars (thirty-nine visitors in all, if we include the entourage). Other countries sent much smaller delegations: Italy eight (sixteen, if we include the people accompanying the scholars), England - seven, Sweden - six, Japan - five, France and Czechoslovakia - four each, the United States, India, and Spain - three each, and China, Turkey, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Hungary, and other countries - one each.136 'Let Them Either Say Nothing about Contemporary Russia or Echo Our Own Words' The substantial shortfall in the expected numbers of foreign guests did not affect the program of the anniversary celebrations, which were carried out on a grand scale. Everyone in the USSR tried to make his or her own contribution to the organization of that grandiose scholarly forum, which was declared The Internationale' of science. In Leningrad, a newly built factory for the production of brewer's yeast asked permission to call itsef the Academy of Science. Stamps were released in honour of the anniversary. The academy was hailed by the Jews of Samarkand, by a chinaware factory, and by the Kazan Republic. The press reported that to mark the occasion, searches were being conducted at Leningrad cemeteries for the graves of deceased academicians. The famed Pushkinist B.L. Modzalevskii located the thirteenyear-old Pioneer Nina Bykova, the great-granddaughter of the eminent Russian scientist of the eighteenth century, M.V. Lomonosov, and asked that she be given a place at the anniversary festivities. The junior personnel of the academy were outfitted with new uniforms. Rolls of red cloth and three red tablecloths were ordered from Moscow decorate the academy's conference hall. The RAS Anniversary Committee issued a special decree regarding the acquisition of Lenin's bust by the Academy of the Arts,137 and the president and vice,-president of the RAS were entrusted with the task of choosing an appropriate bust.138 There was only one departure from the adopted style: 'Elizabethan' orange was chosen to paint the academy's buildings. Many foreign scholars - especially those with a personal interest in contacts with Russia - would later characterize the changes happening in the USSR as positive and comment favourably both in private con-

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versations and in public statements on the government support that science was receiving in the Soviet Union. A professor at the University of Brussels, the mathematician C. Lurquin, came out with a brochure so friendly to the USSR that VOKS itself paid for its publication.139 The French Indologist S. Levi spoke with approval about the USSR's movement towards state socialism. The American historian F. Colder remarked that 'the peasant... already now ... feels generally better than during the Tsarist regime.'140 The historian E. Meyer had been sharply critical of the Soviets before his trip and had spoken out against the attendance of German scholars at the anniversary celebrations. Yet on his return to Germany, in Deutsche Rundschau, he declared that the new government in Russia was there to stay and argued for the greatest possible broadening of German-Soviet scholarly ties.141 In contrast, the Czech Slavist M. Murko, who found himself in the category of 'undesirable' Slavic guests, said that the conditions of work for Soviet scholars were very difficult and that it was impossible to publish anything in the area of Slavic studies and Old Russian literature.142 For all the effort, the strong international resonance necessary to and expected by the Bolsheviks never materialized, as is clear from the foreign-press clippings compiled by the Soviet embassies and by VOKS. Gorbunov had planned to publish the foreign press coverage of the anniversary, but this project had to be postponed; later the review was transferred to VOKS, where it simply disappeared.143 The first international results of the anniversary celebrations were summarized by Steklov and Ol'denburg in their report to Gorbunov of 24 September. The representatives of eight countries (Germany, Japan, France, Italy, Denmark, the United States, and Mongolia) had expressed a desire to resume relations. Most of the proposals received had to do with the individual plans of foreign scholars who needed to work on the territory of the USSR; in this context, Schmidt-Ott's proposal for the 'collaborative work of Russian and German sciences' stood out as particularly attractive.144 The idea of two 'national' sciences collaborating was supported in the USSR. The abstract phrasing of this proposal made it possible for all Soviet organizations and their patrons - from the Communist Academy and VOKS to the Council of People's Commissars and the USSR Academy of Sciences and the departmental sciences - to invest the proposal with whatever specific meaning or understanding of the concept of 'science' they wished. On 28 September, Miliutin, the chair of the 'Politburo Committee for the Direction of the Celebration of the Anniversary of the All-Union

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Academy of Sciences/ reported directly to Stalin on 'the results of the talks with foreign scholars/145 A month later, at the end of November 1925, Miliutin forwarded the final report of his committee to the Central Committee of the Communist Party 'for their information.'146 Miliutin's text repeated almost verbatim the September report of the academicians to Gorbunov. The Communist Academy was interested in controlling the Academy of Sciences and its contacts but not the content of its work. The Politburo of the Communist Party approved continuing discussions between members of the USSR Academy of Sciences and their foreign colleagues under the guidance of the 'Committee for Contacts and Supervision over the Work of the Academy of Sciences/147 settling finally on this new organizational configuration: 'Stalinist science.' The conclusion of the anniversary campaign opened a new chapter in the history of the Academy of Sciences, which now became the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Academician Steklov had accompanied the foreign guests on their tour of the Kremlin in the pouring rain, got drenched, and fallen ill. Treatment in Italy was of no avail, and on 30 May 1926, he died. The new times called for new people. Conclusion The 200th anniversary of the RAS was the first test case of full-scale interaction between two Soviet elites: the scientific elite (RAS / AS USSR) and the party-state elite (from the SNK USSR and the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party down to the local authorities). Each of these groups was still consolidating its own position, but the leaders of both already saw the possible advantages of working together. Two common goals - to overcome political and cultural isolation, and to develop a shared scientific-organizational strategy - made it possible for the academicians and their powerful patrons to adopt easily the general concept and the program of the academy's 200th anniversary celebrations, and to prepare and execute that program together. To that point, neither ideological and political differences, nor the personal antipathies of the organizers of the 'New Science/ hindered cooperation. The significance of the anniversary as an international stage on which new relations could be formed and old ones renewed was clear to both the academicians and the Bolsheviks. The lists of foreign partic-

88 Marina Sorokina ipants prepared by the RAS had been compiled through formal procedures; even so, they were subjected to both political and ideological censorship by the NKID. However strong the pessimism the academicians, attempts by the NKID to edit the lists of foreign delegates to the celebrations resulted, not in a decrease, but in an increase in the numbers of participants owing to the inclusion of representatives from Asiatic countries. The foreign scientists invited by the RAS had been screened for their 'loyalty' to the Soviets, yet almost none had been prevented from attending the festivities. The counter-propaganda being disseminated in a number of European countries - mainly France, where the influence of Russian political emigres was strong - played a large role in turning the RAS anniversary in the eyes of many scientists into an exclusively political show. As a consequence of this counter-propaganda, the largest national delegation at the RAS's celebrations turned out to be the German one, which used this circumstance to strengthen its position in Russia. Finally, another circumstance must be noted. The grand scale of the academic celebrations turned out to be as unexpected for many Russian scientists as it was indecipherable to the foreign scientists. The direct consequence of this was summarized by the Academician Platonov: The academic environment... felt radically refreshed and there was a shift toward greater scholarly activity.' Overall, the anniversary promoted the revival of interest in the West.148 NOTES It is my pleasant duty to express my gratitude to Susan Solomon and Nikolai Krementsov for their advice and criticism, as well as to Aleksander Potemkin and to the workers of the Archive of the Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, the Petersburg Branch of the RAS Archive, along with its former director, Vladimir Sobolev, for their help in the gathering of materials. The research for this essay was made possible by the Russian Scholarly Foundation for the Humanities, Moscow's Public Scholarly Fund, and the Fulbright Program (USA). 1 From a multitude of studies about the role of ritual in Soviet society, two works can be singled out: V.V. Glebkin, Ritual v sovetskoi kul'ture (Moscow: Yanus-K, 1998); A. Kojevnikov, 'Games of Stalinist Democracy: Ideological

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2

3

4 5

6 7

8

Discussion in Soviet Sciences 1947-52,' in Sheila Fitzpatrick, ed., Stalinism (London and New York: Routledge, 2000), 142-75. First noted by V.M. Orel, 'lubilei Rossiiskoi Akademii Nauk: istoriia i traditsii/ in Rossiiskaia Akademiia Nauk: 275 let sluzheniia Rossii (Moscow: Yanus-K, 1999), 31-7. It is still not clear which date should be considered the founding date of the Russian Academy of Science. On 22 January 1724, Peter the Great presented the Presiding Senate with the project of the 'Regulation Concerning the Founding of the Petersburg Academy of Science and Arts.' On 28 January of the same year, the Senate issued an edict regarding the academy's founding. On 17 September 1725, the first academic assembly took place. When anniversary dates were celebrated in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (1776,1826,1876), it was the latter date that was commemorated. In the twentieth century, the anniversary was celebrated on assigned days (1925,1945,1975). In 1999, on the 275th anniversary, the Russian Academy of Science recognized the Tetrine' year of 1724 as the year of the academy's founding. As the president of the AS USSR, V.L. Komarov, had advised the Honorary Academician I.V. Stalin in 1944: The date of the anniversary ... should emphasize the role of Peter the First as the founder of the Academy of Sciences and the link of such an important event in the history of Russia with the Petrine Reforms... Based on this, and also considering a number of practical considerations, which coincide in this case with questions of principle, I would suggest May 1945 as the most appropriate time for these anniversary celebrations.' Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (hereafter GARF),/. 5446 (SNK - Sovet Narodnykh Komissarov), op. 47, d. 2729, /. 32-33. (I would like to express my gratitude to G.A. Savina, who 'presented' me with this document.) Izvestiia, 26 July 1925; Sobranie zakonov i rasporiazhenii raboche-krest'ianskogo pravitel'stva SSSR (1925) no. 48, p. 363 (hereafter SZ SSSR). SZ SSSR (1925) no. 48, p. 351; see also V.A. Triaskina, ed., Dokumenty po istorii Akademii nauk SSSR: 1917-1925 gg. (Leningrad: Nauka, 1986), 323 (hereafter Dokumenty po istorii AN). For convenience, I shall use the preanniversary name of the Academy: RAS. GARF,/. 5446 (SNK), op. 37, d. 76. Until 1917, the Table of Ranks,' which determined promotion in rank throughout the Russian empire, assigned the position of an academician to one of the highest classes, the fourth, which also included major-generals, rear admirals, ministry department heads, and governors. 'Istoricheskii vecher,' Krasnaia gazeta, 7 September 1925; republished in my article 'Pridat' ... impozantnyi kharakter,' Priroda 12 (1999): 63.

90 Marina Sorokina 9 Dokumenty po istorii AN, 327 (from the speech of M.I. Kalinin, Chairman of the TsIK. 10 Dokumenty po istorii AN, 328. 11 See N.M. Raskin's Tis'mo Einshteina v Akademiiu nauk SSSR/ Voprosy istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki 20 (1966): -3; Avtografy uchenykh v Arkhive Akademii Nauk SSSR (Leningrad: Nauka, 1978), 37,120-1. 12 The Bakhmeteff Archive of Russian and East European History and Culture, Columbia University (hereafter BAR), G. Vernadskii Coll., b. 84. (The opinion of the Czech Slavist M. Murko; see G.V. Vernadskii's letter to his father, Academician V.I. Vernadskii, of 3 October 1925.) 13 See the latest studies, which totally refute this conclusion: B.A. Starostin, Teterburgskaia Akademiia Nauk v poiskakh natsional'noi samoidentifikatsii,' in Rossiiskaia Akademiia Nauk, 259-321; Sovetsko-germanskie nauchnye sviazi vremeni Veimarskoi respubliki (St Petersburg: Nauka, 2001); V.S. Sobolev, 'Vozobnovlenie dialoga: Berlinskaia i Rossiiskaia Akademii nauk v pervoi polovine 20-kh godov/ in Nemtsy v Rossii. Peterburgskie nemtsy (St Petersburg: Dm. Bulanin, 2001), 312-15. 14 Rudolf Ludloff, 'Der Aufenthalt deutscher Hochschullehrer in Moskau und Leningrad 1925: Anlasslich des 200 jahrigen Bestehens der Russischen Akademie der Wissenschaften und ihrer Umwandlung in die Akademie der Wissenschaften der UdSSR/ Wissenschafliche Zeitschrift der FriedrichSchiller-Universitat Jena, 6, no. 6 (1956-7): 709-21. Gesellschafts und sprachivissenschaftliche Reihe; Conrad Grau, 'Die deutschen Universitaten und die 200-Jahr-Feier der Akademie der Wissenschaften der UdSSR 1925,' Deutschland-Sowjetunion. Aus fiinf Jahrzehnten kultureller Zusammenarbeit (Berlin: Humboldt-Universitat zu Berlin, 1966), 172-7. In the USSR, A.V. Kol'tsov's The 200th anniversary of the Academy of Sciences' remained the only article on this topic for many years (Voprosy istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki, Vyp. 1 [46] (1974): 11-21), as well as sections in the monographs by A.E. loffe, A.V. Kol'tsov et. al. (see note 18). Only in anticipation of the 275th anniversary of the Russian Academy of Sciences did several works rapidly come into print, under the authorship of lu.Kh. Kopelevich, although these are based on highly limited archival material. See lu.Kh. Kopelevich, 'Nemetskie uchenye na prazdnovanii 200-letiia AN SSSR,' in IIETRAN. Godichnaia nauchnaia konferentsiia 1998 (Moscow: IIET RAN, 1999), 186-8; lu.Kh. Kopelevich, 'Nemetskie uchenye na prazdnovanii 200letiia AN SSSR,' in Sovetsko-germanskie nauchnye sviazi vremeni Veimarskoi respubliki, 126-43; lu.Kh. Kopelevich and E.I. Kolchinskii, 'Politicheskie itogi akademicheskogo iubileia 1925 g.,' in Za 'zheleznym zanavesom': Mify i realii sovetskoi nauki (St Petersburg: Dm. Bulanin, 2002), 37-55.1 have also

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prepared a number of other works based on the lecture that forms the basis for the present article; see M. Sorokina, "'My ne nishchie ...": Iz dnevnika E.G. Ol'denburg/ Istochnik 6 (1999): 28-41; M. Sorokina, '"Nenadezhnyi, no absoliutno nezamenimyi": 200-letnii iubilei Akademii nauk i "delo Masarika-Iakobsona/" in In Memoriam: Istoricheskii sbornik pamiati A.I. Dobkma (St Petersburg and Paris: Feniks-Atheneum, 2000), 117-42; M. Sorokina, 'Uchenye i politika: Postversal'skaia Evropa i mezhdunarodnoe nauchnoe sotrudnichestvo (proekt "200-letnii iubilei Rossiiskoi Akademii nauk" [1925 g.])/ in Puti poznaniia istorii Rossii: novye podkhody i interpretatsii (Moscow: Moskovskii obshestvennyi nauchnyi fond, 2001), 354-81. As, for instance, the famous Revizor [Inspector General] (1925). Rossiiskii gosudartsvennyi arkhiv sotsial'no-politicheskoi istorii, Moscow (hereafter RGASPI),/. 17 (TsK KPSS), op. 121, d. 33, /. 62-66 (this reference was supplied by the director of the Archive of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, G.A. Kniazev, concerning the celebration of the AS's anniversary in 1928). For the signifying role of academic anniversaries in the scientific politics of the USSR, see N. Krementsov, 'A "Second Front" in Soviet Genetics: The International Dimension of the Lysenko Controversy, 19441947,' Journal of the History of Biology 29 (1996): 237. A. Vucinich, for example, emphasizes the use of the anniversary by the academicians for highlighting the responsiveness of their work to the needs of the new society (Empire of Knowledge: The Academy of Sciences of the USSR, 1917-1984 [Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984], 116-18); conversely, V. Tolz assumes that the anniversary was useful to the Bolsheviks as a demonstration of their respect for science (Russian Academicians and the Revolution: Combining Professionalism and Politics [London: Macmillan, 1997], 33-4). D.A. Aleksandrov insists that the anniversary celebrations were 'organized not so much by the Academy, as by the Soviet of the People's Commissars and the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs of the USSR' (D.A. Aleksandrov, 'Pochemu sovetskie uchenye perestali pechatat'sia za rubezhom: stanovlenie samodostatochnosti i izolirovannosti otechestvennoi nauki, 1914-1940,' Voprosy istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki 3 [1996]: 11). A.E. loffe, Mezhdunarodnye nauchnye sviazi sovetskoi nauki, tekhniki i kul'tury. 1917-1932 (Moscow: Nauka, 1975), 124-41; A.V. Kol'tsov, Lenin i stanovlenie akademii nauk kak tsentra sovetskoi nauki (Leningrad: Nauka, 1969), 266-9; A.V. Kol'tsov, Razvitie Akademii nauk kak vysshego nauchnogo uchrezhdeniia SSSR, 1926-1932 (Leningrad: Nauka, 1982), 125-7; F.F. Perchenok, 'Akademiia nauk na "velikom perelome,"' in Zven'ia: Istoricheskii al'manakh,

92 Marina Sorokina

19

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21

22 23 24

25 26

27 28 29

vol. 1 (Moscow: Progress-Feniks-Atheneum, 1991), 168-9; V.S. Sobolev, Dlia budushchego Rossii: Deiatel'nost' Akademii nauk po sokhraneniiu natsional'nogo kul'turnogo i nauchnogo naslediia 1890-1930 godov (St Petersburg: Nauka, 1999), 76-9. A completely different perspective is offered by P. Forman, who cites the 1925 anniversary in his discussion of the German version of the ideology of 'Scientific Internationalism/ where he shows the manipulation and the complex configuration of political and scientific interests in Weimar Germany (P. Forman, 'Scientific Internationalism and the Weimar Physicists: The Ideology and Its Manipulation in Germany after World War I/ ISIS 64, no. 222 [June 1973]: 151-80). This is expressed most fully in S.F. Ol'denburg's 'Nauchno-kul'turnye itogi akademicheskogo iubileiia,' published in Nauchnyi rabotnik 3 (1925): 8, republished in Dokumenty po istorii AN, 341. Protokoly Istoriko-filologicheskogo otdeleniia Imperatorskoi Akademii nauk, 21 March 1912,144. E.F. Shmurlo's note is included in the first appendix to these protocols. The commision was chaired by S.F. Ol'denburg and included V.I. Vernadskii, V.A. Steklov, A.S. Lappo-Danilevskii, V.V. Bartol'd, A.A. Shakhmatov, and E.F. Karskii (Protokoly Fiziko-matematicheskogo otdeleniia Rossiiskoi Akademii nauk, 10 January 1918,29; Protokoly Istoriko-filologicheskogo otdeleniia Rossiiskoi Akademii nauk, 17 January 1918,39; Protokoly Obshego sobraniia (OS) Rossiiskoi Akademii nauk (RAN), 16 February 1918,45). By that time, Academicians Lappo-Danilevskii and Shakhmatov were dead, and Vernadskii had left the Soviet Union. Peterburgskii filial Arkhiva Rossiiskoi Akademii nauk (hereafter cited as PFA RAN),/. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 25, /. 12. For more information concerning these three academicians, see G.I. Ignatsius, Vladimir Andreevich Steklov (Moscow: Nauka, 1967); Sergei Fedorovich Ol'denburg: Sbornik statei (Moscow: Nauka, 1986); A.I. Perel'man, Aleksandr Evgen'evich Fersman (Moscow: Nauka, 1983); and also B.S. Kaganovich, 'Nachalo tragedii: Akademiia nauk v 1920-ye gody po materialam arkhiva S.F. Ol'denburga/ Zvezda 12 (1994): 124-44. It was only the 1927 Charter of AS USSR that assigned the presidium the status of an academic administrative structure. After 1917, eight academicians and four honorary members of the academy emigrated; eighteen corresponding members had left Russia by 1925. Most of them were in the humanities. Dokumenty po istorii AN, 27. Izvestiia Rossiiskoi Akademii nauk, sixth series, 14 (1918): 1391. Protokoly OS RAN, 1918,47; Supplement, 32.

200th Anniversary of the Academy of Sciences 93 30 For the general surveys of the organization of science in the USSR of those years, see M.S. Bastrakova, Stanovleniie sovetskoi sistemy organizatsii nauki (1917-1922) (Moscow: Nauka, 1973), 119-268; Loren R. Graham, The Formation of Soviet Research Institutes: A Combination of Revolutionary Innovation and International Borrowing,' Social Studies of Science 5 (1975): 303-29; N. Krementsov, Stalinist Science (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997), 11-30. 31 GARF,/. A2307 (Glavnauka), op. 7, d. 8, /. 94 reverse. 32 See the following, for instance: Dokumenty po istorii AN, 169-70,174-7,27980, 310-15; lu.A. Pantsyrev, ed., Mezhdunarodnye nauchnye sviazi Akademii nauk SSSR. 1917-1941 (Moscow: Nauka, 1992), 38-41,53-7; Stanovleniie sovetskoi sistemy organizatsii nauki, 70-4,125-7,199-202, and others. 33 Steklov first presented a report about the plan of preparation for the anniversary of RAS at a meeting of the Special Temporary Committee of Science of 19 December 1922 (GARF, /. 5446 [SNK], op. 37, d. 7,1. 272). 34 V.A. Steklov, Perepiska s otechestvennymi matematikami. Vospominaniia (Leningrad: Nauka, 1991), 297. 35 According to the memoirs of Academician A.N. Krylov, he was entrusted with the task of presenting the RAS's invitation to the Parisian Academy of Science, so that the organization could send its representatives to the upcoming anniversary; in the beginning of 1922 he met for that purpose with M. Berten and E. Pikar (A.N. Krylov, Moi vospominania [Leningrad: Sudostroenie, 1984], 253). In the autumn of 1924, A.N. Krylov had his second meeting with the French scholars; at this meeting, Steklov was also present. 36 For Steklov's note about the organization of the 200th anniversary of the RAS and about the credits for it, see PFA RAN,/. 162 (V.A. Steklov), op. 3, d. 7,1.1-7. 37 The note was dated 18 February; it is possible that Rykov received it sometime later. 38 The 'Note' does not have a specific title. It is extant through a copy preserved in the Archive of Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation (henceforth AVP RF) in the collection of 'Secretariat of G.V. Chicherin' (/. 04), which contains the recently declassified 'Dossier of the "Anniversary of the Academy of Sciences'" (op. 59, d. 56954. folder 424), consisting of a concentration of the documents most important for the People's Commissariat concerning the organization of the 200th anniversary of the RAS (henceforth Dossier of 'AS Anniversary'). The note is published in the appendix to "'My ne nishchie...": Iz dnevnika E.G. Ol'denburg/ 69-72.

94 Marina Sorokina 39 See F.C. Barghoorn, The Soviet Cultural Offensive: The Role of Cultural Diplomacy in Soviet Foreign Policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1960); A.V. Golubev, '"Zvezdnyi chas" sovetskoi kul'turnoi diplomatii: 1929-1939 gody,' Rossiia i sovremennyi mir 2, no. 23: 224-44; A.V. Golubev, 'Sovetskoe obshchestvo 1930-kh godov i formirovanie vneshnepoliticheskikh stereotipov/ Rossiia i Evropa v XIX-XX vekakh: Problemy vzaimovospriiatiia narodov, sotsiumov, kul'tur (Moscow: IRI, 1996), 86-115, and others. 40 O.D. Kameneva, 'Kul'turnye sviazi s zagranitsei/ Nauchnyi rabotnik 2 (1925): 142. 41 For more information, see Aleksandrov, Tochemu sovetskie uchenye perestali pechatat'sia za rubezhom.' 42 For more information, see A.E. Ivanov, 'Rossiiskoe "uchenoe soslovie" v gody "Vtoroi Otechestvennoi voiny/" Voprosy istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki 2 (1999): 108-28; A. Kojevnikov, 'World War I and the Transition to the Soviet System of Scientific Research/ Na perelome. Otechestvennaia nauka v pervoi polovine XX veka, 2d ed. (St Petersburg: SPbF IIET, 1999), 38-54. 43 Stanovleniie sovetskoi sistemy organizatsii nauki, 369-70; Mezhdunarodnye nauchnye sviazi AN, 25-7. 44 Calculated on the basis of Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk. Personal'nyi sostav. Kniga 2:1918-1973 (Moscow: Nauka, 1999). 45 E.Iu. Basargina, Russkii arkheologicheskii institut v Konstantinopole: Ocherki istorii (St Petersburg: Dm. Bulanin, 1999), 61. 46 See A.I. Andreev, Ot Baikala do sviashchennoi Lkhasy: Novye materialy o russkikh ekspeditsiiakh v Tsentral'nuiu Aziiu v pervoi polovine XX veka (Buriatiia, Mongoliia, Tibet) (St Petersburg: Agni, 1997); and also GARF,/. 581 (S.F. Ol'denburg), op. 1, d. 42, /. 1-7; Dokumenty po istorii AN, 275-6. 47 Kol'tsov, Lenin i stanovlenie akademii nauk kak tsentra sovetskoi nauki, 115. 48 As, for instance, in the case of the foreign travel (1922-6) of V.I. Vernadskii. 49 loffe, Mezhdunarodnye nauchnye sviazi, 111-24 (the chapter 'Soviet Scholars in Foreign Countries'). 50 P.P. Lazarev, 'Amerika i ee nauka/ Nauchnyi rabotnik 1 (1925), 1:149. 51 S.F. Ol'denburg, Evropa v sumerkakh. Na pozharishche voiny: Vpechatleniia ot poezdki v Germaniiu, Angliiu, Frantsiiu letom 1923 g. (Petersburg: Vremia, 1924). 52 A.E. Fersman, Novye tsentry novoi nauki (Leningrad: Vremia, 1925), 13,15. 53 BAR, G. Vernadskii Coll., b. 12 (letter to his son of 24 May 1923). 54 BAR, G. Vernadskii Coll., b. 86, /. 1924-1 (cited from the letter of A.E. Fersman to V.I. Vernadskii of August 1924). 55 Terrence Emmons and Bertrand M. Patenaude, comps. and eds., War, Revo-

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58 59

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lution, and Peace in Russia: The Passages of Frank Colder, 1914-1927 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1992), 308. Cited according to Rykov's original letter: RGASPI, /. 669 (A.I. Rykov), op. 1, d. 5, /. 11-11 reverse; Copy found in Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' 1.2-3. The letter first published by Sorokina, "'My ne nishchie ...": Iz dnevnika E.G. Ol'denburg/ 68. RGASPI, /. 17 (TsK KPSS), op. 3, d. 490, /. 3. At present, all the materials of the Politburo concerning the Academy of Sciences are published in V.D. Esakov, ed., Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro TsK RKP(b)-VKP(b): 1922-1952 (Moscow: ROSSPEN, 2000), 35-6. RGASPI,/. 17 (TsK KPSS), op. 163, d. 477, /. 22. Unfortunately, I have access only to the silent minutes of that meeting of the Politburo, which does not allow one to follow the decision-making process. The decision about the first international scientific congress of limnologists to take place in the USSR (August 1925) was also made by the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party, but only after a preliminary discussion of the documents prepared by the People's Commissariat of Education of the RSFSR at the Orgburo and at the CC Secretariat (see RGASPI,/. 17 [TsK KPSS], op. 112, d. 665, /. 96-7). Leonid Borisovich Krasin (1870-1926) was well known as a proponent of the broadest possible trade and economic contacts with the West. He was entrusted with the most delicate missions: the military-technical negotiations with Germany and the trade agreement with England (1921), the negotiations on Western credits for the USSR, and the payment of the Tsarist debts' (1924-6). Throughout the first half of 1925, when Krasin was conducting the negotiations on the debts with France, the discussion of the French direction was on the agenda of the Politburo daily, outweighing for a time the German direction. In February 1925 alone, Krasin twice attended the receptions hosted by Stalin (on the second and the twenty-sixth of the month). 'Svodki priema I.V. Stalinym posetitelei za 1925-1928 gody,' Istoricheskii arkhiv 4 (1999): 16. For more information about the connections of Krasin and the academicians, see S.F. Ol'denburg's 'Pamiati druga nauki,' Pamiati L.B. Krasina (Moscow and Leningrad: NET, 1926), 44-5; Dokumenty po istorii AN, 275, 295; Lenin i Akademiia nauk. Sbornik dokumentov, ed. Academican P. N. Pospelov (Moscow: Nauka, 1969), 61,62,110,113-17,130. Sorokina, "'My ne nishchie ...": Iz dnevnika E.G. Ol'denburg,' 72. Izvestiia VTsIK, 17 January 1925; 'Akademik Shcherbatskoi o sovremennoi Frantsii,' Izvestiia, 17 January 1925.

96 Marina Sorokina 65 For more about him, see E.P. Podvigina, 'Nikolai Petrovich Gorbunov/ in A.N. Gorbunov, G.A. Savina, and A.P. Troshina, eds., Gorbunov, N.P. Vospominaniia. Stat'i. Dokumenty (Moscow: Nauka, 1986), 5-41. 66 Through a resolution of the Council of Labour and Defence (STO) USSR of 27 March 1925, 'Concerning the Organization of Celebrations of the 200th Anniversary of AS,' the RAS received 250,000 rubles for the preparation of the buildings, 60,000 rubles for the specific work on the house on Tuchkova Naberezhnaia, where the laboratory of the Nobel Laureate I.P. Pavlov was located, and 40,000 rubles for current expenses (PFA RAN,/. 162 [V.A. Steklov], op. 3, d. 7, /. 42-3; GARF, /. 5446 [SNK], op. 37, d. 67, /. 154, and others). 67 The committee was ratified by a resolution of the SNK USSR passed on 6 May (GARF,/. 5446 [SNK], op. 1, d. 11, /. 269,278-278 reverse, 317-18). 68 The Leningrad subcommittee included N.P. Gorbunov, G.V. Tsyperovich, I.I. Kondrat'ev, V.A. Steklov, and S.F. Ol'denburg (PFA RAN,/. 12 [lubileinyi komitet RAN], op. I , d. 4,1.2). The Moscow subcommittee included A.I. Rykov, M.I. Rogov, A.V. Lunacharskii, P.P. Lazarev, A.P. Pinkevich, N.I. Trotskaia, S.F. Ol'denburg, V.A. Steklov, I.I. Miroshnikov, and, later, F.N. Petrov and O.D. Kameneva (PFA RAN,/ 12 [lubileinyi komitet RAN], op. 1, d. 4, /. 5-5 reverse, 25). 69 V.D. Esakov, 'Pereezd Akademii nauk v Moskvu,' Moskva nauchnaia (Moscow: Yanus-K, 1997), 455; Esakov, Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 41. 70 Protokoly Obshego sobraniia Rossiiskoi Akademii Nauk, 13 May 1925, 66,67; 1 August, 106. 71 Thus, the Bureau for the Reception of Foreign Guests was at first supposed to be headed by the Academician Indologist F.I. Shcherbatskoi, and its members included the daughter of the president of the RAS, E.A. Tolmacheva, and the business manager for the conference, B.N. Molas. The colleagues of Ol'denburg through the Asia Museum (E.E. Bertel's, V. Eberman, N.V. Alabyshev) were attached to the bureau for the period of the celebrations. 72 See, for instance, Perchenok, 'Akademiia nauk na "velikom perelome,'" 180. 73 It was also sometimes called the commission. The first meeting took place on 25 April (PFA RAN,/ 2, op. 1-1925, d. 35, /. 5). 74 RGASPI,/ 17 (TsK KPSS), op. 3, d. 509, /. 3. 75 RGASPI,/ 17 (TsK KPSS), op. 112, d. 676, /. 106,107; Esakov, Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 38-9. Before the revolution, Miliutin studied for a time at the University of Moscow and the Institute of Commerce, but in 1903 he abandoned his studies for revolutionary work. He was the People's Commissar of Agriculture of the first membership of the SNK (until 4 November 1917). Subsequently, his Party and Soviet career went into a

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79 80 81 82

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86 87

decline: from 1918 to 1921 he was the Deputy Chair of VSNKh and the chair of the Economics Department of VTsIK. After 1922 he was the representative of the Comintern in Austria and the Balkans; he was recalled in 1924. He supervised the Economics Section in the Communist Academy. Between 1933 and 1938, Miliutin headed the Scholarly Committee of the TsIK USSR. In the midst of these organizational shifts, on 5 July, M.N. Pokrovskii published a scourging programmatic article in Pravda, titled 'O nashikh nauchnykh kadrakh/ in which he wrote with open sarcasm that the RAS was in the grip of 'dying out old men who left no progeny' and that any interest in the RAS was purely 'a superficial process.' At the end of the article he drew the optimistic conclusion that the 'old men' would soon be replaced by the young Soviet cadres of the Institute of the Red Professors. RGASPI, /. 17 (TsK KPSS), op. 3, d. 510, /. 6; d. 511, /. 6. For information about relations between the RAS and the Communist Academy, see Michael David-Fox, Revolution of the Mind: Higher Learning among the Bolsheviks, 1918-1929 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997), 201-22; and his 'Symbiosis to Synthesis: The Communist Academy and the Bolshevization of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 1918-1929,' Jahrbiicher fur Geschichte Osteuropes 46, no. 2 (1998): 220-41. GARF,/. 5446 (SNK), op. 1, d. 13,1.107-9; SU SSSR. 1925. N 48, p. 363. Esakov, Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 11. M.N. Pokrovskii was on vacation from 10 July for exactly two months right up to the end of the festivities at the academy. Calculated on the basis of the information provided in Akademiia nauk Soiuza Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik: Ee zadachi, razdelenie i sostav (Leningrad: Izd-vo AN SSSR, 1925), 58-9. Of these, there were 15 honorary members and 165 corresponding members. PFA RAN,/. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 2, /. 68. Cited from Sorokina, '"My ne nishchie ...": Iz dnevnika E.G. Ol'denburg,' 30. V.L. lakovlev, 'K proshedshim jubileinym torzhestvam Akademii nauk,' Priroda, no. 10/12 (1925): 71. For comparison, it might be noted that 770 invitations were issued across the USSR (220 to institutions and 550 to individuals). ARAN,/. 1759 (M.N. Pokrovskii), op. 4, d. 396, /. 25. Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' I. 40. la.M. Rozvadovskii (1867-1935), a Polish linguist, professor at Krakow University, a member of the Polish Academy of Sciences (from 1903) and its president from 1925 to 1929, was a corresponding member of the RAS from 1911. For information concerning the

98 Marina Sorokina surveillance of the Leningrad representatives of the OGPU over the disposition in the RAS, including the 200th anniversary, see A.P. Kupaigorodskaia, 'Uchenye pod nabliudeniem organov politicheskogo kontrolia (Leningrad, 20-e gody)' in Problemy vsemirnoi istorii: Sbornik statei v chest' A.A. Fursenko (St Petersburg: Dm. Bulanin, 2000), 229-36. 88 For more information about the situation at NKID, which was torn by the conflict between the People's Commissar G.V. Chicherin and his deputy M.M. Litvinov, see V.V. Sokolov, 'Neizvestnyi G.V. Chicherin. Iz rassekrechennykh arkhivov MID RF/ Novaia i noveishaia istoriia 2 (1994): 3-18. 89 GARF,/. A2307 (Glavnauka), op. 7, d. 23, /. 376 (M.M. Litvinov to V.N. lakovleva on 15 April 1925). 90 GARF,/. A2307 (Glavnauka), op. 7, d. 23, /. 377 (V.N. lakovleva to M.M. Litvinov on 17 April 1925). 91 The Middle East Subsection was doubtful about the necessity of the visit of the English and American Indologists A. Stein, F. Tomas, and C.P. Lenmen (Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' I. 38); and the Far East Subsection noted the absence of scholars from Asiatic countries and proposed its own candidates (Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' I. 39). 92 Ibid., /. 35. 93 The letter sent by NKID to the embassies was published in Dokumenty vneshnei politiki SSSR, vol. 8 (Moscow: Gospolitizdat, 1963), 283-4. In the first draft of the letter, which was subsequently rejected, NKID requested new candidatures not of scholars, but of publicists and public figures (Dossier of 'AS Anniversary/ 1.11). 94 PFA RAN,/. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 13, /. 191. 95 Switzerland was boycotted by the USSR after the murder of the Ambassador V.V. Vorovskii. Bulgaria and Romania were rejected as countries with 'bloody' anti-Communist regimes. 96 Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' 1.114-17. 97 PFA RAN, / 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. I, I. 24. 98 Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' 1.114-17. 99 AVP RF,/. 82 (Polpredstvo SSSR v Germanii), op. 8, d. 165, folder 127, /. 54. 100 Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' 1.122. 101 Ibid.,/. 109. 102 The device of the 'refusal' was worked out by M.M. Litvinov himself, who used the Norwegian Social Democratic press to discredit Brok. After the campaign in the press, Brok himself decided against the trip to the USSR (Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' I. 264). Note that the decision of the Soviet diplomats was upheld by F. Nansen (GARF,/. A2307 [Glavnauka], op. 7, d. 12,

200th Anniversary of the Academy of Sciences 99 /. 253 [from the letter of Acting Head of Glavnauka, A.P. Pinkevich, to S.F. Ol'denburg of 29 August 1925]). In January 1949,0. Brok and Nobel Prize laureates G. Deil and G. Miiller became the first three foreign scholars to be expelled from membership in AS USSR. 103 Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' 1.139. 104 VOKS was headed by Olga Davydovna Kameneva, L.D. Trotsky's sister. The foreign representatives of VOKS were often recruited from embassy personnel. 105 I was able to find only four cases of invitations of foreign guests by Russian academicians. The historian S.F. Platonov asked for the chairman of the Polish Delegation for the Execution of the Riga Agreement, E. Kuntse; the representative of the Polish delegation, V.I. Sukhodol'skii; and a professor of the University of Berlin, K. Shtelin. The geographer L.S. Berg wrote on behalf of the Director of the French Institute in Prague, A. Fichel. A.P. Karpinskii (following the request of G.V. Khlopin) wrote on behalf of the radiologists O. Hahn, F. Panet, and L. Meitner (Berlin) and S. Meier (Vienna). V.N. Ipatiev wrote on behalf of the Berlin professor N. Caro (PFA RAN,/. 12 [lubileinyi komitet RAN], op. 1, d. 2, /. 24, 27, 65; d. 9, /. 137; d. 10, /. 190). Invitations were sent out to all. 106 Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' 1.147; AVP RF, 82 (Polpredstvo SSSR v Germanii), op. 8, d. 165, folder 127, /. 62; PFA RAN, /. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 10, /. 172. 107 PFA RAN, /. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. l,d.lO,l. 172. 108 GARF,/. 5283 (VOKS), op. 7, d. 1, /. 24 reverse (The representative of VOKS S.B. Chlenov to O.D. Kameneva on 23 May 1925). 109 PFA RAN,/. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. I, d. 8, /. 1-1 reverse. This list included twenty scholars from Algiers, Egypt, the Middle East, Japan, India, and Turkey (Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' 1.120-1). 110 GARF,/. 5446 (SNK), op. 5a, d. 703, /. 2, 8. 111 PFA RAN, /. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. l,d.2,1 27. 112 GARF,/. 5446 (SNK), op. 1, d. 13, /. 105; PFA RAN,/. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 2,1. 71 reverse; /. 162 (V.A. Steklov), op. 3, d. 7,1. 50-50 reverse. 113 PFA RAN, /. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. \,d.2,1. 68. 114 PFA RAN,/. 162 (V.A. Steklov), op. 3, d. 7, /. 116. 115 PFA RAN, /. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 2, L 30-30 reverse. 116 Ibid., d. 10, /. 173. 117 Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' 1.157,158. 118 J. Patouillet, a former director of the French Institute in Petrograd and a professor at the University of Lyons in 1925, wrote about it to Academi-

100 Marina Sorokina cian P.P. Lazarev (ARAN,/. 459 [P.P. Lazarev], op. 4a, d. 183, /. 9-10 reverse). The competition was so fierce that Patouillet asked that his letter be destroyed immediately after being read. 119 AVP RF,/. 0136 (Referentura po Frantsii), d. 131, folder 107, /. 2 (emphasis added). On 25 July they specified that they had in mind the ministers of thirteen European countries (Austria, Germany, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Great Britain, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, and Sweden) and also of China, Greece, Mexico, Mongolia, Persia, Turkey, and Japan. All were sent invitations by the RAS (PFA RAN, /. 12 [lubileinyi komitet RAN], op. 1, d. 10, /. 167-167 reverse, 168). The idea of the 'globalization' of the RAS and its transformation into the 'genuine International of science/ which 'could only originate in Moscow, where the heart of Komintern and Profintern beats' (A.V. Lunacharskii), was attractive to the Bolshevik leadership. The Politburo of the Russian Communist Party sanctioned the invitation to the anniversary celebrations of Tomas G. Masaryk, who was the president of Czechoslovakia, a country that did not recognize the USSR (RGASPI,/. 17 [TsK KPSS], op. 3, d. 509, /. 2; Esakov, Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 36-7. For more information about this matter, see Sorokina, '"Nenadezhnyi, no absoliutno nezamenimyi": 200-letnii iubilei Akademii nauk,' 117-42. It also sanctioned the invitation of the Prime Minister of France, Paul Painleve, a well-known mathematician and a foreign corresponding member of the RAS (RGASPI, /. 17 [TsK KPSS], op. 3, d. 513); Esakov, Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 39-40). 120 For more information see Sorokina, '"My ne nishchie...": Iz dnevnika E.G. Ol'denburg/ 64-5. 121 Cited in translation Grau, 'Die deutschen Universitaten,' 175. 122 Ibid., 174. Naturally, the information about this party was endlessly far from reality, but the fact that such a motivation existed is already quite indicative. 123 See Vucinich, Empire of Knowledge, 41-6, etc.; Tolz, Russian Academicians and the Revolution, 6-7; G.D. Komkov, B.V. Levshin, and L.K. Semenov, Akademiia nauk SSSR. Kratkii istoricheskii ocherk (Moscow: n.p., 1974), 188; S.Iu. Trokhachev, 'Nemtsy i russkie v Akademii nauk pervykh let XIX veka/ in Nemtsy v Rossii. Peterburgskie nemtsy (St Petersburg: Dm. Bulanin, 1999), 92-8; Starostin, 'Peterburgskaia Akademiia Nauk'; V.S. Brachev, 'O progermanskoi orientatsii akademika Platonova/ in Russkie v Germanii (1914-1933) (St Petersburg: Tretiia Rossiia, 1995). 124 BAR. Coll. Rodichev Family, b. 4 (letter of V.I. Vernadskii to F.I. Rodichev of 22 April 1928).

200th Anniversary of the Academy of Sciences 101 125 loffe, Mezhdunarodnye nauchnye sviazi, 44. See also V.A. Kosmach, 'Sovetskaia Rossia v germanskoi vneshnei kul'turnoi politike v gody Veimarskoi respubliki (1919-1933 gody)/ in Rossiia i Germaniia, vol. 1 (Moscow: Nauka, 1998), 262-80; V.A. Kosmach, Vneshniaia kul'turnaia politika Germanii v gody Veimarskoi respubliki (1919-1933) (Minsk: BGPU, 1994). 126 Protokoly OS RAN, 1918,319. 127 Protokoly OS RAN, 1922,11 February, 44. 128 The aspirations of the Russian academicians to re-establish and broaden their influence in international scientific organizations necessitated limiting membership in the RAS. Under the pressure exerted by the representatives of France, Great Britain, and a number of other countries, the Charter of the International Research Council (founded in 1918) forbade membership of German scientific organizations as well as those of its allies in the First World War. Russia was also excluded from the list of 1919 members of the International Research Council. If Russia was not allowed to join this organization, then neither the RAS nor any other Russian scientific association could hope to join other, more specialized international research unions. 129 AVP RF, /. 82 (Polpredstvo SSSR v Germanii), op. 8, d. 165, folder 127, /. 61. 130 PFA RAN, /. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 8, /. 122. See also pages 121 and 217. 131 V.P. Leonov et al., eds., Akademicheskoe delo 1929-1931, vol. 1 (St Petersburg: BAN, 1993), 52,140 (henceforth Akademicheskoe delo). This story was told by Platonov during his testimony at the 'proceedings against the Academy of Sciences.' I obviously recognize the tendentiousness and the occasional the outlandishness of these concocted proceedings. Nonetheless, one cannot wholly deny them the right to be treated as a historical source; see B.V. Anan'ich and V.M. Paneiakh, 'Akademicheskoe delo as a Historical Source,' Istoricheskie zapiski 120 (Moscow, 1999): 338-50. 132 For more on this, see Ludloff, 'Der Aufenthalt deutscher Hochschullehrer,' 709-21; Grau, 'Die deutschen Universitaten/ 172-7. 133 PFA RAN,/. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN) op. 1, d. 10, /. 51,85,155. Ultimately, twenty institutions from Germany accepted the invitations: the Academies of Sciences in Berlin, Heidelberg, and Leipzig; twelve universities - out of the twenty-three invited (Berlin, Bonn, Breslau, Halle, Hamburg, Heidelberg, Gottingen, Konigsberg, Leipzig, Miinster, Munich, Jena); the learned societies of Konigsberg and Gottingen; the Society for the Study of Eastern Europe; the Geological Board (Berlin); and the Prussian Meteorological Institute. 134 Dossier of 'AS Anniversary,' 1.163-4,169-72.

102 Marina Sorokina 135 Dossier of 'AS Anniversary/1.180-1. G.V. Chicherin, one of the main proponents of Soviet-German ties, was also interested in the avoidance of the death penalty for the students and also used the situation for his own ends. 136 Dokumenty po istorii AN, 328; my clarifications follow PFA RAN, /. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 13, /. 72. 137 PFA RAN,/. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 2, /. 26. 138 PFA RAN, /. 12 (lubileinyi komitet RAN), op. 1, d. 2, /. 29 reverse. 139 Un Jubile Academique et Pays des Soviets (Brussels: Impr. De M.Weissenbruch, 1926); GARF,/. 5446 (SNK), op. 37, d. 1, /. 205. 140 BAR, G. Vernadskii Coll., b. 12 (The Letter of V.I. Vernadskii to his son of 10 November 1925). 141 A translation of E. Meyer's article into Russian was preserved in the papers of M.N. Pokrovskii (ARAN,/. 1759 [M.N. Pokrovskii], op. 5, d. 48, /. 2-30). 142 BAR, G. Vernadskii Coll., b. 84 (From a letter of G.V. Vernadskii to his father of 3 October 1925). 143 GARF,/. 5446 (SNK), op. 37, d. 1, /. 209 reverse. But in May 1926, N.P. Gorbunov impeded the publication already prepared by VOKS. The text of the review remained, however. See ibid., /. 219-35. 144 GARF,/. 5446 (SNK), op. 37, d. 62, /. 1-3; partly published inMezhdunarodnye nauchnye sviazi AN, pp. 229-31. 145 RGASPI,/. 17 (TsK KPSS), op. 84, d. 1046, /. 150. In the published 'Compendium of I.V. Stalin's Visitors for 1925-1928' there are indications of the questions discussed (Istoricheskii arkhiv 4 [1999]: 8), but there is no information to date about the specific contents of that report. 146 See Esakov, Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 42-4. 147 RGASPI,/. 17 (TsK KPSS), op. 3, d. 526, /. 5; Esakov, Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 41. The Politburo's resolution was published in '"Nashe polozhenie khuzhe katorzhnogo": Pervye vybory v Akademiiu nauk SSSR,' Istochnik 3 (1996): 110-11. The membership of the committee was approved by the Politburo at the referendum of 19 November 1925: the Chairman of the SNK RSFSR S.I. Syrtsov (Chair), A.V. Lunacharskii, V.P. Miliutin, and N.P. Gorbunov (RGASPI,/. 17, op. 3, d. 531, /. 9). It is characteristic that it was subsequently called both 'the Committee for the Strengthening of Scholarly Contacts of the Academy of Sciences with Foreign Scholarly Instututions' and 'The Committee for the International Scholarly Contacts and for the Work of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR.' 148 Akademicheskoe delo, 107-8,110,133,200.

3 Leftists versus Nationalists in SovietWeimar Cultural Diplomacy: Showcases, Fronts, and Boomerangs MICHAEL DAVID-FOX

Within a few years of the stabilization of the Soviet regime, a core dilemma in communist relations with the outside world had crystallized: whether and how to cultivate both ideologically sympathetic 'friends' and influential yet politically distant 'bourgeois' allies. SovietWeimar cultural relations proved a formative test case for this thorny problem. The allure of the Soviet experiment in postwar Europe offered the emergent forces of Soviet cultural diplomacy invaluable opportunities to organize 'friends of the Soviet Union' - a rubric that included a broad range of non-communist sympathizers on the left. Of all the European countries, Soviet Russia in the 1920s had the most extensive intellectual relations with Germany, especially in the realms of culture, science, and professional travel. At the same time, the consequences of the Treaty of Versailles of 1919 and the Rapallo pact, signed by the two international pariahs in 1922, provided the Soviets with an ample pool of willing partners among conservative German scientific, business, and political elites favouring an 'Eastern orientation.'1 Even more, the fiercely anti-Western, anti-liberal proclivities of Weimar's 'new nationalism' contributed to a persistent fascination with the Soviet Union among the intellectuals of the revolutionary and fascist German right. The Soviets pursued both leftists and nationalists in Germany simultaneously, building a dualistic strategy into the very fabric of their German policy. The choices this dualism entailed provoked on the Soviet side a series of conflicts of a type hitherto unknown, as the Soviet experience of courting influential centre-right German nationalists in the 1920s paved the way for a concerted Soviet flirtation with the German extreme right on the eve of the Nazi takeover. Cultural diplomacy, defined as the systematic promotion of a cultural

104 Michael David-Fox

dimension to foreign relations, was largely a twentieth-century phenomenon whose advent was stimulated by nationalism, imperialism, and total war.2 Germany was a relative latecomer to the enterprise, and it was only in the early postwar years that the Weimar Republic made a formal commitment of foreign policy resources to cultural affairs.3 When the Bolsheviks came to power, they clearly noted the involvement of the great powers in cultural diplomacy. But the Party's long experience with revolutionary agitation and propaganda more than direct international borrowing informed the Soviet approach to cultural initiatives in Europe. At a time when the Soviets were diplomatically weak and isolated, they quickly became preoccupied with developing new means of harnessing the widespread international fascination especially intense among Western cultural and intellectual elites - with the first socialist society. If the 1920s, then, was the time when cultural diplomacy came into its own for both Germany and Soviet Russia, it was approached in different ways by the states that wielded it. As in other times and places, cultural diplomacy was shaped by a combination of national imperatives and international agendas. The intriguing variations that emerged suggest just how much the character of cultural diplomacy reflected the polities and policymakers behind it. The French emphasis on language, the German preoccupation with academic scholarship and ethnic Germans outside Germany, and the intensive Soviet concern with propaganda, political-ideological leverage, and scientifictechnological development reflected the ways in which international initiatives meshed with domestic orders.4 The study of Soviet cultural diplomacy in the interwar period - the subject of this chapter - must concern itself with the particular missions and institutions of the rapidly evolving party-state as they intersected with its efforts to position itself internationally. For the Soviets, committed to 'cultural revolution' at home and world revolution abroad, cultural diplomacy was not merely an expansion of the formal foreign policy sphere of the Soviet state, a novel component incorporated into the diplomatic portfolio of the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs.* Cultural initiatives were part and parcel of the broader communist movement (led by the Soviets in Germany and

Indeed, within the Soviet lexicon the concept of cultural diplomacy itself was not prevalent; it was subsumed under notions of 'cultural relations abroad/ cultural 'propaganda/ and the goal of influencing 'public opinion' in foreign countries.

Soviet-Weimar Cultural Diplomacy 105

internationally), as well as an intrinsic feature of an emergent partystate cultural polity that shaped approaches towards the intelligentsia, culture, and propaganda at home and abroad. One of the primary institutional vehicles the Soviet system created in the 1920s to deal with cultural diplomacy and propaganda was the AllUnion Society for Cultural Ties Abroad (VOKS). VOKS had close ties with the state's foreign policy establishment and was a component of the party-state cultural apparatus, but it was always distinct from the Communist International (Comintern), the Moscow-centred alliance of communist parties. For pragmatic reasons, Soviet diplomatic organizations were kept separate from the symbol of world revolution, and this held true for VOKS, but the separation had consequences: the Comintern pressed its interests as the agency most concerned with communist and proletarian movements outside the USSR. VOKS, in contrast, evolved as a separate organization devoted to relations with the foreign 'intelligentsia' - that is, groups of non-proletarians and non-communists most closely associated with the realms of science and culture. VOKS thus constituted a distinctive arm of the new party-state. VOKS was founded in 1925 from a precursor organization, the United Information Bureau of the Commission on Foreign Aid (Ob"edinennoe Biuro Informatsii Komissii zagranichnoi pomoshchi, or OBI) of the Central Executive Committee (TsIK), itself created in 1922. OBI and its successor VOKS were the brainchild of Ol'ga Davydovna Kameneva, the polished, energetic sister of Lev Trotsky and wife of Politburo member Lev Kamenev, who held the post of chairman of VOKS until the end of 1929. Kameneva, educated in Bern and comfortable among the top echelons of the Old Bolshevik European emigration, oriented VOKS toward Western and Central Europe, particularly Germany. From the early 1920s on, she and her co-workers became acutely aware of their ability to include among their foreign contacts both ideological sympathizers and a range of other non-leftists. From the Soviet perspective, both groups were 'bourgeois,' and VOKS's special concern with European 'culture' and the 'bourgeois intelligentsia' brought with it a range of ambiguities and political costs at home. But in the German context those rubrics embraced both sympathizers eager for closer contacts with the first socialist society and nationalists eager to revise Versailles. As an institution, VOKS typifies the cross-fertilization of 'internal' and 'external' concerns and activities that this essay aims to elucidate. Abroad, VOKS managed the 'societies of friends' of the Soviet Union, as the burgeoning number of cultural friendship societies were informally

106 Michael David-Fox

called, as well as relations with a wide array of potentially politically distant intellectuals, scholars, scientists, and cultural figures; it gathered information on public opinion and intellectual trends; it published and gave wide circulation to bulletins on Soviet cultural life; and it supplied the foreign press with information, articles, and photographs. At home, it received foreign intellectual visitors and arranged their contacts and tours within the Soviet Union; managed the domestic end of cultural, scientific, and book exchanges; and engaged the Russian Soviet intelligentsia for participation in its various activities and publications. At one point in the late 1920s, VOKS even propagated the study of foreign languages and was charged with popularizing Western cultural and scientific achievements at home.5 VOKS was thus completely enmeshed in the international and home fronts simultaneously, and formulated its agendas in response to pressures and influences from both. For most of the 1920s, VOKS's simultaneous cultivation of German leftists and nationalists was reflected in its relations with two very different German institutions. The first was a bastion of non-Party leftist sympathizers and intellectuals, the Gesellschaft der Freunde des Neuen Russland (Society of Friends of the New Russia, hereafter 'Society of Friends'), which can be regarded as VOKS's principal cultural 'front' organization of the era - although it will be crucial to define precisely what that means. The second was the Deutsche Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas (German Society for the Study of Eastern Europe, hereafter the 'Gesellschaft'), an important scholarly institution of preNazi Ostforschungg (Eastern studies) that developed close ties with VOKS after 1922. The Gesellschaft brought together a number of nationally oriented scholarly, diplomatic, and business interests favouring a turn to the East as an antidote to the great-power dilemmas of a defeated Germany. VOKS, which touted Soviet 'achievements' abroad, retained an extraordinary focus on the Gesellschaft and the Society of Friends in part because they allowed it to showcase a range of its own achievements to its political masters at home. In many instances, as we shall see, this showcasing involved rose-coloured reporting that covered up a string of Soviet disappointments in Germany, many features of which were recognized by well-informed observers at the time. The years 1923 to 1925 were the heyday of the newly created Society of Friends, for it was in these years that its activities were most influential and that its covert OBI/VOKS handlers were most enthusiastic about it. The trajectory of the Gesellschaft was somewhat different.

Soviet-Weimar Cultural Diplomacy 107

Founded in 1913, it was reactivated in 1920. Beginning in 1923, prodded perhaps by the emergence of a rival in the Society of Friends, the Gesellschaft began to cultivate its Soviet ties energetically. In the period after 1925, as the Society of Friends began to stagnate and German foreign policy turned westward, the Gesellschaft achieved the height of its importance in Soviet eyes. After 1929, although VOKS continued to trumpet its ties with the Society and the Gesellschaft, its mounting frustrations with both partner organizations paved the way for new initiatives, including the disastrous late-Weimar outreach to the radical right. It is tempting to depict the choice of nascent Soviet cultural diplomacy between leftists and nationalists as one between 'ideology/ as represented by the sympathizers, and Realpolitik, as represented by the politically influential nationalists. As this chapter shows, this dichotomy, which has been the foundation of many discussions of Soviet foreign relations even in recent years, is doubly misleading.6 In the story told here, the cultivation of German leftists and rightists alike was rife with hard-headed, utilitarian, and etatist considerations and simultaneously shot through with ideological assumptions. Equally important, a cult of tactical flexibility and utilitarian manipulation was a fundamental part of Marxism-Leninism, an ideology that aspired dialectically to weld theory and praxis. I argue that it is more fruitful to examine the enterprise of Soviet cultural diplomacy as strapped to a simmering cauldron of frequently contradictory motivations and pressures. Some of these authorized, even required, close relationships with various non-communist forces abroad - to the point of cooperating, as we shall see, with a number of far-right and fascist intellectuals - while others made far more innocuous partnerships with all nonproletarians and non-communists into a political liability. More revealing than any effort to disaggregate 'factors' from the mix, then, is the attempt to recover the milieu of Soviet cultural diplomacy across the boundary between domestic evolution and international behaviour.7 External and internal dimensions in the history of the Russian Revolution and the development of the Soviet system were interrelated and highly interactive, yet they are rarely explored together.8 My chapter begins its move into the deep context of Soviet cultural initiatives towards Weimar Germany with the aid of a troika of metaphors: showcases, fronts, and boomerangs. The term 'showcases' refers not to Soviet Potemkin villages displayed to credulous visitors, but rather to the German partner institutions that VOKS depicted to the Soviet leadership (and sometimes to itself) through rose-tinted glasses.

108 Michael David-Fox

It is rarely recognized that some domestic Soviet sites served as model institutions not just for foreigners but for Soviet audiences as well. The showcase phenomenon suggests how Soviet officials could express belief in their own optimistic constructs in a foreign context - or, at least, how those constructs could have policy implications. In using the term 'fronts/ I refer not to the martial metaphors so common in Soviet campaigns but to actual communist front organizations, which have been most closely associated with the international communist movement and the Comintern, as well as with the period from the Popular Front to the Cold War.9 But these front institutions also emerged out of the early cultural diplomacy of the Soviet party-state, as the VOKS materials show. In creating these communist fronts early on, the Soviets were attempting to devise mechanisms to secure covert control from afar. But from Moscow's perspective, these were blunt and inadequate instruments, a far cry from easy manipulation and total control. Finally, 'boomerangs' refers to the manner in which Soviet initiatives abroad constantly rebounded back as political issues at home. VOKS's developing links to Weimar culture demonstrably shaped its own internal affairs. Each metaphor, then, illustrates that powerful but neglected nexus between external and internal cultural politics. VOKS as a Front Organization The combination of 'internal' and 'external' functions that formed the backbone of VOKS's mission took shape less by design than as a response by VOKS's precursor organization, OBI, to a significant influx of non-communist, non-proletarian foreigners into Soviet Russia in 1921-2. In 1920, after Civil War hostilities had for the most part ended, the Soviets faced one of their first important encounters with influential 'bourgeois' visitors. The array of Western figures and their aid missions for famine relief who came to the new Soviet state encountered Kameneva as a member of the Central Committee of Famine Relief (Pomgol) of the Central Executive Committee (TsIK) in 1921, and later as a member of its successor, the Committee on the Consequences of Famine (Poslegol), in 1922. Kameneva, with her co-workers, made efforts to organize cultural activities and to influence the impressions of the visiting foreigners, but at the same time she lobbied for an organization that would be directly involved in developing cultural relations with foreign visitors, not simply fund-raising. As a result, the Commission on Foreign Aid of the Central Executive Committee was created with a

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mandate to open up channels of foreign contacts and to supply information about the Soviet Union to a wide variety of foreigners. This commission, headed by Kameneva, created the United Bureau of Information (OBI), which was the direct precursor to VOKS. The task of OBI/ a 1924 document put it, 'comprises propaganda among the foreign intelligentsia, with the goal of acquainting it with the cultural achievements and the work of the Soviet Republic.' Soon after its creation, OBI moved to develop a strong international presence. Its representatives, like the later 'plenipotentiaries' of VOKS, were usually diplomats based in Soviet embassies abroad.10 Between 1922 and 1925, Kameneva's outfit emerged as the organization that would handle the visits and cultural activities of foreigners while they were in the Soviet Union and also cultivate contacts among non-party figures abroad (some of them after they returned home from the USSR). The Commissariat of Foreign Affairs charged OBI with gathering and dispensing 'cultural-enlightenment information' and developing ties with 'the world of scholars, artists, etc.'11 Out of this set of functions, Kameneva would fashion VOKS in 1925 as an institution that pursued the same distinctive 'cultural' activities at home and abroad, only in a more extensive and prominent fashion. The German Society of Friends, the first of dozens of such societies later founded in Europe and the rest of the world, developed out of the confluence of Kameneva's Moscow-based operation and the parallel emergence of a Comintern initiative based in Berlin. Willi Miinzenberg, like the well-connected Kameneva, got his start in the business of communist cultural propaganda and mobilizing intellectual sympathizers during the famine of 1920-1. The tireless communist impressario was assigned by Lenin with create an international relief action; this led to the emergence of the crown jewel of Miinzenberg's publishing and propaganda empire, the Internationale Arbeiter Hilfe (IAH, also known by its Russian acronym Mezhrabpom).12 Intriguingly, the two major forces behind the creation of front organizations and the mobilization of fellow-travellers got their start during the wave of Western philanthropic involvement in famine relief.13 Although Soviet institutions (OBI and, after 1925, VOKS) in Moscow were responsible for overseeing over the Society of Friends, it was Miinzenberg who played the dominant role in launching the Berlin initiative. In October 1921 his IAH founded a group called Kiinstlerhilfe (Artists Assistance) to study Soviet culture; this was followed by the emergence of 'intellectual circles' formed for the same purpose. In June

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1923 the 'foreign committee' of IAH conducted talks with some thirty to forty German intellectuals and a representative of the Soviet Embassy to found the Vereinigung der Freunde des Neuen Russland (Union of Friends of the New Russia). A few days later, at an IAH World Congress for Economic Aid and Reconstruction of the New Russia, the formation of the German Society of Friends of the New Russia was announced.14 Some of the society's core members had travelled to Moscow and established contact with Kameneva in 1922-3, yet it is clear that Miinzenberg was the driving force behind the society's initial organization. For all that, covert oversight over the institution was given to VOKS's precursor organization, OBI. (Later, VOKS would manage and help finance the international network of cultural friendship societies through its representatives in Soviet embassies and through cooperative figures in the societies' administrations.) In February 1924 a member of the Central Committee of the German Communist Party (KPD), Erich Baron, was installed as General Secretary of the Society of Friends; he would remain its driving force and VOKS's main contact for the duration of the Weimar period. In this way, Comintern and KPD (and hence 'communist' and 'proletarian') interests were built into the founding and operation of a Soviet-directed cultural front organization geared towards non-party cultural elites. From the outset, political liabilities and institutional rivalries affected Soviet cultural work with German intellectuals. In contrast to VOKS, Miinzenberg never had as his primary sphere of activity the realms of the 'intelligentsia' and 'culture.' Because he was ultimately the instrument of the Comintern and the KPD, his organization's publications and activities were oriented towards the mass labour and communist movements. However, Miinzenberg's unique position as the impresario behind Europe's pro-Soviet cultural front organizations, which 'had to be paid for by a degree of permissiveness that guaranteed a commitment to "popular frontism" as a thing-in-itself,' made his own political positions murky.15 From a communist perspective, he was open to charges of 'opportunism.' At the same time, throughout the 1920s VOKS was under pressure from the Comintern to refocus its activities towards 'proletarian' and communist forces. VOKS faced analogous liabilities from militants and other critics at home stemming from its allegedly overly solicitous concern for (and perhaps potential contagion from) politically and socially 'alien elements' abroad. Strikingly, the very status of VOKS at its founding in 1925 as a formally autonomous 'society' was largely an attempt to mirror the

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already existing societies of friends of the Soviet Union, of which the German was the most important. One impetus behind the discussions in late 1924 that led to the founding of VOKS was Kameneva's insistence on direct Soviet state funding for an institution that would have greater stature than OBI. It is thus ironic that this leading vehicle for Soviet cultural diplomacy and propaganda was created deliberately as an officially autonomous, non-governmental 'society/ As Kameneva later revealed, Soviet cultural diplomacy had been bankrolled by 'bourgeois money': OBI had grown in spite of having 'no official positions, no budget, using the apparatus of the Commission [on Foreign Aid] and funds directed toward food supply aid.' As she put it, 'the leftovers [ostatkov] of funding from bourgeois organizations aiding famine relief were diverted to cultural work among foreigners.16 After foreign philanthropy was ended, the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs (NKID) showed interest in a more formal investment in cultural diplomacy when it put forward a proposal to create a 'private' (chastnoe) society called 'Society of Cultural Ties with the West.'17 The the term 'the West' did not appear in VOKS's formal name; even so, VOKS retained an overt preoccupation with Europe in general and Western and Central Europe in particular. Kameneva's consultations with high-level Bolshevik intellectuals in the years leading up to the founding of VOKS reveal that the idea of an ostensibly unaligned society was also emerging from within NKID. For example, she inquired of David Riazanov, the old Marx scholar who headed the Marx-Engels Institute: 'What forms of work do you imagine for our organization, insofar as remaining under TsIK is politically awkward? Do you think it advisable to create a "civil [obshchestvennuiu] organization"? NKID is in favour of the latter; at the same time it considers that financial credits from the Government also will be necessary for the work of such a 'Society for Cultural Ties Abroad."'18 Around the same time, however, it was Kameneva who insisted to Foreign Affairs Commissar Georgi Chicherin that any new agency would have to be an independent 'organ'; for 'political considerations/ it could not be formed under the aegis of Soviet state commissariats or TsIK. Soviet culture, she explained, 'must be represented outside the framework of state institutions [vedomstv]. The Societies of Friends of Soviet Russia cannot have their relations with [Soviet] state institutions [s otdel'nymi vedomstvami Respublik].'19 In other words, the pre-existing foreign societies, which had to be kept autonomous from their own European state structures and under Moscow's control, provided a key

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justification for VOKS's own status as a 'society'; the full extent of Soviet state involvement would be concealed at home as well as abroad. A week later, the Russian Commissar of Public Health, Nikolai Semashko, made the point to Kameneva even more explicitly: the future VOKS, whose mission would be to handle relations with 'the cultured West/ should not be a state agency or interagency organ. Rather, it must take the shape of 'a special Society, along the lines of those existing abroad (the Society of Friends of Russia) which could really attract broad cultural circles [of foreigners]' (emphasis added).20 The implication was that an organization purportedly representing an independent Russian cultural and scholarly public would prove far more effective in the West than an acknowledged mouthpiece of the party-state. Around this time, Kameneva seems to have made up her mind about how to approach the ad hoc TsIK commission (which was headed by a party member identified only as 'comrade Narimanov') that was charged with overseeing the founding of VOKS. In letters to two high officials, the People's Commissar of the Worker-Peasant Inspectorate, Valerian Kuibyshev, and NKID Commissar Chicherin, she called for a single, centralized, authoritative organization that would coordinate 'informational materials' abroad along already established lines, as well as oversee the societies of friends. 'I imagine this work in the form of an interagency commission on foreign cultural ties, under which sections on individual kinds of cultural and scientific work could be formed. These scientific, literary, and other sections could be endowed with an externally public [obshchestvennyi] character' (emphasis in original). In Kameneva's text, the desire to create a fictively non-governmental Soviet analogue to the already existing societies abroad was underscored, as was the targeting of VOKS's 'sections' (such as those in the societies of friends abroad) as vehicles for enlisting 'civil society' or the intelligentsia 'public.' Ultimately, the VOKS administration (pravlenie) did include several 'outstanding figures in science, art, and literature who stand close to Soviet power/ but in a fashion typical of Soviet state institutions in the 1920s, that administration also had a communist fraction: a list of five 'responsible workers' who were Communists, as well as a leadership 'bureau' at the top, also comprised of five members.21 Here, then, is one of the most interesting 'boomerangs' in the history of Soviet cultural diplomacy: VOKS itself was founded as a kind of front organization, a faux society that was in reality a component part of the party-state. The form of a 'society' was chosen for VOKS, as Kameneva's correspondence makes clear, so that the Moscow institu-

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tion would complement the nascent European societies of friends which, as front organizations, were presented as independent of Soviet and Comintern control. What allowed VOKS to claim the status of a non-governmental society was the formal membership of individual figures and institutions from the Soviet scientific and cultural world, and, for the duration of the 1920s, the close involvement in VOKS affairs of such 'cooperative' non-Party figures as Academy of Sciences permanent secretary Sergei Fedorovich Ol'denburg.22 VOKS's self-designation as a society made it into a kind of 'front' organization in the heart of Moscow: its firm party-state affiliation as well as its missions were concealed (or rather half-concealed) behind a broader intelligentsia membership. VOKS's status had far-reaching albeit unexpected consequences. Politically, the formally non-governmental organization had no single powerful bureaucratic protector, despite involvement in its affairs on the part of NKID and to a lesser extent the Central Committee and the secret police. Given that in early Soviet and Stalinist political culture it was a liability to associate with foreigners, the bourgeoisie, and the intelligentsia, one of the principal Soviet vehicles for cultural diplomacy was vulnerable in its own backyard. Analysed in this context, the Soviet presentation for domestic consumption of VOKS's German connections highlights a significant aspect of the 'showcase' mentality. In its internal councils, VOKS officials often expressed scepticism about the quality and general reliability of their German friends, and about the German situation as a whole.23 Indeed, as we shall see, VOKS analysts and Soviet diplomats in Berlin could often be brutally frank regarding the drawbacks of German contacts in their specialized debates. However, when VOKS directed general assessments of its activities abroad to the party-state leadership (and when it touted its foreign contacts to domestic intelligentsia audiences), it played up the strength, depth, and reliability of its German associations. In this way Weimar Germany served as the primary showcase for VOKS, which was always hard-pressed for scarce hard-currency resources, and which faced a good deal of indifference to its work on the part of the party-state leadership in the interwar period - as well as a number of hostile attacks that occasionally made its own survival less than certain. In a March 1929 report, in the same breath as she emphasized VOKS's successes in dealing with the Gesellschaft, Kameneva made an interesting revelation: in part because each Soviet state commissariat already maintained its own division dealing with foreign

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relations, 'every year the question about the [continued] existence of our organization [VOKS] has been put on the agenda/24 Its German partner organizations provided VOKS with the opportunity to prove the success of its mission, which was to advance the reputation of Soviet culture abroad. Kameneva invariably located remarks on things German either at the very outset of her various speeches and reports on VOKS's activities, or ahead of reports on other countries. First and foremost, then, this showcasing of the strength of VOKS's German relationship was a way of bolstering its own credentials and the success of its contested mission. One might argue that such showcasing was a ubiquitous feature of bureaucratic politics, and indeed this conclusion does suggest that the 'showcase mentality' affected inner-party relations as well as those between state and society. Nonetheless, the presentation of a rosy picture of VOKS's German successes was arguably of particular urgency for VOKS, because it lacked powerful political patrons. Ultimately, the result of the showcase phenomenon was the admixture in internal discussions of Soviet cultural assets abroad of a dose of the same studied enthusiasm that pervaded the construction of other kinds of Soviet public showcases. Aspirations of Influence: The Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas One of the most interesting questions is what drove the decade-long relationship between Soviet cultural diplomacy and the German Gesellschaft, a forum for political centrists and nationalists with close ties to the German state and foreign policy establishment. Unlike the Society of Friends, the Gesellschaft was not a new organization; created in 1913, it was active well before the founding of VOKS and OBI. By the early 1920s, in the wake of Versailles and Rapallo, the Gesellschaft had succeeded not only in establishing itself but also in cementing relationships with the German authorities. Equally important, in the decade between its prewar founding and its emergence as a leading centre of East European studies, the Gesellschaft deliberately linked scholarly, state, diplomatic, and economic interests. The institution arose out of the idea for a 'German-Russian society' mooted in 1912, when 108 German politicians, professors, and administrators made an exploratory excursion to St Petersburg. By the time of the Gesellschaft's founding in 1913, extra-scholarly concerns in the field of Ostforschung were already second nature. In its original incar-

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nation, the Gesellschaft included 102 members from the worlds of German scholarship, law, journalism, and economics. The historian Otto Hoetszch, student and successor of the prominent founder of O Ostforschung, Theodor Schiemann, would reject the strong anti-Russian sentiments of his mentor but would continue to enmesh East European studies with politics and diplomacy. To the German Foreign Office, Hoetzsch characterized the goals of the Gesellschaft as both 'scholarly' and 'practical-propagandistic,' but initially at least, his diplomatic contacts were not overly enthusiastic.25 All of that changed, however, after the Gesellschaft was reactivated in 1920 after a hiatus prompted by the war. In the wake of the war, German cultural and scientific initiatives in Soviet Russia assumed greatly heightened importance for the 'Eastern orientation.' Hoetzsch's month-long stay in Moscow, which began on 20 September 1923 - the first trip to Soviet Russia by a 'bourgeois' German scholar - enjoyed the full cooperation of the German ambassador, Graf Ulrich von Brockdorff-Rantzau. In the midst of visits to museums and scholarly institutions, Hoetzsch met with Chicherin and consulted with Kameneva. Although he compared the Communist Party to a religious order and lamented the disappearance of the old cultivated classes, Hoetzsch's impressions were mostly positive.26 The stage was set for the Gesellschaft to develop simultaneously deep connections with the German Foreign Office and friendly contacts with VOKS. One would expect that the Gesellschaft's close ties with the German government would have aroused the suspicions and hostility of the Bolsheviks, but these connections were in fact responsible for much of the Gesellschaft's allure for the unfolding enterprise of Soviet cultural diplomacy. In the 1920s the Gesellschaft became the most important German organization devoted to Russian studies. At its height it included about three hundred members, most of them in Berlin, from within the academic world and from without. Through its lectures, meetings, and publications, the Gesellschaft sponsored research as well as exchanges of information on contemporary Russian history and Soviet developments and policies. It found in VOKS an important and reliable source for recent Soviet books and publications; its leaders considered these crucial for their work (it is interesting to note that the Soviet Union had no comparable scholarly institution devoted entirely to German studies). The Gesellschaft in the 1920s continued to maintain the tight linkage between the worlds of academe and policy that had characterized

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its prewar existence. Michael Burleigh has contrasted this pragmatic focus on contemporary history and politics with another, parallel strand of German Ostforschung - one that emphasized ethnocentric, geopolitical, and cultural-geographical concepts and that revolved around the pre-modern German ethnic presence in the East. This ethnocentric strand, which later achieved prominence under the Nazis, was represented by the Stiftung fur deutsche Volks- und Kulturbodenforchung in Leipzig. It too had a 'functional relationship' to the state in that it provided long-range historical arguments in favour of a German presence in Eastern Europe. There was a degree of cross-fertilization between the contemporary and pre-modern wings of Weimar Ostforschung.27 The various interests represented by the Gesellschaft's member constitute a virtual encyclopedia of non-leftist motivations behind the 'Eastern orientation' favouring positive relations with the USSR. Hoetzsch's main partner, and president of the Gesellschaft, was the science organizer Friedrich Schmidt-Ott, a long-time higher education official in the Prussian Kultusministerium who rose to the rank of minister in 1917. In 1920 he assumed the leadership of the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Association for German Science), which became the leading German force behind Soviet-German scientific cooperation. Schmidt-Ott thus boasted of close ties to the German cultural and foreign policy establishments as well as great administrative experience in science. Like Hoetzsch, he assumed that scientific and cultural connections with Russia were 'above all political' - a phrase that could have come from any Bolshevik - in that cultural initiatives would serve the goals of German foreign policy. Indeed, the Gesellschaft was directly supported by funding from the Kulturabteilung (Cultural Division) of the Foreign Office and initially also by the Kultusministerium.28 As a scholarly centre promoting 'modern' scholarly research agendas that were believed to have contemporary relevance for current German-Soviet relations, the Gesellschaft actively included financial, industrial, and trade interests. Leading figures from Deutsche Bank, Siemens-Werke, AEG, and others interested in promoting exports or economic relations with the USSR were represented in the leadership of the Gesellschaft. The Gesellschaft also developed ties to the Economics Institute in Konigsberg; given the close links among regional political, business, and scholarly interests favouring increased trade relations between East Prussia and the USSR, these ties were noted by VOKS in 1925 as enhancing the Gesellschaft's importance.29

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Hoetzsch himself exemplifies several of the long-standing motivations propelling the Gesellschaft's cooperation with the Soviets in the 1920s. His scholarship, which he insisted had to be politically relevant but non-partisan, was marked by a lifelong concern with Great Power politics, German imperial might, and the Trimat der Aussenpolitik' (primacy of foreign policy). Hoetzsch believed that German national interests were best served by an alliance of strong German and Russian states. Underlying his thinking was a deeply ingrained anti-Polonism and a nationalist desire (widely shared) to revise the Versailles settlement. His inclination towards Russia was prompted initially by concern about the 'Polish danger' closer to home, and was cemented by a firm recognition of the benefits of a Germano-Soviet rapprochement after Versailles.30 Revealingly, before 1919 he toyed with the idea of an anti-Soviet alliance with the Western powers, but Versailles locked in his 'Eastern orientation' for the duration of the Weimar period.31 On the spectrum of postwar politics, Hoetzsch staked out a centrenationalist position with a clear orientation towards foreign policy. A monarchist early on, he belonged to the moderate wing of the rightist Deutschnationale Volkspartei (DNVP). Unlike most of his fellow party members, he became a 'Vernunftrepublikaner' (republican on rational grounds) resigned to the advent of the Weimar Republic. From this perch, he propounded a 'Tory democracy' that would maintain a degree of noble and elite hegemony in the democratic age. He opposed antiSemitism within the DNVP, but as the party's foreign-policy expert in the Reichstag until 1930, he agreed wholeheartedly with the antiVersailles and strong-Reich planks in the party program.32 While Hoetzsch's Gesellschaft became a leading forum for commentary on contemporary Soviet politics and culture, and Hoetzsch welcomed close ties with VOKS as a means of gaining first-hand sources for scholarship, the Soviet internal order concerned him far less than the international arena. He firmly opposed Gustav Stresemann's Westward tilt in German foreign policy, which began around 1925. While the German Foreign Office hoped that investing in the Gesellschaft's scholarly and cultural initiatives might moderate Soviet international behaviour in a crisis, Hoetzsch clearly dreamed of far more from the relationship: a historically destined geopolitical partnership.33 Soviet relations with Hoetzsch's Gesellschaft developed with some intensity between 1923 and 1925, which were the years leading up to the foundation and emergence of VOKS; this ensured a continuing and ubiquitous comparison with the Society of Friends. The first number of

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the Gesellschaft's organ Ost-Europa appeared in August 1925. In the month before the appearance of that issue, the general secretary of the Gesellschaft, Hans Jonas, who had learned Russian as a POW during the First World War, formally requested VOKS 'support' for the journal, by which he meant that VOKS should supply articles from Soviet authors. Ost-Europa became the first German scholarly organ devoted solely to contemporary Soviet and East European affairs. The range of its publications, its relatively high level of coverage, and its regular commentators (such as Arthur Luther, the journal's regular observer on cultural, educational, and scientific affairs) made it a publication valued by the German Foreign Office, and most embassies in Moscow subscribed to it. Hoetzsch's own many publications 'registered GermanSoviet relations like a seismograph.'34 For its part, VOKS greatly valued the opportunity to publish - in a non-leftist venue - prominent Soviet figures such as Education Commissar Lunacharskii, the pedagogue Pinkevich, and the sociologist Reisner, as well as many others of a more 'specialist' bent such as jurists and statisticians.35 Kameneva agreed to send contributions provided that Ost-Europa banned Russian emigre authors, made no changes to Soviet articles, and provided a larger honorarium. Hoetzsch proved willing to forego his links with the Russian emigration.36 Despite a number of moments of friction over articles in the journal that VOKS considered unflattering or anti-Soviet, the relationship proved attractive to both sides. Indeed, Hoetzsch can even be seen as jealously guarding his VOKS connections. The German historian Christoph Mick has detected a certain element of rivalry and competition between the Gesellschaft and the Society of Friends in the period after the society of left-leaning 'friends' arose under the aegis of the very Soviet institution, VOKS, with which the Gesellschaft was most closely involved. Symbolically, in her trips to Germany, Kameneva visited both organizations. On one occasion in 1928, when Kameneva was in Cologne for an international exhibition, she urged the mayor, the future German chancellor Konrad Adenauer, to establish a local branch of the Society of Friends. The Gesellschaft reportedly responded by warning Adenauer about the 'political character' of its left-leaning rival and tried to persuade him to open a chapter of the Gesellschaft instead!37 By 1925 the allure of potential influence over prominent German policymakers had so turned the heads of Soviet embassy personnel in Berlin that some began to favour a complete reorientation of VOKS's

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cultural efforts towards the Gesellschaft. Significantly, the most optimistic assessment of the Gesellschaft's potential came from the Soviet Embassy in Berlin, where the VOKS representative and Berlin diplomat, Nikolai Nikolaevich Shtange, became the point man for the publication of Soviet authors in Ost-Europa. Shtange maintained that precisely because the Gesellschaft was conservative and nationalist in orientation, it would not be suspected of Soviet manipulation and might thus better serve as a cover for Soviet interests. On 24 August 1925 he wrote to Kameneva that the Gesellschaft held 'more and more significance for us.' It had great resources, visible names, and a 'purely German character' - a phrase that could have come from any German nationalist - that endowed it with advantages over the Society of Friends. Because OstEuropa maintained a 'national political physiognomy,' it would be authoritative to those wide circles of the educated public that Das neue Russland, the VOKS-sponsored organ of the Society of Friends, 'is completely incapable of penetrating.' In contrast, 'very many' people harboured 'doubts and mistrust about the information in Das neue Russland.'38 In general, Soviet cultural officials and diplomats placed enormous faith in the influence that could flow merely by placing materials of Soviet origin in foreign publications. Shtange gave the fullest expression to his preference for the Gesellschaft over the Society of Friends in an important September 1925 report to Kameneva and NKID's Central European Section. To him, the Gesellschaft's 'direct ties between government and scholars' were not liabilities but assets. He stressed that 'we have influence over it,' and that the situation was 'profitable': Of course, we must not close our eyes to the fact that bourgeois figures and scholars who are 'well-disposed' toward us will hardly defend our interests in the case of a serious crisis between Germany and the USSR. But they will all the same not speak out openly, even if we were not connected to them by other means. During the conflict [in Soviet-German relations] last year many of the members of the 'Society of Friends of the New Russia' distanced themselves from the society and even left it. In normal circumstances we have in the Gesellschaft a highly powerful apparatus, which we can use for the propaganda of the idea of rapprochement among bourgeois circles in Germany.39

Kameneva agreed with Shtange that the Gesellschaft deserved 'broad support,' and she agreed to provide articles for its journal, set up a book

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exchange, and arrange lectures, securing M.M. Litvinov's approval for all of the above. Significantly, Shtange also favoured a shift in the Society of Friends away from the intelligentsia and towards Comintern control - in this case not out of militancy but out of his overwhelming interest in the non-leftists. However, Kameneva - who did so much to fend off Comintern incursions into VOKS affairs40 - was adamant about maintaining oversight over the Society of Friends and insisted on cultivating the German leftists and nationalists simultaneously. It seems that her sharp retorts to Shtange on these questions prompted him to proffer his resignation as VOKS representative in September 1925.41 Even so, relations between VOKS and the Gesellschaft continued to progress and can be said to have reached their high point after the 200th jubilee of the Russian Academy of Sciences in 1925. This was hardly a matter of chance. For one thing, Schmidt-Ott travelled to Moscow several times in both his capacities: as president of the Gesellschaft, and as director of the Notgemeinschaft. The Gesellschaft's cooperation with VOKS did play a role in bringing to fruition a series of high-profile scientific and cultural events, including the week of Soviet natural science, the week of Soviet history held in Berlin in 1927 and 1928, respectively, and the week of German technology held in Moscow in 1929.42 By claiming some of the credit for the rise in German-Soviet scientific initiatives during these years, Kameneva was implicitly defending VOKS's success and indispensability, and her claims rested on VOKS's work with non-leftists and nationalists.43 Like the Society of Friends, however, the Gesellschaft was not immune to stinging criticisms from Soviet analysts and officials. These focused on its tight links to the organs of German foreign policy and government.44 Indeed, those close connections made the notion that the Gesellschaft could easily be used for Soviet purposes - the position Shtange took in 1925 - open to easy rebuttal. In 1926, Hoetzsch was lionized at one of VOKS's 'evenings of friendship' (vechera sblizheniia), with NKID Deputy Commissar Litvinov himself making a significant foreign policy speech at VOKS's headquarters in the Riabushinskii mansion. When Hoetszch spoke to his Soviet audience of the 'Russian land ... birch trees ... as a base for ... the Russian soul' and read a passage aloud from The Brothers Karamazov, Kameneva's frank remarks about how Hoetzsch 'did not share the Soviet program' must have seemed an understatement.45 Moreover, in the years after 1927 the Gesellschaft's organ Ost-Europa, in the words of one historian, underwent a 'slow transformation' - the result of 'pressure from without...

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and compromise within' - that made it increasingly risky to 'say anything positive about the Soviet Union/46 The Gesellschaft was unsuccessful in attempts to establish independent ties with cultural officials in Ukraine and Georgia, and 'influential circles' of the Gesellschaft were accused of maintaining links with the Ukrainian 'white emigration' in Germany.47 In the late 1920s, moreover, Hoetzsch and the Gesellshaft were subject to the same kinds of sharp internal judgments that were aimed at the Society of Friends. For example, Hoetzsch's 1929 assurances in Moscow to VOKS Central European analyst LevitLivent that German foreign policy circles were no less interested in the Eastern orientation than earlier in the decade were dismissed with great scepticism. Hoetzsch was portrayed as avoiding any serious talks about developing further initiatives with VOKS, and his Berlin discussions of his Soviet trips were characterized as 'unfavourable' to the USSR. In other reports, Levit-Livent emphasized that the Gesellschaft 'cannot be viewed as our ally' and that 'it will always remain a weapon of German policy, of the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs.'48 By the end of the 1920s, in the eyes of closely involved Soviet observers, the Gesellschaft was, if not discredited, then at least perceived as not living up to expectations. Yet it is telling that Levit-Livent, harsh critic of the Gesellschaft though he was, did not reject the kinds of goals the Soviets harboured all along vis-a-vis German nationalists - he only criticized the Gesellschaft as an adequate vehicle for them. 'We must have influence in Germany over the left-wing and middle bourgeoisie, embracing the laboring intelligentsia, and also over a part of that rightwing bourgeoisie that is the opponent of the policy of agreement with the Western allies,' he stated, reaffirming the dualistic strategy by qualifying class with political categories. Through this influence we will get into the ranks of bourgeois circles themselves, neutralizing hostile attitudes toward us.'49 As we shall see, a parallel disillusionment with the Society of Friends in the mid to late 1920s led to a search for new levers of influence in the early 1930s. At the same time, VOKS continued in certain other contexts to tout the Gesellschaft as a major asset, so that it - like the Society of Friends remained a showcase in VOKS summary reports to the Soviet political leadership. It was almost a point of pride that the Gesellschaft had resources and got results; in 1930 it was even portrayed as nothing less than VOKS's instrument for acting on the 'national conservative bourgeoisie.'50 This allure, however tarnished by the late 1920s, allowed VOKS to tolerate the Gesellschaft's links to the Weimar diplomatic

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establishment as well as its pursuit of a particularly 'national' concern with the Volga Germans.51 At the same time, to his own domestic audiences, Hoetzsch played up the Gesellschaft's service to German foreign policy - indeed, he ensured that the Gesellschaft took no major step without consulting the Foreign Office - as waxing right-wing forces increasingly attacked the Gesellschaft for being pro-Soviet and for being manipulated by, in the words of one such denunciation, 'comrade Kameneff Bronstein' (that is Kameneva) and the GPU.52 In the end, what sustained VOKS's relationship with the Gesellschaft was each side's belief that it was successfully manipulating the other. Dilemmas of Control: The Society of Friends of the New Russia While the Gesellschaft held out the prospect for influence over hard-toreach 'bourgeois' and government circles, the Society of Friends - a new institution created by Comintern and Soviet initiatives - held out the prospect of direct Soviet control over sympathizers. The society's debut in the years after 1923 was rather impressive. Its lectures, cultural events, meetings, and visitors from the Soviet Union, as well as its influential journal, Das neue Russland, all were able partially to fill a hunger on the part of German intellectuals for greater contact with the new socialist society to the east. Indeed, to many the society's attraction likely lay not only in the badge of sympathetic identification it offered but also in the opportunities it extended for contact with visiting Soviet figures and information about Soviet culture, science, and society.53 Although the membership was sprawling, the fact that it was large and included a number of cultural and scholarly luminaries was an asset: while they rarely took part in the society's activities, a number of famous figures joined at the outset, including Albert Einstein, Thomas and Heinrich Mann, Franz Oppenheimer, and Karl Griinberg. In 1925 the Society of Friends was reported to have between seven hundred and eight hundred official members, who 'more or less' paid official dues; this number was supplemented by a large group of KPD members who took part in its activities as well (these comprised the approximately two hundred 'unofficial members' who 'for party reasons' were not registered). In 1930 the society, including its several new regional affiliates, was reported to have thirteen hundred members.54 The ethos of the society was consistently Sovietophilic. As Kameneva's correspondence shows, the core members of the society were vetted for their sympathy to the Soviet experiment. In one such document

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from May 1924, Kameneva characterized the society as 'made up in large part of journalists and litterateurs who sympathize with the USSR, and in particular those who themselves spent time with us recently.'55 This was a motley group of radical democrats, social reformers, pacifists, and others united by the pull of the first socialist society. However, the membership over the years also included teachers, doctors, jurists, and artists interested in Soviet activities in their disciplines; scientists and scholars primarily interested in broadening German-Soviet scholarly relations; parliamentarians and public figures, including a small group of Social Democrats; and politicians and intellectuals whose primary interest lay in the 'Eastern orientation/56 As Erich Baron underlined to Kameneva in 1928, a number of German high officials attended the society's talks and evenings depending on the Soviet topic presented; for example, when Soviet law was discussed, officials from the Justice Ministry attended, and when well-known Soviet figures such as Lunacharskii or Semashko spoke, 'all of intellectual Berlin' showed up. The non-leftist visitors also included parliamentarians and officials, professors of many political persuasions, and, on many occasions, the German Ambassador to the USSR, Brockdorff-Rantzau. All of these figures and more would be lost, according to Baron, if Soviet connections behind the Society of Friends became more visible. 'Active and valued members of our Society include Reichsjustizminister Dr. Koch, the Reichskunswart Dr. Radslob... as well as the leader of the German Volkspartei Dr. Schulz, who is a contributor to our journal by way of Hannover.'57 Many of these members of the Society of Friends, it will be noted, were influential non-leftists of the sorts that inspired such marked Soviet enthusiasm for the Gesellschaft. The implications of this are noteworthy: despite the society's leftist profile and orientation, there was in fact a distinct overlap between the society and the Soviets' nonleftist German interlocutors of the era. Even so, the openly pro-Soviet nature of the Society of Friends did significantly affect the kinds of goals that VOKS articulated for it, which differed from those it formulated for more politically and ideologically distant figures. One constantly reiterated task was to propagate a favourable view of Soviet 'achievements' in culture and science specifically and in the construction of Soviet socialism as a whole. Among the rationales for building up cultural contacts in Western Europe more generally were the long-standing concerns within VOKS, NKID, and other agencies for countering anti-Soviet publicity and bad press. In the late 1920s, VOKS also oriented its activities around inter-

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national communist public opinion campaigns, such as the one against anti-Soviet military intervention. The possibilities opened up by the Society of Friends, therefore, revolved around influencing the attitudes of cultural elites and the outlook of the 'intelligentsia/ as well as 'mobilizing public opinion' in Europe. In contrast, Soviet aspirations with the non-leftists and nationalists revolved less around openly disseminating cultural propaganda and more around influencing foreign policy, neutralizing hostility on the part of politically influential figures in the event of a crisis, gathering information and covert contacts, and penetrating otherwise closed groups and milieux. The Society of Friends was a cultural front organization. Unlike nonleftist organizations, it offered the Soviets the prospect of direct, behindthe-scenes control. Much could be accomplished through a front organization by establishing a chain of command with a selected local leader and a pliable presidium, and this remained VOKS's preferred modus operandi with such organizations for decades. On the ground in Germany, Erich Baron, a communist, took on the day-to-day leadership of the society and served as the main figure with whom VOKS worked until 1933. A succession of VOKS representatives in the Soviet Embassy in Berlin served as liaisons between Baron and the VOKS leadership. The record shows that in 1924 Kameneva was in frequent touch with Baron, at various times objecting to German authors in his journal, recommending German contacts of her own, and offering advice on setting up the society's specialized sections.58 During the heyday of the Society of Friends, Kameneva maintained direct ties with certain core members as well. In October 1923, working at that time through OBI, she informed NKID that 'the arrival of the Society of Friends of the New Russia has already commenced/ Among the visitors were the radio engineer Georg Graf Arco, the art critic Max Osborn, and the activist writer Elena Stocker of the Bund fur Mutterschutz (League for the Protection of Motherhood). In 1925, Kameneva characterized Stocker to the Leningrad OGPU as a pacifist journalist who was known for writings and speeches that worked 'to the advantage of Soviet Russia/ Arco, Osborn, and Stocker had all attended the founding meeting of the Society of Friends in Berlin on 1 June 1923, and all became part of its leadership.59 Kameneva also maintained contact with several other key figures. VOKS's crucial contributions to the society were also organizational and financial. From Moscow, VOKS arranged lectures, cultural events, and tours for Soviet cultural and political figures and was heavily

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involved in supplying Das neue Russland with reports by well-known Soviet authors on Soviet culture and 'socialist construction.' Furthermore, neither the journal nor the society would have survived without VOKS's direct financial subsidies. To cite just one example in a lengthy parade of financial crises, in mid-1924 Kameneva was told that without VOKS funding the society's activities would have to stop. As Gol'dshtein, the VOKS representative at this point, put it: 'As I have already written you constantly, such a society cannot survive on its own resources.'60 It was in the realm of oversight that the first VOKS disappointments with the Society of Friends arose. Despite all its dirigiste urges, even during the peak period of the early 1920s VOKS was constantly forced to both limit and conceal those levers it did have in order to maintain the appearance of the society's vaunted 'neutrality.' Constant frustrations were built into the enterprise of covert oversight from a distance and the attendant reliance on local emissaries. The initial close cooperation of Baron with VOKS petered out once the Society entered a period of routine and stasis after 1925. There were, moreover, charges of laxity. In late 1925 Kameneva complained to Nikolai Nikolaevich Krestinskii, the Soviet Ambassador to Germany, that despite VOKS's hard-currency subsidies, Baron had not yet submitted a single substantive report (otchet) on the society's activities.61 Baron, who had a background in publishing, apparently devoted the bulk of his time to producing the society's Das neue Russland. VOKS was also upset that Baron apparently refused to replace or alter the society's presidium between 1925 and 1933.62 Even worse, it turned out that a very large proportion of those who had signed up as 'friends' of the USSR were completely inactive in the society, so that - just as in many Soviet 'social' organizations - there were massive numbers of 'paper' members. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, fourteen regional affiliates were founded in other German cities, but, as a 1933 letter by the VOKS deputy director charged, 'a large portion of them in reality remain on paper.' In Munich, the local branch was apparently being used by a Bavarian entrepreneur to recruit tourists for Intourist trips, and Baron was accused of not knowing the number of members in Berlin and elsewhere.63 As early as 1924, when Kameneva's personal emissary Roman Veller travelled to Berlin to assess the situation, there were already complaints that Baron was doing little to activate the membership and therefore was unsuitable for the job. In the late 1920s there were mounting criticisms that Baron and the society's original core activists were unsuitable for influencing

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German public opinion. Indeed, until 1933 there were repeated Soviet discussions about the need to replace Baron, but this never happened.64 In light of the mounting problems with creating an organization that would be vibrant in its German milieu as well as under Moscow's control, VOKS's optimistic assessments to Soviet party and state organs about the upward climb of the society seem even more misleading. Typically, one early document baldly asserted that 'we' guaranteed the 'leading influence' of communists in the society, either through society members or the VOKS representative.65 Yet for all the rhetoric, Kameneva apparently realized how fragile the Society of Friends really was, and did not press matters with Baron. She even turned into a champion of the society's autonomy, deploying arguments about how delicate it was for VOKS to intervene, when she wished to fend off Comintern and KPD proposals to enlist the society for short-term political goals. As she wrote in 1925, if overt political interference were indulged, 'all the famous names' among the friends would inevitably leave. In 1926, in a discussion with the Agitprop department of the Comintern, Kameneva asserted that '90 percent' of the society's work stemmed from VOKS's initiatives. Yet VOKS could only exert influence through certain comrades and members, and for this reason it refused to take 'responsibility' for the society as a whole. 'We are of the opinion that we cannot openly run the work of the Society, so that the appearance continues to be that the "Society of Friends" is a self-run organization in its own country.'66 If one adds the difficulties of controlling the society from afar to all the other problems of paper memberships, one can appreciate that VOKS had many reasons to be dissatisfied. The dilemmas VOKS faced were compounded by the fact that diplomats in the Soviet Embassy including those working also as VOKS's representatives in Germany, tended to be far more keen on pursuing influential non-leftists rather than the sympathetic 'friends.' In late 1924 Veller reported to Moscow that VOKS's representative Shtange and other embassy officials were devoting almost no energy to the Society of Friends, speaking of it 'sourly' and depriving it of their support: 'Shtange has an extremely cold attitude toward the Society of Friends. This is explained by the fact that the Society, which has many prominent names, in fact has shown no influence in affecting German public opinion.'67 As we saw, in 1925 Shtange articulated a strong position favouring the Gesellschaft over the Society of Friends. That position involved a critique of the Society of Friends as a sponsor of purely 'decorative' activities, where the majority of 'friends'

Soviet-Weimar Cultural Diplomacy 127 joined merely as a token of 'more or less friendly relations with the Soviet Union/ Shtange expected influential non-leftist partners to be less ineffectual - in part because no one would suspect they were controlled by the Soviets. Kameneva firmly rejected Shtange's position in favour of pursuing both kinds of partners simultaneously.68 Tellingly, during high-level discussions of VOKS's profile in 1928, she defined its goals as 'uniting the left intelligentsia' - a formula again combining class and political qualifications - around the 'idea of Soviet culture/ Kameneva openly asserted that 'leftist tendencies' in Europe were more advanced than among those Soviets who aped bourgeois and popular European culture, and argued that leftist European intellectuals would help move the best features of the new proletarian culture abroad.69 As we shall see, an unwillingness to relinquish the German 'friends' - a position justified on pragmatic grounds but anchored in a political-ideological position - remained the mainstream VOKS position even after Kameneva's removal in late 1929. Significantly, VOKS began to cultivate extreme right-wing German intellectuals in the early 1930s. In the mid-1920s, even while the profile of the Society of Friends as a bastion of pro-Soviet intellectuals was being questioned, the focus of VOKS itself came under fire. In September 1925 Kameneva returned from Berlin to counter suggestions from within the VOKS administration that the Moscow centre for cultural diplomacy should conduct work among the 'non-party working masses' and 'democratic circles,' and 'not only among the intelligentsia/ Kameneva, however, was adamant that VOKS's mission had definitively crystallized around 'scholars and the intelligentsia abroad/ While students and other 'elements' in the population might well join the large audiences at the lectures and exhibitions of the Society of Friends, VOKS did not have enough 'bases' to change its primary constituency. This discussion underscores the centrality of the friendship societies in VOKS's plans at that time. The obvious need for direct Soviet sponsorship in propping up even the German 'front' - the strongest society of its kind in Europe - and Kameneva's concern with consolidating VOKS's already existing outposts, suggests one reason why VOKS consistently preferred not to stray far from its selected partner organizations. The model of the German Society of Friends established in Berlin thus turned out to be a boomerang reinforcing the central notion that VOKS's proper domain in general was 'culture' and the non-party 'intelligentsia,' not the revolutionary, communist, or labour movements. Between

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1924 and 1927, a series of challenges to that decision from the Comintern and Willi Miinzenberg forced VOKS and Kameneva to articulate and defend that definition of its mission more staunchly. In 1925 and 1926, the Comintern's Agitprop Department took the opportunity to voice its wishes (Wiinschen) regarding the reorientation of VOKS's work. Specifically, the Comintern hoped to establish closer ties between the friendship societies and European communist parties, which should be brought as close as possible to the political left and the 'proletarian organs.' The Comintern was pressing for greater influence in the societies that VOKS claimed as its domain. In these political skirmishes Kameneva vigorously defended the post-1923 status quo.70 In 1927, as the Comintern moved from a 'united front' into its 'third phase' strategy of more partisan activity in Germany, VOKS had to fend off a more serious attempt on the part of Willi Miinzenberg to wrest the Society of Friends away from VOKS. His goal was to use it as a wedge for communist recruitment in the Social Democratic and labour movements. In this plan, some fellow-travelling intellectuals would still be included, but the focus would be on winning proletarian 'friends' of the Soviet Union for more directly party-political purposes. The working-class cachet and the Comintern and KPD interests involved prompted Krestinskii, the Soviet Ambassador in Berlin, initially to come out in favour of 'fundamentally reorient[ing] if not completely liquidat[ing]' the existing intelligentsia societies of friends. Kameneva was called to Berlin to discuss the issue; there, she vigorously defended VOKS's 'cultural' course.71 In the period leading up to the celebration of the tenth anniversary of the October Revolution in 1927, Miinzenberg convened in Moscow a separate 'Congress of Friends of the Soviet Union/ which was attended by leftist German intellectuals, including eight members of the German Society of Friends. Some participants wanted to subordinate the society to the KPD; others wished to secure its independence from VOKS. But Kameneva prevailed with a resolution favouring the society's continued 'non-party' and 'non-political' character. This set the course for the addition of more cultural and scholarly subsections within the society. Faced with a fait accompli, Miinzenberg enlisted some of the very same leftist sympathizers for a separate, mass organization confusingly called the Bund der Freunde der Sowjetunion (League of Friends of the Soviet Union). His labour-oriented clubs and Soviet film societies were so close to the KPD that for many years VOKS expressed fear of becoming associated with them.72 In many ways, this caution was well advised. The

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Reichskommissariat fur Uberwachung der offentlichen Ordnung (Commissariat for the Observation of Public Order), which had always kept the Society of Friends under surveillance, conflated the two organizations and viewed them as identical. The German Foreign Office, which took a softer line than the security police on the ideological danger posed by the Society of Friends, recognized the society as an arm of the Soviet state rather than the Comintern.73 The Munzenberg offensive was deflected only after the tenth anniversary jubilee, surely one of the most significant events in the history of Soviet cultural diplomacy. The October celebrations became a major event for VOKS, which was heavily involved in extending invitations to many non-party Western intellectuals. An analysis of the lists of invitees points to a mix: they included figures whose presence would garner greater prestige for the Soviets, and others who had already shown themselves to be significant friends of the Soviet Union. In the first category, for example, Albert Einstein and Carl Griinberg, the director of the Institut fur Sozialforschung in Frankfurt, were both courted by the VOKS representative in Germany but declined to travel to Moscow. In the second category, representatives of both the Society of Friends and the Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas were included. Gesellschaft secretary Jonas and Society of Friends activists Arco, Stocker, and Eduard Fuchs were all there.74 With the help of its existing model of the Society of Friends, VOKS under Kameneva staved off Comintern and other left-militant Soviet attempts to reorient its work. Between 1923 and 1927, in another boomerang effect, the German society played an important role in reinforcing VOKS's definition of its overall mission. However, VOKS's domestic political vulnerability to charges that it was neither sufficiently communist nor sufficiently proletarian in its foreign mission was evident well before the upheaval of the Comintern's 'left turn' abroad and Stalin's Great Break at home hit VOKS in 1928-9. After Kameneva's downfall in late 1929, VOKS's original mission came under fire again. As a result, in 1930 and thereafter, the Society of Friends was pressured to become a more active fighter for the positions and interests of the USSR; in other words, VOKS began pushing its German front organization towards greater politicization. The German drift towards the right between 1931 and 1933 also influenced the Society of Friends and VOKS's strategies. The society and its journal began foregrounding more 'national' and foreign policy themes than previously. As Christoph Mick has put it, 'toward the end of the

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Weimar Republic the Society of Friends occasionally allowed "national revolutionary" authors to have the floor in its journal and itself played upon the instrument of the "Spirit of Rapallo/" As discussed in the next section, Baron himself joined the new far left/far right hybrid Society for the Study of the Soviet Planned Economy, Arplan, when it was founded in 1932. At the end of that year, Friedrich Lenz, the ultranationalist professor of political economy who founded Arplan, pondered in Das neue Russland the geopolitical and civilizational significance of the first Five Year Plan for Germany's national destiny 'between Moscow and Versailles.' His distinctively 'National Bolshevik' analysis, proSoviet from a position of hard nationalism, ended with this conclusion: 'Stalin's USSR is the only country which offers the Germans - despite their state weaknesses and social disunity - greater room for maneuver [Spielmum] both technologically-economically and linguistically-culturally.'75 The publication of Lenz's tract in the Society of Friends' 'progressive' organ exemplified a striking paradox: the 'left turn' associated with the first phase of Stalinism prompted the Soviet Union to pursue a more openly politicized, militant cultural diplomacy; yet at the same time it opened the door for more extensive relations with certain intellectuals of the extreme German right. The Opening to 'National Bolshevism' and Conflicts over Arplan Given the jaded view of both the Gesellschaft and the Society of Friends that VOKS analysts expressed after the late 1920s, it is hardly surprising that Soviet cultural diplomacy was open to finding new partner organizations during the twilight years of the Weimar Republic. What was surprising was that the new partner was Arplan (Arbeitsgemeinschaft zum Studium der Sowjetrussichen Planwirtschaft). Arplan was an unusual organization, united as it was by a heterodox fascination with the planned economy and the Five Year Plan. It drew together groups represented in the more established German partner organizations. Like the Gesellschaft, it included among its members academic scholars, although there were more economists and engineers among them than East European specialists. Like the Society of Friends, it included leftist sympathizers and had a communist fraction. But Arplan also boasted a large contingent of far-right and fascist intellectuals. This made sponsorship and support of Arplan controversial within VOKS. VOKS's relationship to Arplan differed in telling ways from its earlier experiences with the Gesellschaft and the Society of Friends. The

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Gesellschaft was a pre-existing organization of influential non-leftists that had a strong interest in reaching out to Kameneva's VOKS in the early 1920s; the Soviets, for their own reasons, were eager to pursue the relationship with this politically well-connected scholarly organization. The Society of Friends was a cultural front organization that was originally the fruit of Miinzenberg's Comintern-based operations among sympathetic intellectuals, but which VOKS avidly touted behind the scenes as the crown jewel of its European cultural front organizations. Both served as showcases for VOKS at home. In contrast, the hybrid composition of Arplan made it the subject of dispute within Soviet officialdom. Moreover, because of its far-right and hard nationalist contingent, Soviet links to it were far more covert than with either of the previous partner organizations. The differences between VOKS's relationship with Arplan and those with its earlier German partners were apparent from the first news of the new German planning society in 1932. VOKS's German analysts and the VOKS leadership in Moscow were initially unaware of the rise of a new German organization interested in the planned economy; only in the first half of 1932 did they become acquainted with it, through reports by its representative in Berlin, Aleksandr Girshfel'd. Girshfel'd worked as the VOKS representative in charge of cultural diplomacy in Germany; he was also a diplomat with the rank of secretary in the Soviet Embassy in Berlin. Intensely interested in Germany's rightward political and ideological drift, he was also something of a special operative with ties to the Russian secret police, and he was involved in a broader communist strategy to make overtures to the extreme right. In his role as the main Soviet figure managing the overtures to the new German planning group in Berlin, Girshfel'd maintained a triple identity. In the course of 1932, acting as much in his other capacities as in his role as VOKS representative, Girshfel'd established relations with Arplan and informed VOKS about it from afar. He guarded his contacts with Arplan jealously, and not just on self-aggrandizing grounds. Much like the Gesellschaft in the mid-1920s, Arplan was perceived as important because its members included influential non-leftists who were unlikely to be seen in their German milieu as puppets of the Soviet Union or international communism. Girshfel'd's intense interest in nationalists and his almost scornful lack of attention to leftist fellowtravellers was strikingly reminiscent of Shtange's 1925 tilt towards the Gesellschaft. Girshfel'd's commitment to Arplan was based on his belief that Soviet involvement would be much more effective in places where

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no one would expect it. Like Shtange before him, Girshfel'd implicitly rejected VOKS's dualistic German strategy, a stance that inevitably provoked conflict with the VOKS leadership. Girshfel'd berated VOKS for not having 'the slightest understanding' [of the] 'character of the relationship between the [Soviet] Embassy and Arplan' and for being unable to grasp 'the meaning of the existence of this organization, which is utterly German for the outside world and for the official leadership of Arplan.'76 Girshfeld's October 1932 report to NKID and VOKS highlighted the importance of the current political context: during the 'intensive growth of fascism' (fashizatsii) in German society it had become crucial for the Soviets to work through organizations such as Arplan, which had a 'thoroughly German image' (sugubo-nemetskii oblik). But the advantages of working with Arplan transcended its image: the group included revolutionary nationalists who, in their willingness to deal with the Soviets, were obviously exceptions to the more mainstream far-right loathing of all things communist. This made the Soviet opening to Arplan different from VOKS's mid-1920s cultivation of non-leftists in the Gesellschaft, who were not overly afraid of publicly acknowledged Soviet connections. In deference to the signal changes in the political climate from the early 1920s to late Weimar, Girshfel'd emphasized that the leadership of the German organization must not 'feel' Moscow's influence, 'which must be deeply and reliably concealed behind the scenes.'77 Girshfel'd anchored his bid to handle the bulk of Soviet interactions with Arplan in the need for secrecy and the prominence of rightwing radicals in the group. For all the caution required, it was the very presence of rightists in the hybrid left-right group that fuelled the intense interest of Girshfel'd in this enigmatic group. The initiator and chairman of Arplan was Friedrich Lenz of the University of Giessen, a professor of law and economics who was deeply involved in far-right political activities. With his background in political economy (he had completed a 1912 thesis under the influence of a brand of scholarly socialism), Lenz became an ultranationalist during Weimar but of a sort different from a number of other right-wing radicals. Rational and realist rather than irrationalist and volkisch in his exposition, the Giessen professor in his 1927 Aufriss der politischen Okonomie (Outline of Political Economy) deployed economic analysis to describe the West in familiar nationalist terms as the site of vulgar materialism, cosmopolitanism, and individualism. In 1927 he became the main force behind the journal Vorkampfer, , published in seven thou-

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sand copies, which increasingly sounded themes of radical anti-capitalism within the 'new nationalism/78 This anti-capitalism formed one basis for Lenz's interest in Soviet economic planning, which might be adapted by Germany to launch an autarkic challenge to the Western great powers. Lenz launched Arplan with his contacts in the generally conservative German academic setting and the world of right-radical politics. While he did, Girshfel'd channelled his input to the new organization through the political journalist Arvid von Harnack, who stood with Lenz at the helm of Arplan as the organization's secretary. Significantly, Harnack was a former extreme rightist (a Freikorps member in the early 1920s) who in the early 1930s became an 'unofficial' - that is secret, member of the KPD. The core of Girshfel'd's faith in Arplan turned out to be his utter certainty that he could control the organization through his well-placed assets; as he put it in February 1932 to Fedor Petrov, Kameneva's successor as director of VOKS, Arplan 'is developing under our direct influence.'79 No doubt, he could also rely on Arplan's communist fraction, but Harnack was especially useful because of his position as secretary, his nationalist credentials, and his hidden communist affiliation. Girshfel'd briefed VOKS on the unusual new German organization as he helped arrange Arplan's first activities in Berlin. That city was the epicentre of Soviet and Comintern activity in Europe, and Girshfel'd made himself useful to the German group by arranging lectures by Soviet planning officials and by ensuring the presence of specialists on the planned economy at Arplan's discussions and conferences. Arplan's activities were launched in January 1932 with a two-day conference in Berlin, during which the group's communist and nationalist intellectuals sparred over the applicability of the Soviet planning model for Germany as well as over how to characterize Soviet intentions in Europe. At the inaugural gathering the Soviet planning official S.A. Bessonov spoke on no fewer than three occasions. In April 1932, Girshfel'd attended an Arplan conference at which Lenz and Hoetzsch spoke about the ten years of the Treaty of Rapallo. The VOKS representative used his report on the gathering to make the case directly to Petrov that Lenz had a far more positive view of the achievements of the Five Year Plan than the Gesellschaft's Hoetzsch, and that therefore Arplan was of far more value to Soviet cultural diplomacy than the old Gesellschaft.80 Over the course of 1932, VOKS officials in Moscow became involved in such activities as securing planning literature from the Soviet State

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Planning Agency (Gosplan), tracking attitudes towards the Soviet Union in publications by Arplan members, and arranging a Soviet visit by a young Giessen colleague of Lenz, Georg Mayer, who was a nonleftist member of Arplan said to be potentially moving towards Marxism.81 What really heightened VOKS's interest in Arplan were proposals made in mid-1932 by German planning enthusiasts that a delegation be sent to the USSR in the summer of that year. Arplan's study trip (Studienreise), with all the expenses and arrangements it required, brought Girshfel'd into much closer contact with VOKS regarding the composition and activities of Arplan.82 This is when the controversies began. In an especially revealing report to NKID in October 1932, Girshfel'd made his position explicit. The current Soviet 'cultural-political line,' he wrote, lay in 'deeply penetrating radical and right-oppositionist circles of the intelligentsia, who have political weight, widening sources for our influence and information.' Given the German shift to the right, Soviet methods would have to be 'more subtle,' trained on German organizations that were 'externally unimpeachably loyal.' Since he viewed only those figures who had no visible Soviet connections as capable of 'propagandizing the idea of politico-economic detente [sblizhenie] with the USSR/ he made no mention whatsoever of leftwing intellectuals - neither those in such institutions as the Society of Friends nor those in the large group within Arplan itself.83 In contrast, when Shuman, the head of VOKS's Central European Section, first studied the list of Arplan members earlier in 1932, he seemed taken aback by the bizarre combination of left-wing and rightwing intellectuals. 'It seems to us,' he wrote Girshfel'd in March, 'that ... the composition of "Arplan" is extraordinarily motley [pestrym]. Will the Society be able to function with such a composition?' Nationalists, he worried, may have joined the society in order to influence it in unwanted ways. Finally: 'Who is this Count Reventlow, the wellknown Hitlerite or someone else, who has ended up as a member of Arplan?'84 As VOKS became more familiar with the nature of Arplan, this initial bafflement quickly turned into a scepticism that VOKS officials would maintain in almost all of their dealings with the group. This set the stage for differing positions with regard to the implications of Arplan's far-right element. VOKS officials certainly did not discount the potential value of Arplan and the need to develop Soviet relations with it. But the way they saw it, any benefits they might accrue from

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Soviet involvement in Arplan would come in spite of the far-right membership, not because of it. It is telling that Petrov, a former Bolshevik cultural official, in April 1932 reported to leading Bolshevik historian and academic administrator Mikhail Pokrovskii that Arplan was 'well connected to academic circles in Germany' and would be directed by VOKS towards useful results 'despite the fact that the composition of the Society is very non-homogenous and several rightist professors are members.'85 Internal Soviet controversies over Arplan in 1932 and 1933 crystallized within a broad political and ideological context. To understand those disagreements fully, we must consider the history of Arplan from both the German and Soviet perspectives. The Soviet overtures to various far-right 'National Bolshevik' and 'conservative revolutionary' intellectuals in the early 1930s had been unconventional, but in the context of the Soviets' experience in forming communist alliances with revolutionary nationalist politicians and intellectuals in the 1920s, they were not unprecedented. Indeed, the Weimar years witnessed a number of political and intellectual intersections between communism and the radical right-wing currents of Germany's 'conservative revolution/ It is interesting that the two single most significant episodes of communist political alliance with the forces of the extreme nationalist and fascist right took place during the two greatest crises of the Weimar Republic: the first during the French and Belgian occupation of the Ruhr in 1923 and the abortive communist uprising of that year, and the second during the late Weimar drift to the right that culminated in the Nazi seizure of power. The earlier of these intersections, which came in the midst of the occupation of the Ruhr, characteristically involved the Comintern, the KPD, and the highest levels of the Soviet state. The KPD's 'Schlageter line' was introduced on 21 June 1923 at an open session of the Comintern's executive committee when top Soviet German expert Karl Radek who was sent to Germany during the revolutionary events of that year - 'electrified the Communist world by offering to make common cause with German fascism.' In his eulogy to the ultranationalist Nazi martyr Schlageter, a veteran Freikorps first lieutenant shot by the French for sabotage in the Ruhr, Radek introduced the notion that 'those who had turned to fascism in their despair over the social ills and enslavement of their nation' no longer needed to be considered anathema. In the summer of 1923 the Schlageter line led to a number of negotiations and joint actions involving communists and fascists (though not, however,

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Hitler). For a brief time, posters with the swastika and Soviet star appeared together. One result of such far right/far left political manoeuvring was to stimulate among extreme-right intellectuals and cultural critics an appreciation of the Soviet order that stood in contrast to the conventional nationalist hatred of communism.86 This political alliance of the ideological extremes, though shortlived, set a precedent on the communist side and nurtured those intellectual currents on the far right in the mid-to-late 1920s that felt a certain attraction to Soviet communism. Those currents continued to develop in Germany in the ideological sphere. First, in the post-1929 'third period' of the Comintern, German communists were encouraged to fight 'social fascists' (the Social Democrats) more than the right itself. Next came a noticeable swing to the right in the country as a whole in the early 1930s, during which the KPD saw a 'great chance to win socialist-thinking elements from the NSDAP.' Finally, in the early 1930s a number of measures were taken to draw working-class support away from fascist organizations and nationalist slogans were injected into communist propaganda. In 1930-2, this policy became known as the 'Scheringer line' of the KPD, named after the Reichswehr officer who, like Schlageter before him, became a symbol of the communists' concessions to nationalism. Politburo member Heinz Neumann was charged with overseeing this strategy, which, according to a leading German historian, was 'without doubt [basedl on a direct order from Stalin.'87 The Scheringer line has clear implications for our understanding of the Soviet relationship with Arplan: it formed the immediate political preconditions that paved the way for a shift in Soviet cultural diplomacy from the centre-right nationalists of the Gesellschaft to the radical and fascist right of Arplan. The jealous manner in which Girshfel'd protected his interactions with Arplan from attempts at oversight on the part of VOKS (and NKID) bolsters the interpretation that this opening to far-right nationalist intellectuals was in part a special Soviet initiative coordinated with the broader German communist strategy of appealing to the increasingly potent nationalist right. If the Scheringer line informed the immediate political context for Soviet involvement in Arplan, the line itself was made possible by a long intellectual past in which a strand of the German 'new nationalism' nurtured not merely covert fascination but also overt praise for certain aspects of Soviet socialism. The ferociously anti-Western world view of the new nationalism contained the seeds of a romantic view of the new Bolshevik regime to the east as a vehicle for a new Russian-

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Asian civilizational challenge to the West. Oswald Spengler, a key figure in the conservative revolution in intellectual life, in his 1919 Preussentum und Sozialismus furthered the appropriation of aspects of revolutionary socialism into a German national framework. His 'Prussian socialism' was a dictatorship of the German state, not the proletariat.88 Yet despite his great influence on later conservative revolutionaries, Spengler considered Germany part of the declining West; in this, he had more affinity with the old 'politics of cultural despair' than with the robust expectation that a new German Reich was about to dawn. Moeller van den Bruck, whose 1923 Das Dritte Reich introduced the notion of the Third Reich/ contrasted the 'young peoples' of the 'East' - which now included Germany with Russia - with the capitalist, materialist West. In the early to mid-1920s, Moeller, like Spengler, also called for socialism to be transformed from a class to a national phenomenon. Moeller's introduction of the notion of a Third Reich in the 1920s was built on a fantastic Ostideologie (Eastern ideology) in which a spiritual Schicksalsgemeinschaft (community of fate) of the young peoples against the decadent, liberal West would correspond to an alliance of communists and nationalists against the republicans at home.89 With the contributions of Spengler and Moeller, the stage was set for fullfledged 'National Bolshevism' - a term current in German politics since 1919. The phenomenon of 'National Bolshevism' has been called one of Weimar's most ambiguous creations, a 'paroxysm of the conservative revolution.'90 In my view it is best seen as that persistent strain within the new nationalism which, in addition to channelling revolutionary energies into a nationalist framework, consistently recognized positive aspects of Soviet communism. Perhaps the most influential National Bolshevik was Ernst Niekisch. Like several other revolutionaries of the right, he had a background in the socialist movement; most notably, in 1919 he had briefly been chairman of the Bavarian Workers', Peasants' and Soldiers' Soviet in Munich. The occupation of the Ruhr in 1923 prompted his conversion to absolute nationalism and volkisch support for all forces - including fascism and communism - that opposed the Western world of Versailles in all its forms. The Widerstand (Resistance) Circle, which Niekisch founded in 1925, took its name to signify opposition to the Western powers. Niekisch called for a national mission for German workers and urged the German Volk to orient themselves towards Soviet Russia, which he considered a 'young,' anti-Western partner for Germany. For him, then, the proletarian-communist idea was prima-

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rily an anti-Western challenge and his National Bolshevism was closely linked to the 'primacy' of East-West geopolitics. In the late 1920s, Niekisch saw in the Five Year Plan a great national struggle against Western Europe destined to endow Russia with that independence which Germany so needed for itself. In his eyes, Stalin's dictatorship was a virile example of total mobilization and a 'model' for Germany; while it was not necessary to Bolshevize, Russify, or Asiatize Germany, it was imperative for Germany to take into account this 'oriental type' as it found its own solution. Niekisch in this period episodically referred to this solution as 'German Bolshevism.'91 Interestingly, Louis Dupeux has portrayed Niekisch's strong opposition to Hitler and the Nazis before and after 1933 as emanating from the furthest extremes of the right rather than the 'left of the Right': Niekisch attacked Nazism as a particularly dangerous creature of the AngloFranco-Jewish West!92 A range of other more minor figures, publications, and splinter groups mirrored Niekisch's consistently favourable view of the Soviet Union on the extreme right - a position eased by the notion that Leninism itself represented a Russian national revolution and that 'socialism in one country' was a Russian Sonderweg (special path).93 Drawing elements of the German extreme right to the USSR, then, were a profound anti-Westernism, the Eastern orientation in geopolitics, the notion of national as opposed to proletarian revolution, and a new nationalist transfiguration of elements of revolutionary socialism. In the early 1930s we might add to this mix a new wave of interest stimulated by the First Five Year Plan, which brought with it a transideological interest in planning and, on the far right, outright fascination with the regimented mobilization of Soviet socio-economic transformation. Niekisch was an active Arplan member who had contact with Lenz, its founder and chairman. Although the tenor of the activist Niekisch's thought was irrationalist and that of the political economist Lenz was rationalist, both were opponents of Hitler and the Nazis within the camp of the extreme right, and both shared a strong interest in the USSR. Indeed, Lenz straddled two of the key subgroups in the Arplan membership: an academic contingent of economists, engineers, and professors, and the extreme nationalists and National Bolsheviks, who constituted about one-third of the membership. Besides Niekisch, radical rightist figures included Niekisch's social and political acquaintance, Ernst Junger, the icily brilliant loner of the conservative revolution. Jiinger made his name by celebrating the total war experience in

Soviet-Weimar Cultural Diplomacy 139 his 1920 Stahlgewittern (Storms of Steel). Around the time he joined Arplan, he published his 1932 work, in part inspired by the Five Year Plan, Der Arbeiter: Herrschaft und Gestalt (The Worker: Mastery and Form) - 'an elaborate vision of a future totalitarian order mobilized for industrial production and destruction/ in which the 'worker-soldier' would become the 'new man/94 Also an Arplan member was Graf Ernst zu Reventlow, ultranationalist author of a celebrated 1914 work on German foreign policy and a volkisch social revolutionary, who had publicly engaged with Radek in the communist press during the period of the Shlageter line and who joined the Nazi Party in 1927. Reventlow is counted among the socalled 'left Nazis/ those who took the 'socialism' in 'national socialism' seriously. Hugo Fischer and Hans Zehrer were Arplan members, both affiliated with the leading journal Die Tat. Werner Kreitz was close to Jiinger and was also Lenz's associate as the publisher of Vorkampfer, sharing the fascination of both these figures for the military-Utopian mobilization and national autarky embodied in the Soviet industrialization drive. In 1931, Kreitz devoted a series of articles in that journal to Soviet planning, in which he did not hide his admiration for Stalin as a realist man of state in close contact with the national 'Russian soul'; this publication provided one context in which Lenz decided to found Arplan the next year. Another of Arplan's far-right nationalists, Joseph 'Beppo' Romer, was a captain in the Bavarian paramilitary group Oberland in the early 1920s and has been called one of the most active 'National Bolsheviks' in the years that followed; he was, moreover, one of the few of their number to succumb fully to the Soviet charm offensive in 1932 and to adopt Communist Party positions.95 Two members of Arplan from Heidelberg, Giselhert Wirsing and Ernst Wilhelm Eschmann, were also politically close to the far right - the first to Die Tat and the second to the Nazis.96 Several of these figures from the camp of rightist revolutionaries were located in and around the ideological and political world of National Socialism - indeed, they can be seen as contributors to the intellectual development of pre-1933 German fascism. The Soviet overtures to Arplan targeted a specific kind of far-right nationalist intellectual. Girshfel'd interpreted his mission as concentrating on that segment of the far right that harboured positive views of the Soviet regime - the National Bolsheviks. In a report he wrote in October 1932, he stated unequivocally that the main goal of the Soviet line on Arplan was 'penetration into various right-radical groupings of

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the intelligentsia that represent so-called National Bolshevism (Tat, Aufbruch, Vorkampfer, etc.)/97 Besides the academics and the National Bolsheviks, Arplan boasted a sizeable and prominent contingent of members on the left. Its six communist intellectuals included the philosopher Georg Lukacs, China scholar Karl Wittfogel, and prominent KPD official German Dunker, and was rounded out by a swathe of non-party Marxist figures. Lukacs joined the Soviet Communist Party during his time in Moscow after 1929 and was directed by the Party to Berlin in 1931. Moving over there to the KPD, he worked primarily with leftist intellectuals and writers. But along with Wittfogel he was also involved in recruiting radical rightist figures to a Soviet-backed organization, the Bund Geistige Berufe (Union of Intellectual Professions), which, much like Arplan, mixed leftist and rightist German intellectuals.98 Finally, Arplan included a number of figures with long-standing Soviet ties - including the hygienist Heinz Zeiss, discussed at length in this volume, who worked in the USSR for a decade after 1921. In the category of prominent German 'partners' of the Soviets who joined Arplan are two whose joint appearance is especially noteworthy: Hoetzsch from the Gesellschaft and Baron from the Society of Friends!99 Indeed, much like the Society of Friends itself, Arplan encompassed a range of figures and political tendencies prepared to engage the Soviets. What was novel about Arplan's membership was that the number of nationalists was roughly equal to the number of leftists, with the far-right and fascist element prominent in a manner that was unprecedented. In their resistance to Girshfel'd's line on Arplan over the course of 1932, the mainstream VOKS officials were generally supported by NKID analysts and by other allies such as Gosplan officials. The tensions triggered by the choice between sympathetic leftist friends and influential nationalists were now expressed in more concentrated form. It bears repeating that the mainstream of VOKS differed with Girshfel'd not over engagement with Arplan, but over the rationales behind that engagement. VOKS's German experts consistently touted advantages of Arplan that had nothing to do with its capacities as a vehicle for attracting radical rightists. Instead, they emphasized Arplan's scholarly interest in the planned economy and the attractiveness for Soviet cultural diplomacy of Arplan's connections to German universities and academe (where the presence of the political left was almost non-existent both before and during Weimar).100 In other words, they justified Soviet engagement with Arplan on the basis of

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the traditional VOKS mission in cultural diplomacy (creating links to cultural and scientific figures). Girshfel'd sought to take one strand of that traditional mission - the concern with influential non-leftists - and apply it to the extreme political right. By stressing other advantages of supporting Arplan, such as the promotion of the image of the planned economy among Germany's intelligentsia, VOKS and NKID officials tacitly refused to adopt Girshfel'd's innovation. A second arena for disagreement turned on the extent of Soviet support for Arplan. Girshfel'd joined Soviet economic officials in Berlin in lobbying for extensive Soviet financial support, including an entire library on planning to be supplied by Gosplan. This provoked extensive discussions among Soviet officials, and in the end modest subsidies were provided for the Arplan delegation to the USSR in the summer of 1932. But the VOKS leadership joined NKID and Gosplan officials in rejecting significant material aid for Arplan.101 With this move VOKS succeeded in downgrading Arplan's importance for Soviet cultural diplomacy. A third and last area of conflict related to differing evaluations of the exclusivity of Soviet engagement with Arplan and similar organizations that contained far-right figures. Girshfel'd, as we have seen, displayed no interest in cultivating leftist sympathizers and fellow-travellers in Germany. There are hints that behind VOKS's clashes with him over Arplan lay a continued commitment to the less covert dimensions of cultural propaganda as well as a desire to do what was possible to maintain Soviet support on the German left. Just like Kameneva in her 1925 response to Shtange, the antagonists of Girshfel'd at VOKS and NKID repeatedly defended simultaneous engagement with existing organizations, in particular the leftist Society of Friends. Nonetheless, even while they continued to advocate attention to the Society of Friends and the Gesellschaft, Girshfel'd's correspondents in VOKS's Moscow office agreed at the end of 1932 that a prime task of 'cultural work' in Germany was 'infiltration [proniknovenie] into segments of the right-oppositionist intelligentsia.' Repetition of this standardized formulation suggests that such 'infiltration' was part of a line or directive approved on high - further implying that it could not be openly challenged or overtly scuttled by VOKS officials. Those Bolsheviks who would have been the first to insist that culture can never be separated from politics were rendered incapable of discussing directly the political implications of their own cultural policy in Germany. They therefore took a stand on a range of specific and targeted objections - and perhaps also against Girshfel'd

142 Michael David-Fox himself, as their sharply worded letters suggest. Perhaps the most frank confrontation with Girshfel'd came at the end of 1932, when VOKS's deputy director, E.O. Lerner, rebuked the VOKS representative in Berlin for paying excessive attention to Arplan and ignoring such proven venues as the Society of Friends. This exclusive focus, in the 'general opinion' of VOKS and NKID, could 'become an absolutely negative factor in the cause of winning important layers of the intelligentsia for us. All of us at VOKS understand perfectly well what Arplan represents, and even so we do not share your point of view about its importance for the Embassy.' Lerner admonished Girshfel'd that his attempt to run Arplan exclusively through the Soviet Embassy in Berlin, bypassing VOKS's oversight, was unacceptable.102 In sum, VOKS and NKID analysts were suspicious of the rightist connections and strove not to make them the centre of their German policy even when the new line on attracting the radical right was openly acknowledged. Girshfel'd, in contrast, placed top priority on infiltration and control and on the political significance of the rightists in Arplan. This leads us to one more potential motivation in the attempt to cultivate National Bolsheviks. Lurking behind Girshfel'd's formulation on the importance of seeking new sources of 'influence and information' on the right lay another interest not uncommon in the Soviet relationship with Western intellectuals: intelligence and espionage. Girshfel'd was involved after 1933 in recruiting as Soviet agents at least one Arplan member and one National Bolshevik figure. Indeed, the Arplan member he recruited into the anti-fascist resistance was the organization's secretary and 'unofficial' communist, Arvid von Harnack, and the National Bolshevik was a former editor of Die Tat. Other telling albeit fragmentary evidence links Girshfel'd's operations among extreme German rightists in 1932 and 1933 (including his connection to the left/right hybrid Bund Geistige Berufe) to the NKVD rezidentura (headquarters) in Berlin.103 That a number of other Soviet figures in Berlin, besides Girshfel'd, were prepared to endorse the gamble of abandoning leftist sympathizers is suggested by an extraordinary protocol of Erich Baron's meeting with Girshfel'd and other Soviet representatives in Berlin in February 1932. At least two Soviet figures in addition to Girshfel'd spoke out about the imminent 'death' of the Society of Friends and the inevitability of its replacement by Arplan: These people are important to us.'104 If some tradeoff was inevitable in at least these Soviet eyes, it is important to recall the partial overlap between the Society of Friends and Arplan, on the one hand, and between the Gesellschaft and Arplan, on

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the other. This has already been noted in the case of the Society of Friends: a small minority of its members subscribed to 'National Bolshevik' ideas, and such revolutionary nationalist notions were even given some currency (as we have seen in the case of Lenz) by the society's journal in the early 1930s. The head of the Society of Friends, Baron, felt it necessary or expedient to become a member of Arplan. An even more striking example of such overlap involved the prominent publicist Adolf Grabowsky of Berlin's Hochschule fur Politik, a member of the rightist Anti-Bolshevik League: Grabowsky was a Society of Friends member as well as a contributor to the Gesellschaft's Ost-Europa who joined Arplan when the time came.105 Connections also existed between the Gesellschaft and Arplan, as evident in Hoetszch's enrolment in the new organization. In addition, Klaus Mehnert - an up-and-coming Gesellschaft member who became secretary of that organization in the early 1930s and who conducted research in the USSR for his influential studies of Soviet youth and education - was actually responsible for coming Arplan's name and was active within it as a lecturer.106 Not surprisingly, there were also open antagonisms among the three institutions. Baron, head of the Society of Friends, denounced Hoetzsch's Gesellschaft in 1932 as a 'reactionary association.' For his part, Girshfel'd warned Arplan leaders Lenz and von Harnack that Arplan should avoid entanglements with the Gesellschaft. Finally, a degree of open rivalry can be detected in the Gesellschaft's reaction to the founding of Arplan. Always jealous of sharing his Soviet connections, Hoetzsch tried unsuccessfully to co-opt Arplan's Lenz into the Gesellschaft's presidium. According to Girshfel'd, the Gesellschaft 'did not like' the favourable Soviet overtures to Arplan. Hoetzsch (in Girshfel'd's undoubtedly inexact rendition) was trying to claim a 'monopoly' on 'private' (that is, non-governmental) ties with the Soviets. Certainly more reliable is Girshfel'd's report that he advised Arplan's Lenz and Harnack to in no circumstances allow Hoetzsch or the Gesellschaft to influence Arplan.107 Notwithstanding the enthusiasm for Arplan among Soviet officials in Berlin, the consistently cooler attitude on the part of VOKS officials and their allies in Moscow did much to mitigate Soviet support for the hybrid German organization. The sparring on the Soviet side, rooted in the broader choice between leftists and nationalists, persisted right up until the Nazis seized power. Broadly speaking, Soviet cultural diplomacy of the late Weimar period - a strategy that downplayed leftist sympathizers and that pursued influence among far-right nationalists even as the Nazis prepared their victory - can be viewed as a disastrous failure.

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In the late 1920s and early 1930s, in the wake of Stalin's Great Break,108 VOKS's mission of focusing on the 'culture' and the 'intelligentsia' abroad again came under fire. But this time the pressure came not merely from Comintern manoeuvring and institutional rivals of VOKS, but from increasing militancy within the organization itself - and from the increasing awkwardness of courting foreign, bourgeois figures as a wave of anti-intelligentsia and anti-specialist persecution at home was unleashed during the first phase of Stalinism. The dangers for VOKS of the militant upheaval on the 'cultural front' inside the USSR were heightened by the potential stigma of its 'soft' cultural mission. Reacting to the dangers, VOKS modified its mission: it would politicize its cultural work as much as possible and focus on more attractive-sounding groups such as the 'labouring intelligentsia.' To the VOKS leadership in 1931, Petrov gave an interesting formulation of VOKS's updated mission in terms of 'cultural' form serving 'political' content: Our work cannot be reduced to the purely cultural [k chistomu kul'turnichestvu] ... What do we strive for in relations with foreigners? We try, first of all, to attract into the orbit of our policy various circles, to force them to act in accordance with our political demands ... The essence does not consist of telling Western Europe: here is our enlightenment, here are our achievements and results of our cultural construction. This is just a form for us that serves a certain content and prompts the intelligentsia at the given stage not to counter our construction but, on the contrary, to march with us.109

Whereas for Petrov the task seemed to lie somewhere between manipulating and winning minds, the practical implications of the Great Break change in course were that VOKS injected increasingly shrill political demands into its cultural-diplomatic activities. In contrast to Kameneva's relatively more subtle and deliberately low-key methods of the 1920s, in the new era VOKS's publications and communications increasingly focused on what were deliberately designed to be more militant, strident, and propagandistic campaigns, such as the one against the dangers of war and intervention against the Soviet Union. The new style of cultural diplomacy blurred if not obliterated previously articulated lines between 'scholarly' and 'cultural' affairs and propaganda. The quality and content of Soviet cultural diplomacy changed significantly because VOKS was taking pre-emptive political action to limit the fallout from its associations with foreign intelli-

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gentsia. In other words, this could be considered one of the greatest boomerangs of all. The irony was that even as these pressures led to the radically heightened politicization of Soviet cultural diplomacy, communist strategy in late Weimar sanctioned a pursuit of the politically 'alien' German nationalists and even fascists. To be sure, Soviet outreach activities to the extreme right wing of the political spectrum always related far more to the covert side of cultural work, and were therefore de facto excluded from the political struggles in Moscow over the refocusing of VOKS's mission. External and internal dimensions in the history of Soviet culture were interrelated, but in the end, this does not mean they worked smoothly or in tandem. Reflections on Dualism This chapter has traced the ramifications of the ingrained dualism in Soviet cultural diplomacy in Germany as it played itself out over the course of the Weimar years. I have established that in this most important case of Soviet bilateral cultural and intellectual relations, one can hardly assume that Soviet leanings were towards ideological sympathizers in terms of either cultural policy or institutional orientation. On the contrary, Kameneva was committed to pursuing both angles, and we have observed a noteworthy progression from Shtange's tilt towards the centre-right Gesellschaft in the mid-1920s to Girshfel'd's preoccupation with the extreme-right National Bolsheviks in Arplan in the early 1930s. But the material calls for more far-reaching conclusions. Identifying Soviet cultural diplomacy as 'dualistic' implies linkages, not just separations, between the dual objects of its attentions, which were Germany's leftist and nationalist intellectuals. The several dichotomies that have implicitly and routinely structured much historical thinking in this area - between political left and right, between ideology and Realpolitik, between the 'hard' study of politics and foreign policy and the 'soft' study of culture, between fellow-travelling intellectuals and scholars and scientists - do not apply in this case. Constructing these oppositions only draws attention away from the manner in which Soviet policy connected them together. To understand Soviet cultural diplomacy in Germany, we must synthetically reconstruct a set of interactions that traversed the political and ideological spectrum. More than that, the material suggests that each of those dichotomies that scholars have con-

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structed retrospectively was at the time connected inside the German context as well. The Gesellschaft, the Society of Friends, and Arplan were not hermetically sealed from one another: their memberships overlapped, there was some common ground in the multiple agendas and motivations of these institutions, and they all were motivated to interact with the Soviets. Ideological fascination with the Soviet order was not confined to the left; it also affected the extreme right, and the spur of German 'national' interests in the Eastern orientation also touched non-rightist parts of the political spectrum. Finally, the Soviets' simultaneous pursuit of leftists and nationalists in Weimar cultural diplomacy was linked to a broader communist political strategy in Germany, one that could prefer exploiting the Schlageter and Scheringer openings into the fascist right over giving any quarter to German social democracy. This, in turn, can be seen as one of the origins of the German catastrophe that commenced in 1933. The Soviets' choice between leftists and nationalists during the Weimar years was resolved by default, with the destruction of the German left by the Nazis. NOTES 1 The numbers were unusual, but the phenomenon was not unique: in the mid-1930s in Britain, during the years of the Popular Front and collective security, Soviet ambassador Ivan Maiskii pursued initiatives to create ties with British conservatives, who were seen as ready to engage the Soviets essentially because of the foreign policy conjuncture. See his overview in 'I. Maiskii. Pol. pred. SSSR v Velikobritanii. Brio Pred. VOKS -1. Smirnovu. 9 ianvaria 1938 g./ Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (State Archive of the Russian Federation, Moscow, henceforth GARF), /. 5283, op. 2a, d. 2, /. 68-72, esp. /. 69. 2 France was the innovator as early as the 1870s. 3 Kurt Diiwell, 'Die Griindung der kulturpolitischen Abteilung im Auswartigen Amt 1919-1920 als Neuansatz: mhaltliche und organisatorische Strukturen der Reform auswartiger Kulturpolitik nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg/ in Kurt Diiwell and Werner Link, eds., Deutsche auswartige Kulturpolitik seit 1871 (Cologne and Vienna: Bohlau Verlag, 1981), 46-7. 4 In making these observations I have found the following works suggestive: Wolfgang Kasack, 'Kulturelle Aussenpolitik/ in Oskar Anweiler and KarlHeinz Ruffmann, eds., Kulturpolitik der Sowjetunion (Stuttgart: Alfred Kroner Verlag, 1973), 351-4, and Frederick C. Barghoorn, The Soviet Cultural

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5

6

7

8

9

Offensive: The Role of Cultural Diplomacy in Soviet Foreign Policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1960). VOKS has been little studied outside the highly circumscribed Soviet-era scholarship, which did, however, establish the basic contours of its work in detail. The latest of such works is N.V. Kiseleva, Iz istorii bor'by sovetskoi obshchestvennosti za proryv kul'turnoi blokady SSSR (VOKS: seredina 20-kh nachalo 30-kh godov) (Rostov-na-Donu: Izdatel'stvo Rostovskogo Universiteta, 1991). See also Ludmila Stern, Trench Intellectuals and Soviet Cultural Organisations in the 1920s-1930s' (PhD dissertation, University of New South Wales, Australia, 2000), chs. 5 and 6 on VOKS; and Michael David-Fox, 'From Illusory "Society" to Intellectual "Public": VOKS, International Travel, and Party-Intelligentsia Relations in the Interwar Period/ Contemporary European History 11, no. 1 (2002): 7-32. See, for example, the seven articles in the special issue on 'Soviet Archives: Recent Revelations and Cold War Historiography/ Diplomatic History 21, no. 2 (1997): 217-306. Nigel Gould-Davies debunks common fallacies about the role of 'ideology' in Soviet international behaviour - including the old saw that 'ideologues' must have a master plan, must be inflexible and aggressive, and cannot cooperate with adversaries - in 'Rethinking the Role of Ideology in International Politics/ Journal of Cold War Studies 1, no. 1 (1999): 90-109. But his analysis is still geared towards isolating ideology as a kind of variable rather than understanding a disseminated system of beliefs (not necessarily totally uniform or coherent) that can inform many different kinds of causal phenomena in other historical spheres. For my approach to this problem, see Michael David-Fox, 'The Fellow-Travelers Revisited: The "Cultured West" through Soviet Eyes/ Journal of Modern History 75, no. 2 (2003): 30035, and David-Fox, 'On the Primacy of Ideology: Soviet Revisionists and Holocaust Deniers (In Response to Martin Malia)/ Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 5, no. 1 (2004): 81-106. For two recent exceptions in very different areas, see Mark Kramer, 'The Early Post-Stalin Succession Struggle and Upheavals in East-Central Europe: Internal-External Linkages in Soviet Policy Making/ Journal of Cold War Studies 1, no. 1 (1999): 3-55; 1, no. 2 (1999): 3-38; 1, no. 3 (1999): 3-68; Erika Wolf, 'When Photographs Speak, to Whom Do They Talk? The Origins and Audience of SSSR na stroike (USSR in Construction),' Left History 6, no. 2 (1999): 53-82. Witold S. Sworakowski, The Communist International and Its Front Organizations: A Research Guide and Checklist of Holdings in American and European Libraries (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution, 1965).

148 Michael David-Fox 10 GARF,/. 5283, op. 8, ed. khr. 2,1.108. 'Ob"edinennoe Biuro Informatsii Komissii zagranichnoi pomoshchi/ no exact date, 1924. 11 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 37, /. 54. 'F.A. Rotshtein, chlen kollegii NKID. Po voprosu ob informatsionnom biuro pri Komissii zagran. Pomoshchi. 17dekabrial923.' 12 On Miinzenberg's direction of propaganda and other activities specifically towards non-communist artists and intellectuals during the famine period, see Babette Gross, Willi Miinzenberg: Eine politische Biographic (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1967), 134-5, and subsequently with fellow-travellers, 230-5; on the early history of the Society of Friends and references to Soviet and East German literature on it, see E.I. Kolchinskii, ed., Sovetskogermanskie nauchnye sviazi vremeni Veimarskoi respubliki (St Petersburg: Nauka, 2001), 67-72. The German society in 1923 was followed in 1924 by those in England, Czechoslovakia, Sweden, and Denmark, and a range of others in subsequent years. V.I. Fokin, Mezhdunarodnyi kul'turnyi obmen i SSSR v 20-30 gody (St Petersburg: Izdatel'stvo Sankt-Peterburgskogo Universiteta, 1999), 101-36. 13 The most informative work on Western philanthropic activity chronicles the activities of the American Relief Administration: Bertrand M. Patenaude, The Big Show in Bololand: The American Relief Expedition to Soviet Russia in the Famine of 1921 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2002). 14 On the role of the I AH in the formation of the Society of Friends, see Christoph Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, Funfjahrplan und deutsche Russlandpolitik 1928-1932 (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1995), 182-6. 15 Helmut Gruber, 'Willi Miinzenberg's German Communist Propaganda Empire 1921-1933,' Journal of Modern History 38, no. 3 (1966): 289. 16 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 31, /. 10-12, Kameneva to Chicherin, 8 December 1924; ibid., d. 118, /. 1 reverse, Kameneva to Moskvin (TsK), 5 January 1928. 17 Ibid., /. 3, 'Postanovlenie kollegii NKID ot 8-go dekabria s.g. [1924].' 18 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 31, /. 62, Kameneva to D.B. Riazanov, 12 December 1924. 19 Ibid., /. 5, 'Vypiska iz pis'ma tov. O.D. Kamenevoi Narodnomu Komissaru po Inostrannym Delam, tov. G.B. Chicherinu. 8 dekabria 1924.' VOKS later had occasion to defend the autonomous status of the societies of friends from their home governments in various countries; this became especially relevant in the case of France, where governmental involvement might have weakened Moscow's behind-the-scenes management of the Paris organization. Ludmila Stern, 'Iz predistorii sozdaniia frantsuzskogo obshchestva kul'turnogo sblizheniia Novaia Rossiia (po ranee neopublikovannym materialam VOKSa),' Australian Slavonic and East European Studies 11, nos. 1-2 (1997): 147,154-5.

Soviet-Weimar Cultural Diplomacy 149 20 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 37, /. 52. 'Semashko. RSFSR. Narodnyi komissar Zdravokhraneniia. Predsedatel'iu komissii zagranichnoi pomoshchi tov. O.D. Kamenevoi/ 16 December 1924. 21 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 31, /. 75, Kameneva to V.V. Kuibyshev, 18 December 1924; GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 97, /. 112, 'Vypiska iz protokola Orgbiuro, 14/ VI-27.' For more on VOKS's relationship with the domestic intelligentsia in the 1920s, see David-Fox, 'From Illusory "Society" to Intellectual "Public."' 22 On these points, see especially Kiseleva, Iz istorii bor'by sovetskoi obshchestvennosti. 23 For example, see GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 4-20, Tolozhenie v Germanii,' undated, probably 1925. 24 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 20, /. 9, 'Mezhvedomstvennoe soveshchanie organizatsii, vedushchikh zagranitsu rabotu. Soveshchanie - 30.111.29 g.'; GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 118,1.84-5, 'O.D. Kameneva. V Sekretariat TsK VKP(b)/ no earlier than 25 July 1928; ibid., /. 1-3, 'O.D. Kameneva. Tov. Moskvinu. TsK VKP(b)/ 5 January 1928. 25 Michael Burleigh, Germany Turns Eastwards: A Study of Ostforschung in the Third Reich (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 14; Uwe Liszowski, Osteuropaforschung und Politik. Ein Beitrag zum historisch-politischen Denken und Wirken von Otto Hoetzsch, vol. 2 (Berlin: Arno Spitz Verlag, 1988), 485,488-9. 26 Here see Gerd Voigt, Otto Hoetzsch 1876-1946. Wissenschaft und Politik im Leben eines deutschen Historikers (Berlin [East]: Akademie Verlag, 1978), 1789,318-19; Kolchinskii, ed., Sovetsko-germanskie nauchnye sviazi, 74. 27 Burleigh, Germany Turns Eastwards, 25-32. 28 Liszkowski, Osteuropaforschung und Politik, 2:490-4, 492n37; Voigt, Otto Hoetzsch, 320. 29 Edgar Lersch, Die auswartige Kulturpolitik der Sowjetunion in ihren Auswirkungen auf Deutschland 1921-1929 (Frankfurt am Main: P. Lang Verlag, 1979), 84-91; Voigt, Otto Hoetzsch, 194-5; GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 113A, Shtange to Kameneva, 24 August 1925. Aleksander Girshfel'd - the Soviet diplomat and VOKS representative who in the early 1930s demonstrated at best cool indifference to the intellectual sympathizers and cultural figures embodied most in the Society of Friends - was the former Soviet consul in Konigsberg. 30 The place of Poland in Hoetzsch's thought on Russia has been most succinctly and forcefully explicated by Friedrich Kuebart, 'Otto Hoetzsch Historiker, Publizist, Politiker. Eine kritische biographische Studie,' Osteuropa, no. 8-9 (August-September 1975): 603-21. See also Burleigh, Germany Turns Eastwards, 15-21; Liszkowski, Osteuropaforschung und Politik, 1:229.

150 Michael David-Fox 31 Liszkowski, Osteuropaforschung und Politik, 1: 230. 32 Liszkowski's vol. 1 is devoted to a close analysis of Hoetzsch's journalistic and political opinions during the Kaiserreich (15-127), the First World War (128-98), and Weimar (199-248). On Versailles, see 230; on DNVP and his views of Soviet domestic politics, see 204-39. For a synthesis of the German-language literature, see Donald O'Sullivan, 'Patient Optimism: Soviet Russia in the Eyes of Otto Hoetzsch (1876-1946),' paper presented at AAASS National Convention, Denver, 10 November 2000. 33 Liszkowski, Osteuropaforschung und Politik, 2: 494-5. On German foreign policy in this period, see, inter alia, Gottfried Niedhart, Die Aussenpolitik der Weimarer Republik (Munich: R. Oldenbourg, 1999); Jon Jacobson, Locarno Diplomacy: Germany and the West, 1925-1929 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1972); Christiane Scheidemann, Ulrich Graf Brockdorff-Rantzau (1869-1928): Eine politische Biographic (Frankfurt am Main: P. Lang, 1998). 34 Fritz T. Epstein, 'Otto Hoetzsch und sein "Osteuropa" 1925-1930,' Osteuropa, no. 8-9 (August-September 1975): 541-54, quotation 550; Jutta Unser, "'Osteuropa." Biographic einer Zeitschrift,' Osteuropa, no. 8-9 (August-September 1975): 555-602; Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 20,51. 35 GARF,/. 5283, op. 6, d. 33, /. 1,2,8,9,16-20, Kameneva to Sergei Ol'denburg, 30 December 1926, and other correspondence. 36 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 96, 'Shtange. Pol. Pred. SSSR v Germanii. Pred. VOKS tov. O.D. Kamenevoi. 31 iiulia 1925.' 37 Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 192. 38 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 113-15, Shtange to O.D. Kameneva, 24 August 1925. Copies to Fedor Rotshtein (NKID and VOKS upravlenie) and Lorents, Otdel Tsentral'noi Evropy NKID. Lersch, however, points out that Das neue Russland contained much material on Soviet culture that seemed new and interesting to the German public. Lersch, Die auswartige Kulturpolitik der Soivjetunion, 83. 39 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 127-8, 'Shtange. Vo VOKS, tov. O.D. Kameneva.' 40 For example, see Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv sotsial'no-politicheskoi istorii (Russian State Archive of Social-Political History, formerly the Central Party Archive, Moscow, henceforth RGASPI),/. 495, op. 30, d. 139, /. 157, Kameneva, 'An Gen. Frumkin. Zum Protokol [Agitprop EKKI] vom 15/VI 1926.' 41 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 134-5, Shtange to Kameneva, 8 September 1925; ibid., /. 144-6, Kameneva to Shtange, 24 September 1925; ibid., /. 48, 'Dokladnaia zapiska/ no later than 3 September 1925; ibid., /. 156-7, Kameneva to N.N. Krestinskii, 2 October 1925; ibid., /. 126-31, Shtange, 'Vo

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43 44 45

46 47

48

49 50 51

52

53 54

VOKS.' For background on Soviet-German scientific relations after 1925, see Kolchinskii, ed., Sovetsko-germanskie nauchnye sviazi, 144-71. GARF,/. 5283, op. 6, d. 57, /. 92 reverse; G.N. Sevostvianov, ed., Dukh Rapallo: Sovetsko-germanskie otnosheniia 1925-1933 (Ekaterinburg: Nauchnoprosvetitel'skii tsentr 'Universitet/ 1997), 168-70,113-15; Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 260-2; Mezhdunarodnye nauchnye sviazi Akademii nauk SSSR, 1917-1941 (Moscow: Nauka, 1972), 239-46; Kolchinskii, ed., Sovetskogermanskie nauchnye sviazi, 232. GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 45, /. 57-60,0.D. Kameneva to N.P. Gorbunov, 31 October 1925. On the Gesellschaft's tight links with the German Foreign Office, see Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 263-5. GARF,/. 5283, op. 8, ed. khr. 11, /. 12-14, 'Vstupitel'noe slovo tov. O.D. Kamenevoi na vechere sovetsko-germanskogo sblizheniia (XXVI vecher VOKS - 11.X.26)'; ibid., op. 6, d. 24, /. 27-54, here /. 27-8,38, 'Stenogramma.' Burleigh, Germany Turns Eastwards, 34. See the 1929 NKID correspondence in Arkhiv vneshnoi politiki Rossiiskoi Federatsii (Archive of the Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation, Moscow, henceforth AVP RF),/. 082, op. 12, d. 80, p. 51, /. 13-14,21,24. GARF,/. 5283, op. 6, d. 57,1. 88-9, 'Otchet po Germanii za 2-oe polugodie 1929'; ibid., /. 92 reverse, 'Levit-Livent, Referent po tsentral'noi Evrope' [VOKS]. 'Germaniia,' 1929; ibid., /. 97, 'Doklad referenta [VOKS] po tsentral'noi Evrope -1. Livent-Levit. 17-go iiulia 1929 g.' The name was written in both ways in the documents. Levit-Livent, 'Germaniia/ cited in full in previous note, /. 93. GARF,/. 7668, op. 1, d. 215, /. 1-71, 'Otchet o rabote VOKS 1 iiulia 1929-1 marta 1930 g.' The importance that German cultural diplomacy (and Hoetzsch) attached to Volga and other Soviet Germans in this period, and the Soviets' cautious response, has been emphasized by V.A. Kosmach, 'Sovetskaia Rossiia v Germanskoi vneshnei kul'turnoi politike v gody Veimarskoi respubliki (1919-1933 gg.),' in B.M. Tupolev, ed., Rossiia i Germaniia (Moscow: Nauka, 1998), 1:264-7. On the ties with the Foreign Office, see Liszkowski, Osteuropaforschung und Politik, 2: 497,506-7; on right-wing attacks, Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 295-7; Voigt, Otto Hoetzsch, 328-30,334-5. Lersch, Die auswartige Kulturpolitik der Sowjetunion, 81-2. GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 5, 'Polozhenie v Germanii,' probably 1925; GARF,/. 7668, op. 1, d. 215, /. 155, 'Otchet o rabote VOKS 1 iiulia 1929-1 marta 1930.'

152 Michael David-Fox 55 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 37, /. 5, 'Kameneva. Chlenu kollegii NKID V.L. Koppu. 14 oktiabria 1923'; ibid., /. 16, 'V otdel Dal'nego Vostoka NKID tov. Baranovskomu'; ibid., /. 19, Kameneva, untitled letter on Society of Friends, May 1924. 56 For example, the society organized medical, technological, legal, and pedagogical sections, the largest of which was the pedagogical. Tolozhenie v Germanii/ /. 5; for a list of prominent members in 1924, including scientists as well as some political figures from the Kultusministerium and Reichstag, see GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 24, /. 22^; ibid., ed. khr. 118, /. 168-9, Erich Baron to Kameneva, no date, 1928. 57 Ibid., /. 169 reverse, Baron to Kameneva. 58 The 1924 Kameneva-Baron correspondence is in GARF,/. 5284, op. 6,d.l. 59 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 53, /. 11, Eduard Fuchs to Hugo Marcus, 23.5.25; ibid., /. 12, 'O.D. Kameneva. Predsedateliu Leningradskogo OGPU, tov. Messing, 4 iiunia 1925.' See also Rolf Elias, Die Gesellschaft der Freunde des neuen Russland: Mit vollstandigen Inhaltsverzeichnis alter Jahrgange der Zeitschrift 'Das neue Russland' 1923 bis 1932 (Cologne: Pahl-Rugenstein Verlag, 1985), 32. 60 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 17, /. 33, Tolnomochnoe Predstavitel'stvo SSSR v Germanii. Dmitriev. Tov. O.D. Kamenevoi. Berlin, 14 iiulia 1924'; ibid., d. 21, /. 36, lu. Gol'dshtein to O.D. Kameneva, 27 June 1924. 61 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 146, Kameneva to A.A. Shtange, 24 September 1925; ibid., /. 156-7, Kameneva to N.N. Krestinskii, 2 October 1925. 62 GARF,/. 5283, op. 6, d. 57, /. 86-7, 'Levit, Otchet po Germanii za 2-oe polugodie 1929'; Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 218, who notes that Eduard Fuchs was favoured as a possible replacement for Baron, who was able to fend him off. 63 Lerner to Girshfel'd, 2 January 1933, cited above, /. 11. On other occasions, Baron did display familiarity with several regional affiliates that in fact were active. 64 GARF,/. 5283, op. 6, d. 1, /. 197, R.S. Veller to Kameneva, Berlin, 12 December 1924. On 23 April 1933 Baron was killed by the fascists. 65 GARF,/. 5283, op. 8, ed. khr. 3, /. 108, 'Ob"edinennoe Biuro Informatsii Komissii zagranichnoi pomoshchi.' 66 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 46, Kameneva to A.A. Shtange, 24 September 1925; RGASPI,/. 495, op. 30, d. 139, /. 157, Kameneva, 'An Gen. Frumkin. Zum Protokol [Agitprop EKKI] vom 15/VI1926.' Some insight into the KPD view of the Society of Friends comes from a 1932 document, in which a German communist identified only as 'Leo' characterized the society as belonging only to the 'outermost periphery of our circles of influence' ('Protokoll iiber die Sitzung von 10. Februar 1932, betr. Gesellschaft der

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67 68

69

70

71

72 73 74 75

76

77

Freunde des Neuen Russlands/ cited in Michael David-Fox, The Soviet Encounter with German "National Bolshevism": Arplan's Far-Right Intellectuals and their 1932 Soviet Tour/ unpublished ms.) Veller to Kameneva, 12 December 1924, cited above, /. 197. GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 47, /. 134-5, Shtange to Kameneva, 8 September 1925; ibid., /. 144-6, Kameneva to Shtange, 24 September 1925; ibid., /. 48, 'Dokladnaia zapiska/ no later than 3 September 1925. Kameneva to Smirnov (Otdel pechati TsK), 21 January 1928, and 'V TsK VKP(b)/ no date, 1928, in GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 118, /. 9-20,115, respectively. GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 27, /. 22, Trotokol No. 1 Soveshchaniia Agitpropa IKKI 12-go oktiabria 1924 goda'; RGASPI,/. 495, op. 30, d. 139, /. 57, Trotokol zasedanii komissii po postanovke sistematicheskoi informatsii SSSR o nauchnoi i kul'turnoi zhizni zagranitsei ot 20 oktiabria 1925 goda'; ibid., d. 290, /. 4, These der Abt. Agitprop des EKKI zur Arbeit des Euros fur kulturelle Verbindung mit dem Ausland,' no earlier than 15 June 1926; ibid., d. 139, /. 57, Kameneva, 'An Gen. [R. N.] Frumkin. Zum Protokol vom 15/VI1926.' GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 97, /. 47, O.D. Kameneva, Tov. Evgen'evu, TsK VKP(b)'; the quotation is from ibid., /. 48, 'Krestinskii. Tov. Piatnitskomu. Kopiia: O.D. Kamenevoi, 1 marta 1927.' GARF,/. 5283, op. la, ed. khr. 160, /. 22, T.N. Petrov. Pred. VOKS. Tov. Litvinovu. NKID, 27 fev. 1930'; Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 205-7. Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 193-7. For materials on the 1927 invitations, see GARF, /. 5283, op. 8, d. 47. Friedrich Lenz, 'Deutschland und die Sowjetunion 1917-1932,' Das neue Russland 9, no. 7-8 (November 1932): 25-47, quotations at 25,46-7; Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 237. On this article as a definitive expression of Lenz's 'revolutionary conservative' position, see Louis Dupeux, 'Nationalbolchevisme': Strategic communiste et dynamique conservatrice. Essai sur le different sens de L'Expression en Allegmagne, sous la Republique de Weimar (19191933), 2 vols., thesis, University of Paris 1,1974 (Lille: Atelier reproduction des theses, 1976), 460n2. This dissertation was also published in the same form in Paris by Librarie Honore Champion in 1979 and in German translation: Nationalbolschewismus in Deutschland 1919-1933, kommunistische Strategic und konservative Dynamik (Munich: Beck, 1985). Girshfel'd to VOKS, 19 January 1932; Girshfel'd to VOKS Sector on Central Europe, 29 February 1932, copies NKID; Girshfel'd to Lerner (VOKS), 18 November 1932, cited in David-Fox, The Soviet Encounter with German "National Bolshevism/" 15. GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 196, /. 193,193 reverse, 'Girshfel'd. Berlin, 27

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78 79

80 81 82

83 84

85 86

87

88

oktiabria 1932. NKID - 2-i Zap. Otdel -t. Sheiniku/ copies to Krestinskii and VOKS. The most extensive treatment of Lenz of which I am aware is Dupeux, 'National-bolchevisme,' ch. 17,428-63, from which the above is drawn. GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 196, /. 156-8, Girshfel'd to F.N. Petrov, 5 February 1932. On Harnack's KPD affiliation, see B. Lange and A.N. Dmitriev, 'Rabochee ob"edinenie po izucheniiu sovetskogo pianovogo khoziaistva (Arplan)/ in Kolchinskii, ed., Sovetsko-germanskie nauchnye sviazi, 205. GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 196, /. 182-3, 'Dnevnik t. Girshfel'da. Berlin, 30-go aprelia 1932.' For this evaluation of Mayer, see GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 196, /. 125. For a full-length treatment of Arplan's activities, its summer 1932 trip to the USSR, and Soviet debates and interactions with it, see David-Fox, The Soviet Encounter with German "National Bolshevism."' GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 196, /. 193, 'Girshfel'd. Berlin, 27 oktiabria 1932. NKID - 2-i Zap. Otdel -1. Sheiniku,' copies to Krestinskii and VOKS. 'Shuman. Zav. Otdelom Tsentral'noi Evropy [VOKS]. Tov. Girshfel'du. Upolnomochennomu VOKS v Germanii. 19.3.32,' cited in David-Fox, The Soviet Encounter with German "National Bolshevism,"' 16n22. GARF,/. 5283, op. 6, d. 172, /. 228, F.N. Petrov to M.N. Pokrovsky, April 1932 [no day]. Emphasis added. Quotations from Warren Lerner, Karl Radek: The Last Internationalist (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1970), 120,121, which reproduces extensive sections from Radek's speech; the above material on 1919 and 1923 is also based on Otto-Ernst Schiiddekopf, National-Bolschewismus in Deutschland 1918-1933, rev. ed. (Frankfurt am Main: Ullstein Verlag, 1973), 7,55-6, 61-2, 70-86,111-25,175; G.A. Kosmach, 'National-bol'shevizm v Germanii i Sovetskaia Rossiia (1919-1932 gg),' in Tupolev, ed., Rossiia i Germaniia, 1:287. Schiiddekopf, National-Bolschewismus in Deutschland, 287, 502nll. See also Kosmach, 'Sovetskaia Rossiia v Germanskoi vneshnei kul'turnoi politike,' 281-93; A.N. Dmitriev, 'K istorii sovetsko-germanskikh nauchnykh i politicheskikh sviazei nachala 1930-kh gg.: Arplan (nemetskoe obshchestvo po izucheniiu sovetskogo planovogo khoziaistva),' in Nemtsy v Rossii: Problemy nauchnykh i kul'turnkykh sviazei (St Petersburg: Dmitrii Bulanin, 2000), 235, citing L.I. Gintsberg, 'Nakanune prikhoda fashizma k vlasti v Germanii: Novye dannye o pozitsii KPG,' Novaia i noveishaia istoriia I (1996): 38. Jeffrey Herf, Reactionary Modernism: Technology, Culture, and Politics in Weimar and the Third Reich (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), 67-8.

Soviet-Weimar Cultural Diplomacy 155 89 Fritz Stern, The Politics of Cultural Despair: A Study in the Rise of the Germanic Ideology (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1961), 209,246-7, and Part III more generally on Moeller's entire biography. 90 Dupeux, 'National-bolchevisme/ introduction. 91 The above is drawn from Michael Pittwald, Ernst Niekisch: Volkischer Sozialismus, nationale Revolution, deutsches Endimperium (Cologne: PapyRossa Verlag, 2002), ch. 2 on early socialist activity, Part III on ideology; Schiiddekopf, National-Bolschewismus in Deutschland, 367-85; Louis Dupeux, 'Presentation generale/ and Dupeux, Tseudo-"travailleur" contre prentendu "etat bourgeois": L'interpretation de 1'Hitlerisme par Ernst Niekisch en 1934-1935,' both in Dupeux, ed., La Revolution conservatrice allemande sous la Republique de Weimar (Paris: Editions Kime, 1992), 12,362; Dupeux, 'National-bolchevisme,' I: 388-428; Ernst Niekisch, Erinnerungen eines deutschen Revolutionars, vol. 1, Gewagtes Leben 1889-1945 (Cologne: Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, 1974). 92 Dupeux, 'Presentation generale/ in Dupeux, ed., La Revolution conservatrice, 12. 93 Schiiddekopf, National-Bolschewismus in Deutschland, 153-57. On these many groups and figures, consult the later work of a participant: Karl O. Paetel, Versuchung oder Chance? Zur Geschichte des deutschen Nationalbolschewismus (Gottingen: Muster Schmidt-Verlag, 1965). 94 Herf, Reactionary Modernism, 72. The literature on Jiinger and both these works is extensive. 95 On Romer, see Dupeux, 'National-bolchevisme/181,191-5,578-9; on Kreitz, ibid., 457-8,458n3; on Reventlow, ibid., 248. 96 Dmitriev, 'K istorii/ 258. In 1932, Lukacs gave lectures to the Tat and Widerstand circles, and he had published in Die Tat as early as 1926. On his role as a Comintern recruiter of intellectual sympathizers, see ibid., 263, 265. 97 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 196, /. 193-5, 'Girshfel'd. Berlin, 27 oktiabria 1932. NKID 2-i Zapadnyi Otdel -1. Sheininu.' Copies were sent to the Soviet ambassador to Germany, Krestinskii, and VOKS's Lerner. 98 B. Lange and A. N. Dmitriev, 'Rabochee ob"edinenie po izucheniiu,' in Kolchinskii, ed., Sovetsko-germanskie nauchnye sviazi, 205; Katerina Clark, review of Viacheslav T. Sereda and A.S. Stykalin, eds., Besedy na Lubianke: Sledstvennoe delo Derdia Lukacha. Materialy k biografii, in Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 2, no. 2 (2001): 452-3. 99 GARF,/. 5283, op. 6, d. 172, /. 190, 'Mitgliederliste.' 100 For example, see GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 196, /. 125, 'Linde. Upolnomochnoe predstavitel'stvo v Germanii. Pred. VOKS tov. Petrovu. Berlin,' 1 July 1932.

156 Michael David-Fox 101 For example, see GARF, /. 5283, op. 6, d. 172, /. 23, 'G. Timm. Zav. Sektorom Tsentral'noi Evropy [VOKS]. NKID Zav. Vtorym Zap. Otdelom t. Shtern,' 3 January 1932. 102 'Zam. pred. VOKSa. E.O. Lerner. Upolnomochennomu VOKS v Germanii t. Girshfel'du. 16/XII-32/ cited in David-Fox, The Soviet Encounter with German "National Bolshevism/" 21n38. 103 For the evidence on the dimension of espionage, see especially Lange and Dmitriev, 'Rabochee ob"edinenie/ 204-6; the previously published article on Arplan by A.N. Dmitriev, cited above, is an expanded version of Lange and Dmitriev: 'K istorii,' 262-6. 104 Trotokoll iiber die Sitzung von 10. Februar 1932, betr. Gesellschaft der Freunde des Neuen Russlands,' cited in David-Fox, The Soviet Encounter with German "National Bolshevism.'" They are identified in the document as Alexandrowsky and Jakubowitsch. 105 Mick, Sowjetische Propaganda, 189-90; Dmitriev, 'K istorii,' 255. 106 On Arplan's name originating with Mehnert rather than Lenz, see Dupeux, 'National-bolchevisme,' 458n3. A February 1932 Arplan document listed Hoetzsch as a member of the Arplan administration and Gesellschaft scholar Klaus Mehnert as a member of Arplan's secretariat. See 'Otchet Obshchestva po izucheniiu sovetskogo planovogo khoziaistva,' in Sevost'ianov, Dukh Rapallo, 247-9. In the postwar period, Mehnert became an influential Sovietologist. 107 Trotokoll iiber die Sitzung von 10. Februar 1932'; GARF, /. 5283, op. la, d. 196, /. 182 reverse, 183, 'Dnevnik t. Girshfel'da. Berlin, 30-go aprelia 1932.' 108 The crash program of industrialization, collectivization of agriculture, and intensified 'cultural revolution' that began in 1928-9 and lasted through 1931-2. 109 GARF,/. 5283, op. la, d. 196, /. 39-42, here 39 reverse, 'Stenogramma rechi t. Petrova v zasedanii Biuro Pravleniia VOKS ot 1.X.1931 g.'

PART TWO Scientific Entrepreneurs across Borders

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4 How to Win Friends and Influence People: Heinz Zeiss, Boundary Objects, and the Pursuit of Cross-National Scientific Collaboration in Microbiology E L I Z A B E T H HACHTEN

How do scientists manage to work together across disciplinary, professional, occupational, or national boundaries? This question has been the object of intense scrutiny by historians and sociologists of science interested in clarifying the dynamics of scientific collaboration. These scholars have proposed a number of models.1 Bruno Latour's interessements theory foregrounds the role played by a powerful scientific entrepreneur who manipulates and controls diverse actors to carry out his or her scientific agenda.2 Susan Leigh Star and James Griesemer, on the other hand, deploy the concept of 'boundary objects' to explain how diverse groups of scientific actors from distinct social worlds can nonetheless carry out collective scientific work.3 In their view, the key to collaboration is not consensus; rather, it is the ability of diverse scientific actors to 'translate, negotiate, debate, triangulate, and simplify in order to work together.'4 Boundary objects - any sort of scientific resource, natural or artificial, from collections of specimens to instruments to taxonomic schemes - allow that process to occur. As Star and Griesemer explain: 'In conducting collective work, people coming together from different social worlds frequently have the experience of addressing an object that has a different meaning for each of them. Each social world has partial jurisdiction over the resources represented by that object, and mismatches caused by the overlap become problems for negotiation.'5 Thus, boundary objects serve as bridges or translation points between actors with divergent or even clashing interests; indeed, collaboration becomes possible through the very fact of referring to these objects. Scholars have used boundary objects to investigate cooperation across the divides of professional status, discipline, and class; this

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approach, though, has not been widely deployed to analyse transnational collaborations.6 In this chapter I use boundary objects to probe the dynamics of one of the most perplexing examples of German-Soviet scientific collaboration in the 1920s - the relationships that Heinz Zeiss forged with Soviet microbiologists. In the annals of interwar German-Soviet medical interactions, Zeiss occupies a unique position.7 Compared to most other German scientists and physicians who oriented their activities eastward after 1919, Zeiss's Soviet sojourn was distinguished by the apparent ease with which he worked his way into the interstices of Soviet scientific life. While actively promoting German commercial, diplomatic, military, and nationalist interests, within less than a decade Zeiss had managed to establish long-term collaborations with researchers at a number of Soviet institutions, including the Saratov Regional Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology, the Chemical-Pharmaceutical Scientific Institute, and the Institute for Serum and Vaccine Control, one of the Commissariat of Health's central research institutions. As an employee of the Control Institute, Zeiss directed the new Soviet national collection of live microbial cultures and exploited the resources of the Mechnikov Museum to write a scholarly German-language biography of the Russian immunologist. How did he do it? How did a foreigner, and a right-wing German nationalist at that, manage to entrench himself within the Soviet microbiological community? Zeiss tried to project the image of a consummate scientific entrepreneur able to garner the support of powerful Soviet government officials and enlist the cooperation of Soviet scientists in his enterprises by force of the prestige and superiority of German science.8 But how well does this representation accord with Soviet realities of the 1920s? The rhetoric of German-Russian cooperation and assertions of the prestige of German science may have influenced officials such as Semashko and Gorbunov, but these would not have been sufficient to secure Zeiss a position in a Soviet research institution or to allow him to forge close working relationships with Soviet microbiologists. And what of the Soviet microbiologists with whom Zeiss worked? Who were they, what were their interests, and why would they have found it advantageous to collaborate with Zeiss? Zeiss's numerous Soviet contacts seem to have recorded few details of these collaborations; this in contrast to the rich archival legacy that Zeiss himself generated. I suggest that the relationships between Zeiss and his Soviet colleagues can be explained by focusing on the boundary objects around

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which their collaborations were structured. The three most important boundary objects that linked Zeiss to the social worlds of Soviet microbiologists were Bayer 205, the microbial cultures of the All-Russian Microbiological Collection, and the holdings of the Mechnikov Museum. I will argue that Zeiss's success stemmed from his ability to identify, manipulate, and sometimes control these objects, which served as translation points between his interests and those of his Soviet colleagues. Over time, there was a definite shift in the degree of control Zeiss exerted over these boundary objects. For the first two-and-a-half years of his Soviet residence, Zeiss controlled access to a number of scarce foreign resources that were key to his early success in establishing himself within the Soviet medical world. The most important of these was Bayer 205, the product of a German pharmaceutical company, which formed the nexus of Zeiss's collaborations with a number of institutions and people across the Soviet Union. The closing of the German Red Cross bacteriological laboratory in 1924 compelled him to find new opportunities to connect to Soviet-initiated and controlled resources. He was able to latch onto two such groups of objects, both housed at the Control Institute: the collection of live microbial cultures, founded in 1924; and the Mechnikov Museum, which opened in 1926. But while Zeiss collaborated in the exploitation of these boundary objects, he maintained his own separate identity and interests, never penetrating fully into the social world of his Soviet colleagues. For their part, the Soviets with whom he worked were pursuing their own interests and exploited these objects in their own ways. As we shall see, they could collaborate in the use of these objects without necessarily sharing Zeiss's agenda. A German Bearing Gifts: Bayer 205 and the Opening to Soviet Microbiologists In his role as director of the German Red Cross's Central Bacteriological Laboratory in Moscow, Zeiss was especially well placed to oversee the openings to the Soviet medical and scientific communities. This relatively well-equipped laboratory offered Zeiss resources for his own research. With German colleagues, he launched a study of intestinal worms in Moscow children; he also pursued investigations of typhus with Mikhail Petrovich Kireev, a medical professor and director of the infectious disease department at one of Moscow's main hospitals. Reports on these projects to the Seventh All-Russian Congress of Bacteriologists, Epidemiologists, and Sanitary Physicians in 1923 (and in

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German medical journals) helped bolster Zeiss's visibility as a medical researcher.9 Zeiss's most sustained and fruitful research efforts, however, revolved 'around the chemotherapeutic agent Bayer 205. This trypanocidal preparation, developed after the war at the Bayer research laboratory at the Elberfeld Farbwerke, was one of the company's newest drugs and had shown great promise in laboratory testing. For the Bayer Company, one of the sponsors of the German mission, the Soviet Union held promise not only as a site for clinical trials of Bayer 205 but also as a potentially lucrative market for the drug; these considerations underlay the company's willingness to make the new preparation available to Zeiss through diplomatic channels.10 Zeiss himself was highly invested in Bayer 205 even before his arrival in the Soviet Union. Much of his work after the war had been devoted to research on Bayer 205; at Mayer's laboratory in Hamburg he had investigated its in vitro effects on various species of trypanosomes from around the world and carried out extensive testing of the drug on experimentally induced trypanosomiasis in laboratory animals.11 Thus, in his very first scientific presentation in Russia - in February 1922, in Moscow, at a colloquium for the scientific staff of the State Institute of Public Health (GINZ) - Zeiss was able to represent himself as an accomplished chemotherapeutic researcher and one of the world's few experts on Bayer 205.12 Drawing on his extensive laboratory experiments in Hamburg, he was able to depict Bayer 205 as a promising preparation with low toxicity and significant therapeutic effects. In tests of laboratory animals experimentally infected with strains from Africa, Asia, and Latin America, the Hamburg group had found that administration of a single dose of the drug conferred a long period of immunity. Zeiss acknowledged that human and large-animal clinical trials were still necessary to establish Bayer 205's effectiveness and mode of action. To rouse his audience's enthusiasm not just for Bayer 205 but for the whole class of chemotherapeutic agents, he framed his discussion with a historical overview of the progress of chemotherapy since the early discoveries of Paul Ehrlich. While conceding that chemotherapeutic agents had thus far proved effective only against protozoa and spirochetes, he pointed out that further research might well lead to preparations effective against a broader range of infective agents.13 Zeiss's audience no doubt found this message compelling. In the era before the development of sulfa drugs and antibiotics, many researchers were still optimistic that chemotherapeutics would yield more 'magic

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bullets' against infectious diseases.14 Since the end of the war a number of new agents had been developed in Europe and the United States for use in diseases such as malaria, syphilis, and trypanosomiasis.15 Soviet scientists and physicians had been cut off from these advances and were interested in catching up; several new institutes devoted in part or in whole to chemotherapy were being created in the post-revolutionary years.16 Bayer 205, marketed under the names 'Germanin' (for use in humans) and 'Naganol' (for veterinary use), represented a new direction in trypanocidal drugs. While the chemical formula was proprietary, it was known to be a non-arsenical, colourless preparation (making it an attractive option for treating infected cattle and other meat-producing animals). Bayer 205 did have drawbacks: it could not cross the bloodbrain barrier (and was therefore useless in the late stages of diseases such as sleeping sickness), resistance to the drug could develop, and the Bayer Company had a monopoly on its sale and distribution. But with Zeiss ready to guarantee a supply of Bayer 205, it is not surprising that there were Soviet scientists very willing to pursue this research. Bayer 205 was the mortar that cemented Zeiss's relationship with several Soviet institutions. One of these was the Chemical-Pharmaceutical Scientific Institute of the Supreme Council of the National Economy (VSNKh).17 Beginning in 1922, Zeiss supplied Bayer 205 to workers at that institute and apparently participated in a multifaceted research program aimed at elucidating the biochemical action of Bayer 205 in vivo, developing a technique for measuring the concentration of the drug in tissues and bodily fluids, and investigating how long the drug persisted in an organism after administration.18 His association with this institute and with its director, O.A. Steppun, was apparently cordial, but there is little indication that Zeiss's role in the work was particularly significant. His main interests lay in conducting field trials of Bayer 205's effectiveness against natural trypanosomiasis. Given the restricted geographical distribution of trypanosomiasis in the Soviet Union, there were very few places where such investigations could be carried out. One such place was Saratov, which was deep inside the Volga German area of settlement and thus a key destination for the German Red Cross. The Saratov State Regional Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology gave Zeiss and Bayer 205 a warm welcome; indeed, by the time Zeiss delivered his first talk on Bayer 205 in Moscow, large-animal experiments with the preparation had been underway for several weeks in Saratov.19 The eagerness with which Zeiss and Bayer 205 were received in Saratov is understandable, given

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the history and mission of the institute. Founded in 1918 as part of the local medical faculty, the Saratov Institute's administration was transferred to the People's Commissariat of Health (Narkomzdrav) in January 1920.20 Under its new state charter, the institute became both a national plague centre and a regional medical research centre for the whole of southeastern Russia. That region, which included the arid Caspian steppes and the southern Urals, had an epidemiological profile more typical of Central Asia than of Europe.21 Although not officially counted among the Soviet Union's tropical medicine institutes, the Saratov Institute was evolving in that direction under the directorship of S.M. Nikanorov. It began publishing a research journal and added a new department of protozoology and parasitology, which was headed by a young zoologist, Sergei Aleksandrovich Ilovaiskii.22 For Ilovaiskii and Nikanorov, Bayer 205 and Zeiss appeared at an opportune moment to bolster their brand-new research program in animal trypanosomiasis. Camel trypanosomiasis, or 'su-auru' as it was known among the nomads of the Volga region, had been identified by several researchers working independently between 1912 and 1914 on the steppes of Astrakhan province, in the Urals, and in Central Asia. In camels, the disease generally had an acute course of one to two months and was characterized by emaciation, fever, swelling, cough, and diarrhea.23 But these trypanosomes also infected other animals, most notably horses, in which the disease manifested itself as a chronic, wasting condition. Wars and revolution interrupted the research; many basic questions - the classification of the trypanosomes, the relation of suauru to the Indian disease 'surra,' the exact vectors and modes of transmission of the parasites, and the role of camels as reservoirs of infection for other species - still remained to be answered. These issues became more pressing in the early 1920s, when the normally endemic disease began appearing in epidemic clusters and seemed to be spreading north and west into Saratov province.24 The opportunity to investigate Bayer 205 added a valuable curative and prophylactic aspect to the Saratov Institute's research program. In this way, an important nexus formed between Zeiss, Bayer 205, and the Saratov Institute. It should be noted, however, that Bayer 205 was initially just one of several avenues that Zeiss pursued in creating alliances at this strategically placed institution. He also hoped to contribute to the institute's much more prominent plague research program through the deployment of 'Yatren,' yet another product of German chemotherapeutical research. This iodine-based antiseptic had been developed by Peter

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Miihlens in Hamburg and had been used successfully in the treatment of amoebic dysentery.25 Zeiss investigated Yatren's effectiveness in attenuating plague bacilli as a first step towards producing a vaccine.26 Given the prevalence of plague in Soviet Russia and the strong interest accorded to it at the Saratov Institute, this line of research could have yielded major benefits for Zeiss. But Yatren ultimately proved useless, thus increasing the importance of the Bayer 205 investigations. Zeiss began his collaboration with Ilovaiskii during the winter of 1921-2. With the su-auru season (late summer and early fall) long past, the scientists carried out laboratory experiments on two camels artificially infected with trypanosomiasis.27 Their joint paper reported that Bayer 205 was capable of completely eliminating the trypanosomes from the blood, unlike preparations such as Salvarsan and Atoxyl, which only suppressed the protozoans and thus allowed infected animals to continue acting as reservoirs of the disease. These first experiments, however, failed to establish the minimum effective dose of Bayer 205 necessary to cure the camels of the disease. Over the next two years - a period in which 'the whole trans-Volga region was enveloped with trypanosomiasis' - Ilovaiskii mounted expeditions to study the natural history of su-auru in the Kirghiz steppe (1922) and the Ural oblast' (1923). Although Zeiss did not participate personally in these studies, he did apparently supply Ilovaiskii with enough Bayer 205 to treat an unspecified number of camels and horses.28 The sudden death of Ilovaiskii in March 1924 threw the Saratov Institute's protozoology program into disarray, and dealt a temporary setback to Zeiss's plans for further testing of Bayer 205. Zeiss did eventually collaborate with Ilovaiskii's former assistant in a small study of sheep trypanosomiasis,29 but the urgency of the program was reduced by the fact that there seems to have been a waning of the epizootic of trypanosomiasis, at least in the areas closest to Saratov. In addition, there was no apparent successor to take over Ilovaiskii's program. It now fell to Zeiss alone to maintain interest and provide leadership. In the mid-1920s he helped amass a collection of monographs on camel diseases for the institute and published occasional review articles on that subject in the institute's journal.30 But he also turned east to find a new collaborator. He found one in the veterinarian V.S. Emelin, director of the Ural Provincial Veterinary Administration. Emelin enthusiastically embraced the cause, carrying out the first large-scale use of Naganol in the Soviet Union. He reported using it on five thousand camels between 1923 and 1926, with such great success that the disease

166 Elizabeth Hachten

was virtually eliminated in his district.31 On the basis of that experience, Zeiss and Emelin announced that Naganol was no longer an experimental treatment and that success in the fight against trypanosomiasis had become only a 'question of organization/ 32 The culmination of Zeiss's efforts came with two large-scale expeditions in the summers of 1926 and 1927 to study su-auru and other tropical diseases in the trans-Volga region.33 Zeiss was able to marshal the assistance of Emelin and the institute staff, formal sponsorship from the Saratov Institute, and funding from German sources, including the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft. For the first time, Zeiss was actually carrying out clinical field trials of Naganol. The 1926 expedition focused on testing its effectiveness as a prophylactic agent in camels, the 1927 venture on administering Naganol in combination with other drugs to reduce or delay the development of drug resistance. Close relations with Zeiss offered advantages to his Soviet allies beyond the provision of Bayer 205. Zeiss was an energetic facilitator of all kinds of foreign exchanges and could be counted on to help his Russian colleagues obtain scarce foreign resources, from the latest medical publications to esoteric works on obscure camel diseases to laboratory equipment. He could also help expedite foreign travel - a highly sought-after perk in the Soviet Union, and one that was difficult to arrange and finance without outside help.34 And most important, he could facilitate the publication of articles by his Soviet collaborators in German journals.35 For Emelin and Ilovaiskii in particular, such opportunities probably would not have materialized without their ties to Zeiss; for Zeiss, joint publication often meant increased visibility for him in Germany. Indeed, Zeiss milked his Soviet experiences for all they were worth, amassing a long list of German-language publications by writing abstracts or reviews of Soviet research, providing descriptions of Soviet medical institutions, and reporting on medical news. But there were clear limitations on how far Bayer 205 could take Zeiss in the Soviet Union. To begin with, not all Soviet scientists embraced Bayer 205. Indeed, many of Zeiss's and Emelin's conclusions conflicted with the views of the leading Soviet expert on trypanosomiasis, Professor Vasili L. lakimov of Leningrad's Veterinary-Animal Research Institute. lakimov, a prominent Soviet parasitologist with ties to the Pasteur Institute, had been one of the first to study camel trypanosomiasis during his 1913 expedition to Turkestan.36 lakimov and his school clashed with Zeiss's allies over everything from classification of the trypanosome that caused su-auru to the minimum effective dosage

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of Naganol to the efficacy of the drug as a prophylactic treatment.37 Ilovaiskii, and Zeiss and Emelin after him, argued that the causative organism of the su-auru of the Astrakhan and Ural steppes was distinct from the trypanosomes found in Turkestan; for his own part, having conducted experiments with Drs Alphonse Laveran and Felix Mesnil of the Pasteur Institute, lakimov asserted that there was a single causative organism responsible for animal trypanosomiases from southeastern Russia through Central Asia: Tn/panosoma ninae kohl-iakimov. (lakimov's classification seems to have been the most commonly accepted in the Soviet Union.) Even more importantly, the lakimov school disputed Naganol's effectiveness as a prophylactic agent and questioned Zeiss's estimate of the minimum effective therapeutic dose of Naganol (was it 8 to 15 grams, or 4 to 6 grams as advocated by Zeiss and his allies?). Overall, the lakimov camp had a much cooler attitude towards Bayer 205 as an economically efficient solution to the problem of camel trypanosomiasis. In many ways, Zeiss and his activities were rather marginal to mainstream Soviet medicine. Bayer 205 was a promising drug against trypanosomiasis, but the disease and its treatment were of interest only to a relatively narrow audience in geographically peripheral areas such as Saratov, the trans-Volga region, and Central Asia. The Saratov Institute and its journal (in which Zeiss published most of his Russian-language research on Bayer 205 and su-auru) was important for plague research but otherwise ranked relatively low in the Soviet hierarchy of medical research. And su-auru was a relatively minor disease, given the much greater threats to human and animal health prevailing in the Soviet Union and the fact that the epidemic outbreak of trypanosomiasis had faded by the mid-1920s.38 Zeiss and Emelin did attempt to reposition Bayer 205 in the medical armamentarium by arguing that it had applications against other diseases.39 In a 1928 paper titled 'Is Bayer 205 Merely a Trypanocidal Substance?' Zeiss and Emelin attempted to marshal evidence to show that Bayer 205 might have anti-bacterial powers or even utility as a tonic with a 'general strengthening action/ They even claimed promising results in experiments by Soviet researchers that used Bayer 205 as a treatment in neurological disorders such as multiple sclerosis, rabies, and canine distemper.40 But they did not succeed in making their case. For its part, by 1924 the Bayer Company had come to see the Soviet Union as only a small market for Bayer 205, particularly in comparison to countries in Africa, southern and southeastern Asia, and Latin

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America, where both human and animal trypanosomiases were much more prevalent. Also Bayer's monopoly on Bayer 205 was coming to an end: in 1924 a researcher at the Pasteur Institute published a formula for a preparation he called 'Fourneau 309,' which turned out to have the same chemical composition as Bayer 205. By the end of the 1920s, in fact, the Soviets had started manufacturing their own version of the drug ('Naganin').41 Zeiss continued to pursue Bayer 205 research in a variety of contexts throughout his residence in the Soviet Union, but once the German Red Cross mission ended and the financial support from the Bayer Company dried up, no one was willing to support extended residence for Zeiss based on that work alone. With the declining usefulness of Bayer 205 as a boundary object, Zeiss would have to find other resources around which to structure his collaborations with Soviet scientists. Cultivating Microbes and People at the Tarasevich Institute In early 1925 notices appeared in Soviet and German medical journals announcing the creation of a new, all-Soviet collection of live microbialtype cultures at the Institute for Serum and Vaccine Control in Moscow. These announcements were signed by the director of the microbial collection, Professor A.L. Tseiss. This, of course, was Heinz Zeiss in his new role as an employee of this Soviet scientific institution, which would serve as his base of operations through to 1930. Given Zeiss's background and ambitions, the fact that he ended up at an institute devoted to the practical tasks of setting standards and overseeing the quality of serum and vaccine production might seem puzzling. But at the time, the Control Institute was a prominent Narkomzdrav institute headed by a renowned leader of the Soviet medical community, Lev A. Tarasevich (1868-1927). The institute was also an important nexus for FrenchSoviet medical relations - a factor of great importance for Zeiss. Even more to the point, the Soviet initiative to create a national reference collection at the Control Institute provided Zeiss with a new scientific resource around which he might construct collaborative relationships with his Soviet colleagues. The key Soviet figure in this collaboration was Lev Tarasevich, one of the most influential of the many non-Bolsheviks associated with Narkomzdrav in its early years.42 An immunologist by training, he had studied medicine in Paris, where he became a close friend and protege of Il'ia I. Mechnikov. During the war, Tarasevich helped org-

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anize the Union of Zemstvos's mass immunization campaigns; this experience convinced him of the virtues of centralization in public health work and of quality control in vaccine production and administration. In connection with this work, he founded a Vaccine Control Station in his bacteriological laboratory at the Women's Medical Courses; this laboratory eventually grew into the Serum and Vaccine Control Institute. After a brief stint as the provisional government's chief sanitary inspector, Tarasevich became one of the first non-Bolsheviks to ally himself with the new medical regime. This placed him in a key position to influence the structure of the new Soviet public health. He was one of the chief architects of GINZ, which consisted of eight essentially selfgoverning institutes and which functioned as the research arm of Narkomzdrav. Tarasevich not only became the first director of GINZ but also held a variety of other administrative positions in the health ministry. As a result, he functioned not only as a conduit to administrators such as Nikolai Semashko but also as an important patron in his own right.43 Tarasevich's Control Institute grew substantially in size and importance in the first years of Soviet power. As a branch of GINZ, the Control Institute acquired responsibility for overseeing the production of diagnostic sera and smallpox vaccine and for checking the quality of biological preparations for the entire country. It thus resembled other national institutes that had appeared in the first decades of the twentieth century.44 The waning of epidemics after 1922 freed Tarasevich and his staff to devote more energy to research; as a result, in 1925 the Control Institute was renamed the Institute of Experimental Therapy and SerumVaccine Control. By that time, the institute's staff had also expanded significantly to include an assistant director, seven physicians, and about a dozen technicians. Except for the top administrators, the staff were predominately female - a reflection of the institute's historically close association with the pre-revolutionary Women's Medical Courses.45 Tarasevich, a strong advocate for closer ties with the Western scientific community, hoped to turn GINZ into an important conduit for reestablishing contacts and facilitating exchanges with individuals and institutions.46 A committed internationalist, he urged Soviet bacteriologists to conform to international standards, adopt successful Western models, and participate in international organizations, especially the League of Nations Health Organization (LNHO).47 He himself was a member of the LNHO's Serological Commission; under his watch the

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Control Institute became one of the dozen sites worldwide that participated in setting standards for dysentery antitoxin and similar agents.48 In the early 1920s, Tarasevich heavily promoted the resumption of French-Soviet medical relations despite the inauspicious diplomatic situation and the strong antipathy towards the Soviet Union among the French public and Russian emigres.49 Olga Mechnikova and Alexander Besredka later recalled that Tarasevich's enthusiastic support for Soviet public health efforts during his first post-revolutionary visit to France in the winter of 1922-3 changed the mind of many sceptics.50 Besides being a Francophile, Tarasevich was a loyal Pastorian who promoted both the image and the science of the Pasteur Institute in the Soviet Union. The celebration of the centenary of Louis Pasteur's birth in 1922 was carefully planned by Tarasevich and a high-level commission within Narkomzdrav, and culminated in the renaming of GINZ in honour of the French scientist. Tarasevich cultivated very close personal and institutional ties between the Pasteur Institute and the Control Institute itself. His numerous trips to France between 1922 and 1927 allowed him to keep abreast of the Pastorians' research and to bring to Moscow the cultures and techniques necessary to replicate their most important discoveries. Thanks in part to Tarasevich's efforts, certain aspects of the Soviet public health program in the 1920s were strongly influenced by work at the Pasteur Institute. In the small world of Moscow medicine, Tarasevich and Zeiss no doubt crossed paths early and often. For Zeiss, Tarasevich must have been a compelling figure; clearly, he and his institute were the strongest Soviet outposts of French and Pastorian influences. As Wolfgang Eckart and Paul Weindling have shown, Zeiss was obsessed with the need for German vigilance lest 'the Russian medical world fall under French influence.'51 Weindling in particular notes Zeiss's animus on the subject: 'He abhorred the influence of France and the Pasteur Institute, denouncing the duplicity of Besredka (a Russian-Jewish emigre) in maintaining relations with both Tsarist exiles and the communist regime.'52 As fate would have it, the creation of a microbial collection or, as Zeiss preferred to call it, 'the All-Russian Microbiological Museum' propelled Zeiss into the Tarasevich Institute.53 Tarasevich and Zeiss evidently had divergent views of this repository; even so, it served as a point of collaboration between them. This new enterprise reflected Tarasevich's interest in standardization and in bringing Soviet bacteriology into conformity with Western norms; it also provided him with leverage when it came to requesting greater resources for his institute.

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For Zeiss, the museum offered opportunities to strengthen his ties to Tarasevich and Soviet bacteriologists; to intensify the exchanges between the Soviet Union and Germany; and to advance his own theories of loimology (the unified study of human, animal, and plant diseases). Some of the hundreds of strains collected by Zeiss were even utilized in a new set of experiments involving Bayer 205. The proposal to create a 'Central Bacteriological Museum of Live Cultures' at the Control Institute was first publicly floated in May 1924 at the Eighth All-Russian Congress of Bacteriologists, Epidemiologists, and Sanitary Physicians, held in Leningrad. At a session sponsored by the Serum-Vaccine Commission of Narkomzdrav, Tarasevich reviewed his work on the LNHO Serological Commission and called for greater coordination between the Serum-Vaccine Commission, the central institutes of Narkomzdrav, and provincial bacteriological institutes in order to bring Soviet practices within international norms.54 A reference collection of type cultures would be an important part of that effort as it could provide institutes across the Soviet Union with standard bacterial types for serum and vaccine production.55 The May 1924 meeting ended with a resolution endorsing the creation of a central bacteriological museum of live cultures and requesting resources for the project. The creation of a national type collection was very much in step with developments around the world. The first years of the twentieth century saw a move away from private and informal efforts to collect different strains of bacteria towards formal, national institutions. For example, the world-renowned Krai collection in Prague was moved to Vienna's Sero-Therapeutic Institute, the American Type Culture Collection appeared in the United States, and the Lister and Pasteur Institutes became national repositories in England and France.56 Similar consolidation had not yet occurred either in pre-revolutionary Russia or in the Soviet Union; indeed, most bacteriological institutes, as well as medical school professors, had maintained their own collections at least until the Civil War years. The Control Institute, for example, had inherited the collection of Professor Praskovaia Vasilevna Tsiklinskaia of the Women's Medical Courses. It seems that Tarasevich also saw the proposed museum as yet another opportunity to lobby for additional financial support, staff, and space for his institute.57 Space was an especially serious problem in overcrowded Moscow. At the time, the Control Institute shared a building with both Kol'tsov's Institute of Experimental Biology and the Institute of Nutritional Physiology.58 Tarasevich was already planning to create a

172 Elizabeth Hachten museum dedicated to Il'ia Mechnikov at his institute; this made the issue of adequate space for the Control Institute all the more pressing. Exactly how, when, and why Zeiss got involved in this project remains uncertain. The proposal would have been public knowledge in Moscow medical circles at the time that Zeiss was facing the imminent loss of German sponsorship and was actively looking for ways to extend his residence in the Soviet Union. An opportunity to be associated with Tarasevich's institute would have been attractive. In his only German-language publication on the microbiological museum, Zeiss claimed responsibility for the 'development and organization' of the collection;59 his public statements in the Soviet Union always described the collection as originating from the proposal at the Congress. Archival evidence suggests that Zeiss's connection with the collection possibly dated from August 1924, when he sent a memorandum to the Commissar of Public Health, Nikolai Semashko, in which he sketched out his vision for a microbial collection that would include a wide range of pathogens - human, animal, and plant - and other economically significant microbes. Zeiss's memorandum came a full five months after the initial resolution at the Congress of Bacteriologists.60 A directive from Narkomzdrav appointing Zeiss to the position of director required the assent of the institute's director.61 Why would Tarasevich have accepted Zeiss into his institute? While the historical record is silent, several possible explanations present themselves. Zeiss undeniably brought with him excellent contacts with key Soviet scientific and medical patrons. Zeiss may have been able to apply pressure to free up additional material resources for the microbial collection. He also controlled valuable assets in Moscow: the Control Institute was one of the beneficiaries of the liquidation of the German Red Cross bacteriological laboratory, and Zeiss also claimed to have lent the institute his large personal collection of books and reprints.62 It may well be that the prospect of employing a foreigner appealed to Tarasevich's cosmopolitanism. Once involved, Zeiss placed his own imprint on the collection of live cultures. He attempted to reshape the institute's mission to fit his own scientific interests and to increase its prestige as a research centre and not merely a warehouse and distribution centre. The collection, he stressed, would not be merely a 'tin can' for preserving bacterial strains as 'museum objects'; it would also serve as a resource for carrying out significant research with theoretical and practical implications for both microbiology and epidemiology.63 Zeiss also insisted that the collection,

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like other national type reference collections, would serve the international research community as a 'centre for the exchange of cultures and a source for obtaining them.'64 Cultures were to be solicited from around the world and would be provided to any researcher on demand (and on payment of handling charges). At the Congress of Bacteriologists in 1925, Zeiss cast the microbiological museum as an important means to improve relations between Soviet and foreign medical scientists.65 In fact, he had been providing German colleagues with Russian microorganisms informally for some time. Zeiss also stressed the utility of the collection for researchers who needed a wide variety of microbial strains for comparative research.66 He placed the comparative method at the centre of a program for transforming microbiology and epidemiology into truly independent disciplines. Calling on microbiologists to emulate the successes of Omelianskii, Pasteur, Hueppe, Mayer, and others, he urged that 'we ... develop medical microbiology with the methods of botany to a much greater degree than has been done to this time and look at it with botanical eyes.'67 For Zeiss, the comparative method offered the surest path for returning microbiology to its botanical roots, and he called on epidemiologists to redress their overemphasis on external epidemiological factors (such as climate, insects, and the race and economic situation of the affected population) by paying greater attention to the internal nature of micro-organisms. Zeiss also elaborated on the connections between the collection of live cultures and his own epidemiological theories, especially his notions of geomedicine and loimology. He discussed these grandiose, albeit vague, visions most extensively in a speech to the bacteriological section of the Society of Amateurs of Natural History, Anthropology, and Ethnography in January 1925.68 The collection, he declared, 'creates the possibility of the systematic study of the distribution of the germs of illnesses of humans, animals, and plants in the USSR. Thus the cartographic distribution of individual disease agents in the USSR can be established in a way similar to that already graphically accomplished for helminths ... Therefore, the formation of this collection has exclusively epidemio-loimological purposes.'69 Zeiss's conviction that the diseases of humans, animals, and plants should be studied in a unitary fashion - from the 'epidemio-loimological' perspective - was behind his push to expand the type collection beyond its original focus on human pathogens. And there was to be a historical dimension as well to the study of the variation and distribu-

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tion of microbes across space and species: The collection creates the possibility to precisely study the path of Russian epidemics in historical-biological perspective and the geographical distribution of microorganisms by industrial regions and the geographic zones of the USSR. It is hard to imagine all the practical implications ... for the fight against epidemics, for agriculture, for sanitary statistics.'70 Zeiss never did clarify the practical implications of this proposed research program. Under Zeiss's directorship, the museum's microbiological collection grew rapidly, from 400 strains in 1926 to approximately 1,100 by 1930.71 During the first five years of the museum's operations, nearly 2,000 cultures were distributed to Soviet and foreign institutes (90 per cent stayed within the country) for use in production and research. A wide variety of organisms, from paratyphoid and cholera strains to Bacteria tularense and melitense (the causative agents of tularemia and Malta fever), were exchanged with scientists from all over the globe. The sheer number of cultures, and the work involved in cataloguing, tracking, and transferring them, quickly necessitated the addition of more staff. Initially Zeiss worked alone, but as soon as cultures began arriving in January 1925, he was joined by a laboratory assistant, A.F. Korzhinskaia. In 1926 a senior research fellow at the institute, E.D. Bunina, became the assistant director of the museum. Two years later it was necessary to add a second technician (Tarasevich's own daughter, luliia L'vovna Stepun, or Steppun, held that post in 1930). On the research side, it seems that the staff carried out only two projects that resulted in publications during Zeiss's tenure as director. Bunina and Korzhinskaia, with assistance from Zeiss, pursued comparative research on the distinctiveness of different strains of Paratyphoid B cultures using the protocols being followed by German research groups.72 And Zeiss collaborated with lu.N. Makarova - a serologist and immunologist who worked elsewhere in the institute - to investigate the biochemical action of Bayer 205 in various immunological processes.73 Neither project, however, came close to fulfilling Zeiss's grand vision of the collection as a centre for geomedical and loimological research. Furthermore, the extent of Zeiss's day-to-day involvement with the live cultures is unclear. He publicized the museum and solicited donations of micro-organisms, but he also carried out many other ongoing activities, maintained a large correspondence, and was often absent from Moscow. His expeditions to study camel trypanosomiasis took him to the Urals for approximately four months in both 1926 and 1927. In 1930 he spent three months in France and Germany.74 It is likely that

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Zeiss served as the administrator of the collection but left the hands-on work to Bunina and the technicians. This scarcely accords with Zeiss's self-presentation as a laboratory-oriented bacteriologist whose devotion to 'his' cultures led him to turn down a job at the League of Nations headquarters in Geneva.75 Was this an example of self-delusion or self-promotion? Or was the microbiological collection a convenient excuse for him to maintain his residence in Moscow? Whatever the case, Zeiss tried to capitalize on his proximity to Tarasevich to encourage greater ties with German science. Tarasevich found himself assiduously courted by German bacteriologists.76 In one such letter, L. Brauer of the Eppendorf Hospital in Hamburg thanked Tarasevich warmly for 'so generously providing a workplace' for 'our friend' Zeiss.77 The Germans' wooing of Tarasevich climaxed in May 1927 when the Hamburg University Medical Faculty awarded him their gold medal.78 Unfortunately for Zeiss and his colleagues in Hamburg, Tarasevich died only weeks after receiving the honour, thus diluting the intended impact of the award.79 Tarasevich's death seems to have had little impact on Zeiss's position at the institute; indeed, in the late 1920s he began seriously exploiting yet another boundary object lodged within its walls. Zeiss's Historical Turn: The Mechnikov Museum as Boundary Object On 23 September 1926, Moscow newspapers reported the formal opening of the Il'ia I. Mechnikov Museum on the premises of the Institute of Serum and Vaccine Control. The occasion allowed visiting dignitaries and the public a first glimpse of the papers and artefacts brought back from Paris by the scientist's widow, Olga N. Mechnikova. This was not the only event marking the tenth anniversary of the death of the Russian-born, Nobel Prize-winning immunologist and zoologist. A few weeks earlier, attendees at the Tenth Congress of Bacteriologists and Epidemiologists in Odessa - where Mechnikov had taught and worked for almost two decades - had dedicated their meeting to his memory. That same year two important biographies of Mechnikov were published in Russian translation: Olga Mechnikova's Life ofElie Metchnikoff, and A.M. Besredka's The History of an Idea.80 The moving force behind these commemorations was Lev A. Tarasevich, one of Mechnikov's favourite Russian students. The celebrations had a profound impact on Zeiss, who developed his own interpretation of Mechnikov's life and

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science, appropriating Olga Mechnikova's biography to develop a revisionist account that emphasized the importance of German influences on Mechnikov.81 Zeiss relied heavily on the holdings of the Mechnikov Museum to make his case. Indeed, this repository served as yet another mediating factor in the ongoing collaborations that Zeiss built with his Soviet colleagues. The flexibility of this boundary object was demonstrated by the fact that another group was able to use the same materials to paint a very different picture of Mechnikov. As with the microbiological collection, Zeiss viewed his association with the Mechnikov Museum as a potential jumping-off point for an even grander project: a scholarly society and institute devoted to the history of Russian medicine and science that would serve as yet another power base for Zeiss himself. The genesis of the Mechnikov Museum is very clear.82 When Tarasevich made his first post-revolutionary trip to Paris in the winter of 1922-3, he found Mechnikova in a quandary over the disposition of her husband's scientific and literary effects, which included unpublished manuscripts, laboratory notebooks dating back to 1861, and an enormous collection of letters, as well as personal belongings, photographs, portraits, and the like. She would have preferred to donate these materials to the Pasteur Institute, where Mechnikov had spent the last thirty years of his career; but she had no confidence that the institute would find the space to house the collection, let alone carry out her wishes that it be made available for the use of scholars and the public. The neglect of Pasteur's papers - which were still unsorted and 'piled up in a little room' many years after his death - did not inspire her with confidence.83 Tarasevich seized this opportunity to propose that a museum dedicated to Mechnikov be established at the Control Institute in Moscow. Mechnikova's endorsement of the scheme - and her choice of the Control Institute as the site of the museum over more logical alternatives such as Odessa or Khar'kov - reflected her personal trust in Tarasevich as well as her desire to situate the collection at the centre of Soviet scientific activities. In return, Mechnikova was promised a continuing voice in the administration of the collection; she was also assured that the materials would be preserved as a unitary collection.84 For Tarasevich, the opening of the Mechnikov Museum was an opportunity to honour his good friend and scientific mentor and to celebrate the close and fruitful ties between French and Russian microbiology that dated back to 1888, when Mechnikov took up residence in Paris.

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The founding of the Mechnikov Museum - located just metres away from the collection of live cultures - created new professional opportunities for Zeiss. Participation in the affairs of the Mechnikov Museum was one means of strengthening bonds with his Control Institute colleagues, as several of Zeiss's close associates at the institute were directly involved in the work of both museums.85 But it was not just expediency that attracted Zeiss to Mechnikov's legacy: he also had a long-standing interest in the history of medicine. Zeiss's wartime experiences had sparked an interest in Otto Obermeier (1843-73), the Berlin physician who first discovered spirochetes in the blood of relapsing fever patients.86 Delving into the history of research on relapsing fever after arriving in the Soviet Union, Zeiss was struck by the fact that Germans and Russians - including Mechnikov - had been responsible for most of the significant discoveries concerning this disease. For Zeiss, this historical accident became proof of the 'mutual, harmonious penetration and alliance of German and Russian medical science.'87 Thus, the history of medicine represented yet another means for Zeiss to promote and strengthen the ties between German and Soviet science. As could be expected, Zeiss quickly established a role for himself with the Mechnikov Museum as a facilitator of contacts with Germany. He publicized the museum's existence to the German scientific community, sending out a call for any materials relating to Mechnikov.88 Most importantly, he offered to translate Olga Mechnikova's biography of her late husband into German. According to Zeiss, Tarasevich enthusiastically embraced the idea and arranged for him to meet Olga Mechnikova at the museum's opening in September 1926.89 But by the time Zeiss began serious work on the project in 1929, he had drastically reconfigured the biography. According to Paul Weindling, in private communications with German patrons, Zeiss emphasized that his intention was to 'counter the narrowness of a Franco-Russian view of Metchnikov by making the fundamental point that his scientific work was shaped by German-inspired philosophical preconceptions.'90 In Zeiss's hands, Mechnikov's life became yet another arena in the ongoing battle against French medical influence in the Soviet Union - a battle that no doubt helped Zeiss gain financial backing for his research from German patrons such as the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft. What exactly was the 'Franco-Russian' view of Mechnikov presented by Besredka and Mechnikova? While these biographers approached their subject in very different ways, both presented Mechnikov as a scientific child prodigy whose early, brilliant biological insights formed

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the basis for all his subsequent scientific achievements. Both writers minimized positive German influences on the Russian scientist's intellectual development, depicting Germany as a source of opposition to Mechnikov and his ideas. Besredka's quite narrow intellectual history included few biographical details; more to the point, in keeping with his emphasis on the originality of Mechnikov's thought, he downplayed virtually all external influences on Mechnikov. The few German scientists mentioned by Besredka figured in the story only in a negative way, as misguided opponents of Mechnikov's theories. In contrast, Mechnikova's book aimed at sketching a well-rounded picture of her husband's personal and professional activities, detailing more fully the intellectual context in which he developed his theories. She depicted her husband as immersed in Western scientific literature from an early age, and she supplied the details of his studies and research in Germany and Italy in the 1860s and 1870s. But by arguing that her husband's theories were already formed by the time he was about twenty years old, she was configuring his studies in German universities as independent study by an already mature scientist. Moreover, very few of Mechnikov's extensive contacts with Germans and German science were presented in a positive light. Instead, characterizing Germany as 'a country hostile to his ideas,' Mechnikova emphasized her husband's conflicts with figures such as Rudolf Leuckart, Ernst Haeckel, and Robert Koch.91 All of this was in sharp contrast to Mechnikova's depiction of the warm relations between Mechnikov and the French, particularly the scientists of the Pasteur Institute. If he hoped to recast this biography into a chapter in the close historical relationship between Russian and German science, Zeiss had his work cut out for him. He endeavoured to present Mechnikov's life as three-cornered: Russian by birth, French by virtue of several decades of residence in Paris, but intellectually and scientifically German. To achieve his goal, Zeiss radically edited Mechnikova's text by deleting many early sections on Mechnikov's family background, childhood, and adolescence, and rearranging the remaining material. The first twentyseven chapters of the original work - nearly one-third of the total text were cut down to just twenty pages in Zeiss's version. Zeiss also cast Mechnikov's intellectual ties with German scientists in a vastly different light than had Mechnikova. For example, he argued that throughout his career Mechnikov had worked within the intellectual framework established by Ernst Haeckel: as an evolutionary embryologist, so ran the argument, Mechnikov had been heavily influenced by Haeckel's

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Gastrea theory, and Mechnikov's optimistic philosophy was simply a restatement of Haeckelian monism.92 To demonstrate Mechnikov's immersion in German scientific networks, Zeiss deployed the epistolary riches of the Mechnikov museum. Zeiss even went so far as to suggest that it was merely a fortuitous accident that Mechnikov ended up in France at all. If only Koch had been a bit nicer to Mechnikov when the latter visited Berlin in 1888, Zeiss mused wistfully in his introduction.93 As a result of Zeiss's heavy editorial hand, Mechnikov's intellectual development was depicted not as an organic unfolding of the seeds of ideas planted early in life but rather as fundamentally shaped by later encounters with Germans and German thought. Olga Mechnikova refused to endorse Zeiss's proposed reworking of the biography. 'My book is written according to a definite plan, logically connected to the life of II'ia Il'ich,' she wrote to P.N. Diatroptov, who took over as director of the Control Institute and chairman of the Mechnikov Museum's board of directors after Tarasevich's death. 'In it, everything is bound up to everything else ... And those links must naturally be laid out in their proper order.'94 She was especially upset that the first portion of the book, covering Mechnikov's early years, would be radically shortened: 'In fact, the detailed description of his childhood and youth is especially important since in them was contained all the germs of the future. The development of his character and thoughts were closely dependent on the environment and its influence from very earliest childhood.'95 Ironically, Mechnikova's approach, with its emphasis on the formative influences of her husband's Russian-Jewish heritage and his early exposure to the environment of Ukraine, closely resembled Zeiss's later emphasis on the relationship between race, birthplace, and scientific creativity in the biography of Emil von Behring, which he coauthored with Richard Bieling in 1941.96 But Zeiss's translation of Mechnikov's biography was more than a polemical document: he was striving to distinguish his own project from earlier Franco-Russian efforts by adhering to rigorous historical methods and by incorporating an extensive scholarly apparatus. Zeiss undertook considerable original research of his own, travelling to German archives and scouring the medical literature of four countries for primary source material. Zeiss even travelled to France in 1930 to interview Mechnikov's widow and former associates. He added many long explanatory footnotes to expand on Mechnikova's references to people and publications, and he often included entire documents, especially items from the Mechnikov Museum. Zeiss also appended to his work a

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history and description of the Mechnikov Museum, as well as bibliographies and indexes. So extensive were the supporting materials that they became a virtual second text, equal in length to Mechnikova's original narrative. In contrast, the Besredka and Mechnikova studies were free of even the most rudimentary source citations. Zeiss's use of the Mechnikov archival legacy contrasted strikingly with another important project based on the same collection: Bor'ba za nauku v Tsarskoi Rossii (The Fight for Science in Modern Russia) edited by the members of the museum's executive board (including Diatroptov, Liubarskii, and Bunina). As originally planned in 1926, this was to be the first of two volumes of correspondence between Russian scientists, based primarily on the Mechnikov archive.97 By 1930, when the volume was actually published, the changed political climate in the Soviet Union - and especially the threatened loss of autonomy for bourgeois scientific specialists - had lent a new urgency to the project.98 The volume became a means of highlighting the positive contributions political and social - made by pre-revolutionary bourgeois scientists. In their introduction the editors argued that scientists such as Mechnikov, Mikhail I. Sechenov, and Alexander O. Kovalevskii had had a profound impact on sociopolitical developments: The deeper and more serious was the work of Russian scientists, the more zealously the autocracy watched them and fought with them: there was no more dangerous enemy for the autocracy than scientific truth/99 According to this view, through his fervent belief in the autonomy of science and academic freedom, even the apolitical Mechnikov functioned as a revolutionary figure.100 The works of Sechenov and Mechnikov were especially important (so went the argument) since they served to spread materialist ideas - which were 'stronger than dynamite and bombs' - and in doing so helped bring down the old order.101 In contrast to Zeiss's book, this collection drew exclusively on correspondence between Mechnikov and Russian scientists, thus firmly embedding Mechnikov in Russian scientific networks. Just as he had done in the case of the microbiological museum, Zeiss attempted to use his connections to the Mechnikov archive to promote other historical projects that would ensure a continuing role for him in the Soviet Union. Starting in the late 1920s, he became an increasingly vocal public advocate for the institutionalization of the history of medicine in the Soviet Union. According to Poddubnyi, Zeiss was even appointed to the Commission on the History of Science of the Soviet Academy of Sciences in 1927.102 He joined the German Society for the

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History of Medicine and Science, and his name appeared with some frequency in German medico-historical journals, sometimes as a coauthor of works by Soviet scholars such as O.A. Steppun and Mikhail I. Lakhtin.103 Zeiss evidently forged a close relationship with Lakhtin, a professor of medical history at Moscow University and a member of the Society of Psychologist-Marxists of the Communist Academy. Referring to Lakhtin as 'an open friend of German historical and medico-historical science/ Zeiss claimed to share with him a common purpose in promoting German-style 'scientific' medical history in the Soviet context.104 In 1928 the Ukrainian medical journal Vmchebnoe Delo published back-to-back articles by Zeiss and Lakhtin arguing for heavier Soviet involvement in the scholarly study of medical history. In his piece, Zeiss argued that 'we Soviets' have lagged in the institutionalization of medical history relative to other countries. He proposed the creation of a scholarly society and research institute, and he laid out a broad program of research for both.105 He concluded with a reference to the 'untouched riches of the Mechnikov Museum,' suggesting that it would be a suitable base for these new institutions. Zeiss refrained from mentioning any central role for himself in these enterprises; even so, he nurtured strong hopes to that effect, which he did make public in Germany. In a 1928 international survey of academic positions in medical history published by Henry Sigerist, one of the two entries under Russia noted that 'a medical history department under the leadership of Prof. Zeiss at the Institute for Social Hygiene in Moscow is in the process of formation.'106 Presumably Zeiss himself was the source of that information. Two years later, in a speech to the German medical history society on that same planned Soviet medical history department, Zeiss back-pedalled, explaining that while Semashko had proposed him as director, this was no longer possible in light of the ideological credentials required for such a position in the new political climate of 1930.107 The role Zeiss claimed for himself conflicts with the evidence. Even at the Mechnikov Museum, Zeiss never exercised significant influence as an animator of Soviet medical history. He was not included on the museum's steering committee, nor was he ever publicly associated with the collection in any other way, and he seems to have had little impact in shaping the official agenda of the museum's staff as set forth in 1930.108 He claimed that he had worked to obtain materials for the Moscow repository, but judging from the published inventories of the collection's holdings, he was not generous in sharing his research materials. And notwithstanding the book's dedication to the memory of Lev

182 Elizabeth Hachten Tarasevich, Zeiss's biographical study of Mechnikov seems to have had limited impact in the Soviet Union.109 The finished book did not appear until 1932; by that year he had been forced out of the Tarasevich Institute and had returned to Germany. Conclusion: Exit and Exegesis That Zeiss was a relentless self-promoter there is no doubt. His task was the easier because he managed to structure collaborative relationships with Soviet scientists based on the shared exploitation of scientific objects that bridged the sometimes considerable gaps between him and his Soviet colleagues. However, even Zeiss was no match for the changing circumstances of the Soviet Union at the end of the 1920s. He now laboured under a dual disadvantage. His Soviet patronage network was beginning to disintegrate, with many of his carefully cultivated contacts having died (Tarasevich in 1927, Lakhtin in 1930) or having been demoted from their positions of power (Semashko and Gorbunov in 1930). Even more important were the shifts in the broader scientific and political climate. Scientists now faced increasing party control over their activities and institutions. And foreigners in particular were coming under increased surveillance and suspicion in the wake of the war scares of the late 1920s, and the Shakhty and Industrial Party trials, which targeted Soviet scientists and engineers for alleged conspiracies with foreign governments and emigres against the Soviet regime.110 Given the cooling of diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and Germany, it is amazing that Zeiss managed to continue his activities as long as he did. The turning point came in the autumn of 1930. He had spent the summer in Western Europe, travelling to Paris, where he interviewed Mechnikov's widow and former colleagues and attended the first congress of the new International Society for Microbiology, whose opening plenary session was devoted to a discussion of the importance of national type culture collections.111 Returning to Moscow in mid-September, Zeiss found that the OGPU had launched an open campaign of harassment and intimidation against him. He and his wife were followed openly by a 'plump' secret policeman. Trouble suddenly arose concerning his residence permit. At the Control Institute, Zeiss discovered that his secretary had been arrested and his desk searched, and that an official investigation of the management of the collection of live cultures had been undertaken amid accusations that microbial cultures had been left

Zeiss and Cross-National Scientific Collaboration 183

carelessly lying open during the summer holidays.112 Rumours swirled around the institute that several bacteriologists with known ties to Zeiss had been arrested: S.M. Nikanorov, director of the Saratov Institute, and M.I. Shtutzer, head of the Kiev Institute of Microbiology. In a late September meeting with Vladimirskii, the new Commissar of Public Health, Zeiss complained that 'since my return everyone has avoided me as though I had plague or leprosy.'113 Vladimirskii professed great respect for Zeiss's work in the Soviet Union, but he also denied any knowledge of the arrests and police tails and could provide no reassurances. Much of the suspicion focused on Zeiss's work with Bacteria tularense, the microbe that causes the plague-like illness tularemia. Tularemia is a disease of rodents that can be transmitted to humans in certain circumstances. McCoy first described it in the western United States in 1911; in 1922, another American, Edward Francis, identified the bacterial agent. In 1926, Nikanorov described a hitherto unknown disease in the Astrakhan region and made a tentative identification of tularemia.114 Understandably, Zeiss became involved with tularemia: to make a precise identification of this new disease, Soviet researchers needed to compare samples collected in different countries. This was the sort of comparative research that Zeiss advocated; furthermore, it represented an opportunity for him to strengthen his Saratov connections and showcase his access to international exchange networks. It is not clear whether Zeiss himself conducted research with the bacteria, but he did forward samples from England and the United States to the Saratov Institute, where Nikanorov and his staff had launched an intensive research program.115 Tularemia also resonated with Zeiss's interests in loimology, historical epidemiology, and geomedicine. As an epizootic disease with implications for human health, tularemia was a perfect example of the need for a loimological perspective in epidemiology. Zeiss published several articles on tularemia for German audiences in which he reported on the Soviet research, adding his own speculations about the history of epidemic tularemia in Russia.116 While Bacteria tularense thus had the potential to become yet another powerful boundary object, as Wolfgang Eckart described in his chapter, Zeiss's involvement with this microbe aroused the suspicions of the Soviet security apparatus and contributed to the collapse of his Soviet activities. Whether there were other, more sinister aspects to Zeiss's involvement with tularemia is impossible to determine; it is also not clear precisely what suspicions were being entertained about Zeiss's activities. In the September meeting between Vladimirskii and Zeiss,

184 Elizabeth Hachten

the former was interested mainly in learning about these 'special cultures/ Zeiss denied rumours that he had betrayed Soviet interests by sending samples abroad and that he was carrying out experiments on the bacteria. Citing his nine years of work for the Soviet government, he assured Vladimirskii that the new Soviet disease was identical to the tularemia found elsewhere in the world and that there were no secrets involved in its cultivation by bacteriologists. One concern raised by Vladimirskii at the September meeting was whether it was safe to cultivate this microbe in the setting of the Control Institute. It should be noted that while natural tularemia has a low human mortality rate, the disease was understood to be quite dangerous in laboratory settings. As Nikanorov pointed out: The disease is highly contagious. Three technicians at the Lister Institute in England were infected by Bac. tularense cultures from America and many laboratory workers in our organization have also already succeeded in infecting themselves in the process of working with [the Soviet] tularemia-like disease/117 This fear seems to have been the trigger behind the investigation of how the cultures had been handled during the summer break. No further action was taken against Zeiss for several months after the meeting with Vladimirskii. But at the end of November, Petr Diatroptov, the director of the Control Institute, came to Zeiss in tears explaining that he was being forced to issue an order removing Zeiss from his position at the institute and appointing Bunina as head of the collection.118 Diatroptov begged Zeiss to resign, which he did on 28 November. A week later, on 7 December, Zeiss again met with Vladimirskii, who explained that no foreigners could be allowed to work at the Control Institute, given its delicate central mission to ensure the quality of the country's supplies of vaccines and sera. Vladimirskii rescinded the order firing Zeiss but refused to reinstate him, instead holding out the vague promise of a job in a different Narkomzdrav institute. But that opportunity never materialized, in part, no doubt, because of the reluctance of Soviet microbiologists to have anything further to do with Zeiss, given the hysterical xenophobia then gripping the country. After his dismissal from the Control Institute, Zeiss slowly faded from the Soviet scene. He maintained at least an intermittent residence in the Soviet Union while he finished the Mechnikov biography, and evidently he sought to cultivate support from other Soviet patrons, such as the All-Union Society for Cultural Ties Abroad (VOKS).119 It was only in February 1932 that he was finally ejected from the country as an undesirable alien. Ironically, Zeiss's very success in creating networks and manipulat-

Zeiss and Cross-National Scientific Collaboration 185

ing boundary objects came back to haunt him in later years. During the Second World War, the NKVD circulated accusations that Zeiss had been involved in bacteriological warfare - a claim no doubt connected to his work with tularemia.120 After the war, Zeiss was arrested by Soviet authorities and charged with having run a spy ring among Soviet microbiologists during the 1920s. While such accusations were commonly lodged against foreigners and their Soviet contacts during the Stalinist era, in Zeiss's case the appearance of espionage may well have been heightened by his assiduous cultivation of ties with Soviet colleagues. The official Soviet accusations against Zeiss, along with his Nazi connections and activities during the war - as described in this book by Schleiermacher and Eckart - have all contributed to Zeiss's clouded and obscure legacy. And what of the boundary objects around which Zeiss's collaborations with Soviet scientists were structured? Each of the boundary objects examined here has continued to figure in Russian science down to the present day, although Zeiss's own involvement with those objects has been virtually forgotten. Bayer 205, now more commonly known as suramin, continues to be a front-line drug in the treatment of trypanosomiasis worldwide (including in the former Soviet Union). The Mechnikov Museum was dissolved in the 1940s; the documents from that collection are now held by the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences, where they continue to attract scholars from around the world. The Tarasevich State Institute of Standardization and Control of Medical Biological Preparations still houses a museum of pathogenic bacteria; however, a 1982 catalogue of the museum traces its history back only to 1955. The persistence of these objects, in contrast to the fragility of the collaborative relationships that Zeiss forged during a remarkable but short-lived career in the Soviet Union, provides another measure by which to judge the significance of his Soviet sojourn. NOTES 1 For an elegant introduction to constructivist models of scientific collaboration, see Jan Golinski, Making Natural Knowledge: Constructivism and the History of Science (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), esp. ch. 1. 2 See Bruno Latour, Science in Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers through Society (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1987), esp. 106-47. 3 Susan Leigh Star and James R. Griesemer, 'Institutional Ecology, "Transla-

186 Elizabeth Hachten

4 5 6

7

8

9

10 11

tions" and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-1939/ Social Studies of Science 19 (1989): 387^20. Ibid., 388-9. Ibid., 412. For example, see Joan Fujimura, 'Crafting Science: Standardized Packages, Boundary Objects, and "Translation,"' in Andrew Pickering, ed., Science as Practice and Culture (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 168-211; Ann Secord, 'Science in the Pub: Artisan Botanists in Early NineteenthCentury Lancashire,' History of Science 32 (1994): 269-304. See Paul Weindling, 'German-Soviet Medical Co-operation and the Institute for Racial Research, 1927-c. 1935,' German History 10, no. 2 (1992): 177206; Weindling, 'Heinrich Zeiss, Hygiene and the Holocaust," in Dorothy Porter and Roy Porter, eds., Doctors, Politics and Society: Historical Essays (Atlanta: Rodopi, 1993), 174-87; Weindling, Epidemics and Genocide in Eastern Europe, 1890-1945 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000). See also Wolfgang U. Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik der Republik von Weimar Deutschland und die Sowjetunion 1920-1932,' Medizin, Gesellschaft, und Geschichte 11 (1992): 105-42; I. Rikhter, 'Meditsina i politika v germano-sovetskikh otnosheniiakh v 20-e gody,' Sovetskoe zdravookhranenie (1990): 69-71; M.V. Poddubnyi, 'Professor G. Tseiss (1888-1949) i istoriia meditsiny v Rossii (k 70-letiiu odnoi stat'i)/ Problemy sotsial'noi meditsiny i istorii meditsiny (1998): 60-61; Poddubnyi, 'Genrykh Tseiss i moskovskie "germanofily" 1920-kh godov,' Acta medico-historica Rigensia 5 (2000): 53-74. This picture of Zeiss as a Latourian scientific entrepreneur manipulating networks of his own making emerges from Weindling, Epidemics and Genocide in Eastern Europe. Abstracts of the three talks Zeiss delivered at the Congress were published in its proceedings in both German and Russian: Dr Zeiss, 'Zusammenfassung zum Vortrag: Wuermeranreicherung und Kochsalzmethode,' Prof. Kireev und Dr Zeiss, 'Zusammenfassung zum Vortrag ueber Fleckfieber und Abderhalden'sche Reaktion/ Dr Zeiss, 'Zusammenfassung zum Vortrag ueber Yatren und Pestbakterien,' VII Vserossiiskii s"ezd bakteriologov, epidemiologov i sanitarnykh vrachei, 22-28 maia 1923 goda v Moskve. Materialy s"ezda, volume 2 (Moscow: Narodnyi Komissariat Zdravookhraneniia, 1923), 30-2. For the Bayer connection, see Weindling, 'German-Soviet Medical Cooperation,' 182-5, and Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik,' 113-17. Zeiss's name appeared on more than half a dozen papers on Bayer 205 that emanated from Mayer's laboratory in the early 1920s, including the

Zeiss and Cross-National Scientific Collaboration 187 following: Martin Mayer and Heinz Zeiss, 'Versuche mit einem neuen Trypanosomenheilmittel ('Bayer 205') bei menschen- und tierpathogenen Trypanosomen/ Archivfur Schiffs- und Tropen-Hygiene 24, no. 9 (1920): 257-94; Martin Mayer and Heinz Zeiss, 'Weiteres iiber die Wirkung von 'Bayer 205'-Serum (Menschenserum)/ Archivfur Schiffs- und TropenHygiene 25, no. 5 (1921): 140-50; Martin Mayer and Heinz Zeiss, 'Uber die Wirksamkeit des Serums mit "Bayer 205" vorbehandelter Kaninchen,' Archivfur Schiffs- und Tropen-Hygiene 25, no. 9 (1921): 259-71. 12 That talk was published several months later as 'O nabliudenniiakh sdelannykh do sikh por s novym sredstvom protiv tripanozom "Bayer 205,'" Meditsinskii zhurnal 5 (1922): 368-74. 13 Ibid., 369. 14 See Thomas S. Work and Elizabeth Work, The Basis of Chemotherapy (New York: Interscience Publishers, 1948), ch. 1; Wilhelm Kolle and Heinrich Hetsch, Experimental Bacteriology in Its Applications to the Diagnosis, Epidemiology, and Immunology of Infectious Diseases, English edition, ed. John Eyre (New York: Macmillan, 1935), 1:187-222; and K. Shmelev, 'Uspekhi sovremennoi khimoterapii infektsionnykh zabolevanii/ Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 4, no. 4 (1927): 441-8. 15 These included Tryparsamide, developed in 1919 at the Rockefeller Institution, and several trypanocidal compounds discovered by Ernest Fourneau at the Pasteur Institute in 1923. 16 Among these were the Chemical-Pharmaceutical Institute of VSNKh, discussed below, and the Institute of Protozoan Diseases of GINZ (later renamed the Tropical Institute), which boasted a chemotherapy division. 17 For Zeiss and the Chemical-Pharmaceutical Institute, see Poddubnyi, 'Professor G. Tseiss (1888-1949) i istoriia meditsiny v Rossii,' 60; on the place of VSNKh and its institutes in Soviet science in the 1920s, see Nikolai Krementsov, Stalinist Science (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), 19. ISO. Stepun, G. Zeiss, and S. Briukhonenko, 'Biokhimicheskie issledovanniia o tripanotsidnom sredstve "Bayer 205'," Trudy Nauchnogo khimiko-farmatsevticheskogo instituta VSNKH, no. 3 (1923): 49-52; this work also appeared the same year in Archivfur Schiffs- und Tr open-Hygiene. Zeiss also claimed to have undertaken unpublished work with Stepun on German serotherapy, and several years later he collaborated on another biochemical study of Bayer 205 with a researcher at the Control Institute. See lu.N. Makarova and A.L. Tseiss, 'Kolloidno-khimicheskie reaktsii sviazyvaniia belkovogo kompleksa germaninom. I. Baier 205 v opytakh s toksinom, antikoksinom i anafilaksiei,' Zhurnal eksperimental'noi biologii i meditsiny 6, no. 16 (1927): 241-50. Interestingly, on this 1927 paper Zeiss listed his affiliation as the

188 Elizabeth Hachten

19 20

21

22 23

24 25

26

27 28

29 30

Chemical-Pharmaceutical Institute, even though he was at that time on the staff of the Control Institute. That fact, however, was not mentioned in the published version of Zeiss's talk. See the overview of the institute's history in Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 1, no. 1 (1922): i-iv. The original structure of the institute included a plague department, a vaccine and serum production department, and a department of general microbiology and epidemiology. For German readers, Zeiss characterized the Saratov Institute as a centre for tropical medicine in Russia, although it was not officially included among the Soviet tropical medicine institutions. Heinz Zeiss, 'Das Reichsinstitut fur Epidemiologie und Mikrobiologie fur den Siidosten Russlands in Saratow an der Wolga,' Munchener medizinische wochenschrift, no. 47 (21 November 1924): 1648-9. For biographical material on Sergei Aleksandrovich Ilovaiskii see his obituary in Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 3, nos. 1-2 (1924): iii-v. S.A. Ilovaiskii and V.D. Shtiben, 'Su-auru - tripanozomoz verbliuda i loshadi v Kirgizskoi stepi i Ural'skoi Oblasti,' Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 2, nos. 1-2 (1923): 51-61, and 3, no. 5 (1924): 160-5. Ibid., 2: 52-3. See also W.L. Yakimoff, 'Au sujet de la trypanosomiase des chameux russes,' Bulletin de la Societede Pathologie exotique 5 (1923): 314-19. See P. Miihlens, '5 Jahre Behandlung der Amobenruhr mit "Yatren 105,'" Archivfur Schiffs- und Tropen-Hygiene 29 (1925): 491-503, and K. Shmelev, 'Uspekhi sovremennoi khimoterapii infektsionnykh zabolevanii,' Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii, no. 4 (1927): 443-4. Zeiss, 'O iatrene i bakteriiakh chumy,' VII Vserossiiskii s"ezd bakteriologov, epidemiologov i sanitarnykh vrachei, 22-28 maia 1923 goda vMoskve. Material]/ s"ezda, no. 3 (Moscow: Narkomzdrav, 1923), 32. Also see Zeiss, 'Dal'neishie issledovaniia o deistvii Yatren'a na chumnye palochki/ Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 3, no. 3 (1924): 147-9. S.A. Ilovaiskii and G. Tseiss, '"Bayer 205" pri eksperimental'nom Su-auru u verbliudov,' Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 2, nos. 1-2 (1923): 63-7. There are mentions of treating animals with Bayer 205 in Ilovaiskii and Shtiben, 'Su-auru,' and S.A. Ilovaiskii, 'Su-auru u loshadei/ Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 3, nos. 1-2 (1924): 49-51. V.P. Bozhenko and A.L. Tseiss, Tripanozomoz ovets,' Vestnik mikrobiologii, epidemiologii i parazitologii 7, no. 4 (1928): 417-20. A. Tseiss, 'Infektsionnye zabolevaniia u verbliudov, neizvestnogo do sikh por proiskhozhdeniia (El'-Gedda, adenity),' Vestnik mikrobiologii, epidemiologii i parazitologii 7, no. 1 (1928): 98-105.

Zeiss and Cross-National Scientific Collaboration 189 31 VS. Emelin and A.L. Tseiss, Terapevticheskoe i profilakticheskoe lechenie Naganolem tripanozomoza (Su-auru) u verbliudov/ Vestnik mikrobiologii, epidemiologii i parazitologii 7, no. 4 (1928): 423-30. (Originally delivered as a talk at the 90th Congress of Scientists and Physicians in Hamburg in 1928.) 32 Ibid., 427. 33 For a plan of work for these expeditions, see A.L. Tseiss, Terespektivy izucheniia tripanozomiaza Su-auru verbliudov i bor'by s nim na lu.-V. SSSR/ Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 5, no. 4 (1926): 308-11. The Saratov Institute's sponsorship of the expeditions of 1926 and 1927 was announced in the Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 6, no. 3 (1927): 369. Zeiss never published any full reports of these expeditions' results with Naganol, although Zeiss and Emelin refer to this work in their 1928 paper, 'terapeuticheskoe i profilakticheskoe lechenie.' 34 One Narkomzdrav official acknowledged as late as 1925 'the impossibility of receiving scientific missions [(komandirovki] abroad in order to become acquainted with the newest methods and advances of foreign bacteriological institutions.' V.S. Solov'ev, 'O deiatelnosti bakteriologicheskikh institutov RSFSR v 1924,' Trudy 1925 Vserossisskogo s"ezda bakteriologov, epidemiologov, i sanitarnikh vrachei v Moskve (Moscow, 1925), 215. As a member of the organizing committee of the joint German-Russian Scarlet Fever Congress held in Konigsberg in June 1928, for example, Zeiss may have helped ensure the inclusion of collaborators such as Kireev, E.D. Bunina (Zeiss's colleague at the Tarasevich Institute), and M. Shtiitzer (a Soviet bacteriologist of German descent and head of the bacteriological institute in Rostov-na-Donu). A. Wolff-Eisner, 'Deutsch-russischer Scharlachskongress,' Munchener medizinische Wochenschrift 27 (July 1928): 1184-6 and 1267-8. M. Shtiitzer, 'Nemetsko-russkii kongress po skarlatine v Kenigsberge,' Gigiena i epidemiologiia 9 (1928): 120-7. 35 As Daniel Alexandrov has noted, over the course of the 1920s the general trend among Soviet scientists was to publish a decreasing percentage of their papers in foreign journals. 'Publication abroad was, undoubtedly, prestigious, but it was easier to place an article in a Russian publication.' D. A. Alexandrov, 'Pochemu sovetskie uchenye perestali pechatat'sia za rubezhom: stanovlenie samodostatochnosti i izolirovannosti otechestvennoi nauki, 1914-1940,' Voprosy istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki 3 (1996): 1-23, on 12. 36 For lakimov, see his entry in the Bol'shaia meditsinksaia entsiklopediia, gen. ed. N.A. Semashko, 1st ed. (Moscow: Gos. Izd-vo biol. i med. literatury, 1931), 36: 784. 37 For a reply to the work of lakimov and his school, see Emelin and Tseiss, 'Terapevticheskoe i profilakticheskoe lechenie,' 423-30.

190 Elizabeth Hachten 38 In the early 1920s, the temporary spread of trypanosomiasis outside of its usual endemic area had made it easier for Zeiss, Ilovaiskii, and Emelin to argue for the economic importance of Bayer 205. They could also point to the fact that camels served as reservoirs of trypanosomiasis for other domesticated animals and that camels were important to the economy of the arid trans-Volga regions. A. Tseiss, 'Infektsionnye zabolevaniia u verbliudov.' 39 A.L. Tseiss and V.S. Emelin, 'lavliaetsia li "Bayer 205" tol'ko protivotripanozomnym sredstvom?' Zhurnal mikrobiologii, patologii i infektsionnykh boleznei 5 (1928): 217-22. 40 This line of research is rather puzzling since it was well known that the drug was ineffective in the late, neurological stage of trypanosomiasis as it could not be absorbed into the cerebrospinal fluid. 41 See the article 'Tripanosomy, Tripanosomiaz' in Bol'shaia meditsinskiai entsiklopediia, ed. N.A. Semashko, 1st ed. (Moscow: Gos. Izd-vo biol. i med. literatury, 1931), 32: 792. 42 For Tarasevich, see L.I. Grabovskaia, Lev Aleksandrovich Tarasevich 18681927 gg. (Biograficheskii ocherk) (Moscow: Meditsina, 1970); K.G. Vasil'ev, E.P. Popushoi, and E.Iu. Gol'd, Chelovek redkoi samobytnosti (Kishinev: Izd. 'Karta Moldaveniaske,' 1970); Peter Krug, 'Russian Public Physicians and Revolution: The Pirogov Society, 1917-1920' (PhD dissertation, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1979); and John F. Hutchinson, Politics and Public Health in Revolutionary Russia, 1890-1918 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990). 43 Tarasevich guaranteed a place in GINZ for close friends and colleagues such as Nikolai Kol'tsov of the Institute of Experimental Biology and Petr N. Diatroptov, who became head of the Sanitary-Hygiene Institute. In part, this was a function of the fact that, as Mark Adams put it, 'Narkomzdrav came into being not as a state instrument but as a professional network encompassing divergent agendas.' Mark B. Adams, 'Eugenics as Social Medicine in Revolutionary Russia: Prophets, Patrons, and the Dialectics of DisciplineBuilding,' in Susan G. Solomon and John F. Hutchinson, eds., Health and Society in Revolutionary Russia (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990), 200-1. Among the other posts Tarasevich held were the chairmanship of the Main Scientific Medical Council (Glavnyi Uchenyi Meditsinskii Soviet) and positions on the Epidemics, Serum-Vaccine, Wasserman, and BCG commissions, as well as on the editorial boards of several journals. 44 See Gosudarstvennyi Nauchnyi institut narodnogo zdravookhraneniia imeni Pastern, 1918-1924, eds. L.A. Tarasevich and V.A. Liubarskii (Moscow: GINZ, 1924), 12-15. Cf. the history of the US Public Health Service Lab (predeces-

Zeiss and Cross-National Scientific Collaboration 191

45

46

47

48

49

50

sor to NIH) as discussed in Victoria Harden, Inventing the NIH: Federal Biomedical Research Policy, 1887-1937 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986), 27-29. The female members included lu.N. Makarova (Tarasevich's daughter-inlaw), L.A. Aleksina, A.I. Togubina, N.L. Zhivago, E.D. Bunina, and E.V. Glotova, all of whom were former students of Tarasevich, who had occupied the chair of bacteriology at the Women's Medical Courses. Apparently, the atmosphere of the institute was particularly close, even familial. See Arkhiv Russkoi Akademii Nauk (henceforth ARAM),/. 1538, op. 1, d. 87, the reminiscences of E.V. Glotova and L.A. Aleksina, Tamiati uchitelia i druga (iz vospominanii o prof. L.A.Taraseviche)' (1951) and ARAN,/. 1538, op. 2, d. 89. N.L. Zhivago, 'O L.A. Taraseviche/ (1947). On the need for Soviet physicians to reconnect to French and English medical communities, see ARAN,/. 1538, op. 1, d. 47, /. 10. L.A. Tarasevich, 'Ob ustanovlenii nauchnykh i medits. otnoshenii s zapadnoi Evropoi/ Otkrytoe pis'mo v redaktsiiu zhurnala 'Vrachebnoe delo' (1921). On the occasion of the fifth anniversary of the institute, Tarasevich celebrated the new opportunities for increased contact and travel that made possible a series of collaborations in epidemiology, prophylactics, and serology. Tarasevich and Liubarskii, Gosudarstvennyi institut, 11. Although the Soviet Union was not a member of the League of Nations, Narkomzdrav cooperated with the league's public health bodies in famine relief, epidemic disease monitoring, and research on the efficacy of buccal immunization. The Serological Commission - the creation of Thorvald Madsen, president of the Health Organization and director of the Sero-Therapeutic State Institute in Copenhagen - reflected the general trend towards international standardization in many areas of medical practice. See W.C. Cockburn, The International Contribution to the Standardization of Biological Substances. I. Biological Standards and the League of Nations 1921-1946,' Biologicals 19 (1991): 161-9. See G.I. Liubina, Rossiia i Frantsiia: Istoriia nauchnogo sotrudnichestva (vtoraia polovina XlX-nachalo XX vv) (Moscow: 'lanus/ 1996), 215; Liubina, 'Osnovnye napravleniia sotrudnichestva sovetskikh i frantsuzskikh uchenykh v 20-3- gg. XX v. (tochnye i estestvennye nauki),' Voprosy istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki 3 (1985): 120-7. Liubina credits Tarasevich with helping re-establish Soviet-French diplomatic relations. See O.N. Mechnikova, 'Vospominaniia o L've Aleksandroviche Taraseviche,' Zhurnal mikrobiologii, patologii i infektsionnykh boleznei 4 (1927): 331^1. But Tarasevich was certainly no mouthpiece for Soviet interests in

192 Elizabeth Hachten France; indeed, there was no single 'party line' on Soviet-French scientific and medical relations, even among representatives of Narkomzdrav, VOKS, and the Soviet Embassy. See Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv Russkoi Federatsii (henceforth GARF),/. A-482, op. 35, d. 162, /. 1-28. A. N. Rubakin, 'Kratkii otchet o deiatel'nosti Predstavitel'stva Narkomzdrava vo Frantsii.' 51 Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik/ p. 114. Weindling argues that this was part of Zeiss's broader 'policy of undermining the influence of French medicine and diplomacy.' Weindling, 'German-Soviet Medical Cooperation/ 181,185. 52 Weindling, 'Heinrich Zeiss, Hygiene and the Holocaust/ 177. 53 Zeiss was inconsistent in his terminology, referring at times to the Collection of Microbial Strains, the All-Russian Museum of Microbiology, the AllSoviet Microbiological Collection, or simply the Collection of Live Cultures. 54 Trudy VIII Vserossiiskogo s'ezda bakteriologov, epidemiologov i sanitarnikh vracheiv g. Leningrade, 20-26 main 1924, eds. A.N. Cherventsov and A.A. Filaretov (Leningrad: Tip. Novaia Zaria, 1925), 650-3. 55 It appears that Tarasevich's report was part of a broader effort by Narkomzdrav to strengthen central control over the nation's bacteriological institutions. At the same congress, the head of Narkomzdrav's Vaccine-Serum Commission announced that 'the centre must take a harder, more definite line' towards the bacteriological institutes. Ibid., 211. 56 For historical background on the development of microbial collections, see J.R. Porter, The World View of Culture Collections/ in Rita R. Colwell, ed., The Role of Culture Collections in the Era of Molecular Biology (Washington, DC: American Society for Microbiology, 1976), 62-72. 57 Tarasevich and Liubarskii, Gosudarstvennyi institut, 12. 58 Ibid., 24. 59 Zeiss's exact claim was that '[Dr] Ausbau und die Organisation dieser Sammlung am Pasteurinstitut is mir aufgetragen worden.' H. Zeiss, 'Die Griidung der Allrussischen mikrobiologischen Sammlung in Moskau/ Miinchener medizinische Wochenschrift (1925): 523-4. The other, Russian version of the speech, which lacks this depiction of his role, is A.L. Tseiss, 'Organizatsiia Vsesoiuznoi mikrobiologicheskoi kolleksiia/ Vrachebnoe delo 12/14 (1925): 1049-50. 60 Auswartiges Amt, Bonn, Politisches Archiv, R 66424, 'Abschrift/ dated 29 August 1924. 61 According to historian Nikolai Krementsov, while personal patronage especially by the heads of government agencies - was a crucial factor in

Zeiss and Cross-National Scientific Collaboration

62

63 64

65

66 67 68

69 70 71

72

193

Soviet scientific organization, 'the agency, however, rarely interfered in the direction, content, or duration of research, the choice of personnel and equipment, or the structure of institutions; these were largely defined by the scientists themselves. So, despite its financing of all scientific research, the state's influence on scientific work itself was minimal.' Krementsov, Stalinist Science, 21-2. A.L. Tseiss, 'Otchet za pervyi god sushchestvovaniia Vserossiiskogo muzeia mikrobiologii/ Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 5, no. 3 (1926): 225. Ibid., 224. A.L. Tseiss, 'Organizatsiia Vsesoiuznoi mikrobiologicheskoi kollektsii,' Vrachebnoe delo 12/14 (1925): 1050. The Serum-Vaccine Commission session at the 1924 congress also produced several resolutions on the need to strengthen international exchanges of various kinds. 'Up to this time, all efforts of foreign researchers to receive Russian strains have been futile. And in the interests of international cooperation this situation must be corrected.' A.L. Tseiss, 'Zadachi i tseli Vserossiiskogo Mikrobiologicheskogo Muzeia/ Trudy IX Vserossiiskogo s"ezda bakteriologov, epidemiologov, i sanitarnykh vrachei, Moskva, 25 maia-1 iunia 1925 g. (Leningrad: Org. biuro S'ezda), 1: 201. In response to international interest, Zeiss published specific calls to Soviet researchers to submit samples of paratyphoid A and B bacilli and atypical or non-agglutinating cholera vibrios for exchange purposes. Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii 4, no. 4 (1925): 122. Tseiss, 'Organizatsiia Vsesoiuznoi mikrobiologicheskoi kollektsii/ 1049. Tseiss, 'Otchet za pervyi god,' 223. There were two versions of the speech: A.L. Tseiss, 'Organizatsiia Vsesoiuznoi mikrobiologicheskoi kollektsii/ Vrachebnoe delo, no. 12/14 (1925): 1049-50; and H. Zeiss, 'Die Griiridung der Allrussischen mikrobiologischen Sammlung in Moskau/ Munchener medizinische Wochenschrift (1925): 523-4. Tseiss, 'Organizatsiia Vsesoiuznoi mikrobiologicheskoi kollektsii/ 1049. Ibid. On the actual operation of the museum, see Tseiss, 'Otchet za pervyi god/ and Rossiiskii Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv sotsial'no-politicheskoi istorii (henceforth RGASPI),/. 357, op. 1, d. 125, /. 34-8. 'Muzei zhivykh kul'tur: Instituta eksperimental'noi terapii i kontrolia syvorotok i vaktsin im. L.A. Tarasevicha/ (1930). E.D. Bunina and A.F. Korzhninskaia, 'Sravnitel'noe izuchenie shtammov gruppy paratifa B v sviazi s ucheniem Uhlenhuth'a i kil'skoi shkoly ob edinstve i samostoiatel'nosti otdel'nykh tipov/ Zhurnal mikrobiologii, patologii i infektsionnykh boleznei 5, no. 3 (1928): 370-80. The authors

194 Elizabeth Hachten

73

74 75 76 77 78 79 80

81

82

83

acknowledged Zeiss's assistance in obtaining the necessary bacterial strains; when this paper was later republished in Germany, however, Zeiss received billing as a co-author. They made use of several different strains of cholera and diphtheria from the collection to prepare the necessary toxins and antitoxins for their experiments. Makarova and Tseiss, 'Kolloidno-khimicheskie reaktsii sviazyvaniia belkovogo kompleksa germaninom/ 241-50. This work was framed as an expansion on the research carried out on Bayer 205 at the ChemicalPharmaceutical Institute. RGASPI,/. 357, op. 1, d. 125, /. 6-7. Zeiss report to Vladimiriskii, 8 October 1930. Weindling, Epidemics and Genocide, 210-11. See following correspondence in the ARAN,/. 1538, op. 4, d. 65 [L. Brauer], d. 251 [B. Nocht], d. 97 [F. Wolter], d. 402 [Miihlens]. ARAN,/. 1538, op. 4, d. 65, /. 2. See ARAN,/. 1538, op. 4, d. 28 [Medical Faculty of Hamburg University]. See Zeiss's obituary of Tarasevich in Munchener medizinische Wochenschrift, no. 25 (1928). O.N. Mechnikova, Zhizn' II'ii Il'icha Mechnikova (Moskva: Gosizdat, 1926). A.M. Bezredka, Istoriia odnoi idei. Tvorchestvo Mechnikova, trans. A.L. lasnaia (Khar'kov: Izd. 'Nauchnaia mysl/" 1926). Both of these works were originally published in French; Mechnikova's biography had also appeared in English translation. Heinz Zeiss, Elias Metschnikow, Leben und Werk (Ubersetzt und bearbeitet nach der von Frau Olga Metschnikowa geschriebene Biographie, dem Quellenmaterial des Moskauer Metschnikow-Museums und eigenen Nachforschungen) (Jena: Verlag von Gustav Fischer, 1932). On the founding of the museum, see O.N. Mechnikova and V.A. Liubarskii, 'Istoriia vozniknoveniia muzeia pamiati 1.1. Mechnikova/ in Muzei, pamiati 1.1. Mechnikova (Moscow-Leningrad: Gosudarstvennoe Meditsinskoe Izdatelvstvo, 1930), 33-44. Mechnikova's recollection accords well with the story that emerges from Tarasevich's correspondence with Mechnikova, Besredka, and other Paris connections in this period. For information on the history of the Mechnikov museum since the 1920s, see 'Memorial'nyi muzei 1.1. Mechnikova,' Priroda, no. 5 (1970): 82-3, and V.D. Nikitin, 'Istoriia muzeia I.I. Mechnikova (k 150-letiiu co dnia rozhdeniia 1.1. Mechnikova),' Problemy sotsial'noi gigieny i istorii meditsiny (1995): 53-6. Her description of the treatment of Pasteur's archive comes from an interview with the newspaper Rabochnaia Moskva, 9 September 1935 (ARAN,/. 584, op. 2, d. 225, /. 9).

Zeiss and Cross-National Scientific Collaboration 195 84 This latter promise was violated in the postwar era: the bulk of Mechnikov's papers were deposited in the archives of the Academy of Sciences, and the artefacts were moved around to several locations in Moscow before ending up in a medical museum in Riga, Latvia. Recently, diplomatic efforts have been made to secure the return of these items to Russia. Nikitin, 'Istoriia muzei Mechnikova/ 55-6. 85 E.D. Bunina was a member of the four-person administrative board that oversaw the Mechnikov Museum's operations, and both she and A.F. Korzhinskaia were closely involved with the cataloguing of the collection. E.D. Bunina, N.L. Zhivago, and A.F. Korzhinskaia, 'Kratkaia kharakteristika muzeia pamiati II'i Il'icha Mechnikova, in Muzei pamiati I.I. Mechnikova, 45-51. 86 Heinz Zeiss, 'Otto Hugo Franz Obermeier (1843-1873) (Zur Erinnerung an seinen 50. Todestag),' Archivfur Geschichte der Medizin 15 (1923): 161-4; and Otto Obermeier: Die Entdeckung von fadenformigen Gebilden im Blut von Riickfallfieberkranken (1873), ed. with an introduction by Heinz Zeiss (Leipzig: Verlag von Johann Ambrosius Earth, 1926). Zeiss also published articles about Obermeier and his spirochete in the journal Russkii arkhiv protisologii in 1925 and 1926. 87 Zeiss, Otto Obermeier, 9. 88 ARAN, /. 584, op. 2, d. 225, /. 6. 89 On the writing of the Mechnikov biography, see Heinz and Waltraud Miiller-Dietz, 'Bemerkungen zu der Metschnikow-Biographie von H. Zeiss,' Ada medico-historica Rigensia 1, no. 20 (1992): 32-9, and Weindling, 'Heinrich Zeiss, Hygiene and the Holocaust.' In the introduction to the Mechnikov biography, Zeiss reported meeting Olga Mechnikova at the opening of the museum. 90 Weindling, 'Heinrich Zeiss,' 179. The Miiller-Dietz article also mentions the Hamburger Hochschulbehorde as a source of financial backing for Zeiss's research. 91 Olga Metchnikoff, Life of Elie Metchnikoff, 1845-1916 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1921), 150. Mechnikova noted one exception: Rudolf Virchow is lauded for the 'moral support' he extended to Mechnikov. 92 Zeiss, Elias Metschnikow, 2-4. 93 Ibid., 2. In the process, Zeiss also revealed the long-term and cordial correspondence that Mechnikov maintained with rivals such as Emil von Behring. 94 ARAN,/. 584, op. 6, d. 123, /. 1. O.N. Mechnikova to P.N. Diatroptov (no date but probably 1929). 95 Ibid.

196 Elizabeth Hachten 96 Heinz Zeiss and Richard Bieling, Behring. Gestalt und Werk (BerlinGrunewald: B. Schultz, 1940). According to Weindling, in that work Zeiss was concerned with demonstrating 'the enduring persistence of intellectual creations, and the racial roots of science.' 'German-Soviet Medical Cooperation/ 202. 97 Bor'ba za nauku v Tsarskoi Rossii: Neizdannye pis'ma I.M. Sechenova, I.I. Mechnikova, L.S. Tsenkovsogo, V.O. Kovalevskogo, S.N. Vinograskogo, M.M. Kovalevskogo i drugikh (Moscow and Leningrad: Gosudarstvennoe sotsial'noekonomicheskoe izdatelvstvo, 1931). 98 On the repression of Soviet scientists and engineers during the 'Great Break' of 1928-31, see Sheila Fitzpatrick, 'Cultural Revolution as Class War/ in Sheila Fitzpatrick, ed., Cultural Revolution in Russia, 1928-1931 (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1978), 8-40; Kendall Bailes, Technology and Society under Lenin and Stalin: Origins of the Soviet Technical Intelligentsia, 1917-41 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1978), esp. chs. 3-6; Loren Graham, Science in Russia and the Soviet Union: A Short History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 93-8; Krementsov, Stalinist Science, 31-53. 99 'Ot redaktsii/ Bor'ba za nauku v Tsarskoi Rossii, 7. 100 In response to an inquiry from the literary editor of the collection, S.Ia. Shtraikh, Olga Mechnikova insisted that Mechnikov had no other political allegiances. ARAN/. 584, op. 6, d. 126, /. 1-2. O.N. Mechnikova to S.I. Shtraikh (no date but probably 1929). 101 Ibid. 102 Poddubnyi, 'Professor G. Tseiss (1888-1949) i istoriia meditsiny v Rossii/ 60-1. 103 H. Zeiss, O. Steppuhn, and A. Lewtschuk, 'Die russische Volksmedizin/ Archivfur Geschichte der Medizin 18 (1926): 261-6. Of the series of articles Zeiss had planned with Lakhtin on the history of medicine in Russia, only the first portion by Lakhtin seems to have been published. Michael J. Lachtin, 'Die Geschichte der russischen Medizin von 1807-1927,' Sudhoffs Archivfur Geschichte der Medizin 22 (1929): 356-60. 104 Quoted in Miiller-Dietz, 'Bemerkungen zu der Metschnikow-Biographie von H. Zeiss/ 35. 105 A.L. Tseiss, 'O neobkhodemosti osnovaniia v SSSR obshchestva dlia izucheniia istorii meditsiny i estestvennykh nauk (a takzhe issledovatel'skogo Instituta)/ Vrachebnoe delo, no. 6 (31 March 1928): 435-6. 106 Henry E. Sigerist, 'Die Geschichte der Medizin im akademischen Unterricht/ Kyklos I (1928): 147-59, on 149. Mikhail Lakhtin's chair in medical history at Moscow University was listed in Sigerist's directory as the only other entry for the Soviet Union.

Zeiss and Cross-National Scientific Collaboration 197 107 Heinz Zeiss, 'Der Arbeitsplan des neugegriindeten Moskauer Forschungsinstituts fiir Geschichte und Methodologie der Medizin/ Sudhoffs Archivfur Geschichte der Medizin 24 (1931): 258. 108 V.A. Liubarskii, 'Zadachi i tseli muzei/ in Muzei, pamiati I.I. Mechnikova, 52-6. 109 The 'Franco-Russian' view of Mechnikov remained dominant in the Soviet historiography, while Zeiss's biography fell into obscurity. It was conspicuously absent from a book-length bibliography of works by and about Mechnikov published in the early 1950s: V.V. Khizhniakov, G. M. Vaindrakh, and N.V. Khizhniakova, Tvorchestvo Mechnikova i literatura o mm (Bibliograficheskii ukazatel') (Moscow: Medgiz, 1951). In a comprehensive inventory of the Mechnikov archive published in 1960, Zeiss's work is not listed among the secondary works that drew heavily on the archival collection: Rukopisnye i dokumental'nye materialy 1.1. Mechnikova (Moscow: Biuro nauchnoi informatsii Ministerstvo Zdravookhraneniia SSSR, 1960). Given the strong nationalism evident in Stalinist-era history of medicine, that neglect is not surprising. However, Zeiss's reading of Mechnikov continues to influence Western (especially German) works on Mechnikov. 110 A detailed discussion of these trials of Soviet and foreign engineers and scientists is provided in Bailes, Technology and Society under Lenin and Stalin. Also see Krementsov, Stalinist Science, 31-53, on the Stalinization of Russian science from 1929 onward. For a broader context for understanding the dynamics of Soviet attitudes towards foreigners, see Jeffrey Brooks, 'Official Xenophobia and Popular Cosmopolitanism in Early Soviet Russia,' American Historical Review 97, no. 5 (1992): 1431-48. 111 On the international microbiological society, see Porter, The World View of Culture Collections,' p. 64, and GARF/. 5283, op. 2, d. 69, /. 132-8. Zeiss report to VOKS (1930 g.). Also see RGASPI, /. 357, op. 1, d. 125, /. 6-7. Zeiss's letter to Vladimirskii, 8 October 1930, reporting on his activities in July and August of that year. 112 Information about these events is based primarily on Zeiss's own account of an interview with Vladimirskii on 27 September 1930. He apparently prepared a memorandum detailing the conversation and sent one to Vladimirskii as well as a version for the German Embassy. Both these accounts were preserved in Russian and German archives. Zeiss's version of events was sent to the German Foreign office. See Archiv Auswartiges Amt (henceforth AA) VIW, R 66092. Twardowskii to Foreign Office, 10 December 1930. Also useful for reconstructing these events was a secret report of an inquiry into the management of the microbiological museum prepared by the assistant director of the Control Institute, V.A. Liubarskii, for Vladimirskii, 3 September 1930. RGASPI,/. 357, op. I, d. 125, /. 2-2 ob.

198 Elizabeth Hachten Liubarskii reported that the live cultures were usually kept in locked cabinets, but when E.D. Bunina left on summer vacation she entrusted some of the cultures that needed replating to E.V. Glotova, head of the department of serum control. When Glotova in turn departed on holiday, these cultures, among them Bacteria tularense, were left unsecured in a box. 113 RGASPI,/. 357, op. I, d. 125, /. 3-5 reverse. Transcript of meeting between Zeiss and Vladimirskii, 27 September 1930, compiled by Zeiss. 114 S.M. Nikanorov, Tuliaremiia v Severnoi Amerike i tuliaremiepodobnye zabolevaniia v SSSR/ Vestnik mikrobiologii, epidemiologii i parazitologii, 7, no. 3 (1928): 289-93, and also Tularaemia' in Kolle and Hetsch, Experimental Bacteriology and Its Applications, 339-46. Robert Pollitzer provides a complete overview of the Soviet published literature on tularemia in History and Incidence of Tularemia in the Soviet Union: A Review (New York: Institute of Contemporary Russian Studies, Fordham University, 1967). 115 On Zeiss's attempts to acquire the tularemia microbe, see Weindling, Epidemics and Genocide, pp. 212-13. For an overview of the tularemia program at the Saratov Institute see Vestnik mikrobiologii, epidemiologii i parazitologii 7, no.3 (1928): 289-344. 116 Zeiss proposed that many presumed plague epidemics may actually have been tularemia, including the infamous Vetlianka outbreak in the Volga region in 1877-8. H. Zeiss, 'V. Die Pest in Russland. I. Pestahnliche Lymphdrusenentziindungen im Wolgadelta 1926. (Tularamie?)/ Munchener Medizinische Wochenschrift, no. 27 (July 1929): 1137-8; 'VI. Die Pest in Russland. II. Die pestahnliche Seuchen an der Oka and dem Ural im Jahre 1928 Tularamie?' Munchener Medizinische Wochenschrift, no. 32 (August 1929): 1342^. 117 Nikanorov, Tuliaremiia v Severnoi Amerike,' 290. 118 AA, VIW, R 66092. Twardowskii to Foreign Office, 10 December 1930. 119 See Zeiss's correspondence with VOKS, GARF/. 5283, op. 2, d. 69 /. 180-1 [1930]; d. 90, /. 132-8 [1931]. For example, Zeiss was in Moscow in May 1931 when he reported to VOKS on lectures he had delivered on the Soviet Union during a recent trip to Germany. 120 See the discussions of the Soviet charges against Zeiss by Miiller-Dietz, 'Bemerkungen zu der Metschnikow-Biographie von H. Zeiss,' 36, and Weindling, 'Heinrich Zeiss/ 180. Tularemia had become part of the germ warfare research programs of several countries, including the Soviet Union, by the 1940s. For example, see Ken Alibek, Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World - Told from Inside by the Man Who Ran It (New York: Random House, 1999), 29-32.

5 'Creating Confidence': Heinz Zeiss as a Traveller in the Soviet Union, 1921-1932 WOLFGANG ECKART

The past two decades have seen a veritable explosion of travel literature of all kinds. Yet, scientific travel has thus far been relatively underrepresented - this, even though some of the journeys that have marked the modern era most profoundly - those of Darwin and von Humboldt, for example - were undertaken in the name of science. As a genre, the travel account has its own advantages and disadvantages: what it adds in immediacy, it loses in objectivity. Analysed in tandem with other sources, accounts of scientists' travels can provide valuable cross-cultural and cross-national insights. The disinclination to analyse scientific travel may well stem from the difficulty of disentangling the research, political, and personal agendas of scientists who ventured beyond their own borders. The hygienist Heinz Zeiss is a fascinating (and enigmatic) example of German scientific travellers in the years after the First World War. Between 1921 and 1932, Zeiss traversed large parts of Russia and the Near Eastern Soviet Republics, reporting in often minute detail on almost everything he encountered. Zeiss's reports are multilayered: as a scientist, he explored infectious diseases in Russia, developed scientific hygiene, and investigated anthropological questions. As a private individual, he had an eye for the social and cultural changes that marked the post-revolutionary decade. As an employee of the German Foreign Office (later accused of espionage), he relayed information he considered important to German interests. The intersection of interests in Zeiss's reports gives rise to questions. To what extent did his extra-scientific interests (in anthropology, in politics) shape his work as a hygienist? To what extent did his observations as a hygienist inform his conclusions on social and political life?

200 Wolfgang Eckart

What were his attitudes towards Russian revolutionary politics and the Russian people in general? What was Zeiss's view of himself as a traveller? Over the course of a decade in Soviet Russia, Zeiss had a number of paymasters. He first went to Russia after the First World War as a part of the German Red Cross Mission; within a few years he was working as a research physician for the Soviets. In 1921 he opened a close relationship with the German Foreign Office, which collected his letters and his frequent detailed reports via the courier service of the German Embassy in Moscow. Several of Zeiss's expeditions in Russia were financially supported by the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Association for German Science). There is also evidence that he was on the payroll of the German Foreign Office, at least during the second half of the 1920s.1 All in all, his role as a 'cultural' agent in Russia, creating confidence in the East and reporting to the West, was not badly paid. Travelling constitutes an interesting secondary aspect of some life histories; in Zeiss's case, travel was at the very core of his activities, not only during his interwar years in Russia, but also during the two wars. From 1915 to 1918 he served in Syria, Palestine, and Mesopotamia as a soldier in Turkish service under the Red Crescent; much later, in 1941 and 1942, as a member of the Wehrmacht, he travelled to southeastern Europe, probably returning to the occupied part of Russia.2 As we shall see, travel injected his scientific activities with a geographic slant that fit well with racial anthropology, politics, and epidemiology. Zeiss's travels in Russia between 1921 and 1932 are the focus of this chapter. Of particular interest are two important camel trypanosomiasis expeditions, both of which he led, and both of which illustrate the dual role he was playing. His approach was that of a hygienist trained in microbiology (but thinking and observing in categories of geomedicine) or of a specialist in veterinary medicine, especially animal parasitology; yet at the same time, he was acting as a emissary in Russia and the Near East for the German Embassy in Moscow. In the latter capacity he was constantly documenting and passing on political, cultural, ethnographic, and race anthropology observations as well as his military impressions and experiences. The relationship between Zeiss's travel reports and his medical-geographical studies in the USSR will be of particular interest in what follows. Was the connection accidental? Did the studies follow a coherent program? Did they constitute a specific medical-geographical program in themselves?

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 201 A Life in Two Countries

Zeiss's early training was typical of his times. Between 1907 and 1912 he studied medicine in Marburg, then in Heidelberg, Freiburg, Berlin, and Munich. The fledgling doctor found his first employment as a medical intern and regular second assistant to Rudolf Otto Neumann at the Institute for Hygiene of the University of Giessen. From there he moved on to the Friedrichstadt Hospital in Dresden, where he stayed only seven months. From April 1913 to April 1914 he served as a volunteer physician and assistant physician in the Royal Saxon Army. From May to July 1914 he received training in tropical medicine at the Hamburg Institute for Tropical Diseases, in the department of Professor Martin Mayer; there, on the eve of the First World War, he was hired as a scientific assistant. The war interrupted Zeiss's studies in tropical medicine. The twentyseven-year-old medical reserve officer was sent to the Western Front as chief physician of the Saxon Field Artillery Regiments Nr 48 and Nr 115, and then to the Eastern Front in Russia. In October 1915, fourteen months later, he was reassigned to the German Military Mission in Turkey, where he served on the German medical staff at the Turkish Headquarters for Medical Services. During the war, Zeiss came under the influence of several charismatic figures, whose political and sociobiological perceptions helped shape his 'colonial view' of the Russian situation and did much to frame his work in the context of racial hygiene and race anthropology. Probably the most important of these men was Ernst Rodenwaldt (1878-1965), later Professor for Hygiene at Heidelberg. Zeiss started working for him in the spring of 1916, as adjutant and first assistant. Rodenwaldt had been a colonial physician in Togo and was now serving as the advisory hygienist of the 5th Turkish Army in western Asia Minor.3 After the war, he would serve as a colonial physician in the Dutch East Indies. In 1932 he joined the foreign branch of the Nazi Party; on his return to Germany, he was made a professor of hygiene at Heidelberg. A highly qualified specialist in malaria, Rodenwaldt strongly supported the colonial project and promoted the Nazi's racist theories in his teaching and writing. Between 1936 and 1943 he and Zeiss edited the textbook Einfilhrung in die Hygiene und Seuchenlehre (Introduction to Hygiene and Disease Studies), a work that addressed not only hygiene and bacteriology, but also racial hygiene, eugenics, and the Nuremberg Laws. This book established the two authors as the co-founders of 'geographical medicine.'4

202 Wolfgang Eckart

Zeiss's thinking was also strongly shaped by Victor Schilling (18831960), later a haematologist, who commanded the rear area of the 4th Turkish Army in Syria and Western Arabia in 1915 and 1916. While serving under Schilling, Zeiss would have been aware of Schilling's early ideas on racial hygiene. The Nazi leadership later helped Schilling become a full professor of internal medicine at the University of Miinster, over the protests of the faculty. After 1934 he gained a reputation as a fanatical proponent of eugenics, a devoted admirer of the Reichsarztefuhrer, Gerhard Wagner, and an apologist for a German 'community of fate' composed of 'healthy blood stock.'5 In March 1918 Zeiss was felled by amoebic dysentary and left the Near Eastern theatre. He returned to Dresden, where he continued to serve in the military until February 1919. In March 1919 he returned to the Hamburg Institute for Tropical Diseases. Zeiss's postwar career trajectory was somewhat unusual for a young German of his station and age. In the war's aftermath, German scientific relations with most of the West had collapsed almost totally; they would not begin to receover until the mid to late 1920s. As a consequence, most doctors in Zeiss's cohort focused on establishing or reestablishing their careers in Germany. The situation for Germany was different vis-a-vis Russia; after the war, fostering trade with the Soviet Union was key to German foreign policy. Zeiss's career fit well with this new eastern orientation in German foreign relations. The year 1921 was a crucial one for Zeiss, who was now thirty-three years old. In September of that year he joined the emergency expedition of the German Red Cross (GRC) for Russia.6 Until July 1924 he would head the GRC's Central Bacteriological Laboratory. When the mission (led by Dr Peter Miihlens7) ended, Zeiss - who was now qualified to lecture in tropical medicine at the University of Hamburg - 'took up an invitation' from the Russian Commissar of Public Health, N.A. Semashko (1874-1949), and entered Soviet service. From 1 October 1924 to 30 September 1925 he was a department head at the Chemo-Pharmaceutical Research Institute of the Supreme Council of the National Economy. Later he would head the Microbiological Museum of Living Cultures at the Tarasevich Institute for Experimental Therapy and Serum Control in Moscow (directed by P.N. Diatroptov until the early 1930s). As the museum's director, he was in charge of a remarkable collection of living pathogenic strains at a time when international research in biological warfare had just begun in earnest.8 Some of these

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pathogens were completely harmless; others were highly dangerous. Zeiss's work with these pathogens was closely monitored, and as this study will show, it was the political sensitivity of this work that triggered his departure. In 1932 he left the Soviet Union under a cloud. Politically, Zeiss never really disengaged himself from his homeland. Even before his first trip to Russia, he had joined the conservative DNVP (German National People's Party). By the late 1920s he was associated with the Nazis; he joined the party in 1931, while on home leave. Zeiss was not especially ambitious politically, and he never made a name for himself in party politics. Even so, during these years the roots of his later racial thinking and his favourable attitudes towards bloodand soil-based 'geopolitics' were taking shape, as was his interest in the Nazi ideology. As we shall see, all of these influences would mark Zeiss's publications on hygiene in the 1930s - for instance, his collaborative work with Rodenwaldt, which I have already mentioned. The geographical, anthropological, and political approaches to epidemiology that animated Zeiss's and Rodenwaldt's work took their inspiration from 'geopolitics' - a concept first articulated in the early 1920s by the Munich geographer Karl Haushofer (1869-1946). Haushofer popularized the notion of geopolitics by grafting Social Darwinist and race-anthropological thought onto the teachings of the Swedish political scientist Rudolf Kjellen (1864-1922),9 which featured the concept of political space. Geolopolitics emphasized spatial dependence, and this made the concept a favourite demagogic theme of the radical right after the First World War. By radicalizing Kjellen, Haushofer made geopolitics fashionable among National Socialists;10 he himself became the concept's chief proponent. Influenced by the development of geopolitics, Zeiss established the field of geomedicine, which posits that the emergence and spread of disease is a function of the geographical milieu (climate, landscape, ecosystem, civilization, and history). Geomedicine was permeated with concepts from racial anthropology - for example, it attached great importance to interbreeding as a supposedly pathogenetic factor.11 As Weindling has noted, Zeiss rose rapidly in academe after his return to Germany in 1932. In 1933 he became senior lecturer and deputy head of the Berlin Hygienic Institute, which he headed permanently as a full professor after 1937. By 1934 he had risen to join the Scientific Senate for Military Medicine, a section of the Reich Research Council. Simultaneously, he became a member of the Academy of Mil-

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itary Physicians, which was closely affiliated with the Medical Inspection Agency of the Army. By this point, he had reached the top of the German Army medical system; by virtue of his professorship in Berlin he was also the leading hygienist in Germany. There are good reasons to speculate that his travel experience in the Soviet Union, and his geomedical ideas, were of vital importance to the German High Command's preparations for the invasion of the Soviet Union. The Second World War saw Zeiss at the Bulgarian and Greek fronts (1941) as an advisory hygienist. We can suspect but cannot yet prove that his work as advisory hygienist 'of an army in the East' (1942) also took him to occupied parts of the Soviet Union. In the spring of 1945, with the Russians about to overrun Berlin, Zeiss, although suffering from Parkinson's disease, remained at his various posts: professor of hygiene, director of the Hygiene Institute, and Physician General at the Military Medical Academy in Berlin. On 2 November 1945, after Berlin fell, he was arrested by the Russians on charges of espionage against the Soviet Union. On 10 July 1948 he was sentenced to twenty-five years' imprisonment. (The Soviets had been investigating him for espionage as early as 1930, when he was still living and working in Moscow.) Zeiss's illness was worsened by the shock of arrest. As a result, he was first transferred to the Central Military Hospital of Moscow's Butyrka Prison in 1946. There he remained until his sentencing in 1947. In the summer of 1948 he was transferred to the Military Hospital in Vladimir, accompanied by a physician and a nurse, to serve out his sentence. There, on 15 March 1949, he contracted pneumonia. Between 20 and 22 March his condition worsened dramatically. Other prisoners of war reported that the Chief Physician of the Military Prison Hospital in Vladimir was very worried about her highranking patient and did what she could for him. Aware that Zeiss had lived and worked as a hygienist in Russia for many years, she apparently respected him greatly. Zeiss was able to communicate with ease with the nursing personnel, thanks to his good knowledge of Russian. The German hygienist had always emphasized his deep personal friendship with the Soviet Union (at least while he was there). Zeiss died on 23 March 1949.12 It is not without irony that Zeiss died from an infectious illness while a prisoner in a country that had been attacked by Hitler's armies, to which Zeiss belonged as Physician General.13 Moreover, he died in the country that for nearly three decades had been the focus of his ambi-

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 205

tions as a physician, as a medical geographer, as a hygienist, as an anthropologist, as a general, and - probably most important - as a traveller. It was in this last capacity that all of Zeiss's skills, interests, and professional obsessions intersected. The Red Cross Mission: Extending German Assistance Zeiss's numerous reports from Russia suggest a man on the move. He visited places of interest to him (such as, the Volga region) frequently, for short stays; his longer expeditions were unique events, never repeated. There is no evidence that his itineraries were dictated by the German Foreign Office, but since he was receiving part of his salary from Berlin, we can assume as much. Almost immediately after arriving in Russia with the German Red Cross Mission, Zeiss witnessed first-hand the horrors of starvation and disease, not only in Petrograd but also (as Weindling has described) in places as far-flung as Minsk, Kazan, and the Volga German region.14 The activities conducted by the German Red Cross - from relieving hunger (in Petrograd), to providing medical aid (in Minsk and the Volga German region)15 to improving water supplies (in Kazan) - solidified Germany's reputation in Russia as a reliable partner. The diversion of large streams of immigrants from Minsk and Petrograd to holding camps on German territory also helped to alleviate hardship and to strengthen the Germans' reputation.16 In the spring of 1924 the aid program of the German Red Cross was rolled up. By this point, the harshest consequences of the famine of 1921 had been overcome. Even after the dire need had passed, German physicians remained active in many districts. Among those who chose to stay was Zeiss, who had acquired a solid reputation. Under his direction, the Central Bacteriological Laboratory had cooperated fruitfully with other medical bodies in Moscow. At the laboratory, epidemiological and hygiene expeditions were planned, health statistics kept, samples analysed, vaccines developed, and inoculation projects organized.17 In 1924, Zeiss moved seemingly effortlessly to the Tarasevich Institute and began to organize his travels. Shoring Up the German Minority: Saratov and Uralsk Apart from the various trips Zeiss undertook as a member of the German Red Cross Mission - primarily in 1922 - to the malaria-infested

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areas of the Volga German settlements (5 to 20 September 192218), four other expeditions deserve special attention: his journey to Saratov and Uralsk (10 to 29 March 192619); his two expeditions devoted to combatting camel trypanosomiasis (15 June to 15 August 1926, 20 July to 2 October 192720); and finally, his trip to Rostov, Krasnodar, and the Kuban area (15 May to 2 June 192921). These expeditions command our attention not only because they were Zeiss's longest journeys to distant places in the Soviet Union, but also - and more importantly - because they throw into relief his fascination with a number of interrelated issues: the problems of civilization, the position of the German minority in Russia, and the contribution of a geopolitical 'gaze' to scientific hygiene. In some ways, Zeiss's travels to Saratov and Uralsk were connected to his past visits to the German Volga settlements in the early 1920s. As on those occasions, Zeiss pursued objectives that transcended the medical. He was especially interested in the level of 'civilization' of these regions, their economic development, and of course the situation of the German settlers living there. In their concern with non-medical issues, Zeiss's expedition reports were remarkable for the times. Indeed, they resemble most closely physicians' reports of the colonial period. Rodenwaldt and many of his colleagues had sent detailed reports of this kind to the Reich Colonial Office (Reichskolonialamt) before 1914.22 Of course, now the addressee was no longer the Reichskolonialamt but the Foreign Office. Nonetheless, in their similarity to documents rooted in the early medical geography and colonial medicine of the late nineteenth century, Zeiss's reports smack of a post-colonial mentality. The reports he sent were intended to familiarize his German audience with the difficult living conditions of the Volga Germans and to raise interest in the newly founded Volga Committee of the Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas (Society for the Study of Eastern Europe).23 Zeiss argued that it was urgent to establish German medical 'bridgeheads/ which would carry out 'civilizing' work. In a letter covering his travel report to the German Embassy, dated 16 April 1926, he had already emphasized these issues. His report, he wrote, dealt with 'the actual cultural state of affairs (German language, university, and other practical-scientific institutions). The medical and cultural interests of the Volga Republics would have to be represented somewhere in the newly founded Volga Committee of the Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas in Berlin. This would involve, above all, a veterinarian support program at the Volga spon-

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sored by the Reich/24: Zeiss was not above goading his German readers with comparisons: The Adventist community has already secured two physicians' bases in the Volga colonies, where one physician and two nurses from Germany are working. This constitutes practical medical as well as cultural aid. The funds come from North America.'25 While Zeiss's reports, with their blend of medical concerns and cultural issues, were unusual for German physician-travellers after the First World War, they were not that much different from those of other medical scientists travelling to and reporting from Russia at this time. The purely scientific findings tended to be recorded in journal articles; the strictly cultural concerns can be found only in unpublished manuscripts. Good examples of the latter are the Karl Wilmanns diary26 and, to a lesser extent, the diary of the German pathologist Ludwig Aschoff; both contain precisely such blending.27 The 1920s was an era dominated by pure laboratory science, so the mixing of science and culture in these reports is noteworthy. Zeiss's report on his journey to Saratov and Uralsk provided not only valuable information on the leading 'practical-scientific institutions' of that region's health system, but also a window onto his own goals. He provided matter-of-fact descriptions of the Hygienisch-Bakteriologische Institut der deutschen Republik in Pokrowsk (HygienicBacteriological Institute of the German Republic in Pokrovsk) and the Chemisch-Bakteriologische Laboratorium (Chemical-Bacteriological Laboratory) in Saratov, which was under Very proficient management [by Dr Hermann, a Jew]'; he praised the bacteriological division of the state-run Agricultural University in Saratov as well as the plague laboratory in Uralsk, while complaining about Uralsk's 'decrepit' Laboratory for Veterinary Bacteriology, where 'any systematic work simply vegetates.' The report paid great attention to health institutions, yet the author seemed little interested in the health of the local ethnic German population. Assessments such as the following were relatively rare. 'With respect to the health conditions of the German population, the commissar of Public Health Dr. Obert informed me that malaria was constantly on the rise instead of diminishing. One positive sign, however, was the increasing birth rate among German peasants. Abortion was common only in cities such as Pokrovsk; German women had abortions only very rarely.'28 Instead the physician's gaze focused on the 'civilizational advances of the German population.' Zeiss was obviously pleased that by special

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decree, 'German peasant sons' no longer had to perform military service outside of the Volga Republic, and that German was spoken in the military as well: '(German is also the language of command!)'29 And, he reported that the Germanic Department of the Saratov College of Education had been strengthened considerably and could now compare favourably with similar institutions in Moscow and Leningrad. He considered the Germanic Department of the Saratov teacher training college a 'cell' for a 'purely German pedagogical faculty'; by October 1926, he declared, it ought to be 'supplemented with a purely German historical, scientific, and physical-mathematical faculty with German teachers and German as the language of instruction/ For the time being, there would be one Russian instructor for methodology in each of these projected facilities. Clearly, Zeiss was also enthusiastic about the Soviets' promotion of the pedagogical-scientific project at the 'German University' in Saratov, which would enhance the cultural independence of Volga Germans: These planned facilities, whose preparations are already in full gear, have received enthusiastic acceptance from the Germans. The Soviets are earning just recognition for their efforts in developing the national cultural life of the German minority, and commentators point out how the university will allow the Germans to maintain their own civilization and culture in Russia. The Germans are right to emphasize that the establishment of a small state of their own under German leadership will facilitate their civilizing task. By contrast, other Germans in Russia under Russian leadership, or even more so, under the tutelage of other foreign nationalities (such as the Caucasian Germans under the Armenians in Azerbaijan), are fighting much more desperately for their German-ness than the Volga Germans.30

The development of a German university, Zeiss went on, reflected Lenin's principles on the 'treatment of minorities' in the Soviet Union.31 'If ... progress is steady/ Zeiss hoped, the 'German minority in Russia will soon be leading all other minorities/ In this context, the German University could 'of course become a model for the other minorities/ Indeed, the German University in Saratov was precisely the means to open 'an extensive field of activity for tactfully managed German cultural propaganda/ Zeiss emphasized the importance of sending instructors from Germany to Saratov as exchange professors; this would allow the German lecturers to gain work experience in Russia.

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The project would have the added virtue of rolling back French cultural policy in Russia: There can hardly be a better antidote against French cultural propaganda than the German University in Russia. There would be no telling what the beneficial effects of our civilizing work might be in Russia as well as in the East in general. We already have similar examples such as the Herder Institute in Riga and the German Universities in Transylvania/32 As one might expect, Zeiss attached similar importance to the other German or German-Russian cultural facilities in Saratov: the German School, the State Institute for Foreign Languages, which was headed by a Volga German, A. Lonsinger, and whose library contained six thousand German books (in addition to eight thousand French, four thousand English, and two thousand Italian books); the Heimatmuseum (People's Museum) of the German Volga Republic in Pokrovsk; and the affiliated Botanical Garden in Stephan (Bergseite) [=Vodyanoi Bugerak], which was in the care of Professor Emil Meyer, who had been in charge of Moscow's Botanical Gardens prior to the Russian Revolution. Yet time and again a bitter undertone crept in, with Zeiss observing that because of the German economic situation, Germany itself could not offer the kind of material support that the Volga Germans expected. Where, he asked rhetorically, was the aid from Germany? 'One is bitterly touched when the Volga Germans continually reproach the Reich Germans because Germany has done so little for them; when they complain that the German Red Cross had not gone first and exclusively to their own countrymen but instead to the Tartars in Kazan, with whom Germany did not have a single vdlkisch or cultural bond. The Volga Germans were fully aware of how many valuable medical drugs and foodstuffs the German Red Cross gave to the Tartars.'33 For Zeiss, the example of F.A. Lorenz, a German American, demonstrated quite clearly how aid could be provided effectively. Lorenz, an emigre Volga German, was editor-in-chief of the German-language paper Die Weltpost, published in Nebraska, as well as the founder of the Volga Relief Society. During the great famine, 'in an unfaltering effort/ he had sent 'tens of thousands of dollars, garments, and food items' to his old home on the Volga. When Lorenz died of pneumonia in January 1926, Zeiss reported, even the Communists mentioned him with respect in the market square of Pokrovsk: 'He died for his German people/ After all, Zeiss observed, 'the Communists were familiar from their own history with commitment and sacrifice, with open advocacy of their opinion and nationality/

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'Trust, Extensive and Profound Trust': The Camel Expeditions Zeiss always realized that there were a variety of ways to build German bridgeheads. He viewed the two large expeditions - financed by the Notgemeinschaft and the Billroth Foundation - to fight camel trypanosomiasis in 1926 and 192734 not simply as scientific ventures, but also as vehicles for spreading cultural propaganda for Germany. The campaign against camel trypanosomiasis involved economic promotion as well, in that new markets for Bayer 205 might be found.35 By the spring of 1923, the special importance of this medicine, especially for the market in Soviet Asia, was already well understood at the Foreign Office and the Bayer Company, and expectations were high. As early as 1923, at the suggestion of the Department for Foreign Trade in the Foreign Office, Bayer 205 was being marketed internationally under the brand name Germanin.36 On 16 March 1923 the privy councillor in the Department for Foreign Trade at the Foreign Office, Dr Asmis, reported from Moscow on the amazing successes Zeiss had achieved with the new drug in treating camels in Turkestan and Transcaspia.37 If the camel herds of the 'pro-German Moslems' of Turkestan and Transcaspia could somehow be protected from this disease with Germanin, the new 'medicine [would] acquire its special political significance ... in that corner of the world as well/38 In this way, the new drug would serve 'as invaluable propaganda for German know-how ... in Asia, too' and thus become 'a steady, quiet ally of any diplomat disseminating German cultural propaganda abroad/39 By September 1926, Zeiss was able to report to the Foreign Office that his new veterinarian activities were yielding their first cultural-political dividends.40 'With incredible speed/ word had spread in the expeditionary area 'that Bayer had arrived for treatment of the camels; it was reminiscent of the Negroes' "bush telegraph/" Both camel breeding and the economy of the area had been 'completely saved/ The 'economic significance of this circumstance' was hard to overestimate, and 'the government was quite ready to acknowledge this fact anywhere in public/ Not without striking an emotional note, Zeiss closed his report to the embassy: The physical strains are certainly tremendous and greatly affect one's physical and mental strength. However, they are offset a thousand times by the work accomplished for Germany's reputation with the receptive Eastern peoples. The major reason for continued work has been established! - Trust, extensive and profound trust/41 A second expedition to fight camel trypanosomiasis was organized for the following year, and took Zeiss, with Dr Emelin and Dr Karl

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Koopmann, to the province of Uralsk. This trip, which spanned the period from July to October 1927, was neither as smooth nor as successful as the first. During the first leg, to Saratov, Zeiss noted the severe shortage of clothing and glass syringes in the state stores. He opened his cultural report (Kulturbericht)*2 on the expedition with that observation. During his stay in Saratov he engaged in cultural-political work, attending productive meetings with Saratov professors Behning and Dinges. With Behning he discussed the success of the 'Russian Scientists' Week,' which had been held in Berlin the previous year and had provided an opportunity to show German science in a favourable light. Scientists who were not well disposed towards Germany had come away positively impressed. Both scientists agreed that such meetings should continue. Behning was full of praise: 'He called this thought and its realization especially fortunate and admitted freely that doubtless it [the Russian Scientists' Week - WUK] had even had a lasting effect on scientists favouring the Entente (among which group, by the way, Prof. Lasarev (!) is always counted). The priority was now not to let the impact peter out but to work toward an exchange of young scholars between the two countries.'43 During his stay in Saratov, Zeiss met the natural scientist, physician, and psychotherapist P. P. Podiapolsky, and as well as Dinges, a linguist. Podiapolsky complained that despite an official invitation from the Hamburg neurologist and psychiatrist Max Nonne, he had not been given an exit visa. With Dinges, Zeiss had a long conversation about a common plan for dialect studies and for the 'compilation of a Volga German linguistic atlas, which [would be] of practical and cultural importance.'44 Dinges, too, reported that he had not yet been given permission to leave Russia to participate in the anniversary celebrations at the University of Marburg, even though he had 'tried all possible avenues.' Zeiss observed that 'his appearance as a "fellow Hessian" of all things would have been so very desirable for cultural reasons.'45 In recording Podiapolsky's and Dinges's complaints, Zeiss was already staking out for himself a role as a facilitator of Soviet-German scientific exchanges (Elizabeth Hachten refers to this aspect of Zeiss's work in her chapter in this book). The journey to the Urals, following the stay in Saratov, 'with seats reserved in a hard coach/ went smoothly. Zeiss knew the city from his previous trips in March and June 1926; now, in the mid-summer of 1927, he witnessed the impressive scene of a city constantly darkened by severe sandstorms. The ravages of war were still quite obvious,

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although clean-up operations had begun. The 'street scene' had 'changed unfavourably by comparison to 1926': 'A lot of it has to do with the tearing down and clearing of the shelled and burned-out buildings. They have started a systematic clean-up and this shows quite strikingly how much the southern part of the city with the finest stone buildings has suffered. I have not noticed any new buildings/46 It is quite remarkable how instinctively the cultural gaze of the travelling hygienist focused on whatever appeared 'new' and 'strange' to him. His reports alternated gloomy assessments with vivid landscapes and were filled with minute details, always offered in a smugly ironic tone. To illustrate, Zeiss recorded the following impressions of the urban area of Uralsk: The street scene appears somewhat more colourful because of the smart crimson caps worn by the soldiers of the 46th cavalry regiment, which has been garrisoned here since June 1926. On the outside the regimental barracks and municipal guardhouses have been renovated. Saturdays are conspicuous for bringing out many drunken people, mostly workers, including women. There is no difference between Saratov and Uralsk. And another thing: as a visible sign of the steadily increasing ethnic strength, one can observe many pregnant women (on average every seventh female) - despite the truly poor economic situation that is felt everywhere. The number of movie theatres has risen; they play the re-runs from Moscow. Summer gardens and restaurants have opened, who knows for how long? In short, one lives and tightens the belt some more. The samovars are humming, the church bells ringing, people catch fish, go to the dacha or 'to the gardens,' as they say around here. You cannot overhear one conversation about the bomb attacks in Leningrad or elsewhere.47

In descriptions such as these, Zeiss's preoccupation with degeneration is patent. His observations, especially of the hinterlands, depict a post-revolutionary Russia far different from what his German readers or for that matter his Soviet hosts - perhaps expected. He describes what he identifies as individual escapism into the private sphere. His account reflects some degree of empathy, yet it remains an outsider's arrogant view of a people about to lose their 'natural innocence' in the transition to modernity. A number of small examples illustrate this. For instance, he laments the introduction of swimwear: A completely new fad has entered the bathing scene, which is quite a popular pastime in the summer. The 'bathing suit' for both sexes is

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 213 attempting a breakthrough as a fashion (trunks for the men, a suit for the ladies). Until now it was commonplace to bathe with refreshing naturalness, barely separated, in the nude. Now things are becoming more 'exquisite/ the bathing suit is coming into fashion ... It's called a 'cultural advance.' From a moral perspective it would be regrettable if this fashion were to be successful, for if it succeeded, the kind of natural innocence that did no harm to anyone would vanish from Russian life.48

Nobody in Berlin would have dared to bathe nude in public; but in Uralsk, Zeiss, the future Berliner, regarded bathing costumes as morally regrettable. He portrays their advent not as a forward step towards modernity or cultural progressiveness, or even the result of revolutionary acculturation, but rather as a deviation from Russian traditionalism and naturalness towards second- or third-rate Western modernist decadence. Zeiss seemed to favour backwardness read as innocence, yet he condemned backwardness when it bred unhygienic conditions that fostered disease. As a medical observer, his roots reached back to the medical geography and pathology of the nineteenth century (such as that of Rudolf Virchow); as a hygienist, his links to Max von Pettenkofer were also strong. For Zeiss, good hygienic conditions were important not only in preventing disease, but also in fostering the central government's tolerance of the German minorities. That same tolerance and laissez-faire, so the argument went, might breed among other nationalities conditions that were unhygienic. Thus education - especially medical education - was of the greatest relevance: education meant development, development meant hygiene, and great hygiene among highly developed minorities bred tolerance. Zeiss and his companions were of course also interested in the medical facilities at Uralsk. The newly appointed head of the Uralsk Health Service, the twenty-seven-year-old Armenian physician H.R. Isaakov ('according to himself, Isaakian'), arranged a visit to the Children's Hospital in Uralsk for 28 July 1927. Isaakov had not seen the facility either, so he accompanied the group to the hospital, a former private residence with three wings. The first impression was depressing enough; the hospital's exterior seemed 'neglected.' The interior shocked the visitors deeply. A 'strange faecal smell' permeated the entire building; as the group soon found out, it was caused by a plugged toilet that had flooded the entire basement with sewage. Requests for repairs had been rejected for months already. Even more horrifying were the conditions in the sick bays themselves:

214 Wolfgang Eckart The inspection revealed to us a 'sick depot/ not a hospital. The tiny beds were largely shoddy wooden boxes, the bed linen torn [!] and covered with urine, which drew countless flies. In fact, the rooms were infested with flies swarming around the mouths, eyes, anal orifices, and genitalia of the half-naked children and flying from one to the other [!]. The dressing material was poor and inadequate, the examination chairs dirty and worn out. The worst part was the so-called 'infection ward'; in this tract children and adults were mixed together. They were located beside the 'lake of faeces' in the basement. For instance, two adults with typhoid fever shared the same room with a 16-year-old adolescent suffering from tetanus. The chamber pots of the typhoid patients were poorly cleaned and had flies on them. In the adjoining room the following patients lay together: one peasant with anthrax, two children with healed-up erysipelas, and one woman with an open erysipelas. A third room accommodated four cases of septic scarlet fever and throat infections.49

The surgical 'patient material' was 'demonstrated' by Dr Koopmann. In most cases, Zeiss reported, these were Kirghiz children with severe bone tuberculosis. Apparently, it was usual among the Kirghiz simply to abandon children suffering from TB or syphilis at hospitals, in order not to be infected themselves, and never to return to collect them. In this way the cured or half-cured children subsequently added to the Uralsk 'urban proletariat the most unproductive elements/ According to Zeiss, this phenomenon was mainly the result of political changes set in motion by the revolution. More autonomy, party schools, the migration of young, politically trained Kirghiz to urban centres, and the rural exodus into the cities in search of better income opportunities, had all precipitated a sharp increase in illnesses in urban areas, where the 'newly arrived Kirghiz quickly become victims of TB and simply die like flies': 'Consequently, for the hundreds of small peoples there is severe medical danger in Lenin's gift of self-determination for minorities living in Russia, which in and of itself would be welcome for cultural and political reasons. TB and syphilis will decimate these peoples, and without doubt after a few decades a number of small non-Russian peoples will pay for their freedom with death/ It was difficult to determine, he went on, when the 'contamination' with TB had started. Reports from the 1840s and 1850s stating that the Kirghiz were completely free of TB could no longer be verified; they might be based on the truth or on 'superficial diagnosis/ Mechnikov, Burnet, and Tarasevich had made similar observations with regard to

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venereal diseases and trachoma among the Kalmucks in 1911; yet the disease pattern (TB/trachoma) had also been advancing among the Kalmucks. In its second stage, which lasted more than a month, the expedition travelled among the Kirghiz and the Ural Cossacks. In Uralsk and during his visit to the Kalmucks, Zeiss had reported to Berlin mainly on the poor medical care; during this part of the journey, he was impressed the most by cultural-anthropological phenomena. He was especially interested in the ways the Kirghiz and the Ural Cossacks were responding to cultural contact with Western civilization, in the form in which it had been transported to their territory by the revolution. One was inevitably tempted, Zeiss suggested, to draw 'parallels with the North American Indians': The one, like the other, is a primitive people, a people of the prairies or steppes, on which the European West pounces with its machine culture, with syphilis, TB, and alcohol (called the "white doctor" by the Kirghiz) ... They get out of the way, but things only get worse. Socialism and machine culture with their dangers have touched them and taken root in the westernmost outpost of their country, the Gouvernement of Uralsk; from there they steadily advance, albeit at a pace of three steps ahead and two steps back/50 According to Zeiss, the Kirghiz were the 'ethnic gateway to the East/ The way he saw it, their resistance to modern civilization was poorly developed, and as a result they were succumbing to the advance, to the 'thrust' of Western culture, unable to step out of its way. Already the new Kirghiz 'face of life' revealed unmistakably 'Russian traits/ Here again we notice Zeiss's 'colonial' perspective: he, looked everywhere for signs that a 'primitive people' is degenerating through acculturation, and furthermore, he found them: in clothing ('Quite charming is the fondness of Kirghiz boys for suspenders'), in nutrition, and in architecture. Acculturation had also injected the Kirghiz with a number of negative traits: inclinations to theft, indifference, corruption, and idleness. Comparing his observations with his experiences in Turkey during the First World War, Zeiss argued that undoubtedly, the 'harmful' Kirghiz characteristics were solely a result of contact with the Russians. The process - which included the establishment of a national army, by way of which male adolescents 'become even more enslaved to alcohol, venereal diseases, and tuberculosis' - resembled nothing so much as 'a sort of Trojan horse/51 Zeiss identified racial degeneration as yet another consequence of acculturation. The Kirghiz were in grave danger of being 'pushed back'

216 Wolfgang Eckart

into the steppes or even 'annihilated' - or, alternatively, being assimilated by the Russians and eventually forced 'to vanish into the Russian ethnic body like the Tartars/ In formulating this assimilationist thesis, Zeiss again compared the Kirghiz with the Aboriginal peoples of North America. Here, he followed the assessment of the Stuttgart (later Liibeck) ethnologist and physician Richard Karutz, who as early as 1911 had observed: 'One speaks of a new American race, and in future we will equally speak of a biological process in Russia, of a new Russian, whose physiology and psyche are welded together from the Slavic, Germanic, Semitic, Finnish, Turkish, Mongolian, and Armenian elements of the empire. Here lies the cultural task and world historical significance of this empire.'52 Zeiss liked to enrich his notes and observations with historical examples, assessments from others, and eyewitness accounts; his own judgment was never very impressive. He collected all kinds of data, but he rarely interpreted them. An excellent example was his unmediated presentation of information he had gathered from his meeting in Gurev with the physician J.S. Rusheinikov, who was a Ural Cossack, a Communist, and an instructor with the Central Executive Committee (VTsIK).53 According to Rusheinikov, to rescue the Kirghiz, who were threatened with extinction, it would not be enough to 'liquidate' national differences - for example, between Cossacks, Kirghiz, and Russians; it would also be vital to exert 'leverage' directly on the Kirghizians ('that is, the poor Kirghiz') by awakening the spirit of class struggle: The poor Kirghiz are being held in thrall by their beys ['great lords,' in Russian Communist jargon kulaks, faust, or bourgeois economic oppressors]. Just like the Cossacks, the poor Kirghiz are being kept away from the pastures by their own rich kulaks. Only once the poor become really aware of their situation will the Cossacks and the Kirghiz unite in class warfare against their Russian and Kirghiz kulaks/54 Zeiss was deeply impressed by Rusheinikov's personality, admiring his impressive, vivid, and at times comical lecture ('a real piece of agitation'). Yet he never questioned or commented on anything; instead, he merely integrated this or that additional bit into his colourful travel mosaic, into his depiction of Kirghiz culture. Zeiss's 'cultural report' on the second camel expedition is remarkable not only for its detailed descriptions, but also for its consistently pessimistic tone. As an observer, Zeiss wore two hats: hygienist, and cultural and racial anthropologist. The portrait of the Kirghiz that emerges from his report is one of ongoing degeneration, of seemingly inevitable

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 217 demise, both cultural and biological. For Zeiss, the Kirghiz were representative of the many other ethnic groups facing pressure from advancing civilization. In this light, the positive turn he takes in the last two pages of the report is all the more surprising. In what seems a deliberate effort to alleviate the gloom, Zeiss closes with a euphoric assessment of the Soviet prospects for future development based on their very dealings with the 'almost completely untouched peoples and population classes/ This optimistic stocktaking includes a political admonition to his German audience to capitalize on the opportunities these developments offer for German interests: It would be a misunderstanding if one were to pick out only the negatives from what I have written. I have attempted to depict and to follow a descriptive approach. For everything is undergoing fermentation and alteration, but of such a quality that it may and will be transformed into an ordered state the next day. I have experienced this time and again and I could substantiate it using examples. Despite numerous setbacks, the Soviets have the iron resolve to accomplish the best results. Of all things this will and the direction in which things are currently heading make all the difference. The developments connected with this process, which free abundant forces, must receive steadily growing and much more focused attention from Germany and from German science; otherwise, we may one day face some serious and unexpected consequences. The systematic integration of talented and virtually untouched peoples and population classes into the intellectual and political life will soon bring a great number of competent forces into the leading echelons; they will and must deal with Europe. At the same time these individuals will become an immense pool of competition in the global struggle of minds, especially in science, and simply owing to sheer numbers. It may be difficult to hold our own against these masses, who are inspired by a world mission, by the thought of spreading happiness to the peoples and the world. Any underestimation can have dire consequences. German science has to comprehend the unique quality of this intellectual confrontation with Russia in order to conduct it in such a way that it increases Germany's power.55 A final assessment of Zeiss's 1927 cultural report is difficult to make. For one thing, his 'cultural report' was much more than a report about a culture; it blended hygienic, geographic-political, ethnological, anthropological, and racial elements. Yet his agglomeration of diverse observations was by no means haphazard; rather, it was driven and

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animated by the agenda of medical geography (or geomedicine, as he would later call it), which he developed and attempted to bring to productive use in the late 1920s. The following section explores Zeiss's early programmatic statements on medical geography and the contributions that his medical travels made to those statements. The veterinary aspects of the 1927 expedition are also difficult to evaluate, but for different reasons. The fight against camel trypanosomiasis in the Russian southeast can certainly be called a medical success, for many animals were healed there, and local economic resources were in this way protected. There were also cultural dividends, as word of the expedition's success spread, popularizing German medical and pharmaceutical know-how. But Zeiss was forced to acknowledge some problems, caused in particular by a few Russian veterinarians, who were apparently little qualified and of a rather difficult character, and who were uninterested in or even threatened by his activities. Zeiss detected what he perceived as clear opposition to his work. Animals had been inoculated improperly or not at all, and had died. His instructions were not obeyed or only grudgingly carried out, and even then not fully. However, he did not interpret these problems of 'opposition' as general resistance; rather, he saw them as relating mainly to the bad character of a few colleagues. Thus in his expedition report he made the astonishingly pejorative remarks, which suggested both personal hurt and the wish to retaliate:56 The opposition consisted of the most unworthy veterinarians, who have been the bane of all decent persons for a long time; these are the director of the veterinary laboratory in the Gouvernement Uralsk, Amanshulov, his assistants Shuravlev and Arbusov, and the director of the veterinary union, Chernomordzev. All four are known throughout the city as drunkards, and types whom Gogol could not have described better, especially since the translation of the family names is risible enough: Amanshulov Goodday, Shuravlev - Spewer (or Heron), Arbusov - Watermelon, and Chernomordzev - Black-eater. Nevertheless, this four-leafed clover was certainly not to be underestimated, particularly as the Kirghiz Amanshulov remarked that the Saratov Institute desired to take the fight [against camel trypanosomiasis, WUE] into its own hands, as it considered this its legitimate sphere of activity. The second point is that I am not a veterinarian, and the third is that I am a foreigner.57

This from Zeiss, who prided himself on being a special friend of the Russian people.

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 219 'What Is Medical-Geographical Research?': A Rhetorical Question

Zeiss's reflections, which were forwarded to Berlin through the German Embassy in Moscow, read like a justification not only for all of the hygienist's travel and expeditionary activities in Russia, but also for his interest in medical geography. In some of his earlier papers (see Susan Solomon's chapter), Zeiss had pointed to the practical and theoretical significance of medical geography; but he had not developed any detailed program for such activities in the Soviet Union. He engaged the issue systematically for the first time at the inaugural meeting of the Gesellschaft fur Rassenpathologie und Geographische Verbreitung der Krankheiten (Society for Racial Pathology and the Geographic Spread of Diseases) on 28 December 1928 in Moscow, where he posed this question: 'What are the objectives of medical-geographical research in the USSR?'58 In an unpublished memorandum for the Foreign Office, sent in early 1929, he began to outline the answer. Zeiss was concerned with four major aspects of medical geography in the Soviet Union: (1) medical topography, (2) epidemiology, (3) pathological anatomy, and (4) general medical geography. Zeiss's interest in medical topography was not confined to recent findings of medical-scientific travel research; it also embraced earlier medical-geographical literature. 'Historical studies' in particular possessed for him a special 'practical value' as a 'life story of that part of the world concerned.' Such evaluations were far removed from merely 'flipping through old books for pleasure'; instead, the objective was to determine important 'fragments' of a 'historical biology of pathogenic agents.' In his epidemiological studies, Zeiss initially followed the traditional directions of the discipline, focusing either on the spatial and temporal spread of diseases or on demographic issues. In so doing, he was moving in the safe territory of contemporary epidemiology. However, he soon took a different turn: surprisingly, the hygienist also wished to integrate a quasi-cosmological aspect of epidemiology, modelled after the neo-Platonic microcosm-macrocosm theory: 'For completeness' sake one ought to point to the manifestations of life in the universe - ether, sunspots, the moon, the stellar world - with their undeniable influence on the course of life and on the human body (e.g., the menstrual cycle, fertility and suicide curves, the influence of the moon, and the riddle of the eels finding their way back from the Atlantic to European rivers). Horace's saying that quite a lot still exists between the heavens and earth which conventional schooling does not even allow in our dreams is still quite topical today.'59

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In his approach to pathological anatomy, Zeiss emphasized the importance of 'race.' A great deal had already been written on this topic in recent times, he admitted, but the term continued to be too 'vague'; it was basically just an 'expedient construction, as in geometry.' Knowledge about race, or 'constitution/ was non-existent. Only international cooperation on a large scale could solve this dilemma. 'Research into blood types' deserved especially close attention, because it could uncover 'many geographical interconnections' and shed light on 'prehistoric processes/ on Germanic migrations, on immunological interconnections, and on much more. Race-anthropological and race-pathological research into blood types had almost mystical significance for Zeiss, when it came to medical explanations for geographic and demographic phenomena. Zeiss was certain that through the scientific study of blood types, he could find answers to 'political-geographical questions - for instance why certain areas like the Northwest toward Reval or the Southwest from the lower reaches of the Ural River deep into Ukraine exhibited "dagger-like intrusions" of specific blood types into others.'60 The ancient and mysterious saying of Mephistopheles - 'Blood is a very special kind of juice' - attained a completely new meaning in this connection, a meaning 'whose implications still preclude any final conclusions.'61 Zeiss characterized general medical geography as a field that had not yet been developed and that had to be 'created from scratch.' In this new field, progress would be contingent on interdisciplinary cooperation and on recourse to the auxiliary geographic sciences such as climatology, geology, and historical geography. Special attention, he argued, should be paid to the ways in which the surface of the earth was 'changing gradually through the combined influence of man and the natural forces.' For this question of the interaction of man and nature, 'Russia of all places' contained rich evidence. Zeiss's 1928 memorandum contained the seeds of ideas that he would develop in the early 1930s with his 'geomedicine/ But even at this early point, we see the outlines of a highly complex combination of fields - epidemiology, climatic and tropical medicine - brought together against the backdrop of the themes of global imperialism (Weltimperialismus62), racial pathology, the ideology of 'blood and soil/ the whole laced with cultural and political history: 'In this way our reflections have gone full circle. All tasks are harmoniously interconnected. The demand for Medical Geography or Geographical Pathology is not merely for a working hypothesis, but for another pillar in the

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strengthening of scientific medicine. For medical geography puts the physician - whatever his service be - in touch with the matter with which we spend our lives: the earth and its manifestations of life/63 Zeiss's Russian journeys presaged the theories of geomedicine that he would formulate fully many years later in collaboration with Ernst Rodenwaldt - theories that would find a warm reception in the context of National Socialist racial and territorial planning. Zeiss was not able to apply this theory in Russia, because by 1932 he had been forced to leave the country. Although he would never return there as a welcome guest, his gaze would remain focused especially on Russia (see Sabine Schleiermacher's chapter). At the End of the Journey There is an old adage that travel means more than reaching certain destinations, observing people, cities, and regions, and perhaps even ordering such observances. Travel also means being absent from familiar places, old yardsticks, and tested methods. 'Being away' also constituted part of Heinz Zeiss's travel biography, as a closer look at the final phase of his stay in Russia will show. Late in his Russian sojourn, the keen traveller and Russophile grew painfully aware that notwithstanding his long experience in the country, his lack of institutional integration into post-revolutionary Russia diminished his control over his work and left him vulnerable to charges of disloyalty to his hosts and even subversion. In 1930, certain events - which curiously enough, again had something to do with travel and some cultures of tularaemia64 - affected Zeiss's connections with the Soviet Union. Unaware or unmindful of the unwritten law which says that an important person should never go on an extended vacation in difficult times, Zeiss returned from a holiday in late 1930 to find himself accused by the Soviet Commissar of Public Health of carelessly leaving dangerous cultures in his laboratory without any supervision.65 The culture in question, which had been given to Russia by the United States in late 1929 for scientific purposes, was tularaemia; Zeiss himself had identified it with the northern Ural type of the germ. Tularaemia is one of the most infectious of all known pathogens; the inhalation of as few as ten organisms is sufficient to cause disease. At that time, because it was so extremely infectious, so easy to disseminate, and so lethal, tularaemia was seen as a possible biological weapon.

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Indeed, during the Second World War, the Japanese considered using it for that purpose as did the Americans and their allies.66 But the history of this weapon had already begun in the mid-1920s. In Russia, tularaemia had been observed since 1926, as Zeiss reported to the German embassy in 1929: 'According to Prof. Korshun [head of the Mechnikov Institute for Infectious Diseases] in different regions of Russia, plague-like diseases, very similar to tularaemia, had been observed since 1926. The specific germ has been isolated in the Saratov Institute for Bacteriology.'67 On 13 November 1928, at a meeting of the Moscow Bacteriological Society (long name: 'Bacteriological Department of the Society of the Amateurs of Science, Anthropology, and Ethnography'), tularaemia was discussed as a great danger. Professor I.L. Krichevskii, director of the Bacteriological Institute of the Second Moscow University, reported that he had tried hard to obtain cultures of the bacterium from American colleagues, but without success. During the meeting, Zeiss reported that German bacteriologists had also been refused the germ. His report was written in the third person, but there is little doubt that the conclusions were his own: 'The same [being refused the germ] happened to German hygienists, as I have assured myself. Allegedly, only in Paris (Inst. Pasteur) does another culture exist, but the French will not give it away either. The American behaviour is absolutely perspicacious because it obviously has to do with the preparation of a future "bacteriological war," as an infection with tularaemia would cause a long-lasting illness, with relatively little mortality [verhaltnismassig wenig todlich], and would therefore be more humane than gas. On the other hand, virulent cultures could only be dropped by bombers [Bombenflugzeuge].'68 At the meeting, Zeiss's words elicited agreement, but also strong criticism, principally from Professor Martsinovskii, director of the Moscow Tropical Diseases Institute. But in all likelihood, the discussion was of greatest interest to the Russian military. In 1929 a tularaemia culture had been unexpectedly handed over by a Dr L.U. McCo from the Washington Health Service (I was not able to identify this person) to a Dr Sarchi in Sverdlovsk; the correspondence between the tularaemia germs and the Russian plague-like germs soon became clear. This is how Russia came to possess this potential biological weapon and - more to the point - the capacity to produce large quantities of it. Russia could now participate in the international research scramble for this new biological weapon. Zeiss's supposed negligence in safeguarding this culture during his absence triggered his dismissal in 1930. According to Zeiss's report to

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the German Embassy, in a private conversation with the Health Commissar, Vladimirskii, on 27 September 1930 in Moscow, Zeiss tried to convince the commissar that he was the victim of unjustified rumours and speculations: Z.: This is the reason for my urgent request to talk with you today - I know what you think, because there is such a rumour going about in Moscow and especially amongst my colleagues. I am supposed to have disclosed the existence of these plague-like tularaemia germs, supposedly to be prepared for war purposes, to the German Government. Do you think that I would be so stupid and disloyal, Commissar? ... Tularaemia exists in North America, Norway, South Africa, and Japan. There is thus nothing mysterious about it, nothing of military interest. To use tularaemia cultures as a weapon [Kriegsmittel] is pure nonsense.' Vladimirsky (nodding his agreement several times): V: 'Is every bacteriologist able to breed cultures of tularaemia or is there a secret formula for the culture medium? Is it possible to breed tularaemia as easily as diphtheria, typhoid or cholera?' Z.: 'No, there is no secret about it, nor about the formula for a culture medium. ... Therefore keeping any such thing a secret, or even trying to establish a tularaemia monopoly on the part of the Soviet Union, is out of the question. The germ could be discovered tomorrow in Germany, France, Italy, or elsewhere, should there be an outbreak of tularaemia amongst rodents or man.'69

Of course, Zeiss knew better, and Vladimirskii perhaps understood that Zeiss was trying to placate him and minimize the affair. That the matter was considered serious is clear from the fact that Zeiss was kept under extremely close surveillance for weeks. His secretary was arrested and his desk was searched, and the OGPU began to dog his footsteps. In the same conversation, Zeiss complained: 'Commissar, since I returned I have been avoided like a leper or one infected with the plague. Please tell me frankly: what does all this mean? Since Sunday, 21 September, a GPU agent has been posted at my front door. Other agents follow my every step even in the daytime. My wife feels harassed on the street, and so do I. On Sunday, two agents followed us into the cloakroom of Vakhtangov theatre; yesterday an agent followed us on the Boulevard. It's insulting, Commissar. Am I regarded as a parasite or as a criminal?'70 Vladimirskii tried to allay Zeiss's fears, even emphasizing that he fervently hoped the hygienist would continue to work for Russia. But his orders were different. On 28 November 1930, Zeiss was released from

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all his duties at the Tarasevich Institute by 'Order No. I,'71 given by Vladimirskii himself. Zeiss's former assistant, Dr Bunina, took over immediately; Zeiss was no longer allowed to work with living cultures in the Soviet Union. Though Order No. 1 was withdrawn as early as 6 December 1930, the newer order did not help matters for Zeiss. The Museum of Living Cultures, which he had directed, was dissolved, to be reopened later in another institution. Zeiss attributed the notice of termination to the charges laid against him of espionage against the Soviet Union (the allegation was that he had given tularaemia germs to the German government for the purpose of biological warfare research), but there is no evidence in the German files to support this accusation. It is far more likely that the Russian authorities did not want a foreigner handling living cultures in Russia at the dawn of the era of biological warfare research. The Russian Experience: Propaganda or Science? How are we to evaluate Zeiss's Russian odyssey? Should we interpret his activities as mainly an exercise in cultural propaganda in aid of Germany's postwar search for new zones of influence in the East? Or as an attempt by an enthusiastic Russophile to help with the reconstruction challenges facing post-revolutionary Russia? It is impossible to know what was going on in the soul of the German hygienist. To make matters more complex, the stated goals of his work, and the ways he described it in his reports, varied with the addressee. When Zeiss reported to people in high positions in Germany (his contacts in the Foreign Office, Members of Parliament, industrial magnates, representatives of science), he always presented as paramount his work in the service of cultural propaganda for Germany, and at the same time against Germany's First World War enemies, who were also active in Russia. For example, on 18 December 1926, he wrote to the president of the Notgemeinschaft, Friedrich Schmidt-Ott:72 We natural scientists who work overseas are more able than our colleagues working at home to recognize those national and international values represented by the Notgemeinschaft, how its calling is to renew the world reputation of German science, particularly for the receptive peoples in the Near and Far East - and to counter the newly invading cultural influence of North America, which is pushing out from China. This influence is continually growing in extent, and naturally it is taking on a

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 225 political coloration which is not so good for Germany. The constant increase of our German scientific influence in the East could be of significance for the renaissance of our Fatherland, which cannot and should not be overlooked.73

Of course Zeiss presented himself as a fighter for the 're-emergence' of postwar Germany in the east, and on more than one occasion: in 1926, as we saw, he had underscored the importance in the Volga republics of his own activities and of German educational activities in general.74 Four years later, in a letter to Georg Schreiber, the high-ranking Catholic priest and member of Parliament for the Catholic Zentrum, Zeiss again stressed the importance of conducting cultural propaganda abroad. This time he made special reference to the tasks of Catholic Christian missions in Russia. On 3 January 1930, Zeiss wrote from Moscow - the centre of the 'tremendously bubbling and fermenting bolshevism' - that German universities and German politics should not turn away from Russia because of rising enmity towards Bolshevism. Nothing could be worse at the present time: 'We in Germany have to wait, wait, and wait again, because our great time is still to come. The cultural and political thread to Russia may not be severed now. Especially not at this time!'75 Zeiss insisted that 'the conquest and penetration of the east for the Catholic church' was a task of particular importance for German cultural politics in Russia. But, he added, this would only be possible through the concerted effort of all 'physical and mental forces,' and even then only after a comprehensive pacification in Western Europe: 'We will only reach this goal if we have peace in the west, if Germany enters into a strong cultural alliance with France, which should and will not be difficult to achieve. Mental penetration - not the domination of France - and the political, cultural and ecclesiastical pacification of the east are Germany's tasks for the future.'76 As a Catholic priest, Schreiber would certainly have been pleased by such statements about a Catholic cultural mission in the east; whether a realistic Weimar cultural politician such as Schreiber was pleased by such radical political fantasies is a matter of some doubt. The subject continued to preoccupy Zeiss. Indeed, Russia's religious and cultural situation was the main topic of a lecture he gave in 1931 in Cologne, the Catholic Rhineland capital.77 Zeiss had been invited by Konrad Adenauer, at that time the mayor of Cologne, to address the Deutsche Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas (Landesgruppe Rhein-

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land) (German Society for the Study of Eastern Europe, Rhineland regional committee), of which Adenauer was chair. Here, Zeiss spoke about 'contemporary Russian life.' His connection to Adenauer - an active member of the Catholic Zentrum since 1906 - was probably facilitated by Schreiber. It would be stretching matters to link German foreign policy towards France and the USSR under the later Chancellor Adenauer to the political fantasies of a Heinz Zeiss. Yet it is certainly interesting that these two very different men with similar political visions met in the Rhineland capital in 1931. But the same Zeiss sounded much different when he was corresponding with Semashko, the Soviet Commissar for Public Health. Zeiss wrote to him from Moscow on 2 November 1927 on the occasion of the tenth Anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution78: Some 6 years - two-thirds of the past decade have passed, during which I was able to follow the development and progress made at first hand. I thank you for having allowed me to participate in your own project within the great plan of the Government for the organization and improvement of Soviet medicine, i.e. a true Social Medicine. Virchow once said: The physician is the natural lawyer of the poor.' You have extended the meaning of this sentence in your work as People's Commissar in a high position ['an hoher Warte']. The extension of the above sentence fits your personality and your work: The physician is the natural lawyer and the representative of social hygiene.' The history of medicine will keep the deeds done by you in mind as an example and inspiration. May you continue to be able to work for the good of Soviet Russia.79

In praising Semashko, we may note, Zeiss took care to underscore his own contributions towards the construction of the Soviet system, in which social medicine was to be of great importance. The question of how Zeiss himself evaluated the results of his stay of more than a decade in the Soviet Union is of great interest, especially given the circumstances of his rather sudden return to Germany. On this point, Zeiss wrote two revealing letters while still in Moscow, the first to the German Embassy there in December 1931 and the second to the German Research Society (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) in January 1932, shortly before he returned to Germany. On 12 January 1932 he wrote in a positive vein to the society80: 'Upon the suggestion of the Ambassador Dr. von Dirksen, and with the permission of the Imperial Ministry of the Interior, I will now return to

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Germany completely, in order to be available to the University authorities after 13 years' activity as a hygienist [sic] overseas (2M> years in Asia Minor and Syria, 10M> years in Russia)... My scientific and practical activities in the Soviet Union will come to an end in the course of the winter semester of 1932. The scientific work has been finished and the material to be worked up at home is nearly completely collected/81 In fact, Zeiss was able to point to five completed, larger projects, as well as to eight nearly completed ones, which were to be 'worked up at home.' Besides his hygiene and bacteriological work, Zeiss emphasized his research on the history and geography of medicine. He made no mention to the society of the scientific and political dissonances in Russia, especially the medical and military problems associated with the research on tularaemia. The fact that Zeiss presented himself as having left the Soviet Union at the 'suggestion' of the German Embassy and with the 'permission' of the German Interior Ministry was certainly a gloss on the truth. The hygienist had been strictly forbidden to carry out any activities with living micro-organisms, and all his closest assistants had been arrested and were awaiting an uncertain fate; at that point he had no option but to leave the country, because there was no more work for him to do and his own safety was at risk. A month earlier, on 10 December 1931, in his letter to the embassy, Zeiss had discussed his stay in the Soviet Union in a more candid manner.82 Zeiss did not evaluate his entire stay in the Soviet Union in a positive way; rather, he focused on his microbiological work at the Tarasevich Institute, which, because of the arrest of cooperating colleagues in Rostov and Saratov, but, even more important, because of his own 'dismissal, could not be continued.' In its tone, this 'balance sheet' sounded like a swan song for all of Russian bacteriology, which without Zeiss was now imperilled (so he was suggesting). The research on paratyphus A had had to be interrupted, along with all research on the plague and tularaemia. The Museum of Living Cultures was 'completely dead and quiet' since his (Zeiss's) 'departure': The items in it have been distributed to all departments of the Institute, no further cultures are being obtained, neither bacteriological nor epidemiological work of any kind is being carried out. In the same fashion all... investigations have either stopped, been carelessly lost, or the young representatives of science have simply taken to their bosoms [stolen] whatever appeals to them.'83 Zeiss also discussed quite openly his pained reaction to this situation. As a 'payment in return' he had 'taken back all of his own collection of

228 Wolfgang Eckart 3,000 offprints, until that point available for the use of the Institute and in constant circulation amongst all scientific co-workers.' Furthermore, he had 'refused ... all requests' to obtain for the institute 'any more reliable diagnostic (German) sera, as he had done in previous years, since the Russian ones were good for nothing.' That Zeiss, who was so fond of declaring himself a friend of Russia, would no longer be contributing to the long-term development of German-Soviet cooperation in hygiene remained unspoken. Zeiss's retrospective was the querulous complaint of a 'foreigner' who really only wanted to introduce 'something better,' but who was confronted with envy and resentment: 'Apart from the personal, truly Russian envy of the foreigner, who works more, faster and better than the native, apart from the resentment, since the foreigner shows the Russian what one must do in one's own land for the good of the State, a series of discoveries of the worst kind of work on the part of Russian authorities came to light through my department... Are these not enough reasons to become automatically unloved in Russia?'84 In fact, Zeiss had repeatedly drawn attention to slipshod Russian work in veterinary medicine on the camel trypanosomiasis expedition, especially in the area of inoculation. Workers had died from defective inoculation tablets for typhus, which proved to be highly virulent; animals had died from inoculation materials that were infected with tetanus. Hygienic materials from military camps had received false positive assessments. These could have been treated as isolated incidents to be investigated and eliminated, or dealt with in a cooperative fashion among colleagues. At the end of his stay in Russia, however, Zeiss used these incidents to denigrate the entire Russian hygiene sector as mismanaged and of poor quality. The German hygienist was disparaging an entire decade of productive work in the Soviet Union. As to the intrigues against him, and the charge that he had passed on tularaemia bacteria to Germany for military purposes, Zeiss assumed no responsibility whatsoever, portraying himself as a victim. His report to the Medical Faculty of Hamburg University in April 1931 was unequivocal: The facts are as follows: there has been a so-called cam-. paign against all Russian specialists for years now, because of sabotage or damaging work; anyone can read about this in the newspapers for himself. In these trials, starting with the Shakhty trial and going on until today, the foreigner who worked with the Russian in question is involved every time. This happened to me as well.'85 Zeiss's abrupt and emotional withdrawal from all things Soviet seems odd; as late as January 1930, in a communication to Schreiber, he

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 229

had described himself as fascinated - indeed, excited - by the political turmoil in the Soviet Union: The past weeks and months... the period after the return to this immensely seething and bubbling mental world of Bolshevism, have brought me forward, have clarified me in such a way that I am truly happy to live and work in such times. Here it is more interesting and important every day to observe - simply to open up your mouth, nose and ears, and to absorb, to collect, to take in. The struggles of this new 'spirit' [Geistigkeit], which already acts against true spirit without any spirit, is cruel and shocking and, in the end, certainly useless. For true spirit cannot be done away with by a 'Ungeist' at all in the end. This is the lesson taught us in a particularly clear fashion by the modern struggle in Russia.86

That Zeiss himself was soon to be a victim of this struggle - in which he doubtless saw himself on the side of the 'true spirit' - was something the German hygienist could probably not have imagined at this point in time. Conclusion Who was the fifty-eight-year-old German prisoner of war who died at Vladimir in 1949, far from home? Are we dealing with the professor of hygiene of Berlin University, the surgeon general of Hitler's armies in the east, or merely a traveller at the end of a long journey? Even these questions, which should be easy to answer, are difficult. Zeiss was all of these things - and always in his own way. As a hygienist, he was certainly a hybrid. While he was a follower of the Koch school, he was of course not a pure bacteriologist. His thoughts and ideas were shaped by Pettenkofer's holistic approach to hygiene. For Zeiss, epidemiology, soil and water, the climate, nutrition, and the influences of culture, politics, and history on health were as important to preventing epidemics and restoring public health as the fight against bacteria. Thus, in his epidemiological thinking he was in the tradition of Pettenkofer and the nineteenth-century school of medical geography. Yet at the same time he was a modernist in the tradition of Koch, as evident above all in his organizing of a 'museum of living cultures' in Moscow. To belong to the group of modernists in the field of hygiene also meant to include in medical thinking the various aspects of 'race/

230 Wolfgang Eckart

Indeed, racial theory was an integral part of Zeiss's thinking, but he was far from being a radical racist, nor did he practise racial hygiene not during his time in Russia, and not after. Anti-Semitic remarks are difficult to find in his letters and manuscripts from Russia. After 1933, once he returned to Germany, this would change dramatically! At the same time, Zeiss was one of the fathers of geomedicine, an enterprise that emphasized the importance of geography (climate, landscape, ecosystem, civilization, race, and history) to the emergence and spread of disease. As a field, geomedicine was suffused with racialanthropological perspectives - for example, it emphasized interbreeding as a pathogenetic factor. Had the Soviet Union been completely conquered by Hitler's armies and 'reorganized' according to the inhumane and criminal Generalplan Ost,87 these ideas might well have played a major practical role. But Zeiss was also a traveller and an observer. Even when practical tasks dominated (as in the camel trypanosomiasis expeditions), cultural observations always took up the large part of his reports. What was his perspective as a travelling observer? Was it that of a colonialist, of an adventurer, of a scientist on an expedition, or of a political spy? His perspective was an amalgam of all these. Germany had lost all her colonies during the war and after the Treaty of Versailles, yet she maintained strong and semi-imperialistic relations with countries in the Far East such as China and Japan and was about to establish new relations with eastern countries. Although Zeiss was in close contact with former colonial physicians like Ernst Rodenwaldt, he had never been in the German colonies himself, nor had he travelled to Germany's zones of influence in East Asia. The main purpose of Zeiss's journeys was to build confidence in German medicine, technology, and personnel, not to colonize. That said, his perspective as a hygienist was more than that of a helpful visitor or a well-intentioned diplomat looking to establish good and prosperous relations; it was also that of a prospector in an exotic country encountering exotic people, whose exotic politics offered hope as well as danger. For Zeiss, Russia was a country full of hidden treasures to discover and mysteries to unveil. Thus he was always looking for undiscovered terrain where he could stake claims for German medicine, science, and politics, and even for Catholicism. His diverse tools included vaccination, medical education, cultural propaganda, and sociopolitical espionage. To Zeiss, the allegations that he was involved with biological warfare activities in Russia and with the transfer of tularaemia germs to Germany hardly mattered. To him the accusation was a lie; 'as a German,' he always felt a strong 'obligation toward his country to report

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 231 about everything' of importance, especially about those things which could be 'directed against Germany.' In carrying out this obligation, he thought, he 'could never be a spy.'88 Zeiss's story is that of a man at the intersection of three strong forces: an insatiable thirst for knowledge; a strong medical mission as an epigone of a nation with a leading reputation in hygiene and bacteriology; and an overwhelming obsession with spreading German culture. Had he not been allowed to leave the Soviet Union in 1932, he might have been torn to pieces by these forces. NOTES 1 In a letter to the German Foreign Office, the German ambassador in Moscow, Ulrich Graf Brockdorff-Rantzau (1869-1928), asked for a raise in Zeiss's monthly salary from US$125 to US$300, because of the Valuable activity of the Professor ... in the interest of cultural relations between Germany and the Soviet Union.' The ambassador's request was granted immediately. In fact, up to then, Zeiss had been getting not only the monthly US$125 directly from Berlin, but also 40 per cent of the embassy's fees for the medical examination of Russian travellers to Germany. By the second half of the 1920s, Zeiss's considerable additional income had dwindled to only 40 rubles per month because the number of travellers to Germany had declined dramatically. For his services to Russian institutions, Zeiss was given a salary of about 120 rubles. From this he had to finance a secretary to produce his letters and reports. However, there is no evidence that he actually employed a secretary. Politisches Archiv des Auswartigen Amtes (hereafter A A Polit Archiv), R 66091 a (Kult VI-W): Brockdorff-Rantzau to Auswartiges Amt, Moscow, 10 March 1927; Auswartiges Amt to German Embassy Moscow, Berlin, 17 March 1927. 2 For Zeiss's biography, see Gottlieb Olpp, Hervorragende Tropenarzte in Wort und Bild (Munich: Verlag der Arztlichen Rundschau Gmelin, 1932), 426-7; Hans Harmsen, Tn memoriam Prof. Dr. med. Heinz Zeiss,' Zentralblatt fur Bakteriologie, Parasitenkunde, Infektionskrankheiten und Hygiene 168 (1957): 160-2; Kurschners Deutscher Gelehrtenkalender 1961 (Berlin: Saur, 1961), 2397; Wolfgang U. Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik der Republik von Weimar - Deutschland und die Sowjetunion 1920-1932,' Medizin in Geschichte und Gesellschaft 11 (1993): 105-42; Paul Weindling, 'Heinrich Zeiss/ in Wolfgang U. Eckart and Christoph Gradmann, eds., Arztelexikon (Munich: Verlag C.H. Beck, 1995), 389-90. 3 On Rodenwaldt, see the doctoral thesis by Manuela Kiminus, 'Ernst

232 Wolfgang Eckart Rodenwaldt - Leben und Werk' (Diss. med., Medical Faculty, University of Heidelberg, 2001). 4 See H. Zeiss, 'Geomedizin (geographische Medizin) oder medizinische Geographic?' Munchner Medizinische Wochenschrift 5 (1931): 198-201; Ernst Rodenwaldt, 'Geomorphologische Analyse als Element der Seuchenbekampfung/ Hippokrates 6 (1935): 375-81; H. Jusatz, 'Ernst Rodenwaldt (1878-1965) als Begriinder der geomedizinischen Forschung,' Heidelberger Jahrbucher 14 (1970): 23-5. 5 On Schilling, see above all Bernward Vieten, Medizinstudenten in Munster Universitat, Studentenschaft und Medizin 1905 bis 1945 (Cologne: Pahl-Rugenstein, 1982), 283f. 6 Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik/ 112f; Paul J. Weindling, 'Heinrich Zeiss, Hygiene and Holocaust/ in Dorothy Porter and Roy Porter, eds., Doctors, Politics and Society: Historical Essays (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1993), 174-87. 7 Zeiss had met Miihlens during the First World War at the Hamburger Tropeninstitut. For Miihlens, cf. Olpp, Hervorragende Tropenarzte in Wort und Bild, 285-6. 8 Friedrich Hansen, 'Biologische Kriegfuhrung in Deutschland. Projekte, Forschung und Anwendung 1870 bis 1950' (Diss. med., Medizinische Hochschule Hannover, 1992). 9 See Robert Sieger, 'Geopolitik,' in Paul Herre, ed., Politisches Handworterbuch, vol. 1 (Leipzig: Koehler, 1923), 690; Friedrich Stieve, 'Kjellen,' in ibid., 1: 953; and Robert Sieger, 'Staatenkunde/ in ibid., 2: 667. Rudolf Kjellen, Der Staat als Lebensform (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1917). 10 David Thomas Murphy, Heroic Earth: Geopolitical Thought in Weimar Germany, 1918-1933 (Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1997); Rainer Matern, 'Karl Haushofer und seine Geopolitik in den Jahren der Weimarer Republik und des Dritten Reiches: ein Beitrag zum Verstandnis seiner Ideen und seines Wirkens' (philosophical thesis, Karlsruhe, 1978); HansAdolf Jacobsen, Karl Haushofer, Leben und Werk (Boppard am Rhein: Boldt, 1979). 11 In this context, see also H. Zeiss, 'Die zukiinftige Aufgabe einer deutschen Volkskunde/ Archivfur Bevolkerungswissenschaft 5 (1935): 20. 12 Harmsen, 'In memoriam Prof. Dr. med. Heinz Zeiss,' 160-2. 13 For Zeiss's relations to National Socialism, see also Paul Weindling, Epidemics and Genocide in Eastern Europe, 1890-1945 (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1999). 14 Here I am relying primarily on Wolfgang Giithoff, 'Zur Epidemiologie und

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 233

15

16

17 18

19 20

21

22 23

Bekampfung des Seuchengeschehens in Sowjetrufiland von 1918 bis 1924 ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der deutsch-sowjetischen medizinischen Beziehunge' (Med. diss., Humboldt-Universitat zu Berlin, 1986), 66-74. For the history of the Volga Germans, see Paul Weindling, 'German-Soviet Medical Co-operation: The Institute for Racial Research, 1927-ca. 1935,' German History 10 (1992): 3; also Weindling, 'Heinrich Zeiss, Hygiene and the Holocaust'; Alfred Eisfeld, Deutsche Kolonien an der Wolga 1917-1919 und das Deutsche Reich (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1985); Gottlieb Beratz, The German Colonies on the Lower Volga: Their Origin and Early Development. A Memorial for the 150th Anniversary of the Arrival of the First German Settlers on the Volga, 29 June 1764 (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1991); Johannes Kufeld, Die deutschen Kolonien an der Wolga (Niirnberg: HFDR, 2000). P. Miihlens, 'Die russische Hunger- und Seuchenkatastrophe in den Jahren 1921-1922,' in Zeitschrift fur Hygiene und Infektionskrankheiten 99 (1923): 14; E.G. Nauck, 'Von der Tatigkeit in Kazan/ in Blatter des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes, Sonderheft (June 1922): 14. Cf. also Giithoff, Zur Epidemiologie, 758. For the activity of the institute, cf. in particular ibid., 83-95. For the activity of the institute, see especially Giitthof, Zur Epidemiologie, 83-95. Bundesarchiv Berlin (Lichterfelde) (hereafter BArch Berlin), 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 414: Beobachtungen iiber die augenblicklich in den Wolgakolonien herrschende Malaria, Moscow, 25 September 1922. BArch Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 415: Bericht iiber meine Reise nach Saratow und Uralsk vom 10.-29.3.1926, Teil 1 u. 2; also in BA Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 417. BArch Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 416: Bericht iiber die 2. Expedition zur Bekampfung der Kameltrypanosomiase Su-auru im russischen Siidosten vom 20.7.-2.10.1927; Kulturbericht iiber meine 2. Kamelexpedition; BA Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 417: 'II. Teil des Kulturberichtes iiber meine 2. Kamelexpedition.' BArch Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 418: 'Bericht iiber meine Reise nach Rostow a/D., Krassnodar und zu der Deutsch-russischen Saatbau Akt. Ges. (Drusag) im Kubangebiet vom 15.5.-2.6.1929.' Wolfgang U. Eckart, Mund Kolonialimperialismus: Deutschland 1884-1945 (Paderborn: Schoningh, 1997). The society had been founded in 1913 by the historian of Eastern Europe Otto Hoetzsch (1876-1946). After the First World War, Friedrich SchmidtOtt took over the position of chair and made efforts to establish a close con-

234 Wolfgang Eckart nection with the Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Association for German Science), which he headed. The German nationalist Reichstag MP Hoetzsch remained the ideological leader. The aim of the society was to enhance cultural exchange and develop positive relations with the Soviet Union. See Christoph Mick, 'Kulturbeziehungen und auCenpolitisches Interesse: neue Materialien zur "Deutschen Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas" in der Zeit der Weimarer Republik/ Osteuropa 43 (1993): 928; Giinter Rosenfeld, Sowjetunion und Deutschland 1922-1933 (Cologne: Pahl-Rugenstein, 1984), 197-8. 24 BArch Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 415, Zeiss to the German Embassy, Moscow; Moscow, 16.4.1926. 25 Ibid. 26 Jochen Richter, ed., Lues, Lamas, Leninisten: Tagebuch einer Reise durch Russland in die Burjatische Republik im Sommer 1926 (Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus, 1995). 27 Susan Gross Solomon and Jochen Richter, eds., Ludwig Aschoff: Vergltichende Volkerpathologie oder Rassenpathologie: Tagebuch einer Reise durch Russlemd und Transkaukasien (Herzbolzheim: Centaurus, 1998). 28 BArch Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 415: Bericht iiber meine Reise nach Saratow und Uralsk vom 10.-29.3.1926, Teil 1 u. 2; also in BA Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 417. 29 Ibid. 30 Ibid. 31 For Lenin's politics towards minorities and nationalities, see Terry D. Martin, The Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union, 1923-1939 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2001); Helene Carrere d'Encausse, The Nationality Question in the Soviet Union and Russia (Oslo: Scandinavian University Press, 1995), 315-16, 385-7,472-3; Robert Service, Lenin: Eine Biographie (Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuchverlag, 2002), 548ff. 32 BArch Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 415: Bericht iiber meine Reise nach Saratow und Uralsk vom 10.-29.3.1926, Teil 1 u. 2; also in BArch Berlin, 0902 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 417. 33 Ibid. 34 On the scientific goals and findings of these expeditions see Guthoff, Zur Epidemiologie, 88-93. 35 'The final objectives of the expeditions to Russia shall not be purely practical-scientific, but also provide some sort of economic benefit for German industry. In the case of the Bayer-205-treatment the most important aim is to convince Russian authorities to purchase Naganol and subsequently the

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 235

36

37 38 39 40

41 42

43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57

antimony agent.' BArch Berlin: 9 February, German Embassy Moscow, Nr. 416. Zeiss to Schmidt-Ott, Moscow, 2 December 1927. See Wolfgang U. Eckart, '"Germanin" - Fiktion und Wirklichkeit in einem nationalsozialistischen Propagandafilm/ in Medizin im Spielfilm des Nationalsozialismus (= Hannoversche Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der Medizin und der Naturwissenschaften, 1) (Tecklenburg: Burg-Verlag, 1990), 69-82. See in this context H. Zeiss and Sergey Ilovaisky, '"Bayer 205" bei experimenteller Kameltrypanosomiasis ("Su-auru")/ Archivfiir Schiffs- u. Tropenhygiene (1924): 7-11. Bayer-Archive, Leverkusen, Holding 'Bayer 205,'Asmis to Carl Duisberg, Moscow, 16 March 1923. Ibid. BArch Berlin: 9 February German Embassy Moscow, Nr. 415. Zeiss, 'Bericht iiber eine Expedition zur Bekampfung der Kameltrypanosomiase (Suauru) im russischen Siidosten vom 15.6.-15.8.1926/ [unpublished manuscript, August 1926]. Ibid. BArch Berlin: 9 February, German Embassy Moscow, Nr. 417. Zeiss, 'Kulturbericht iiber meine 2. Kamelexpedition im Gouv. Uralsk vom 20.7.2.10.27' [unpublished manuscript, 2 parts, November 1927], here first part. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. BArch Berlin: 9 February, German Embassy Moscow, Nr. 417. Zeiss, 'Zweiter Teil des Kulturberichts iiber meine 2. Kamelexpedition im Gouv. Uralsk vom 20.7.-2.10.27.' Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. BArch Berlin: R73/221 fol. 1. Zeiss, 'Bericht iiber eine Expedition zur Bekampfung der Kameltrypanosomiase (Su-auru) im russischen Sudwesten vom 15.6.-15.8.1926.' Ibid.: 'Die Opposition bestand aus den minderwertigsten Tierarzten, die bereits seit langem der Spott aller anstandigen Leute sind; dem Leiter des

236 Wolfgang Eckart

58

59 60 61 62

63 64

65 66 67 68 69

tierarztlichen Gouvernementslaboratoriums in Uralsk Amanshulow, seinen Gehilfen Schurawlew und Arbusow, sowie dem Vorstand der tierarztlichen Gewerkschaft Tschernomordzew. Alle 4 sind stadtbekannte Saufkumpane und Typen, wie sie Gogol nicht besser hatte schildern konnen, zumal die Ubersetzung der Familiennamen komisch genug wirkt: Amanshulow - Gutentag, Schurawlew - Reiher, Arbusow - Wassermelone, und Tschernomordzew - Schwarzfresser. Nichtsdestoweniger war dieses vierblattrige Kleeblatt nicht zu unterschatzen, zumal der Kirgise Amanshulow das Wort fuhrte: dass das Saratower Institut die Bekampfung [der Kameltrypanosomiasis, W.U. Eckart] in die Hand nehmen wollte, was sie als ihr eigenes Gebiet betrachteten. Zum zweiten, dass ich nicht Tierarzt und zum dritten Auslander bin.' AA Polit Archiv: R 66091a, Medizinalwesen in Russland, 1927-1930: German Embassy Moscow to German Foreign Office, Moscow, 16 February 1929; also enclosed is the memorandum titled: 'Welche Aufgaben hat die medizinisch-geographische Forschung in SSSR? Ein Vorschlag von H. Zeiss.' Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid.: 'Highly instructive is the powerful growth of tropical medicine due to the development of global imperialism and the entry of various great powers into world politics. This occurred around 1894 [sic]. Political developments after 1918 and the distribution of power in the future struggle for the Pacific region automatically cause highly accelerated growth of tropical medicine.' Ibid. BArch Berlin: German Embassy Moscow, Nr. 414, Zeiss to German Embassy Moscow, 'Ueber Tularamie in Russland,' January 1929; PA: R 66091 a, Medizinalwesen in Russland: Zeiss to German Embassy Moscow, 31 October 1930; German Embassy to German Foreign Office, Moscow, 10 December 1930. BArch Berlin: R 66092, Wissenschaft-Gesundheitswesen/Zeiss-Russland: Zeiss to German Embassy Moscow, 1 October 1930; German Embassy to German Foreign Office, Moscow, 10 December 1930. See Hansen, 'Biologische Kriegfuhrung in Deutschland.' BArch Berlin: German Embassy Moscow, Nr. 414, Zeiss to German Embassy Moscow, 'Ueber Tularamie in Russland/ January 1929. Ibid. AA Polit Archiv: R 66091 a, Medizinalwesen in Russland: Zeiss to German

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70 71

72 73

74 75

76

77 78 79

Embassy Moscow, 31 October 1930; German Embassy to German Foreign Office, Moscow 10 December 1930. Ibid. Ibid.: Zeiss to German Embassy, 1 October 1930. - '1. The Assistant at the Institute, Prof. Zeiss, is released from his duties with effect from 1 December 1930. 2. The duties of the Director of the Museum of Living Cultures shall be transferred for the time being to the Chief Assistant at the Institute, Dr. E. Bunina. 3. Director of the Institute (signed) P.N. Diatroptow.' BArch Berlin, R73/221, fol. 1, Zeiss to Schmidt-Ott, Moscow, 19 December 1926. 'Wir im Auslande arbeitenden Naturwissenschaftler empfinden es eher noch mehr als unsere in der Heimat arbeitenden Volksgenossen, welchen nationalen und internationalen Wert die Notgemeinschaft darstellt, wie sie dazu berufen ist, die deutsche Weltgeltung in der Wissenschaft gerade bei den so empfanglichen Volkern des nahen und fernen Ostens neu aufzurichten und gegen den von China neu vordringenden... kulturellen Einfluss Nordamerikas anzukampfen. Dieser EinfluG wachst standig, nimmt naturlich starke politische Farbung an, die eher nicht fur Deutschland ist. Eine standige Erweiterung unseres deutschen wissenschaftlichen Einflusses im Osten kann fur den Wiederaufstieg unseres Vaterlandes von uniibersehbarer Bedeutung sein.' BArch Berlin, 09.02 [German Embassy Moscow], vol. 415; 'Bericht iiber meine Reise nach Saratow und Uralsk vom 10.-29.3.1926.' BArch Berlin, R73/223, Zeiss to Schreiber, Moscow, 3 January 1930. 'Flucht ist eine Angstbewegung, getrieben von Hohlheit, Gottlosigkeit und Angst vor sich selbst. Darum miissen wir in Deutschland warten, und immer wieder warten, denn unsere Hauptzeit wird noch kommen. Der kulturelle und politische und kulturpolitische Faden nach Russland darf jetzt nicht abreissen. Jetzt schon gerade nicht!' Ibid. 'Wir werden das nur erreichen, wenn wir im Westen Ruhe haben, wenn Deutschland ein starkes kulturelles Bundnis mit Frankreich eingeht, das uns nicht schwer fallen kann und wird. Die geistige Durchdringung nicht Beherrschung Frankreichs - und die kulturpolitische und kirchliche Befriedung des Ostens durch Deutschland sind unsere Zukunftsaufgaben.' BArch Berlin, R73/223, Konrad Adenauer, letter of invitation, Cologne, 11 March 1931. BArch Berlin, R73/221 fol. 1, Zeiss to Semashko, Moscow, 2 November 1927. 'Es sind auch soeben 6 Jahre, also zweidrittel des vergangenen Dezenniums, verflossen, wahrend denen ich die Entwicklung und das Vorwartss-

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80 81

82 83

84

85

chreiten an Ort und Stelle verfolgen konnte. Ich danke Ihnen, dass Sie mich an Ihrem eigenen Werk innerhalb des grossen Plans der Regierung am Auf- und Ausbau der Sowjetmedizin, das heisst der ausgesprochenen Sozialen Medizin - teilnehmen lassen. Virchow sagte einmal: "Der Arzt 1st der natiirliche Anwalt der Armen." Sie haben diesen Satz in Ihrer Arbeit als Volkskommissar an hoher Warte erweitert. Auf ihre Personlichkeit und Ihre Arbeit passt die Erweiterung des obigen Satzes: "Der Arzt ist der natiirliche Anwalt und Vertreter der sozialen Hygiene." Die Geschichte der Heilwissenschaft wird diese von Ihnen geschaffene Tatsache bewahren als nachahmenswertes Beispiel. Moge es Ihnen vergonnt sein, weiterhin zum Wohle Sowjetrusslands zu wirken/ BArch Berlin, R73/223, Zeiss to Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, Moscow, 12 January 1932. 'Auf Anregung des Botschafters Dr. v. Dirksen und mit Einverstandnis des Reichsministeriums des Inneren werde ich nun ganzlich nach Deutschland iibersiedeln, um nach 13-jahriger Hiygienischer [sic\] Tatigkeit im Auslande (2Vi Jahre Kleinasien und Syrien, 10M> Jahre in Russland) zur Verfiigung der Hochschulbehorden zu sein ... Meine wissenschaftliche und praktische Tatigkeit in der Sowjetunion wird im Laufe des Wintersemesters 1932 zu Ende gehen. Die wissenschaftlichen Arbeiten sind abgeschlossen, das in der Heimat zu bearbeitende Material ist fast vollstandig gesammelt.' BArch Berlin, R73/223, Zeiss to Deutsche Botschaft Moskau, Moscow, 10 December 1931. 'Man hat den Bestand auf alle Abteilungen des Instituts verteilt, es werden keine Kulturen mehr beschafft, es wird iiberhaupt nicht mehr weder bakteriologisch noch epidemologisch gearbeitet. Desgleichen sind alle ... Untersuchungen entweder eingestellt, verschlampt oder verloren, oder das ihnen zusagende hat sich der junge Nachwuchs einfach angeeignet (gestohlen)/ 'Ausser personlichem, echt russischem Neid auf den Auslander, der mehr, schneller und besser arbeitet als der Einheimsche, ausser der Missgunst, da der Auslander den Russen zeigt, was man im Lande selbst zum Nutzen des Staates bearbeiten miisse, kamen eine Reihe von Entdeckungen schlechtester Arbeit russischer Dienststellen durch meine Abteilung... Sind das nicht genug Griinde, um in Russland ganz von selbst unbeliebt zu werden?' BArch Berlin, R73/223, Zeiss to Medical Faculty of the University of Hamburg, Moscow, 16 April 1931. 'Der Sachverhalt ist folgender: gegen alle russischen Spezialisten geht seit Jahren ein sogenannter Feldzug wegen Sabotage oder Schadlingsarbeit, wie sich jedermann aus den Zeitungen

Zeiss in the Soviet Union 239 leicht iiberzeugen kann. Bei diesen Prozessen, angefangen vom Schachtyprozess bis heute, wird jedes Mai derjenige Auslander mit hineingezogen, der mit den betroffenen Russen zusammengearbeitet hat. So ging es auch mir.' 86 'Die vergangenen Wochen und Monate ..., die Zeit nach der Riickkehr in die hiesige, ungeheuer brodelnde und gahrende [sic] Geisteswelt des Bolschewismus, haben mich in einer Weise gefordert und geklart, dass ich wirklich froh bin, in einer solchen Zeit zu leben und zu arbeiten. Hier wird es ja mit jedem Tag interessanter und wichtiger zu sehen - rein Mund, Nasen und Ohren aufzusperren und aufzunehmen, zu sammeln, einzuheimsen. Der Kampf dieser neuen "Geistigkeit," die schon ohne Geist gegen den wirklichen Geist geht, ist grausam und erschiitternd und sicher letzten Endes vergebens. Denn der wahre Geist kann iiberhaupt nicht letzten Endes durch den Ungeist erledigt werden. Das lehrt der heutige Kampf in Russland in ganz besonders deutlicher Weise.' 87 Der 'Generalplan Ost': Hauptlinien der nationalsozialistischen Plantings- und Vernichtungspolitik, Mechtild Rossler and Sabine Schleiermacher, eds. (Berlin: Akad.-Verlag, 1993); Sabine Schleiermacher, 'Soziobiologische Kriegsfuhrung? Der "Generalplan Ost,'" Berichte zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte (1996): 145-56. 88 BArch Berlin, R73/223, Zeiss to Medical Faculty, University of Hamburg, Moscow, 16 April 1931.

6 Infertile Soil: Heinz Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography to Russia, 1922-1930 SUSAN GROSS SOLOMON

In his book on the ambiguities of Weimar culture, written some thirty years ago, Peter Gay gave us the trenchant image of the 'outsider' as 'insider.'1 In the person of Heinz Zeiss,2 we have a fascinating variant of what Gay was talking about. As a German in Russia, Zeiss was an outsider who relentlessly cultivated insider status. Within less than five years of his arrival, he had 'gone native/ taking the Russian name and patronymic Albert L'vovich (A.L. Tseiss); equally telling, in some of his publications (both Russian and German), he inverted the 'we/ they' distinction, writing 'with us, in Russia' ('u nas v Rossii'). At the same time, he nurtured his links with Germany, writing frequent reports from 'inside' to his patrons in the German Foreign Office, the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Association for German Science) in Berlin, and the Deutsches Auslands-Institut (German Foreign Institute) in Stuttgart as well as to his colleagues in the Institut fur Schiffs- und- Tropenkrankheiten (Institute for Naval and Tropical Diseases) in Hamburg. So diligent was Zeiss about maintaining his links with Germany that when he was accused in 1931 by German critics of having abrogated his German citizenship, he reacted not only with horror, but also with amazement.3 Considering his relative youth and his limited work experience in Germany prior to 1921, Zeiss was remarkably adept at parlaying his outsider/insider status to advantage, both in Russia and in Germany. In good measure, Zeiss's success was a function of the times. The 1920s were the high-water mark of German-Russian bilateral relations: in the wake of the Treaty of Rapallo of 1922, cross-national ties flourished on the governmental, scientific, and personal levels. The fledgling Soviet regime welcomed foreigners,4 particularly those like Zeiss who not only

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were prepared to work in its service but also presented themselves as well connected in their home countries. Germany was no less eager to reward those who served its goal of opening to the east. In his correspondence with his German colleagues and patrons, Zeiss nurtured his image as a loyal servitor of Germany's relationship with Russia. For his services, in 1924 he was made Privatdozent for tropical medicine in Hamburg and given leave from the faculty to pursue his 'cultural work' in Russia. In 1925 he was awarded the title of professor by the Hamburg senate.5 In early 1932, a year after being summarily dismissed from the Tarasevich Institute, he returned to Germany as an honoured native son who had done important service for the homeland.6 For all his accomplishments, there was one project dear to Zeiss's heart that he was unable to realize - namely, the successful implanting in Russia of the field of medical geography. Medical geography, whose roots are commonly traced to the work of Leonhard Ludwig Finke in the late eighteenth century,7 examines how place and health (and disease) are interrelated. In the first half of the nineteenth century, as researchers explored a range of geographic factors (climate, soil, environment, location, and human and animal populations) to explain the distribution of disease and the regional characteristics of pathological processes, the field experienced exponential growth. At its height in the 1850s, the field was drawing on the insights of a range of cognate fields - on topography, climatology, anthropology, pathology, soil science, zoology, botany, to name but a few. In the last third of the nineteenth century, a variety of factors combined to strongly dampen interest in the field.8 By the 1920s, when Zeiss was pleading its cause in Russia, medical geography, once the 'queen of the medical sciences,' had become in such countries as Germany, France, and England the province of specialists in tropical medicine, in military medicine, and, to a lesser extent, in human geography.9 During his Russian sojourn, Zeiss managed to put in place what he considered important institutional underpinnings of medical geography. But try as he might, he could not persuade his Russian colleagues to adopt those ideas he considered to be the core of the field. To be sure, the volume of the Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia published in 1928 carried an entry on medical geography (geogmfiia meditsinskaia). The text of the entry described the field much as Zeiss might have, and the bibliography at the end of the entry replicated almost completely the sources listed in Zeiss's articles on the subject.10 But except for one work in Russian, the literature cited was entirely German, which sug-

242 Susan Gross Solomon

gests that while Zeiss may have been regarded as the ranking authority on medical geography, the field itself had not really taken root in Russia. Zeiss's inability to sell his ideas in Russia raises intriguing questions. Was his failure primarily a function of his insider/outsider status? This chapter will argue that Zeiss's status, with all its ambiguities, was not the primary impediment to success; indeed, given his relatively modest scientific accomplishments, Zeiss may well have gotten further in Russia than he would have had he remained in Germany. Rather, we suggest, there was a significant lack of 'fit' between the enterprise of medical geography as Zeiss defined it and the ecology of scientific fields in Russia. Zeiss brought with him from German discussions a set of scientific fault lines that did not fit the Russian paysage, and he paid inadequate attention to important foci in Russian research for which his German training had not prepared him. The focus in this chapter will be on the years 1922 to 1931, when Zeiss was in Russia, trying to sell medical geography to his Russian colleagues. We will not deal with the subsequent evolution of Zeiss's medical geography into geomedicine and then into geopolitics, to which Sabine Schleiermacher devotes much attention. At issue in this chapter is not the filiation of Zeiss's ideas, but the accuracy of his judgment that Russia was fertile soil for the field of research he called 'medical geography.' Framed in this way, Zeiss's assessment of the Russian scientific landscape draws attention not simply to the particular features of German-Soviet relations in the interwar years, but more generally to the complexities of building scientific disciplines across national boundaries. Medical Geography in Germany: Roots and Shoots Recent scholarship reveals that in the nineteenth century the rubric 'medical geography' included an array of research on the relationship between disease and place. Broadly defined, the field of medical geography studied how and why the incidence and presentation of disease varied with a range of aspects of 'place' (location, climate, environment, vegetation, animal and human populations). The field was frequently equated with (read 'reduced to') one or another of its subfields - medical topography (the description of medical conditions in particular locales), medical meteorology (the link between disease and climate), or medical cartography (the construction of disease maps).11

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography 243

While medical geography drew heavily on the insights of all these subfields, its explanatory goals and methods transcended those of any one of them. The lineage of medical geography has been much discussed of late.12 According to the canon in the history of medicine, while medical geographic thinking dates back to Hippocrates, the field as such emerged after 1794, when Leonhard Ludwig Finke's magisterial work on medical topography, Versuch einer allgemeinen medicinisch-pmctischen Geographic, was published in Germany.13 As with all canons, there are dissenters. Terming Finke's topographical work 'descriptive/ experts in the history of French medicine have proposed as the field's father the army physician, Jean-Christian-Marc Boudin, whose Traite de geographic et de statistique medicates et des maladies endemiques (1857) aimed at explaining disease variation; this book also provided disease maps and discussed the ethnic composition of the population.14 Like many scientific enterprises, medical geography was institutionalized first as a field and later as a teaching discipline. Specialized journals emerged in the mid-nineteenth century. In 1864, Archives de Medecine Navale began publication in France; however, as German scholars are fond of pointing out, the first journal devoted exclusively to research in medical geography was Deutsches Archiv fiir Geschichte der Medicin und Medicinische Geographic, which appeared in 1878, followed in 1898 by the Leiden-based Janus, Archives internationals pour I'Histoire de la Medecine et pour la Geographic medicate.15 These journals appeared at a time when research in medical geogaphy was tapering off. The establishment of medical geography as a teaching discipline was uniformly slower in coming. The first recorded professorship of medical geography was held by Arthur Bordier in the 1880s in France, but that professorship was located in the School of Anthropology, not in the medical school. A comprehensive source on medical specialties in nineteenthcentury Germany lists no lecture courses, much less chairs, in medical geography.16 The agenda of medical geography varied from country to country. In the words of Rupke, 'medical geography was not a single current.'17 To illustrate, in the late nineteenth century, British medical geographers were preoccupied with issues of empire; their French colleagues were pursuing tangencies with medical anthropology.18 As intriguing as the national variations are the within-country differences in the field. Of particular interest for us are two approaches to medical geography in Germany in the first half of the nineteenth cen-

244 Susan Gross Solomon

tiny from which Heinz Zeiss drew inspiration. The approaches not only differ from each other but, at important points, are also contradictory. The first of these has been termed 'Humboldtian medicine' by historian of medicine Nicolaas Rupke.19 The leading representatives of this approach - Friedrich Schnurrer (1784-1833), Caspar Friedrich Fuchs (1803-1866), and Adolph Miihry (1811-1888)20 - shared several articles of faith. To begin with, they believed it possible to discover general laws explaining the distribution of disease by applying the concepts, terminology, and representational forms of the new geography associated with the work of Alexander von Humboldt. Furthermore, these thinkers conceived of infectious diseases as plants distributed according to defined regions and zones. As Miihry explained, since diseases were expressions of a region in much the same way as were plants, they should be studied as part of an integrated geosystem. The reference to an integrated geosystem reflected the interest of the 'Humboldtians' in holistic structures and in what Malcom Nicolson has called a 'unity of landscape' - an interest that harked back to Humboldt himself.21 Finally, the Humboldtians were committed to the importance of plotting patterns of disease on world maps. In 1827, Schnurrer presented a textual world map; Heinrich Berghaus followed in 1852 with a contoured map, on which the written word was replaced by shading, colours, and codes. In 1856, Miihry presented an isotherm map, with a zonal distribution of diseases.22 Significantly, the Humboldtians presented sophisticated isotherm maps, but without possessing detailed information about the distribution of the diseases they were charting. Persuaded that the distribution of disease was controlled by climate, they took for granted their ability to chart the distribution of disease following general laws. The other strand in German medical geography of interest is the one developed by the German physician August Hirsch (1817-1894). On important points, Hirsch's thinking clashed with that of the Humboldtians. In 1853, while still relatively unknown, Hirsch captured attention by writing an article that criticized Fuchs for having generalized about the distribution of disease before collecting adequate information; three years later he launched a critique of Adolph Miihry for having ignored the important factor of history.23 Hirsch presented his conception of the field of medical geography in a two-volume work, Handbuch der historisch-geographischen Pathologic (1860-4). At the core of Hirsch's thinking lay the distinction between research in medical geography (which structures and presents informa-

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography 245

tion on a geographical basis, including information on pathology as part of the description of a given region) and research in geographical medicine (which organizes the inquiry around specific diseases, showing how they take different forms in different regions of the world).24 Hirsch's work fell squarely in geographical medicine or, as he preferred to call it, 'geographical pathology': his agenda was to examine how individual diseases were distributed on the face of the earth and to identify the geographically dependent features (race, nationality, soil conditions, climate, social factors) that affected the occurrence and distribution of individual diseases. Significantly, in contrast to the Humboldtians, Hirsch believed that the physical-environmental approach was insufficient, as it neglected social conditions that played a role in the origins of disease. So strong was Hirsch's interest in social factors that he dedicated his book to the London Epidemiological Society to honour its work in public health.25 Hirsch's work gained rapid recognition: in 1864, he received a professorship in Berlin to teach the history of medicine.26 Less than two decades after the publication of Hirsch's work, medical geography began to experience a downturn: publications in the field declined, and approaches proliferated, with little cumulation of knowledge.27 According to conventional wisdom, the decline was caused by the triumphs of bacteriology, which relegated to the background explanations of the distribution of disease that relied on geographical factors.28 But recent scholarship argues that the dominance of bacteriological reasoning was never complete. As Olga Amsterdamska points out, as early as 1890 bacteriologists were aware that germ theory alone could not explain epidemics of infectious diseases. Laboratory research did not eliminate interest in 'biological predispositions' or in the role played by cultural, social, and environmental factors in the causation and transmission of disease.29 Scholars are now pointing to factors other than the dominance of bacteriology to explain the decline of medical geography. Everywhere, medical geography faced competition from fields more securely institutionalized. In France, hygiene was the master science that related health and disease to place. By the early nineteenth century, medicine had appropriated the location questions of geography and recast them as hygiene questions, thus reducing medical geography to a 'tributary' of hygiene. In Germany, according to one account, medical geography was disadvantaged by the triumph of a current of pathological anatomy that favoured a morphological approach to morbidity; another source suggests that some of the purview of medical geography was

246 Susan Gross Solomon

siphoned off to cognate subjects such as epidemiology, medical statistics, and hygiene.30 Professional factors added to the tenuous position of medical geography. In France, specialists in military medicine - the most enduring enthusiasts of medical geography - were not part of the elite, nor were they ensconced in the academies. In Germany, the leading Humboldtians worked outside university/hospital research, thus depriving themselves of the kind of high profile that adds lustre to a fledgling field.31 There were also issues of method. By the mid-nineteenth century the holistic approach and the search for general laws - both hallmarks of Humboldtian medical geography - were no longer the cutting edge in science. Indeed, in Germany the older approaches may have carried some taint of Naturphilosophie. In France, a concerted campaign to expel natural history methods from medicine doomed medical geography.32 And finally, in late nineteenth-century Europe, aetiological issues often had political overtones. In Germany in particular, as the tide swelled in favour of medical reform and social causes, the Humboldtians, with their exclusive focus on physical-environmental causes, were at a distinct disadvantage.33 Hirsch had argued for the salience of social factors in understanding the geographical distribution of disease. But there was little contact between Hirsch's followers and proponents of the newly emerging field of social hygiene (Sozialhygiene) in Germany. Indeed, from the late 1880s on, German specialists in social medicine reached out to such cognate endeavours as medical statistics, population statistics, anthropology (particularly anthropometry), economics, and social welfare, but not to geography.34 The field of medical geography had declined in much of Europe by the 1920s; even so, Zeiss treated German medical geography of the middle third of the nineteenth century as a living storehouse of relevant ideas. He drew freely on that storehouse, cherry picking from a variety of sources, without acknowledging that the authors of those sources often disagreed fundamentally. To be specific, Zeiss took from the Humboldtians their faith in discoverable laws governing the geographical distribution of disease; their belief that disease among plants, animals, and humans should be studied as part of an integrated whole; and their insistence on the priority of the physical environment as a factor influencing disease. He also echoed the Humboldtians' reverence for cartographic display, though inexplicably, he did not cite the contributions of his Humboldtian heroes (Schnurrer, Miihry, and Fuchs) to the systematic mapping of disease.35

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography 247 Zeiss also drew upon the work of August Hirsch. He mirrored Hirsch's passion for the history of disease, arguing as Hirsch had done that unless the history and geography of disease were understood, it was impossible to say anything definitive about the distribution of illness. In that spirit, Zeiss repeatedly referred to the journals Deutsches Archiv fur Geschichte der Median und Medicinische Geographic and Janus, which brought together the history and geography of disease. In his enthusiasm for history, Zeiss ignored the fact that Hirsch had criticized the Humboldtians for their failure to take history into account. In addition to this, Zeiss echoed Hirsch's emphasis on social factors, though as we shall see, in Zeiss that echo was purely rhetorical. Zeiss at Work: Constructing Medical Geography in Russia Zeiss did not go to Russia with a blueprint for constructing the field of medical geography. Instead, almost immediately after arriving in Moscow, he set about building himself an institutional base. At middecade, after some four years in Russia, he began to elaborate his conception of the field, a process that continued almost until his departure in 1931. Zeiss made frequent references to the importance of methodology, but he never provided precise tools for the field he championed. The implications of this pattern of field building would be significant. Zeiss left a voluminous written record of his efforts to 'construct' medical geography in Russia. There are memoranda, letters, research reports, and articles scattered in archival repositories throughout Germany and in Russia. Perhaps the demands of his insider/outsider status required Zeiss to keep patrons and colleagues in Germany and Russia advised of the details of his activities; Zeiss's own interest in burnishing his image, for short-term advantage or for posterity, may also have contributed to the veritable flow of paper now at the disposal of historians. An examination of Zeiss's communications shows that almost from the beginning he conducted two separate sets of conversations, one with his German patrons and colleagues, the other with their Russian counterparts. While particular items (a letter, a published article, or an unpublished memorandum) were part of both sets of conversations, such items invariably carried different meanings in the two conversations. Zeiss crafted the two-track conversation carefully: he tailored his communications to what he thought his audience needed to know and could digest. Thus, he did not establish in Moscow (and perhaps never

248 Susan Gross Solomon

intended to) what Peter Galison has termed a 'trading zone/ where representatives of radically different scientific cultures could combine their activities locally while continuing to differ on the global meaning of what they were doing.36 In fact, as the decade wore on, the distance between the interactions Zeiss had with his German and his Russian interlocutors increased. Playing the Patrons

Zeiss's war experiences had persuaded him of the importance of providing fighting forces with an accurate picture of the distribution of disease. In early 1922, with less than six months' experience as director of the Central Biological Laboratory in Moscow, he wrote to his German patrons to urge the creation in Russia of a German research institute that would monitor epidemics (cholera, relapsing fever, spotted fever), study high-risk groups (children and workers), conduct research in veterinary medicine, and study the role of insects as disease carriers.37 While he noted the utility of the proposed institute for Russia, Zeiss's memorandum emphasized the advantages of his plan for his German patron. Russia was the cooking stove of plagues, which had to be closely monitored - so went his riff. The proposed institute might yield not just hygienic gains, but cultural ones as well. Russian physicians, eager for German medical literature, would be receptive to help from their German colleagues; such help might even offset French and American efforts to gain a toehold in Russia. Finally, there was the market angle: the proposed institute might create a window of opportunity for the German chemical/pharmaceutical industry. As Paul Weindling tells us in his chapter, Zeiss was to be disappointed in his hopes of creating a German research institute in Moscow. In 1924, when his berth at the Central Bacteriological Laboratory evaporated, he pushed a proposal raised at the Eighth All-Russian Congress of Bacteriologists and Epidemiologists to establish an extensive microbial collection to supplement the tiny collection in the Tarasevich Institute. There was more than a little self-interest here: Zeiss was likely angling for a role for himself as custodian of the new collection. Thus it was that in August 1924, Zeiss wrote a memorandum on the subject to his most powerful Russian patron, the Commissar of Public Health, Nikolai Semashko. The previous year had shown - so ran the text - that it was not enough to focus exclusively on external epidemiological conditions (such as the constitution of the population, the fea-

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hires of particular races, and the influence of meteorology, economic conditions, entomological indexes); researchers needed to study the biological properties of human pathogens. The microbial collection he wanted to create would be not only a repository of live cultures, but also a significant base for research on the microbes causing epidemics in Russia. The microbiological collection would be directed from an 'epidemiological-loimological' (plague-related) perspective.38 In this document, Zeiss did not express - as he would the following year concern about the tensions between the agendas of microbiology and epidemiology. In lobbying his patrons to support the microbial collection in Moscow, Zeiss was careful to preserve the appearance of transparency. He copied to his patrons in the German Foreign Office the memorandum he had written to Semashko.39 But the conversations Zeiss had with his German and Russian patrons did not coincide perfectly. For example, in making the case for establishing the collection, Zeiss referred to similar collections elsewhere in the world with which the Russians might exchange cultures. To the Germans, Zeiss suggested that the Moscow collection might serve as a bridge linking Germany to the League of Nations, which was producing monthly epidemiological reports.40 To his Soviet patron, Zeiss emphasized that the exchange of live cultures would not only increase Russia's resources for research, but also strengthen Russia's role in international science.41 Contending that 'Russia should not stand aside with respect to these developments,'42 he presented himself as an insider, one who was concerned about Russia's position in the world of medical science. Within the year, the All-Russian Microbial Collection was established in the Tarasevich Institute and Zeiss was named its director. He could not resist crowing. In late January of 1925 he delivered to a meeting of the Amateurs of Natural Science, Anthropology, and Ethnology in Moscow a triumphal report whose gist was published in Munchener Medizinische Wochenschrift and in a variety of Russian journals.43 As Elizabeth Hachten notes in her chapter, in his published report Zeiss trumpeted his commission to build and organize the live cultures; the Russian version contains no mention of his role.44 Engaging the Colleagues

At about this time, Zeiss drafted a manuscript that, according to a list of his publications he compiled himself, was never published. Titled The

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Military Hygiene Tasks of Medical Topography in Russia in Connection with the All-Russia Microbiological Collection/ this document was written in German; in shortened form, it was then translated into Russian. At the heart of the manuscript was a pragmatic argument for the importance of preventive epidemiology for military mobilization: medical topographical research that included the geographic, zoological, botanical, climatological, and cultural features of the land mass would lead to fewer losses of manpower in battle. To be useful, Zeiss insisted, topography required cartographic presentation, but he did not provide examples of such presentation. On a second point, Zeiss was more forthcoming. The microbial collection in the Tarasevich Institute could be useful in implementing preventive epidemiology: the bacterial stocks could be used in the preparation of polyvalent vaccines.45 Zeiss's interest in training the insights of epidemiology and microbiology on a common problem would remain a characteristic of his thought.46 The German text of the manuscript on military epidemiology was laced with descriptions of military campaigns (inter alia, German campaigns) gone awry because of inadequate preventive epidemiology as well as with references to sources (mostly German) on epidemiology. The pared-down Russian version of the manuscript contained no references to research in epidemiology and only scant citations relating to military engagements. At the beginning of 1926, an article by Zeiss titled 'Challenges of Medical Topography in the Soviet Union' appeared in Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii,47 the journal of the Saratov Institute, where Zeiss's closest scientific colleagues were based.48 The article omitted the term 'military medicine' in its title; even so, the text is nearly identical to that of Zeiss's unpublished German manuscript on military-medical hygiene, to which we have just referred. Like the German original, the Russian article argues for the importance of preventive epidemiology for military incursions, providing ample detail on military campaigns (some of them German) that had been imperilled by lack of epidemiological knowledge. Besides offering military benefits, medical topography stood to unlock riddles of the distribution of diseases such as epidemic meningitis, typhus and paratyphus, dysentery, cholera, malaria, and pneumonia. The scientific references in the German manuscript are reproduced here, and added to the citations are works by Russian bacteriologists - Mikhail Shtutser, Vladimir Barykin, V.V. Sakharov, Obrastsova, and Lebedeva - who had researched on Russian territory strains of cholera, typhoid, meningitis, and pneumococcus.49 Like the

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography 251 German original from which it was drawn, the 1926 Russian article called for topographical research that would integrate the distribution of disease among humans, animals, and plants. In Zeiss's view, Russia, with its enormous expanse and variation, was an ideal venue for developing the field of medical topography. Significant preparatory work had already been done in the epidemiological divisions of the republican Commissariats of Public Health. But further progress in the field would require the development of botanical geography, zoological geography, and the ecology and geography of bacteria, backed up by colloid and physical chemistry research. To assure readers that such a goal was realistic, Zeiss added: 'Let it not be said that I am asking for an Utopia: the stones to build medical topography are lying all about ... To bring together these isolated stones is only a matter of time and organization.'50 Zeiss closed his article with the statement that medical topography had 'social hygiene and general hygiene significance/ This sentiment cannot be found in the original German manuscript. By including it in the Russian publication, Zeiss was sending the signal that he knew the importance in Russia of the buzz word 'social hygiene/ The extent to which he understood the meaning of that term for the Soviets is an open question. Notwithstanding the inclusion of the term social hygiene, to Russian readers of Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii, Zeiss's 1926 article would have been something of a curiosity. The absence of Russian sources in Zeiss's article suggests that neither medical topography nor military epidemiology was front and centre for Russian readers. Zeiss's scientific motives for writing the 1926 article may well also have been opaque to his readers. But then, the document by Zeiss that would have provided that all-important context for the 1926 publication had not been translated into Russian. Limiting the Audience In 1925, Zeiss published in Munchener medizinische Wochenschrift an article on the significance of Russia for medical-geographical research. This article, 'Die Bedeutung Russlands fur die medizinisch-geographische Forschung/ marked the first occasion on which he used the term 'medical geography' in a deliberate way.51 The article lacked both a clearly articulated problematic for the field of medical geography and a fleshed-out methodology; what it did provide were Zeiss's rea-

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sons for championing the field; he also identified its cognates and its competitors. This article, I argue, holds the key to Zeiss's understanding of and passion for medical geography and to his motivation for pushing the field in Russia. Yet it was never published - entirely or in part - in Russian. Zeiss's agenda for medical-geographical research revolved around the study of variations in the virulence, forms, and location of disease among humans, animals, and plants, examined in their interconnections. This agenda - strongly reminiscent of the approach taken by 'Humboldtian medicine' - would remain part of Zeiss's core program. But in this piece, Zeiss also provides evidence of his lifelong fascination with history. For him, important variations occurred not just in space but in time. Invoking the German medical historians George Sticker and Karl Sudhoff, he insisted that it was impossible to say anything meaningful about disease patterns without looking at their history. In arguing for medical geography, Zeiss treated the reader to a rather long (and unsystematic) excursion into the field's lineage. Interest in the geographic distribution of disease had its roots in travels by physicians to distant places. But as a field of inquiry, medical geography - or 'medical topography,' as he sometimes called it - was pioneered by the Germans Leonhard Ludwig Finke and August Hirsch. By drawing a straight line from Finke to Hirsch, Zeiss was doing what the presentday historian of medicine Michael Osborne has deplored - namely, glossing over the representatives of Humboldtian medicine. In Zeiss's case, this sleight of hand was especially odd, given that much of his agenda was drawn from Schnurrer, Fuchs, and Muhry. In Zeiss's view, what marked medical geography as distinctive in the current period was its recourse to cartographic presentation of the distribution of disease. Cartography should be done by military and civilian administration together. The maps should include animal diseases and plant diseases. For all his lip service to the importance of medical cartography, there is no evidence that at this point Zeiss himself did any systematic mapping in the sense of superimposing the distribution of disease onto maps. Nor did Zeiss make mention of previous important contributions to cartography - those of Finke (1792), Schnurrer (1827), and Berghaus (1848). Zeiss was not precise about the content of medical geography or familiar with the cartographic method he was recommending, but he was crystal clear about the work he wanted the field to accomplish. 'Die Bedeutung' staked out a towering position for medical geography: the

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field was to serve as a bridge between bacteriology and epidemiology. Zeiss termed 'wasteful' the divide between the disciples of Robert Koch, who insisted on the bacillus as the primary cause of epidemic disease, and those of Max von Pettenkofer, who argued for a 'localist' approach. Pointedly, Zeiss lamented that Germany had a (Kochian) 'main line' and that Koch's discoveries had pushed bacteria to the centre of attention, enabling his followers to corner the market on the hygiene chairs in Germany. What was really missing, he warned, was epidemiological thinking. Zeiss himself had one foot in bacteriology, the other in epidemiology. As director of the Collection of Live Cultures in Moscow, he encouraged research on microbial stocks. Visiting Zeiss's office in the Tarasevich Institute in 1926, the German neuropsychiatrist Karl Wilmanns noted that pictures of Ehrlich, Behring, and Koch adorned the walls.52 At the same time, having trained as a hygienist himself, Zeiss celebrated the creation of the German epidemiological society in 1924. Zeiss had some sympathy for Pettenkofer's views, particularly as modernized by Friedrich Wolter, the Hamburg hygienist who argued that soil and ground water were the most important influences on disease patterns and that large-scale fluctuations in climate could explain outbreaks of epidemics.53 In 'Die Bedeutung,' Zeiss not only championed medical geography but also took aim at fields he perceived as its rivals. In the late 1920s, as we shall see, racial pathology would draw Zeiss's attention; but at mid-decade, his sights were trained on the burgeoning field of experimental epidemiology, which combined - so its proponents claimed insights from traditional bacteriology and epidemiology. The focus of Zeiss's attack was Fred Neufeld, the leading German exponent of experimental epidemiology, with his 'colonies of mice.'54 Neufeld, director of the Robert Koch Institute for Infectious Diseases in Berlin, was among the bacteriologists who after the First World War rejected traditional laboratory practice as artificial and whose research involved exposing large 'colonies of mice' to disease under controlled conditions, using the natural routes of mouth, eyes, and skin. Neufeld was a prominent target: in 1926 he had delivered the prestigious De Lamar lectures at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.55 But around this time, other scientists - from Britain (W.C. Topley) and America (Harold Amoss, Clara Lynch, and later Leslie T. Webster) were breaking new ground in experimental epidemiology.56 It is possible that Zeiss directed his attack at Neufeld - whom he characterized

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as a descendant of Koch - because he did not read English easily and was therefore unaware of the contributions of Neufeld's colleagues, or because he considered Neufeld most dangerous in the German setting. Zeiss acknowledged Neufeld's experiments as a 'talented imitation' of human plagues and epidemics; even so, he insisted that they lacked the essential ingredient - the 'links of the experimental populations with space and all their relations which Nature has bequeathed to every living thing/ Epidemiology, he wrote, must not permit itself to be driven in the direction of experimentalism; it must divorce itself from doctrinaire parasitology and examine the mass illness of people, animals, and plants.57 Here, his approach to medical geography was redolent with holism.58 He applauded the return of physicians to medical and natural science-historical research. He celebrated the growing focus on the ill person rather than the illness, and he praised the revival of interest in such concepts as the environment, constitution, heredity, racial hygiene, psychology, and philosophy - all of this in language both romantic and philosophic.59 To Zeiss, if medical geography was to make progress it would have to devote itself in the short term to the pursuit of medical topography.60 Russia offered unprecedented opportunities for this kind of research. 'Medical enlightenment pushes us relentlessly toward the east/ he insisted.61 The east's attractiveness lay not in its highly developed medical research but in its raw material. Zeiss was certain that the variation necessary for sustained epidemiological studies required a large, politically unified land mass like that of Russia, China, or America. Russia, he crowed, contained within its borders nearly all known infections and tropical diseases. And what climatic variations! What Zeiss did not say directly was that Russia promised opportunities to combine research fields that in Germany were divorced from and arrayed against one another.62 Zeiss praised the Skriabin Commission on the fauna of worms, formed in 1922 under the Institute for Experimental Veterinary Medicine, which brought geographic, anthropological, zoological, and entomological perspectives to the study of helminthology. According to Zeiss, the important bridge building between bacteriology and epidemiology had not gotten far in Russia. As Sabine Schleiermacher points out in her chapter, Zeiss noted that hardly any Russian researchers had been trained in both bacteriology and epidemiology. He regarded the microbiological collection in the Tarasevich Institute as a possible location for bringing together epidemiological and microbio-

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logical research and thus transcending the turf battles that inhibited inquiry in Germany. As we shall see, the turf battles that Zeiss set out to overcome were German battles, which did not play in the same way - or indeed, at all - in Russia. Carving a Niche

The publication of 'Die Bedeutung' in 1925 marked the beginning of a new phase in which Zeiss focused his energies on selling medical geography in Russia. He began work on a second institutional support for medical geography: a Russian society for the study of the history of medicine and natural sciences, with an attached research institute. In late December of 1926 he made the case for the society in a talk to the Institute for Biophysics.63 Zeiss's host in the institute, P.P. Lazarev, had a strong interest in cosmology, which, as we will see, Zeiss shared.64 Zeiss's talk, which urged 'cooperation between hygienists and epidemiologists to found a history of epidemics in Russia,' opened with high-flown references to the history of culture and the human mind. Zeiss then turned to his specific agenda - the institutionalization of the history of medicine as a discipline in the medical school;65 the creation of a Russian society for the study of the history of medicine and the natural sciences; and the establishment of a research institute that would collect valuable historical sources, arrange exchanges with similar units abroad, attract professors and students to the study of history of medicine, and found a library. To make the case for research in the history of medicine compelling, Zeiss pointed out that a number of countries - Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, France, Spain, Romania - already had research units in the field. Russia had resources, he noted, including the historian of medicine M.I. Lakhtin as well as a number of illustrious scientists and physicians, not to mention the Commissar of Public Health, Semashko.66 In his campaign to institutionalize the history of medicine as a teaching and research field, Zeiss again pursued a policy of transparency. His December 1926 talk was eventually published, initially in Germany (1927) and then in Russia (1928).67 The Russian and German texts were perfect replicas of each other. In mounting the campaign, Zeiss was not completely disinterested. As Elizabeth Hachten notes in chapter 4, Zeiss hoped to be appointed head of a history of medicine department at the Institute for Social Hygiene in Moscow. These hopes would have been frustrated: in mid-

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1927, having reviewed the Institute for Social Hygiene's plans for the coming year, the planning commission of the Commissariat of Public Health decided not to create a separate kabinet on the history of medicine; instead it would make the history of medicine one of two subdivisions of the newly created kabinet on the organization of health care.68 His hopes frustrated, Zeiss wrote an unpublished report to his patrons in which he stated: The Russian in himself and for himself has almost no sense of history, no understanding and above all, no patience for the laborious historical specificities of research/69 Undermining the Rivals As Zeiss worked to lay the groundwork for medical geography in Russia, he continued his pattern of attacking perceived rivals. Three years earlier, the focus of his fury had been experimental epidemiology; now it was racial pathology. The context of the latter attack is revealing. In late 1928, Zeiss was preparing for publication in Russian an article on medical geography in the USSR. The article appeared in the Russian Journal Gigiena i epidemiologiia in 1929 as The Tasks of Medical Geography in the USSR/ Its German version, written at the same time but never listed by Zeiss as having been published, bore the title 'What Are the Tasks of Medical Geographical Research in the USSR? A Proposal by H. Zeiss/70 In the article, Zeiss discussed medical geography in relation to a series of its near neighbours - medical topography, epidemiology, pathology - which had contributed to its development. Each of these contributing fields faced challenges. Without good topographical research, medical geography was inconceivable, Zeiss began. The Russians had been doing topographical research since the first half of the nineteenth century but the findings had yet to be systematized. Again, strides had been made in Russia in epidemiological research on endemic and epidemic disease, but Zeiss now called for the broadening of the factors influencing life and the human organism to include factors such as the ether, the sun spots, the moon, and the stars. In a literary vein, he wrote: The words of Horatio that between heaven and earth there is more than is dreamt of in our philosophy have still not lost their significance!'71 In an otherwise neutral review of the cognates of medical geography, Zeiss's discussion of pathology stands out as a jeremiad against the field of racial pathology. Race, Zeiss charged, was an unclear concept; at best, it was a heuristic construction 'like geometry/ Comparative anatomy or

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comparative pathology were much more promising than racial pathology, but the most exciting new developments lay in the area of blood grouping, which might provide new data on geographic linkages and on the historical record of the settlement and dispersion of Russia's peoples. Such data could offer insight into the conditions of immunity of different peoples and tribes, thus providing a real link to medical topography. Waxing lyrical at the prospect of blood group research, Zeiss quoted Mephistopheles: 'Blood is a special juice/72 In this polemic, Zeiss made no references to specific authors or institutions; even so, the background of the attack seems clear. By the late 1920s, at scientific meetings and in print in Germany, pathologists were debating the best explanation for the differential distribution of disease. Some emphasized the geographic environment, others the work situation, still others the social circumstances, the nutritional complex, or the racial factor. The growing attention to racial pathology may well have been what drove the idea of creating an International Society for GeoPathology. A proposal to this effect was placed on the agenda at the Congress of German Pathologists in Wiesbaden in April 1928. By 1929, when the next Congress of German Pathologists met in Vienna, the International Society had been founded, with pathologists and pathological anatomists from eighteen different countries. The first meeting of the society was convened in Geneva on 8 October 1931.73 From the outset, the guiding spirits of this initiative were the Swiss pathologist Max Askanazy and the German patho-anatomist Ludwig Aschoff.74 The society endorsed Askanazy's conviction that geographic pathology was preferable both to the pathology of peoples, which precluded research on disease among animals, and to the pathology of races, which presupposed the existence of pure races. On the question of race, Askanazy was critical of the belief that all differences in the distribution, form, and intensity of disease could be explained by the factor of race, but equally so of the belief that none of those differences could be accounted for by race.75 We may assume that from his Russian perch, Zeiss would have been following the German discussions closely, particularly as he was in frequent contact with Aschoff.76 To what extent did Zeiss perceive these developments as relevant to Russia? According to an author's starred note that appeared in both versions of the article on medical geography in the USSR, while he was preparing the piece, Zeiss attended the inaugural meeting of the Russian Society for Racial Pathology and the Geographical Distribution of Disease held in Moscow on 14 December

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1928.77 This gathering may well have persuaded Zeiss that racial pathology was a potential rival to medical geography not only in Germany, but in Russia as well. Whether in this instance, as in others, Zeiss was transporting scientific fault lines from Germany to Russia will be discussed below. The German and Russian texts of the 1929 article were exactly the same except for a few significant phrases in the starred note that appeared on the first page of each piece.78 The German version of the note tells the reader that the discussion at the society meeting 'pointed out the political [my emphasis] significance of medical geographical work for the international [my emphasis] cultural minorities.' This formulation signalled to Zeiss's German audience that medical geography might have utility for the situation of the 'international' (Zeiss's code word for 'German-speaking') minorities. Zeiss's conviction that his German readers were primarily interested in the political situation of the German-speaking minority in Russia was not new; that belief had animated a 1927 request he made to his patron, the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft, to support a two-year study of the Volga Germans.79 The Russian version of the same note reported that the discussion at the meeting of the Russian Society for Racial Pathology and the Geographical Distribution of Disease 'underscored the importance of medical geographic research for the culture of national minorities.' This note suggests that in late 1928, as his gaze moved from geographic to human variations, he was becoming increasingly intrigued not only by Russia's German minorities but also by the array of minorities found within Russia's borders. As we shall see, his approach to the study of the 'minority question' differed substantially from that of his Russian hosts. For Internal Use Only: Zeiss's Program for Medical Geography (1929)

In 1929, Zeiss wrote a twenty-page memorandum titled 'What We Understand by Medical Geography,' in which he provided the fullest description to date of his understanding of and agenda for the field of medical geography. Unlike his 'Die Bedeutung/ which appeared in print in 1925, the 1929 memorandum was not published. Nor, judging from internal indications, was it intended to be. It has been preserved in an archival repository. The 1929 memorandum gives the impression of a patchwork quilt. Various sections were written and rewritten, and then all the parts were stitched together, with little editing. It is clear, though, that the

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memorandum was designed to stake Zeiss's claim as the spokesman for medical geography. To pre-empt other claims, Zeiss denounced (unspecified) work in the field of medical geography as 'medical statistics, pathology, epidemiology, anthropology mixed up together and decorated with geographic feathers.'80 Two aspects of this manuscript are noteworthy. First, it featured a lengthy excursion into the history of medical topography, which Zeiss declared the forerunner of medical geography. This section foregrounded two lines - one from Finke to Hirsch, the other from Finke to the Humboldtians - with no discussion of the relationship between the two lines.81 The lineage Zeiss constructed included not only prominent German researchers and practising physicians but also non-Germans such as Boudin and Bordier of France and Muzio of Italy. Zeiss - always the booster of German science - also remarked on the 'minor English writers/ whose works paled beside the 'first rate' research of Hirsch.82 Zeiss included Russian work in the chronology. Most good Russian work had been done in the second half of the nineteenth century under the impetus of zemstvo medicine - so went the spin.83 Between the late 1880s and the post-revolutionary period, there was a hiatus; 'only the last ten years' had brought a change. The founding of the USSR, with its guarantees of cultural and political autonomy, had made it possible to conduct research in the union republics and among the national minorities. Zeiss's emphasis on the importance for medical geography of the study of disease among national minorities merits attention. Like many of his compatriots, Zeiss was aware of the spatial constraints that German science had faced since the war; he looked to Russia to provide the population variation to which Germany no longer had access. Second, the manuscript contained a detailed agenda for the development of the field. By this point, Zeiss's notion of the net of factors relevant to the study of disease variations had widened; besides the oftenmentioned factors of climate, land form, soil, and so on, and the factors emphasized by general parasitology (bacteria, protozoa, and the like), he now included the magnetism of the earth and especially electromagnetic forces (as cited by Fuchs and Miihry), as well as cosmic factors - the sun, the moon, and the stars - (as cited by the physicianpsychologist Willy Hellpach). Zeiss was particularly inspired by the research on sunspots and their impact on cholera and grippe in Russia and Western Europe conducted by Aleksandr Chizhevskii (whose name he mistakenly rendered as Chichevskii).84 For Zeiss, the whole was greater than the parts. He insisted that unless all of these factors

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were included, no medical geography useful to the regime could be fashioned. Zeiss made no reference to it, but at the time, holism was fashionable in a range of German medical specialities.85 According to Zeiss, this type of synthetic project required an international effort at data collection and mapping, much like the monthly epidemiological reports put out by the Hygiene Section of the League of Nations. These reports, Zeiss noted, advanced beyond medical topography (descriptive science) to medical geography (explanatory science), but they lacked the historical dimension. Given his emphasis on the importance of cartography for medical geography, Zeiss was surprisingly vague about the methodology of map making. As an excuse, he noted that he had not been able to obtain a copy of Berghaus's 1826 map!86 The final section of Zeiss's 1929 manuscript hinted at a direction in which medical geography should develop in the near future. Drawing on the Swedish political scientist Rudolf Kjellen, the German philosopher of history and culture Oswald Spengler, and the geopolitician Karl Haushofer, he sketched out a field of research, which he labelled 'geomedicine,' that was to include the following among the factors affecting the distribution of disease: politico-economic relations, the level of economic welfare, public and state medicine, the social conditions of the population, and their blood grouping.87 As Sabine Schleiermacher points out in her chapter, the contours of Zeiss's geomedicine would become clear after he returned to Germany in 1932. Zeiss did not publicize in Russia any part of this manuscript - perhaps because he intuited that he had now moved the concept of medical geography beyond what his Russian colleagues could or would accept. The Russian Terrain: Scientific Fault Lines and Bridges As we have seen, Zeiss's campaign to secure a commanding position for medical geography led him to attack the fields of experimental epidemiology and racial pathology, which he had identified as its rivals. In mounting these attacks while he was in Russia, Zeiss seems to have assumed that the issues dominating German scientific medicine were alive in Russia and, even more to the point, that the fault lines in the Russian discussions ran pretty much as they did in the German debates. But in this he had misperceived the Russian scientific landscape: he had cast as 'rivals' scientists who did not see their own agendas and that of medical geography as mutually exclusive.

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography 261 Experimental Epidemiology and the 'Bacteriology-Epidemiology Divide'

Early in his Russian sojourn, Zeiss remarked on Russia's receptivity to research that bridged or drew together a variety of scientific fields. Zeiss hoped that Russia would prove fertile ground for transcending the 'wasteful divide' between bacteriology and epidemiology that beset Germany. For Soviet bacteriologists and epidemiologists in the 1920s, the debate between the followers of Koch and those of Pettenkofer was, as one contemporary put it, 'of purely historical interest.'88 Russian bacteriologists and physicians who identified themselves as 'epidemiologists' (the latter often working under the flag of obshchestvennaia meditsina, or community medicine) had begun working together as early as March 1905, at the extraordinary Pirogov Congress on measures to combat cholera.89 To be sure, in the 1880s, when Russian bacteriologists reported their first successes in identifying the causal mechanisms of some epidemics, proponents of community medicine displayed hostility to the new science, fearing that their programs for social and economic change might be rendered obsolete. But the successes of bacteriology did not translate into government patronage; in contrast to Germany, where the imperial government supported bacteriology, Russian bacteriologists - like most scientists in Russia - were forced to seek private patrons to support their teaching in the universities.90 Thus, they made common cause with the proponents of community medicine to combat epidemics - and the tsarist government. In Russia, bacteriologists and epidemiologists met in a variety of structured settings. The field of bacteriology was institutionalized not only in the Institute for Experimental Medicine and in the Pasteur stations, but also in clinics in city hospitals, where bacteriologists often worked cheek by jowl with proponents of community medicine. From 1911 on, bacteriologists and epidemiologists convened regularly in professional meetings to talk about ways to combat epidemic disease; after the revolution, they were joined by sanitary physicians. By the mid-1920s these combined gatherings had grown so large that the programs had to be subdivided into concurrent bacteriological, epidemiclogical, and sanitary sessions. The representatives of these three specialities met not only at conferences, but also on commissions established to contain a series of epidemics - of typhus, typhoid fever, scarlet fever, cholera, and diphtheria, malaria, and syphilis.91 The institutionalization of bacteriology and epidemiology worked to

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tamp down rather than heat up tensions. In Russia, bacteriology was being institutionalized as a distinct teaching field by the turn of the twentieth century. The first department was opened in 1896 in the Military Medical Academy in St Petersburg. By the 1920s there were separate departments of bacteriology in Russian medical, veterinary, and agricultural institutes.92 Epidemiology followed a far slower trajectory. For much of the period under review here, epidemiology was subsumed under public health teaching in Russian medical schools. General (or 'experimental') hygiene examined the impact on health and disease of such factors as soil, climate, air, and water using the methods of physics, chemistry, and biology; it also proposed sanitary reforms.93 Early in the twentieth century, attempts were being made to loosen the grip of general hygiene. To no avail. After the Bolshevik Revolution the bacteriologist D.K. Zabolotnyi (1866-1929), who was the driving force behind the anti-epidemic centre - which had been founded in 1918 under the Institute of Experimental Medicine to collect and systematize epidemiological observations and to train epidemiologists - pressed for an independent department of epidemiology under the joint aegis of the medical faculties of Odessa, Kharkov, and Ekaterinoslav. Independent departments of epidemiology were established in 1920 at the Odessa medical institute (under Zabolotnyi's direction), in 1927 in Dnepropetrovsk, and in 1932-3 in Kharkov.94 Russia was slow to follow the lead of Ukraine. Zabolotnyi, who moved from Odessa to Petrograd in 1923 to head the newly founded joint department of microbiology and epidemiology at the prestigious Military Medical Academy, was unable to secure the creation in the academy of a separate department of epidemiology.95 In 1925 and again in 1928, the All-Union meeting of departments of preventive medicine passed resolutions calling for the creation of separate departments of epidemiology in the medical schools.96 Between 1924 and 1930, dotsent courses in epidemiology were created in some Russian medical schools, but no separate departments were established.97 Not until 1931 - a year after Russian medical training had been streamed into three distinct faculties - was the first independent department of epidemiology opened, at I Moscow Medical Institute. That department, which lacked premises and equipment, was located in the least prestigious faculty - the sanitary prophylactic faculty.98 The delayed institutionalization of epidemiology was evident in research as well as in teaching. For much of the 1920s, epidemiological . research was carried out in hygiene labs or in special sections of sani-

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tary bacteriological institutes." Epidemiologists published their findings in outlets shared either with hygiene or with microbiology.100 Given the slow development of epidemiology as a discipline, epidemiologists were understandably receptive to bridge-building ventures that placed them at the cutting edge of research on the distribution of disease. They eagerly embraced the new field of experimental epidemiology. Zabolotnyi underscored the value of the new field for the task of clarifying the influence of a variety of epidemiological factors on the incidence of disease.101 He hailed the methodological precision of experimental epidemiology, which would help quantify epidemic diseases and lead to the establishment of a parasite index for the study of malaria. In Russia, as elsewhere, it was the bacteriologists who took the lead in accepting experimental epidemiology. Far from mocking the 'colonies of mice' used by experimental epidemiologists, Russian bacteriologists praised the efforts being made to reduce the number of variables influencing the spread of disease, to create uniform conditions for the observation of disease, and to give the data a degree of certainty.102 The Russian champions of experimental epidemiology emphasized that the new direction in research was intended to supplement, not displace, statistical and historical research on the spread of disease. Part of the appeal of experimental epidemiology lay in its potential practical applications. In a 1925 article, O.G. Birger, a Privatdotsent in bacteriology in Moscow, emphasized the potential of experimental epidemiology to determine the best approach to immunization in a population and to assess the utility of preventive inoculation.103 The new experiments might even make it possible to examine the impact on epidemics of variations in nutrition and race!104 Soviet bacteriologists did more than welcome experimental epidemiology - they derided its detractors. In a 1927 article, the same Birger warned that the current trend towards differentiating epidemiology from bacteriology must not be allowed to revive traditions better left buried - namely, the localist studies of Pettenkofer.105 The real targets of Birger's attack were the 'fantastical and unsubstantiated' contentions of Friedrich Wolter, who was bringing back the old, localist view that the causative agents of infection were generated in the soil and transmitted to human beings by air. The new experimental epidemiology - so ran Birger's argument - gave the lie to Wolter's reliance on the soil: British and American researchers Topley, Webster, and Amoss had shown that epidemics could be artificially induced in sterile conditions.

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Initially, the Russians applied the approach of experimental epidemiology to their data. At the Ninth Ail-Union Congress of Bacteriologists, Epidemiologists and Sanitary Doctors (25 to 31 May 1925) in Moscow, Tarasevich delivered a report on 'current tendencies in epidemiology' in which he used materials assembled by Russian bacteriologists and epidemiologists to examine some of the leading hypotheses in experimental epidemiology.106 But soon, the Russians made it clear that they wanted to be seen as original contributors to experimental epidemiology. In a 1927 article celebrating ten years of achievement in epidemiology and microbiology, V.A. Barykin touted the work of the leading Russian researcher on soil bacteria, Sergei N. Vinogradskii (1856-1953), whose notion of the 'microbial paysage' was being used in the research on cholera (1925) and typhoid fever (1926) conducted by the Commissariat of Public Health's Microbiological Institute.107 Vinogradskii had argued that it was not enough to be able to see the culture of a microbe in a test tube; the researcher had to identify bacteria in their natural unsterilized setting and examine the coexistence of all microflora, without making assumptions about causative agents. Vinogradskii, who began his work on the microbial paysage in the 1880s with particular interest in the physico-chemical processes of transformation in the soil, may well have been influenced by Pettenkofer. But Barykin, head of the microbiology division in the State Institute for Public Health (GINZ), presented Vinogradskii's ideas as lying between the fields of microbiology and epidemiology. The entry 'bacterial paysage' in the Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia reported with undisguised pride that Americans (and Japanese) had followed Vinogradskii's ideas.108 Significantly, those Russians who were interested in experimental epidemiology did not look primarily to the Germans. Although Fred Neufeld was routinely mentioned, Russian bacteriologists and epidemiologists also cited the Americans and the British (Topley, Webster, Amoss, Pritchett, and Flexner).109 Whether Zeiss's mockery diminished Neufeld's lustre in Russian eyes is unclear. Whatever the case, Zeiss's hesitations over experimental epidemiology clearly did not dampen Russian enthusiasm for the field. Racial Pathology and Geo-Pathology: Rivals or Complements

After attending the December 1928 meeting of the Russian Society for Racial Pathology and the Geographical Distribution of Disease, Zeiss criticized the field of racial pathology with a vehemence he reserved for

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fields he saw as competitors of medical geography. In doing so, he was grafting onto Russian science a rivalry from the German discussions. In Russia, the relationship between geopathology and racial pathology stimulated neither the interest nor the passion it did in Germany. Early on, Russian pathologists signalled their desire to be part of the International Society for Geo-Pathology.110 After the 1929 meeting of the German Pathological Society in Vienna, A.I. Abrikosov, the acknowledged dean of Russian pathologists, was approached to serve as the representative in Russia of the International Society for Geo-Pathology and to organize a national committee there.111 Abrikosov relayed the invitation to Semashko. Abrikosov and Semashko then 'agreed together' that the Presidium of the Russian Society for Racial Pathology and the Geographical Distribution of Disease, headed by the well-known zoologist Nikolai Kol'tsov, should do double duty as the Russian national committee of Askanazy's International Society. This decision required justification. In a letter to Askanazy of late January 1930, Abrikosov acknowledged that to the extent it focused on the biological characteristics of different races, the Russian Society for the Study of Racial Pathology and the Geographical Distribution of Disease had somewhat different goals from the International Society for Geo-Pathology. But since the Russian society included within its purview questions of geographic pathology, there was no reason to strike a separate national committee for Askanazy's society. Abrikosov's letter suggested that for the Russians, the agendas of racial and geographic pathology were not mutually exclusive.112 On behalf of the International Society for Geo-Pathology, Askanazy accepted Abrikosov's proposal. Within a year of the December 1928 meeting, Zeiss would characterize the Russians as 'running to racial pathology.'113 How accurate was this perception? How serious a force was racial pathology in Russia? Initially, the Russian Society for Racial Pathology and the Geographical Distribution of Disease experienced exponential growth. Founded in December 1928, the society held four meetings between March and May 1929, during which an impressive range of papers were presented.114 In his inaugural address to the society, Kol'tsov took what might be seen as a hegemonic position, including under the rubric of racial pathology work on the influence on disease patterns of such factors as climate, nutrition, and social life. Kol'tsov did not stipulate a precise definition of 'race'; instead, he laid out the disputes over the concept among anthropologists, biologists, and sociologists and then

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offered his own view.115 For Kol'tsov, the term race seems to have been a convenient rubric under which to subsume a variety of research agendas, including his own in human genetics.116 Kol'tsov's inclusiveness set off alarm bells. In 1929 the one-time community medicine physician, M.M. Gran, who a decade earlier had generated a proposal for an Institute for Social and Community Medicine,117 wrote an article expressing concern lest medical geography be swallowed up by racial pathology.118 There was little danger of Gran's nightmare becoming reality. By 1931 the Russian Society for Racial Pathology and the Geographical Distribution of Disease was a spent force. But even before that point, the appeal of racial pathology - while perhaps deep in certain quarters - was not broad. Among Russian pathologists, racial (and even geographical) pathology was, at best, marginal. A hundred-page review of Russian pathology written in 1926 makes no reference to Soviet work in racial pathology. And in the address he delivered during the Week of Russian Natural Science in Berlin in 1927, Abrikosov listed as the three top priorities for Soviet pathologists the impact on disease patterns of calamities (epidemics, famine); specific pathological problems; and occupational pathology.119 Research by German pathologists working in the German-Russian Laboratory for Comparative People's Pathology (founded in 1927, and known by its German co-director as the Institute for Racial Research) underscored the significance of factors such as climate, economics, nutrition, and work; when the racial factor was discussed, its significance in determining the distribution of disease was generally denied.120 Zeiss's exaggeration of the attractiveness of racial pathology in Russia may have been driven by the interest of his principal German contacts and interlocutors: the German science patron Friedrich SchmidtOtt, head of the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft, and the neurobiologist Oskar Vogt, director of the Lenin Brain Research Institute in Moscow from 1925 to 1935.121 Here, perhaps, we have a prime example of the ways in which interested outsiders constructed Russian 'reality.' The Lure of the Social

Even as he overestimated the strength and appeal of 'rivals/ Zeiss underestimated the attractiveness in Russia of the social approach to understanding the distribution of disease. As defined by its most prominent spokesman and patron, Semashko, the Russian Commissar

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of Public Health - who also served as editor-in-chief of the newly created journal Sotsial'naia gigiena, and as the first professor of social hygiene at Moscow State University - the field of social hygiene studied the influence of the economic and social conditions of life on the health of populations and the means to improve their health.122 Following Semashko, social hygienists insisted that disease was not primarily a biological phenomenon; it was first and foremost a social phenomenon, best understood in its societal context. For Semashko, the field of social hygiene held the key to the success of the new Soviet medical system, which demanded a physician 'as much at home in sociology as in biology, as much interested in preventing illness as in curing it/123 Social hygiene was undeniably 'the newest guest at the table' of Russian public health. While it had roots in pre-revolutionary community medicine, the institutionalization of social hygiene as a discipline in the medical schools and as a field of research in a specially created institute was a creature of the post-revolutionary years. Thanks to the patronage of Semashko, the field rapidly sent down institutional roots. In 1922, the first department of social hygiene was opened at I Moscow University; a year later, there were seven such departments in the Russian republic alone. By 1925, social hygiene had assumed the leadership of the 'prophylactic' kafedry (departments) in the medical schools.124 Although research in social hygiene began somewhat later than teaching, it developed at an equally frenetic pace. In 1923 the State Institute for Social Hygiene was founded to coordinate all social hygiene research on public health problems. Within a year the institute had established a centre for methodology to standardize the social research methods (questionnaires, surveys) used by institutes and government commissions conducting 'social hygiene research.' Over the next two years the institute's researchers hammered out a substantive agenda for inquiry on 'problems of collective life.' This agenda included communal education; consumption (nutrition and alcoholism); sexual life (sexual habits, sexual deviance, sexual education); and labour.125 In concept, though not in scale, the institute's agenda was closest to the one pioneered in the second decade of the twentieth century by the Chicago School of Sociology.126 Scientists in a variety of fields - including fields Zeiss knew very well - incorporated into their work the new focus on the social. Russian epidemiologists underscored the social nature of health and disease. In his magisterial reports on epidemics in Russia, which he wrote in 1922 for the Epidemiological Intelligence Reports of the League of Nations

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Health Section, L.A. Tarasevich declared: The chief immediate causes of our epidemics and of our depopulation are as follows: poor and insufficient nourishment; dirt due to shortage of soap and linen; cold in the houses; overcrowding in the houses; highly unsatisfactory method of railway travelling; shortage of sanitary and medical appliances/127 Over the course of the 1920s, the social focus of Russian epidemiology grew stronger. In the first textbook on epidemiology, Osnovy epidemiologiia (1927), D.K. Zabolotnyi acknowledged the microbe as primum movens, but at the same time he called on researchers to pay attention to its host and to the conditions in which that host lived.128 Epidemiology, the textbook argued, required not only bacteriology but also statistics and social hygiene. Russia had some depth in these fields. Zabolotnyi cited with approval the work of a group, of pioneering Russian social statisticians (P.I. Kurkin, S.A. Novosel'skii, E.I. lakovenko), who well before 1914 had pressed for social statistics to be included in research on epidemics. In 1927, lakovenko exulted that in contrast to Germany with its powerful Kochian faction, Russia was emphasizing a sociological approach to epidemics.129 Yet when it came to social hygiene, Zabolotnyi cited only one Russian - the spokesman for prerevolutionary community medicine turned teacher of social hygiene, Z.G. Frenkel'; for the rest, he referenced the the work of German physicians such as Alfred Grotjahn, Walter Ewald, Albert Gottstein, Max Mosse, and Gustav Tugendreich).130 There was no mention of the Soviet social hygienists in the State Institute for Social Hygiene who, from 1923 on, were applying the concept of lifestyle (byt) in examining the impact of social factors on the distribution of disease. In the 1920s even bacteriologists seem to have 'caught the bug' of social factors. In 1927 an article reviewing a decade of progress in bacteriology and epidemiology reported that Barykin and his colleagues working in the Transbaikal region had found that infectious osteoarthritis was affected by lifestyle and climatic factors related to agricultural labour; again, in a study of an epidemic of intestinal forms of malignant anthrax in laroslavl in 1927, Barykin and a co-worker Very convincingly' demonstrated the impact of lifestyle factors (the nutritional regime) among those groups of the population generally laid low by epidemics.131 Zeiss sent signals that he understood the importance of social in Russia. In a 1925 article on the significance of Russia for medical geography, Zeiss cited the work of Alfons Fischer, the Baden social hygienist who had written about the social hygiene implications of medical topography.132 In his first article on medical topography, published in Russia in

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1926, Zeiss wrote 'medical geography has a social hygiene and a general hygiene significance.'133 Zeiss routinely cited the German physician A. Hirsch, who stressed social factors. Rhetoric aside, there is evidence that Zeiss was not entirely comfortable including social factors among the influences on the distribution of disease. For example, when reviewing a work by Chizhevskii that he much admired, Zeiss remarked that the social factors the author invoked were unmeasurable.134 More revealing is Zeiss's handling of the series of helminthology expeditions conducted between 1919 and 1925 under the stewardship of K.I. Skriabin, director of the Department of Helminthology at the Institute of Experimental Veterinary Science, of the Helminthological Department of the Moscow Tropical Institute, and of the Department of Helminthology of the Physico-Mathematical Faculty of Moscow University.135 Skriabin's work interested Zeiss on a number of grounds. In 1922, as the newly installed director of the German Red Cross laboratory in Moscow, Zeiss himself had conducted with a colleague a study of helminthoses among Moscow schoolchildren.136 Zeiss counted Skriabin and his colleagues a core part of his scientific network. He also collaborated with Skriabin's student, P.P. Popov, head of the helminthology division at the State Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology of South East Russia in Saratov, an institution whose work and whose Pettenkoferian director, Nikanorov, Zeiss mentioned favourably.137 Not least of all, as we have seen, Zeiss lionized the Skriabin Commission as the epitome of interdisciplinary work. Yet Zeiss did not acknowledge some of Skriabin's efforts. In 1925, Skriabin led an expedition to Rostov on the Don, organized by the Commissariat of Public Health, to investigate the impact of labour and lifestyle on the incidence of occupational helminthoses among miners and to organize sanitary measures among this population. Although the expedition's results were hardly profound from a social hygiene perspective, Skriabin's summary article called for more research on the variations in the incidence of helminthoses among ethnic groups, occupational groups, age cohorts, and residents of geographical regions. Two years later, Skriabin set out guidelines for studies of the impact of lifestyle, racial factors, and occupational factors on the incidence of human helminthoses.138 Neither the 1925 expedition nor the guidelines that flowed from it were mentioned by Zeiss or by his collaborator, Popov.139 Zeiss was certainly aware that social hygiene was a growth industry in Russia. Likewise, he was familiar with the Institute for Social

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Hygiene. In late 1926, after visiting that institute, he wrote to the German Embassy describing it as a place devoted to teaching and research, to exhibitions, and to exploring health administration.140 The following year, as we have seen, he tried unsuccessfully to shoehorn himself into the State Institute for Social Hygiene as the head of a department on the history of medicine. Zeiss remarked on the prevalence of social hygiene. As a participant at the Tenth All-Russian Congress of Bacteriologists, Epidemiologists and Sanitary Physicians held in Kiev from 5 to 11 September 1926, he was in the room when Semashko opened the congress with an address that signalled the importance of social hygiene. In his report on the congress, Zeiss noted that all of Soviet medicine was 'born under the sign of social hygiene/141 Yet he did not take Soviet social hygiene seriously. Indeed, in the same report he noted with some amazement that Semashko presented the field of social hygiene as a science that dealt with the study of the impact of noxious social factors on the occurrence and development of illness. The field of social hygiene was shot through with concepts of class war (it was preoccupied, Zeiss complained, with the working class!).142 As Sabine Schleiermacher tells us in the following chapter, in 1932, after returning to Germany from Russia, Zeiss would contrast Soviet social hygiene unfavourably with his geomedicine. Both fields were interdisciplinary, but in Zeiss's view, social hygiene placed too much emphasis on social conditions and was driven by a socialist agenda. While he was in Russia, Zeiss treated Soviet social hygiene as an empty slogan. Sometimes he invoked it to legitimate his own medical geography both in Germany and in Soviet Russia; at other times he used it as a jumping-off point to reference German work. He never engaged the content of the Soviet research - even, as we shall see, when it bore on what had become the cornerstone of his agenda for medical geography - the study of the minorities (Minderheiten). The 'Question of the Minorities'

By the end of the 1920s, Zeiss was underscoring at every opportunity the salience of the national minorities to the Soviet regime. In this, he was on the mark. At the start of the decade, the Russian government was concerned mainly with preventing the extinction of the splay of small peoples it had inherited from tsarist times; as the decade wore on, the government saw the national minorities as an important source of labour for the project of socialist construction.143

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Zeiss had a particular interest in the minorities. Having failed to market medical geography in Russia as the solution to the 'divide' between epidemiologists and bacteriologists, he began to present the 'question of the minorities' as a selling point for the field he championed. In the late 1920s, he could be found arguing that medical geography held the key to understanding the distribution of disease among national minorities in Russia.144 For all his rhetoric, Zeiss never unpacked the category of 'minority.' He sometimes talked about the culture or social life of the Minderheiten, but he was never interested in trying to connect cultural or social variations to the disease patterns he observed. He seems to have assumed that the most important variations in the patterns of illness among these populations could be uncovered through blood group research.145 Zeiss's approach to the national minorities stands in stark contrast to the research on variations in disease among the national minorities (natsmeny) conducted in the second half of the 1920s at the behest of the Russian Commissariat of Public Health by researchers based at the State Institute for Social Hygiene. Beginning in 1925, social hygienists participated in a series of expeditions to the hinterlands, joining anthropologists, medical statisticians, and specialists in infectious diseases.146 The expeditions aimed not only to map disease and suggest measures to contain it, but also to identify the factors that could best explain the variations uncovered. Social hygienists assumed that social factors trumped all other variables; what remained to be determined empirically was which social factors (level of economic well-being, lifestyle, occupation, social class, education, gender, religion) were most relevant to the diseases under scrutiny. The distance between Zeiss's approach and the one introduced by the social hygienists is clearly illustrated in the case of trachoma. In Russia in the 1920s, trachoma was widely configured as a disease of national minorities.147 In 1926, in the leading journal of hygiene and epidemiology, LA. Dobreitser presented data collected by the Commissariat of Public Health on the distribution of trachoma in the USSR: in 1925, 60 per 10,000 of the population were suffering with trachoma, with the highest incidences being reported in Azerbaidjan, Turkmenistan, Armenia, and Transbaikal.148 During his Russian sojourn, Zeiss repeated the familiar saw that trachoma was a disease of the minorities, but he made no proposals to investigate why. In an article titled 'Social Hygiene Reflections on the Minorities,' published in 1932 after he returned to Germany, he repeated the same statement, citing (erroneously) Russian statistics that put the

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rate of trachoma among the Tatars at 38 per cent, and among the Chuvash at 62 to 92 per cent.149 For Zeiss, the fact that the disease occurred disproportionately among minorities closed rather than opened the issue. In contrast, from the mid-1920s on, Russian researchers struggled to disentangle the web of social factors that bore on the distribution of trachoma. Some configured trachoma primarily as a disease of the rural population. Others characterized it as the handmaid of poverty and lack of 'sanitary culture.' An expert on trachoma among the Chuvash declared trachoma to be rooted in both lifestyle and social class: its victims were the poor and the historically disadvantaged.150 Still others, acknowledging the correlation between poverty and the high incidence of the disease, insisted that the most important influence was the absence of medical help.151 Many researchers found it impossible to separate poverty and lack of culture from ethnographic factors. Others were sceptical about the impact of ethnographic factors. A Dr Antonovskii from Kharkov drew attention to the high incidence of trachoma among the Volga Germans living in Ukrainian regions alongside Ukrainians and Jews. Researchers had noted the harmful effects of the common washing cups favoured by the German population.152 But, Antonovskii asked, was the cup an indicator of lifestyle or of nationality? Antonovskii, who was committed to the primacy of social factors, added that the kinds of conclusions drawn by foreign physicians about variations in susceptibility by nationality were underresearched.153 All of this literature was in the public domain by the time Zeiss wrote his 1932 article. Except for one piece, all of the articles had appeared in prominent journals in hygiene and epidemiology and in preventive medicine - journals that Zeiss had either published in or followed closely. Only one of the articles cited had been published in the journal of the State Institute for Social Hygiene, and ironically, that article carried a German abstract.154 To Zeiss, the social approach to the study of disease remained an empty slogan. Notwithstanding his 'insider' experience in Russia, Zeiss saw what he had been schooled to see. Assessing the Gains Zeiss's program for implanting medical geography in Russia was watched with interest in some German medical circles. In a 1926 monograph on epidemiology, Friedrich Wolter referred to the possibility of opening in Russia Pettenkoferian-inspired research institutes for epide-

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miology and microbiology of the kind 'that did not exist in Germany/ Wolter intimated that the idea had been proposed by Tarasevich, director of the Pasteur Institute in Moscow. But a letter from Wolter to Tarasevich makes it clear that it was Wolter himself who proposed the institutes, which he described as following 'Zeiss's program.'155 The evidence suggests that Zeiss failed to sell the field of geographical medicine in Russia. The entry meditsinskaia geogmftia written by the bacteriologist Zabolotnyi for the authoritative Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia (1929) hardly depicted medical geography as a cutting-edge endeavour. It had flourished in the late eighteenth century and through the first two-thirds of the nineteenth, but the triumphs of bacteriology had relegated the field to the background. With attention now focusing on the role of live carriers, flies and rodents, so ran the spin, geographic medicine was becoming relevant once again.156 As examples of the diseases illuminated by 'geographic medicine/ Zabolotnyi listed plague, yellow fever, malaria, encephalitis, helminthiasis, leishmaniasis, tularaemia, pellagra, and - most surprisingly - neurosis among women of the North. Except for a collected work, Mediko-topograftcheskii sbor, published in 1870-1, the literature cited by Zabolotnyi was German. This, in contrast to Zeiss's insistence that Russian zemstvo medicine had spawned a venerable tradition of work in medical topography. Perhaps Zabolotnyi ignored that literature because he considered it descriptive and old-fashioned, since it did not reflect the bacteriological model of disease aetiology.157 Whatever the case, Zabolotnyi's near total reliance on German sources suggests that Zeiss's sales campaign on behalf of medical geography had failed. Yet the German sources cited by Zabolotnyi overlapped nearly perfectly with those furnished by Zeiss; from this we can infer that the Russians recognized Zeiss as the authoritative voice on the German field. Zeiss's own assessment of his success merits attention. A letter he wrote to one of his German patrons, the Deutsches Auslands-Institut in Stuttgart, in early 1929 sounded an optimistic note. Zabolotnyi's entry suggested that medical geography was an artificial plant in Russia, but Zeiss had seen a draft of a forthcoming handbook on medical geography that the bacteriologists S.I. Zlatogorov and D.D. Pletnev were preparing.158 Moreover, interest in medical geography seemed to be on the rise: pathologists, hygienists, epidemiologists, and parasitologists (of humans and animals) had their eyes on the Russian population. Russia had an 'unbelievable' splay of peoples and tribes - settled peasants on the plains, nomads in the Caucasian and Central Asian

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mountains, and city dwellers. There was now easy access to these populations; indeed, as Zeiss put it, 'good material is lying on the i en streets. There were, he admitted, obstacles: the growing interest in racial pathology and a certain 'speculativeness' among bacteriologists that 'diminished the incentive to search for causative agents/ Even more serious was the absence of history in the Russian epidemiological work of the 1920s. Without history, Zeiss insisted, solid work in comparative anatomy and pathological anatomy and anthropology were unthinkable. He had been lobbying since 1924 for the creation of the Russian Society for the History of Medicine (the society was eventually created in January 1929, with Zeiss's involvement160), but historically minded physicians were few and far between in Russia. More to the point, the type of historical work Zeiss was commending had run up against official dogma (the Marxist 'state religion/ historical materialism) and the 'indolence' of some people. While acknowledging these difficulties, Zeiss lobbied his patron for support for a German-Russian research institute for medical geography in Moscow. The projected institute would house four divisions: pathological anatomy, studied in a geographical context; epidemiology (bacteriology and parasitology); microbiology, with a serological subdivision; and a division devoted to methods of geographic research, building on botany, geology, and zoology.161 Recall that in 1922, Zeiss had urged the creation of a German Institute in Russia. Now, nearly eight years later, he was proposing a bilateral venture. The institute would have a clear market niche: it would not be all-German like the Moscow-based German-Russian Laboratory for Racial Research, or allRussian like Vogt's Brain Research Institute (described by Jochen Richter in his chapter).162 There were indications that such cooperation could work. Zeiss listed his work with P. Popov (the chief physician of the Moscow Tropical Diseases Institute) on blackwater fever and sprue,163 Max Jessner's syphilis expedition with Russian colleagues to Baikal in 1928, and the pathological-anatomical research conducted under the auspices of the German-Russian Laboratory for Racial Pathology in Moscow. In fact, as I have argued elsewhere, the 'cooperation' in these ventures was more formal than substantive. The German and Russian teams that participated in the syphilis expedition had different agendas and methods; the promised joint publication gave rise to real tensions and mutual recriminations. For its part, the Laboratory for Racial Pathology stimulated ongoing disputes between Germans and Russians over

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funding. More to the point, despite the strenuous efforts of the Germans to recruit Russian collaborators, no Russian researcher ever worked in the laboratory.164 It is unclear whether Zeiss's Stuttgart patron knew about the strains in the Soviet-German scientific collaborations; there is no doubt that Zeiss knew about 'the cooperation/ In 1931, not two years after he had painted for his patron a cautiously optimistic portrait, Zeiss published in Miinchener medizinische Wochenschrift a damning assessment of the state of Russian work in medical geography.165 By this point, he had been dismissed from the Tarasevich Institute. For the first time in a decade, he was living in Russia without any affiliation with a Soviet institution. Zeiss's article suggests that while he may have been physically in Russia, he had removed himself emotionally from the Russian scene. Zeiss now listed his affiliation as '(Hamburg)-Moskau/ Zeiss's 1931 article, to which Wolfgang Eckart has referred in his chapter, was an indictment of Russian medical geographic research. There was no current work in the field to speak of; at best, the collection of live cultures he had launched might spark some research. Moreover, Russian epidemiological research was weak. Practical work in epidemiology done in three institutions - the Saratov Institute, the hygiene-bacteriological institute in Rostov on the Don, and the epidemiological chair in the Odessa medical institute - could serve as a beacon for Europe. But the epidemiological research lacked historical analysis. Some regional universities in Russia were doing work in local history and folklore, but this work was 'disconnected from medicine.'166 This assessment suggests that Zeiss had either not looked at or had not taken seriously the field of Soviet social hygiene, which focused on the links between lifestyle and health. The 1931 article marked Zeiss's movement away from the field he had championed with so much persistence. To medical geography ('a branch of geography which studied geographic factors affecting the well-being of humans, plants, and animals') he now contrasted the more dynamic field of geographic medicine ('a branch of medicine which sought to clarify medical phenomena using cartographic techniques').167 The extent to which Zeiss's movement away from medical geography towards geomedicine was fuelled by his disappointments in Russia remains an open question. Afterthought: Do Ideas Have Borders? The successful transport of ideas across national borders is contingent on a variety of factors - the ease of intellectual movement, the support

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(if not sponsorship) of cross-border scientific traffic by powerful and interested patrons (preferably on both sides), the density and prominence of cross-national scientific networks, and the 'fit' of the ideas being transported with their new scientific surround, to name but a few.168 In the campaign to import medical geography from Germany to Russia, the stars seemed favourably aligned. Governmental and scientific relations between Germany and Russia were at their high point, with connections not just fostered but trumpeted. As one of the intermediaries charged with advancing German cultural policy in Russia, Zeiss enjoyed high-level patronage, not only among German diplomats and science administrators, but also among top-level Soviet leaders. He was able to parlay that patronage to construct institutional underpinnings for the field he championed and to secure for himself an institutional niche in highly respected scientific institutions in both countries: the Tarasevich Institute in Russia, the University of Hamburg in Germany. Zeiss published his research findings in reputable scientific journals in both Russia and Germany. Notwithstanding his success in 'crossing borders/ Zeiss did not create a 'trading zone' in Russia. Instead, he conducted two parallel, but different, conversations about medical geography, one with his German reference group, the other with his Russian audience. As we saw, the German conversation was far broader than the Russian one; Zeiss may well have believed that his Russian patrons and his colleagues in bacteriology and epidemiology would not be receptive to his full conception of the field, with its holism and its references to the links between politics, geography, and disease. Instead, presenting medical geography as a scientific enterprise capable of bridging the fields of epidemiology and bacteriology, Zeiss pinned his hopes on the receptiveness of Russian scientists to fields that crossed disciplinary lines. His assessment of the intellectual climate in Soviet Russia was not wrong: as Mark Adams has argued, post-revolutionary Russia was fertile ground for hybrid fields.169 But the particular hybrid Zeiss was promoting had no place in the landscape of Soviet scientific fields. Zeiss misjudged the Soviet terrain in interesting ways. As the 1920s wore on, he became increasingly fixated on racial pathology as the major rival in Russia to medical geography. As we saw, racial pathology had limited purchase in Russia. In fact, Zeiss's Russian colleagues were far more attracted by experimental epidemiology. They saw that

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field as being at the cutting edge of medical science; in the Russian setting, experimental epidemiology had the added advantage of bringing together representatives of fields that had been working side by side for decades. Zeiss also underestimated the power of the social focus to shape research agendas in Russia. Much like his heroes in Germany the Humboldtians - he underestimated the extent to which aetiological issues in Russia had political overtones. As the Commissar of Russian Public Health once remarked: 'Social hygiene is its own type of political literacy in the medical schools.'170 Zeiss's insistence on treating social hygiene as an empty slogan deprived him of the possibility of mobilizing the premium on social change in the service of his ideas; furthermore, it marginalized him. This said, the failure of medical geography to take root in Russia cannot be treated simply as a function of Zeiss's misreading of the Russian landscape. Stripped of its cross-cultural penumbra, transnational discipline building is still discipline building. Border crossing may make the process of building a new discipline more complex, but the core prerequisites of the activity remain the same. To turn a cluster of research interests into a field, those who speak on behalf of a fledgling enterprise have to find an institutional home, configure the field in a way that distinguishes it from its near neighbours, set forth a research problematic, and offer a research methodology. Research shows that the order in which these prerequisites are realized varies from case to case. In biochemistry, according to Robert Kohler, it was the institutional contexts and relationships that shaped research programs; in immunology, writes liana Lowy, it was the looseness of the 'boundary' concepts that enabled the federation of research; in the emergence of the laboratory-based physiology, argues Daniel Todes, it was the organization of experimentation that was critical.171 While the order may vary, what is significant is that the core tasks be accomplished. Zeiss began by setting in place a set of institutional supports. At mid-decade, he presented what he considered compelling questions about the geographical distribution of disease. But in an important way, this was the story of a research program without a methodology. Zeiss referred repeatedly to the importance of cartography, yet he offered no guidelines for map making. Without the methodology, the Russian terrain proved infertile for the spread of Zeiss's ideas: the furrows were marked out, and the activity of ploughing was rationalized, but the ploughs were missing.

278 Susan Gross Solomon NOTES The author gratefully acknowledges the insightful comments of Nikolai Krementsov and Wolfgang Eckart. Helpful suggestions on an earlier draft were made by Michael Hubenstorf (Vienna) and Elizabeth Hachten. 1 Peter Gay, Weimar Culture: The Outsider as Insider (New York: Harper and Row, 1968). 2 For Zeiss's resume, see Bundesarchiv Abteilung Koblenz (hereafter BAKoblenz), NL 336 (H. Harmsen), 'Lebenslauf.' For Zeiss's list of his scientific works, see BAKoblenz, NL 336 (H. Harmsen), nr. 346, fol. 3-17, 'Verzeichnis der wissenschaftlichen. Arbeiten.' I am grateful to Sabine Schleiermacher for making this source available to me. 3 See BAKoblenz, R73, nr. 223, fol. 85-7, Zeiss to Medical Faculty in Hamburg, 16 April 1931. 4 On travellers and fellow-travellers to Soviet Russia, see, for example, Michael David-Fox, The "Heroic Life" of a Friend of Stalinism: Remain Rolland and Soviet Culture,' Slavonica 11, no. 1 (2005): 3-29, special issue entitled Across and Beyond the East-West Divide: Transnational and Transsystemic Tendencies in State Socialist Russia and East Central Europe. 5 'Lebenslauf,' 2. 6 Shortly after his dismissal, Zeiss was informed by the Deutsches AuslandsInstitut in Stuttgart that a permanent position would likely be found for him. Auswartiges Amt, Bonn, Politisches Archiv (hereafter AA Polit Archiv), R 83869, Abt. IV, Bd 2 (Oktober 1929-November 1932), DAI to Zeiss, 4 December 1930. Ten months earlier Herbert von Dirksen of the German Embassy in Moscow had written to the Foreign Office in Berlin urging a position for Zeiss as one of those who had served German cultural policy in Russia. Ibid., Dirksen to Foreign Office, 18 February 1930. 7 Leonhard Ludwig Finke, Versuch einer allgemeinen medicinisch-praktischen Geographic, 3 vols. (Leipzig: Weidmann, 1792-5). George Rosen, 'Leonhard Ludwig Finke,' Bulletin of the History of Medicine 20, no. 4 (1946): 527-31; Frank A. Barrett, 'Finke's 1792 Map of Human Diseases: The First World Disease Map?' Social Science and Medicine 50 (2000): 915-21. 8 For the development of medical geography, see the essays in Nicolaas A. Rupke, ed., Medical Geography in Historical Perspective (London: Wellcome Trust Centre of the History of Medicine at UCL, 2000); Frank A. Barrett, Disease and Geography: The History of an Idea (Toronto: Geographical Monographs, York University, 2000). 9 See Ronald L. Numbers, 'Medical Science before Scientific Medicine:

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10 11

12

13 14

15 16

17 18 19

20

21

Reflections on the History of Medical Geography/ in Rupke, Medical Geography, 217; Mark Harrison, 'Difference of Degree: Representations of India in British Medical Topography, 1820-c. 1870,' in ibid., 51-69; Mirko Grmek, 'Geographic medicale et Histoire des Civilisations/ Annales 18, no. 6 (1963): 1086. For the ironies in the field's downturn, see Erwin Ackerknecht, 'AntiContagionism between 1821 and 1867,' Bulletin of the History of Medicine 22, no. 5 (1948): 565. 'Geografiia meditsinskaia/ Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia 6 (1929): 629. For medical topography, see Harrison, 'Difference of Degree'; for medical meteorology, see Barrett, Disease and Geography, 344-55; for medical cartography, see Barrett, Disease and Geography, 469-523; Nicolaas A. Rupke and Karen E. Wonders, 'Humboldtian Representations in Medical Cartography/ in Rupke, Medical Geography, 163-77. One historian likened the dispute to would-be claimants arguing over a family inheritance. Conevery Bolton Valencius, 'Histories of Medical Geography/ in Rupke, Medical Geography, 3-28. Finke, Versuch. For Finke's place in the tradition, see Rosen, 'Leonhard Ludwig Finke'; Barrett, 'Finke's 1792 Map of Human Diseases.' Michael A. Osborne, The Geographical Imperative in Nineteenth-Century French Medicine/ in Rupke, Medical Geography, 31-49; Grmek, 'Geographic medicale.' Grmek, 'Geographic medicale/ 1084. For France, see ibid.; Osborne, The Geographical Imperative.' For Germany, see Hans Heinz Eulner, Die Entwicklung der medizinischen Spezialfacher an den Universitaten des deutschen Sprachgebietes (Stuttgart: F. Enke, 1970), as cited in Nicolaas A. Rupke, 'Humboldtian Medicine/ Medical History 40 (1996): 306. See Rupke, 'Humboldtian Medicine/ 294. Harrison, 'Difference of Degree'; Grmek, 'Geographic medicale.' In what follows, I have drawn heavily upon the excellent article by Rupke, 'Humboldtian Medicine.' See also Susan Cannon, 'Humboldtian Science/ in S.F. Cannon, Science in Culture: The Early Victorian Period (Kent, UK, and Dawson, NY: Science History Publications, 1978). For the links between these thinkers and Finke, see F.A. Barrett, 'Medical Geography as a Foster Child/ in Melinda S. Meade, Conceptual and Methodological Issues in Medical Geography (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1980), 1-15. Malcolm Nicolson, 'Alexander von Humboldt, Humboldtian Science and the Origins of the Study of Vegetation/ History of Science 25 (1987): 164-94.

280 Susan Gross Solomon 22 Rupke and Wonders, 'Humboldtian Representations in Medical Cartography/ 163-77. 23 Rupke, 'Humboldtian Medicine'; Grmek, 'Geographic Medicate.' Frank A. Barrett, 'August Hirsch: As Critic of and Contributor to Geographical Medicine and Medical Geography/ in Rupke, Medical Geography, 98-117. 24 August Hirsch, Handbuch der historisch-geographischen Pathologic, 2 vols. (Erlangen: Enke, 1860-4). See Barrett, 'August Hirsch/ 107. 25 Hirsch, Handbuch, 1: 3, as cited in Rupke, 'Humboldtian Medicine/ 309. 26 Grmek, 'Geographic medicale/ 1081. 27 Barrett, Disease and Geography. 28 For the view that the rise of bacteriology was responsible for the downturn, see ibid., 373-81; for the view that the triumphs of bacteriology raised the prominence of geographers, see Max Sorre, 'Complexes pathogenes et geographic medicale/ Annales de Geographic 42 (1933): 1-18. 29 Olga Amsterdamska, 'Standardizing Epidemics: Infection, Inheritance, and Environment in Pre-War Experimental Epidemiology/ in Jean-Paul Gaudilliere and liana Lowy, eds., Heredity and Infection: The History of Disease Transmission (London: Routledge, 2001). 30 For Germany, see Osborne, The Geographical Imperative/ 49. For France, see Grmek, 'Geographie medicale/ 1085; Rupke, 'Humboldtian Medicine/ 307. 31 For Germany, see Osborne, 'Humboldtian Medicine/ 307; for France, see Osborne, 'The Geographical Imperative/ 50. 32 Osborne, 'The Geographical Imperative/ 50. 33 Rupke, 'Humboldtian Medicine/ 308-10. 34 Gabriele Moser, 'Im Interesse der Volksgesundheit,' Sozialhygiene und dffentliches Gesundheitswesen in der Weimarer und derfruhen SBZ/DDR (Frankfurt am Main: VAS, 2002), 48-52. 35 For Zeiss's stress on 'the cartography of disease (the geographic pathology of Hirsch)/ see Fielding H. Garrison, 'Geomedicine: A Science in Gestation/ Bulletin of the Institute of the History of Medicine 1 (1933): 2. 36 Peter Galison, 'Computer Simulation and the Trading Zone/ in Peter Galison and Donald J. Strump, eds., The Disunity of Science: Boundaries, Contexts, and Power (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1996). 37 Zeiss, 'Die Notwendigkeit eines deutschen medizinischen Forschungsinstituts in Russland/ Bundesarchiv Berlin (hereafter BA Berlin), RMI, Nr 9398, Bd 1,496-509. The addressee of the document, dated January 1922, is not clear. 38 H. Zeiss, 'Die Griindung der Allrussichen mikrobiologischen Sammlung in Moskau/ Munchener medizinische Wochenschrift 13 (1925): 523-5.

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography 281 39 AA Polit Archiv, R66424, Zeiss to German Embassy, Moscow, 30 December 1924. 40 Zeiss, 'Die Griindung.' 41 AA Polit Archiv, R 66424, 'Abschrift/ dated 29 August 1924. 42 Ibid., fol. 5. For the international reach of the collection, see 'Bericht iiber das 1. Jahr des Bestehens des Allrussischen Mikrobiologischen Museums,' Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (hereafter GARF), /. A-482, op. 35, d. 115, /. 217-19. 43 For the Amateurs of Natural Science, Anthropology, and Ethnology, see James T. Andrews, Science for the Masses: The Bolshevik State, Public Science, and the Popular Imagination in Soviet Russia, 1917-1934 (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2003). Zeiss, 'Die Griindung.' For the Russian versions, see Vrachebnoe delo, nos. 12/14 (1925); Vestnik Biologii 4 (1925); Gigiena i epidemiologiia 1 (1924). 44 Zeiss, 'Die Griindung/ 523-4; A.L. Tseiss, 'Organizatsiia Vsesoiuznoi mikrobiologicheskoi kollektsii/ Vrachebnoe delo, no. 12/14 (1925): 1049-50. 45 'Die kriegshygienischen Aufgaben einer medizinischen Topographic in Russland in Verbindung mit der Allrussischen Mikrobiologischen Sammlung.' GARF/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 35-40. For the Russian version, see 'Voenno-gigienicheskie zadachi meditsinskoi topografii Rossii v sviazi s Vserossiiskim mikrobiologicheskim Institutom/ GARF,/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 25-34. 46 For links between medical geography and military and expeditionary medicine, see Osborne, 'The Geographic Imperative.' 47 A.L. Tseiss, 'Zadachi meditsinskoi topografii v Rossii/ Vestnik mikrobiologii i epidemiologii I, no. 5 (1926): 25-31. The copy of this document found in the archives bears the title in German, written in Zeiss's hand. BAKoblenz, R 73, no. 222, fol. 92 Rs-95. 48 For Zeiss's description of the Saratov Institute, see H. Zeiss, 'Das Reichsinstitut fur Epidemiologie und Mikrobiologie fur den Siidosten Russlands in Saratow an der Wolga/ Miinchener medizinische Wochenschrift 47 (1924): 1648-9. 49 In a single footnote Zeiss listed three prominent bacteriologists and two on whom no information could be found. 50 Zeiss, 'Zadachi meditsinskoi topografii.' 51 Zeiss, 'Die Bedeutung Russlands fur die medizinische-geographische Forschung/ Miinchener medizinische Wochenschrift 43 (1925): 1834-8. According to the author, the piece was ready for submission at the end of 1924 but was held back for unspecified reasons. 52 See Lues, Lamas, Leninisten: Tagebuch einer Reise durch Russland in die Bur-

282 Susan Gross Solomon jatische Republik im Sommer 1926, Hrsg. Jochen Richter, mit eine medizinhistorischen Einfuhrung von Susan Gross Solomon (Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus, 1995). 53 F. Wolter, 'Aufgaben und Ziele der epidemiologischen Forschung' (Vortrag auf der Tagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft fur Epidemiologie, Innsbruck 1924). Cited in Zeiss, 'Die Bedeutung Russlands.' 54 Zeiss, 'Die Bedeutung Russlands.' 55 See F. Neufeld, 'Natural Immunity and Its Significance for Epidemiology/ De Lamar Lectures, 1926-1927 (Baltimore: Williams and Wilkins, 1928), 1-13. 56 For experimental epidemiology, see Amsterdamska, 'Standardizing Epidemics'; Andrew Mendelsohn, 'From Eradication to Equilibrium; How Epidemics Became Complex after World War I/ in Christopher Lawrence and George Weisz, eds., Greater Than the Parts: Holism in Biomedicine (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 303-34. 57 Zeiss, 'Die Bedeutung Russlands,' 1836. 58 For holism in medicine, see Lawrence and Weisz, eds., Greater Than the Parts, in particular the introduction by the editors and the conclusion by Charles Rosenberg; Anne Harrington, Reenchanted Science: Holism in German Culture from Wilhelm II to Hitler (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996). 59 For the romantic strain in the natural history school, see Johanna Bleker, 'Between Romantic and Scientific Medicine: J.L. Schonlein and the Natural History School, 1825-1845,' Clio Medica 18 (1983): 191-201. 60 Zeiss cited Alfons Fischer, 'Medizinische Topographie, ihre Geschichte und ihre Bedeutung fiir die soziale Hygiene,' Sozialhygienische Mitteilungen 8, nos. 1 /2(1924): 15-17. 61 Zeiss, 'Die Bedeutung Russlands/ 1838. 62 This theme can be found in Max Kuczynskii, 'Neue medizinische Aufgaben im neuen Russland/ Das Neue Russland, nos. 7/8 (1924): 25-6. 63 Zeiss, 'Neobkhodimost' sozdaniia russkogo obshchestva po izucheniiu istorii meditsiny i estestvennykh nauk i issledovatel'skogo instituta/ GARF,/. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 131-7; the German original of the talk can be found in ibid., /. 123-9. 64 I owe this information about Lazarev to Nikolai Krementsov. 65 From 1902 on, the privat dotsent M.Iu. Lakhtin, whom Zeiss knew, taught a course in the history of medicine in the kafedra of the history and encyclopedia of medicine. V.V. Kovanova, Pervyi Moskovskii meditsinskii institut (Moscow, 1957), 74. 66 Zeiss, 'Neobkhodimost' sozdaniia/ 131. 67 See Zeiss, 'Die Notwendigkeit der einer Griindung einer russischen Gesellschaft fiir Geschichte der Medizin/ Mitteilungen zur Medizin und Naturwissenschaft 26 (1927): 227-31, as cited in BAKoblenz, NL 336 (NL Hans

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography

68 69 70

71 72 73

74

75 76 77

283

Harmsen), 346, 'Verzeichnis der wissenschaftlichen Arbeiten/ 10. For the Russian version, see A.L. Tseiss, 'O neobkhodimosti osnovaniia v SSSR obshchestva dlia izucheniia istorii meditsiny i estestvennykh nauk (a takzhe issledovatel'skogo instituta)/ Vrachebnoe delo, no. 6,31 March 1928, 435-6, as cited by Elizabeth Hachten in chapter 4. GARF,/. A-482, op. 26, d. 12, /. 118,121-4. Archiv Humboldt Universitat zu Berlin (hereafter AHUB), Nachlass Zeiss, Box 3, fol. 10, 'Vor einigen Jahren.' The Russian version appeared as L. Tseiss, 'Zadachi meditsinskoi geografii v SSSR/ Gigiena i epidemiologiia 5 (1929): 57-9. The German version, subtitled 'A Proposal by H. Zeiss/ was prepared for a festschrift for the bacteriologist, P.N. Diatroptov. See Zeiss, 'Welche Aufgaben hat die medizinischgeographische Forschung in der SSSR? Ein Vorschlag von H. Zeiss/ Aschoff Archives, Institute fur Geschichte der Medizin, Freiburg i. Br (hereafter Aschoff Archives), VIII, 14. Zeiss's list of publications suggests that the German version was never published. Zeiss, 'Zadachi meditsinskoi geografii/ 58. Ibid. For the German discussions, see Robert Rossle, 'Allgemeine Pathologic und Pathologische Anatomie in ihren gegenseitigen Beziehungen/ presented in Berlin on 4 November 1929, Munchener medizinische Wochenschrift 77, no. 9 (1930): 350-52. For the original proposal to create a society for geopathology, see 'Deutsche Pathologische Gesellschaft. Tagesordenung fur die XXIII. Tagung der Deutschen Pathologischen Gesellschaft/ GARF, /. A482, op. 35, d. 339, /. 20-22 reverse. For the creation of the society, see Comptes Rendus de la Premiere Conference Internationale de Pathologie Geographique (Geneva: Kundig, 1931). Max Askanazy (1865-1940) held the chair of pathology at Geneva from 1905 to 1939. 'Necrologie/ Revue Medicale de la Suisse Romande 61, no. 4 (1941): 245-51. For Ludwig Aschoff's biography, see Cay Riidiger-Prull, 'Holism in German Pathology (1914-1933),' in Weisz and Lawrence, Greater Than the Parts, 46-68. Max Askanazy, 'Probleme der vergleichenden Volkerpathologie/ Forschungen und Fortschritte 6, no. 29 (October 1930): 380-1. Innumerable letters between Zeiss and Aschoff in the period 1925-32 can be found in the Aschoff archives. For the founding meeting, see Susan Gross Solomon, 'Vergleichende Volkerpathologie auf unerforschtem Gebiet: Ludwig Aschoff's Reise nach Russland und in den Kaukasus im Jahre 1930,' in Susan Gross Solomon and Jochen Richter, eds., Ludwig Aschoff: Vergleichende Volkerpathologie oder Rassenpathologie - Tagebuch einer Reise durch Russland und Transkaukasien

284 Susan Gross Solomon

78 79

80

81 82 83

84

85 86 87

88

89 90

91

92

(Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus, 1998), 1-51. For Zeiss's reports on that first meeting, see AHUB, Nachlass Zeiss, Box 3, fol. 109-10, 'Bericht iiber die l.ordentliche offentliche Versammlung der Gesellschaft fur Rassenpathologie und die geographische Verbreitung der Krankheiten am 22.3.29.' Ibid., fol. 57; Zeiss, 'Welche Aufgaben?' 1. BA Berlin, 09.02, Deutsche Botschaft Moskau, 417, fol. 112-13, Heinz Zeiss an die Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft 7, October 27.1 owe this information to Sabine Schleiermacher. AHUB, Nachlass Zeiss, Box 3, fol. 97-119, Zeiss, 'Was verstehen wir unter medizinischer Geographic?' n.d. Internal indications suggest the document was composed in early 1929. Ibid., fol. 109. Ibid., fol. 102. Ibid., fol. 104. For zemstvo medicine, see John F. Hutchinson, '"Who Killed Cock Robin?" An Inquiry into the Death of Zemstvo Medicine,' in Susan Gross Solomon and John F. Hutchinson, eds., Health and Society in Revolutionary Russia (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990), 3-26. Zeiss, 'Was verstehen wir,' fol., 114,115. An article by Chizhevskii was published in the joint German-Russian medical journal, Russko-nemetskii meditsinskii zhurnal 9 (1927). See the essays in Lawrence and Weisz, eds., Greater Than the Parts. Zeiss, 'Was verstehen Wir?' fol., 111-12. Ibid., fol. 115. For the geopolitical school in Germany, see David T. Murphy, The Heroic Earth: Geopolitical Thought in Weimar Germany, 1918-1933 (Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1997). D.K. Zabolotnyi, 'Osnovy epidemiologiia,' in Izbrannye Trudy, vol. 2 (Kiev: Akademiia Nauk USSR, 1957), 217. Trained as a bacteriologist, Zabolotnyi became one of the leading spokesmen for the field of epidemiology. John F. Hutchinson, Tsarist Russia and the Bacteriological Revolution/ Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 40 (1985): 436. For the role of private patronage in Russian science, see Daniel P. Todes, Pavlov's Physiology Factory: Experiment, Interpretation, Laboratory Enterprise (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002). 'Bakteriologiia,' in Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia 2 (1928): 712-14. V.A. Barykin, 'Uspekhi mikrobiologiia i epidemiologiia v S.S.S.R. za desiat' let/ Gigiena i epidemiologiia 10 (1927): 13. John F. Hutchinson, Politics and Public Health in Revolutionary Russia, 1890-1918 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990). L.A. Shkorokhodov, Materialy po istorii mikrobiologii v dorevoliutsionnoi Rossii (Moscow: Medgiz, 1948), 200; 'Bakteriologiia/ Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia, 714.

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography 285 93 See 'Gigiena Eksperimental'naia/ Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia 6 (1929): 619-23. The description of experimental hygiene overlaps entirely with that of epidemiology. A.V. Gromashevskii, 'O prepodavanii epidemiologii na meditsinskikh fakul'tetakh/ Profilakticheskaia meditsina 9 (1928): 233-43. 94 la.V. Gorfin, "Osnovnye voprosy vysshego meditsinskogo obrazovaniia i prepodavaniia profilakticheskikh distsiplin v deiatel'nosti uchenogo soveta Narkomzdrava RSFSR v pervye gody sovetskoi vlasti (1917-1923)/ Sovetskoe zdravookhranenie 10 (1964): 69; V.A. Bashenin, 'K istorii razvitiia kafedra epidemiologii v SSSR/ Zhurnal mikrobiologii, epidemiologii i immunobiologii 21 (1967): 52-5. 95 D.K. Zabolotnyi, 'Otchet o deiatel'nosti kafedry mikrobiologii i epidemiologii s ucheniem o dezinfektsii/ in Voenno-meditsinskaia akademiia, 19181928 (Moscow, 1928), 226-7. 96 G.V. Khlopin, 'Ustanovlenie i soglasovanie programm obshchei (eksperimental'noi) gigieny mezhdu soboi i so spetsial'nymi kursami gigieny/ Sotsial'naia gigiena 5 (1925): 27-9. Trudy vtorogo soveshchaniia predstavitelei profilakticheskikh kafedr,' Sotsial'naia gigiena 13 (1928): 166ff. 97 175 Let Pervogo Moskovsksogo Gosudarstvennogo Meditsinskogo Instituta (Moscow: Medgiz, 1940), 391. 98 GARF, /. A-406, op. 12, d. 2519, /. 192-4, 'Uchebnyi Plan Sanitarno-Profilakticheskogo Fakul'teta Medinstituta'; Zabolotnyi, 'Otchet o deiatel'nosti,' 226-7. 99 'Bakteriologiia,' Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia 708. An article celebrating the tenth anniversary of the 1917 revolution did not separate the accomplishments of microbiology and epidemiology. Barykin, 'Uspekhi mikrobiologii i epidemiologii.' 100 The publication outlets shared with hygiene were Gigiena i epidemiologiia (1922-1931) and Profilakticheskaia meditsina (1923-9). The publication outlets shared with microbiology were Vestnik mikrobiologii, epidemiologii i parazitologii (1922-35), which was the organ of the Saratov microbiological institute and Meditsinskaia parazitologiia i parazitnye bolezni, based in Moscow. 101 'Bakteriologiia,' Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia, 702. 102 Ibid. 103 O. G. Birger, 'Eksperimental'naia epidemiologiia,' Gigiena i epidemiologiia 5 (1925): 56-67. 104 Ibid., 66. 105 O.G. Birger, 'Vozrozhdenie lokalisticheskikh teorii v epidemiologii/ Gigiena i epidemiologiia 7 (1927): 42-50.

286 Susan Gross Solomon 106 'IX Vsesoiznyi S"ezd bakteriologov, epidemiologov, i sanitarnykh vrachei 25-31 maia v Moskve/ Moskovskii meditsinskii zhurnal 7 (1925): 125. 107 Barykin, 'Uspekhi, mikrobiologii i epidemiologii.' 108 'Bakteriologicheskii peizazh/ Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia 2 (1928): 694-5. 109 'Bakteriologiia/ Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia, 702; Barykin, 'Uspekhi, mikrobiologii i epidemiologii.' 110 Aschoff Archives, VIII, 13, Letter of L. Aschoff to A.I. Abrikosov, 11 June 1928. 111 GARF,/. 7668, op. 1, d. 546, /. 49, Letter of Abrikosov to the Commissar of Public Health (n.d.). Aleksei Ivanovich Abrikosov (6.1.1875-1955) was professor of pathological anatomy and director of the Pathological Institute of the I Moscow State University from 1920 to 1953 and president of the Russian Society of Pathologists. Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia 1 (1926): 81-2. 112 Aschoff Archives, III, la, Letter of Abrikosov to Askanazy, 29 January 1930. For this episode, see Susan Gross Solomon, 'Dealing with the Outside World: The Soviets and the International Society for Geographic Pathology/ paper prepared for 'Health in the City' Conference of the Society for the Social History of Medicine and the International Network for the History of Public Health, Liverpool, 4-7 September 1997. 113 Zeiss,'Welche Aufgaben?' 114 'Kratkii otchet o deiatel'nosti obshchestva po izucheniiu rasovoi patologii i geograficheskogo raspostraneniia boleznei,' Russkii evgenicheskii zhurnal 7, nos. 2-3 (1929): 113. 115 N.K. Kol'tsov, 'Zadachi i metody izucheniia rasovoi patologii,' Russkii evgenicheskii zhurnal 7, nos. 2-3 (1929): 72-7. 116 For Kol'tsov's 'tactical flexibility/ see Mark B. Adams, 'Science, Ideology and Structure: The Kol'tsov Institute, 1900-1970,' in Linda L. Lubrano and Susan Gross Solomon, eds., The Social Context of Soviet Science (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1980), 173-204. 117 Tnstitut Sotsial'noi i obshchestvennoi meditsiny: kratkaia ob"iasnitel'naia zapiska/ GARF,/. A-482, op. 1, d. 136, /. 3-4; 'Osnovnye polozheniia organizatsii instituta/ ibid., 4 reverse-5 reverse. The covering letter to Semashko can be found in ibid., /. 2. 118 M.M. Gran, 'Rasovaia patologiia i meditsinskaia geografiia/ Kazanskii meditsinskii zhurnal 5 (1929): 560-2. 119 Helene Herzenberg, 'Bericht iiber die russische allgemein-pathologische und pathologisch-anatornische Literatur der Jahre 1920-1926,' Ergebnisse der allgemeinen Pathologie und pathologischen Anatomie 21 (1926), Abt II;

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography 287 Abrikossoff, 'Ueber die Richtung und die Ergebnisse der Pathologie in der U.d.S.S.R wahrend der letzten Jahre/ in Oskar Vogt, ed., Die Naturwissenschaft in der Sowjetunion (Berlin: Ost-Europa Verlag, 1929), 14-28. 120 For example, Hans-Joachim Arndt, 'Uber Aufgaben und Ziele der Kropff orschung im heutigen Russland/ in Journal fiir Psychologic und Neurologic 39, nos. 4-6 (1929): 236-53; H. Hamperl, 'Beitrage zur geographischen Pathologie unter besonderer Beriicksichtigung der Verhaltnisse in Sowjetrussland und des runden Magengeschwiirs,' Ergebnisse der allgemeinen Pathologie und pathologischen Anatomic 26 (1933): 354^122. 121 Solomon, 'Vergleichende Volkerpathologie.' 122 Nikolai Semashko (b. 1874), the first Commissar of Public Health of the Russian Republic, was the author of the first text on Soviet social hygiene. See N.A. Semashko, Nauka o zdorov'e obshchestva: Sotsial'naia gigiena (Moscow, 1921). Susan Gross Solomon, 'Social Hygiene and Soviet Public Health, 1921-1930,' in Solomon and Hutchinson, eds, Health and Society in Revolutionary Russia, 175-200. 123 N.A. Semashko, 'Sotsial'naia gigiena, ee sushchnost', metod i znachenie/ Sotsial'naia gigiena I (1922): 5-11. 124 Susan Gross Solomon, 'Social Hygiene in Soviet Medical Education, 19221930,' Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 45, no. 4 (1990): 607-43. 125 For the methodological centre, see Tolozhenie 238,' Biulleten' NKZ no. 22 (1 December 1924). For the substantive agenda, see 'Plan rabot Instituta Sotsial'noi Gigieny na 1926 god,' Tsentralnyi Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv SSSR (hereafter TsGA SSSR), /. 34, op. 2, d. 80, /. 1. 126 For Chicago social problems sociology, see Rolf Lindner, The Reportage of Urban Culture: Robert Park and the Chicago School (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). 127 Professor L. Tarassevitch, 'Epidemics in Russia since 1914,' Epidemiological Intelligence, Report of the Health Committee of the League of Nations Health Section, no. 2 (Geneva, March 1922) and Epidemiological Intelligence, Report of the Health Committee of the League of Nations Health Section, no. 5 (October 1922): 44-5. 128 Zabolotnyi, Osnovy Epidemiologii, 210-11. 129 E.I. lakovenko, 'Epidemicheskie indeksy/ Gigiena i epidemiologiia, no. 3 (1927): 36. For lakovenko, see Hutchinson, Politics and Public Health, 67. 130 Moser, 'Im Interesse der Volkesgesundheit.' 131 Barykin, 'Uspekhi mikrobiologii i epidemiologii/ 12-13. 132 A. Fischer, 'Medizinische Topographic, ihre Geschichte und ihre Bedeutung fiir die soziale Hygiene,' Sozialhygienische Mitteilungen 8, no. 1/2

288 Susan Gross Solomon (1924): 15-17. Zeiss cited Fischer repeatedly. See 'Die kriegshygienischen Aufgaben einer medizinischen Topographic in Russland in Verbindung mit der Allrussischen Mikrobiologischen Sammlung.' GARF, /. 5446, op. 37, d. 40, /. 34-9. 133 Tseiss, 'Zadachi meditsinskoi geografii/ 31. 134 Zeiss, 'Was verstehen wir?' 135 K. Skriabin, (Moscow), 'Mitteilungen iiber vier russische helminthologische Expeditionen in dem Dongebiet 1919-1920,' Archivfur Schiffs- und Tropen-Hygiene 26 (1922): 176-8. 136 A Ha'rle, Th. Siitterlin, and H. Zeiss, 'Helminthologische Untersuchungen an Moskauer Kindern,' Archivfur Schiffs- und Tropen-Hygiene (1923): 14054. 137 For Zeiss's glowing assessment of Skriabin, see AHUB, Nachlass Zeiss, Box 3, fol. 236. For his evaluation of the institute, see Zeiss, 'Das Reichsinstitut fur Epidemiologie und Mikrobiologie.' 138 K.I. Skriabin, 'Gelmintofaunisticheskoe obsledovanie naseleniia kak metod izucheniia sanitarnykh uslovii truda i byta,' Profilakticheskaia meditsina 9/10 (1925): 29-35. K.I. Skriabin and R.Ed. Schultz, 'Vvedenie v praktiku izucheniia fauny paraziticheskikh chervei poniatiia gelmintotsenoticheskogo indeksa/ Profilakticheskaia meditsina, no. 4 (1927): 21-8. 139 P. P. Popov, 'Uspekhi meditsinskoi gelmintologii v SSSR za poslednie 10 let/ Gigiena i epidemiologiia 8 (1927): 72. 140 BAKoblenz, R 73, Nr 222, Zeiss to German Embassy, 26 November 1926. 141 Ibid., 'Bericht iiber die Teilnahme an dem X. Allrussischen Kongress der Epidemiologen, Bakteriologen and Sanitatsarzte am 5-11 September 1926.' 142 'X Vsesoiuznyi imeni I.I. Mechnikova S"ezd bakteriologov, epidemiologov, i sanitarnykh vrachei, 5-11 sentiabria v g. Odesse/ Moskovskii meditsinskii zhurnal 11 (1926): 135. According to a report in the Moscow Medical Journal, there was no discussion of Semashko's opening report. 143 Susan Gross Solomon, The Health of the "Other": Medical Research and Empire in 1920s Russia/ in John Woodward and Robert Jutte, eds., Coping with Sickness: Perspectives on Heath Care, Past and Present (Sheffield: European Association for the History of Medicine, 1996), 137-60. 144 Zeiss, 'Was verstehen wir.' 145 Zeiss, 'Welche Aufgaben.' 146 See Solomon, The Health of the "Other."' 147 See 'IX Vsesoiuznyi imeni I.I. Mechnikova S"ezd bakteriologov, epidemiologov i sanitarnykh vrachei 25-31 Maia v Moskve/ Moskovskii meditsinskii zhurnal 7 (1925): 139.

Zeiss and the Import of Medical Geography 289 148 LA. Dobreitser, 'Rasprostranenie trakhomy v SSSR/ Gigiena i epidemiologiia 7 (1926): 89-102. 149 Zeiss, 'Sozialhygienische Betrachtungen/ Miinchener medizinische Wochenschrift 14 (1932) 14: 559. 150 A.S. Sabbaitov, Trakhoma v RSFSR i bor'ba s nei/ Gigiena i epidemiologiia 5 (1928): 52-60; I.K. Lukianov, 'K voprosu o glaznoi zabolevaemosti naseleniia chuvashskoi avtonomnoi oblasti/ Profilakticheskaia meditsina 5 (1926): 42-6; A. lastrebov, 'O zadachakh organov zdravookhraneniia po obsluzhivaniiu natsional'nykh menshinstv/ Gigiena i epidemiologii 4 (1928): 18-24. I.K. Lukianov, 'Vazhneishie momenty v voprose o sotsial'noi patologii trakhomy/ Sotsial'naia gigiena 2 (1929): 71-80. 151 A. N. Pizhev, 'Bor'ba s trakhomoi v Khar'kovskom okruge/ Profilakticheskaia meditsina 5 (1926): 35-46; Lukianov, 'K voprosu o glaznoi zabolevaemosti.' 152 See Lukianov, 'K voprosu o glaznoi zabolevaemosti'; A.I. Antonovskii, 'K voprosu ob epidemiologii trakhomy,' Profilakticheskaia meditsina 5 (1926): 25-34. 153 The Germans, he explained, were cultured, but their sanitary habits were not good. Germans who stemmed from Prussia seemed to have a higher incidence of trachoma than those whose forebears came from Holland - a finding that Antonovskii could not explain. 154 The article appeared in the main journal for social hygiene. I.K. Lukianov, 'Vazhneishie momenty.' 155 Friedrich Wolter, Die Grundlagen der beiden Hauptrichtungen in der epidemiologischen Forschung (Munich: Lehmann, 1926), 4-5. BAKoblenz, R73, Nr 22, Wolter to Tarasevich, 1 April 1927. Wolter was interested in using Russia to support his views. Friedrich Wolter, Die Malaria in Russland in ihrer Abhangigkheit von Boden und Klima (Munich: Lehmann, 1930). 156 'Geograficheskaia meditsina,' Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia, 629. 157 I owe this suggestion to Elizabeth Hachten. 158 AHUB, NL Zeiss, Box 3, fol. 7-20, Zeiss to DAI. The letter was undated. According to Zeiss, the handbook was scheduled for publication in 1929. It has not been located. 159 Ibid., 13. 160 See Heinz Zeiss, 'Der Arbeitsplan des neugegrundeten Moskauer Forschungsinstituts fur Geschichte und Methodologie der Medizin,' Sudhoffs Archivfur Geschichte der Medizin 24 (1931): 258-63. 161 AHUB, NL Zeiss, Box 3,19, Zeiss to DAI. 162 See Jochen Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos: Eine Chronik zur medizinischen Biog-

290 Susan Gross Solomon raphie Lenins und zur Geschichte der Elitegehirnforschung in Dokumenten (Herbolzheim: Centaurus, 2000). 163 For example, see Popow und Zeiss, 'Das Schwarzwasserfieber in Russland/ Archivfiir Schiffs- und Tropen-Hygiene 29 (1925), Supplement 1. Zeiss und Popow, 'Die Spru in Russland/ Seuchenbekampfung, no. 4 (1928). 164 See Susan Gross Solomon, 'Das Reisetagebuch als Quelle fur die Analyse binationaler medizinischer Unternehmungen,' in Lues, Lamas, Leninisten, 1-43; Solomon 'Vergleichende Volkerpathologie.' 165 Zeiss, 'Der augenblickliche Stand medizinisch-geographischer Forschungen in der Sowjetunion/ Munchener medizinische Wochenschrift 35 (1931): 1476-9. 166 Ibid. 167 H. Zeiss, 'Geomedizin (geographische Medizin) oder Medizinische Geographie?' Munchener medizinische Wochenschrift 5 (1931): 198-201. 168 See John Harley Warner, The Selective Transport of Medical Knowledge: Antebellum American Physicians and Parisian Medical Therapeutics/ Bulletin of the History of Medicine 59, no. 2: 213-31; R.G.A. Dolby, The Transmission of Science/ History of Science 15 (1977): 1-43; Pamela Spence Richards, The Movement of Scientific Knowledge from and to Germany under National Socialism/ Minerva 28, no. 4 (1990): 401-25. 169 In the 1920s, 'hybrid fields' abounded in Russia. See Mark B. Adams, The Soviet Nature-Nurture Debate/ in Loren R. Graham, ed., Science and the Social Order (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1990), 97. 170 Semashko, 'Sotsial'naia giginea, ee sushnost', metod, i znachenie.' 171 Robert E. Kohler, From Medical Chemistry to Biochemistry: The Making of a Biomedical Discipline (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982); liana Lowy, The Strength of Loose Concepts - Boundary Concepts, Federative Experimental strategies and Disciplinary Growth: The Case of Immunology/ History of Science 30 (1992): 372-96; Todes, Pavlov's Physiology Factory.

7 The Scientist as Lobbyist: Heinz Zeiss and Auslandsdeutschtum SABINE SCHLEIERMACHER

In the wake of the First World War, scientific and cultural exchange was an important component of the efforts to establish peaceful relations between Soviet Russia and Weimar Germany. Other contributors to this volume have discussed Heinz Zeiss's scientific engagement. His role as the self-proclaimed representative of German Kulturpolitik (cultural policy) in Soviet Russia is the subject of this chapter. In that role Zeiss not only cultivated relations with Russians but also acted as the protector of Germans living in Moscow and in settlements on the Volga River. Even before he left Germany, Zeiss had been involved in the cause of the Auslandsdeutsche, the ethnic Germans residing beyond Germany's frontiers, and had nurtured close relationships with the supporters of the Auslandsdeutsche movement active within Germany itself. But the opportunity to travel widely in Russia allowed Zeiss to pursue this interest at first hand. The experience shaped his scientific outlook: he became increasingly preoccupied by a new field of research that he called 'geomedicine.' In this chapter I explore the extent to which Zeiss's Kulturpolitik and his scientific work were driven by colonial ideas. Was his 'medical mission' about cultural exchange, or was it mainly concerned with securing political influence for Germany by means of cultural products? And to what extent did his sojourn in Russia lay the groundwork for his subsequent position on population policy? Zeiss in Moscow: In the Service of Cultural Policy The precedent of combining German medical assistance with cultural policy was set early. In 1921, a major famine in Russia, provoked by civil

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war and crop failure, gave rise to an international relief campaign to which the Weimar government wanted to contribute. The Foreign Office proclaimed the 1921 relief campaign, in which the German Red Cross participated, a 'Resistance to the Danger of Epidemic in the East/1 This campaign was intended not only to prevent an epidemic and provide charity, but also to exploit 'an entry, [both] culturally and commercially/ into Eastern Europe for the cause of science and industry.2 There is clear evidence of this intertwining of medical and cultural policy in Zeiss's own career. While serving as a physician and epidemiological researcher for the Russian state, he was active in Kulturpolitik 'on behalf of the Foreign Office of the Soviet Union/3 In Moscow, he 'worked in continual contact with the German Embassy/ and 'on behalf of the embassy, [he] completed various scientific reports and studies/ His activities were valued by the German government; while in Moscow he lived 'in a building belonging to the embassy,' and with the support of Ulrich Graf von Brockdorff-Rantzau,4 the first German Ambassador to the Soviet Union, he received 'compensation from Reich resources/5 Zeiss used his travels to disseminate German medical know-how and German culture. In Germany, his contribution was publicly acknowledged. In 1929 the Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung reported that 'through his specialized training in the health conditions in Russia and his intense personal contact with both Russian and German research circles, Professor Zeiss serves the scientific collaboration of both nations in an exemplary manner/6 In public, Zeiss presented his work as loyal to the interests of science and the equality of both nations. But in a letter to the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaften (Emergency Association for German Science), he described it in a different light: 'All future expeditions are to further transmit the knowledge of German science to Russia and Asia. They should serve to open up this part of the continent for German research; they should continually supply scientists with new material. They should show the awakening east the value of Germany's high standard of work in a clear and effective manner. This is a task for the next decades, [a task] that should be of special interest to Germany/7 Zeiss did not see his Russian colleagues as equals. His travel reports, as analysed by Wolfgang Eckart in this book, praised German scientists while criticizing their Russian counterparts in ways that reflected the cliches Germans held about themselves. As an example, Zeiss described a German colleague as follows:

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The significance of Stutzer for Russian medical science is that his research is absolutely reliable [and] free of the unnecessary and more or less fantastic thinking so often common to Russian bacteriologists. [He practises] severe criticism of his own work with an industriousness of a bee and an abundant amount of organization in which 'loyalty to the small and unimportant' [is evident] in all of his work. Furthermore, he is - thanks to his German training as both hygienist and microbiologist - a rarity in Russia, at least in terms of the high quality [of his work], since microbiology and hygiene are not associated at the university in Russia nor in practical life in Russia. If you examine the individual Russian bacteriologists that have these two characteristics, you will indeed find a few who typically have been trained [in] Germany, but who do not occupy such a high rank as does Stutzer.8

According to Zeiss, the Russians were not only scientifically, but also spiritually and politically, inferior to the Germans. That he thought so is clear from a letter he wrote in 1930 to Georg Schreiber, a supporter of the movement for the Auslandsdeutsche.9 The Russians' spiritual inferiority, Zeiss argued, opened opportunities for German cultural penetration of the east: The period after [my] return to the ... tremendously simmering and fermenting spiritual world [Geisteswelt] of Bolshevism encouraged me in a way and clarified for me that I am truly glad to live and work in such a time... The struggle of this new 'spiritualness' [Geistigkeit]... is terrible and deeply shocking and, in the end, in vain. An Ungeist cannot, in the end, finish off the true Geist. The struggle in Russia shows this in very specific detail. That is why it is so regrettable that the majority of the spiritual Germans or those wanting to be spiritual -1 have the feeling that the Foreign Office and many... circles at the universities - allow themselves in a negative sense to be led purely by an emotional politics [Gefuhlspolitik] against Russia with a more or less loud call: 'Away from Russia. Nothing more in common with these people.' This attitude is all the more wrong than these people can imagine. [The] raging of the local dictators is an escape, a movement of fear fueled by hollowness, godlessness, and the fear of one's self. That's why we must wait in Germany, and wait again and again, because our time will come. The cultural and political and kulturpolitische thread to Russia cannot be torn now. Especially not now! ... The spiritual penetration ... and the kulturpolitische and religious gratification of the east through Germany are our future tasks.10

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Zeiss's work on behalf of German-Soviet scientific and cultural exchange - as he understood it - eventually came under fire, as Wolfgang Eckart details in his chapter. In a letter written several years after the fact to the Swedish explorer Sven Hedin, Zeiss explained that he had been 'accused of military espionage in a most sordid manner/11 In 1930 the Commissar for Public Health suspected Zeiss of passing to a third party the results of bacteriological research conducted by the Tarasevich Institute.12 Zeiss vehemently denied this accusation in numerous letters to the German Embassy in Moscow, to no avail; his contract of employment with the Russian state was terminated in December 1930. Mistrust of Zeiss had grown to such an extent that the Russian state chose not to consider him for a position at another research institute. Indeed, Zeiss admitted that someone 'in my position cannot even think about such an appointment, nor would [one] be able to think freely in a new institute. It would be wrong to insist on a new placement in which [my] two faces [doppeltes Gesicht] - my position with respect to the [German] embassy and my peculiarity as an employee of the Russian state - would, in the long run, lead to [continual] misunderstandings/13 After this debacle, Zeiss served briefly as the Russian correspondent for the Miinchner Medizinische Wochenschrift.u He explained: Now it is possible to occupy myself fully with social questions that are of equal interest to the Reich authorities as well as German doctors without the hindrance of [having to perform] some kind of service. Concurrently, the attack by the Russians on the burgerliche medical trade press has been stopped. The Russians know about my objective reporting on Soviet Russian medical facilities. [My reports] should therefore truly be agreeable to the Russians. Access to the Russian material has no limits thanks to the press card that the press department of the Foreign Commissioner's Office issued to me ... The Russians must surely be disappointed if they quietly thought that, by not appointing me to one of their institutes, they could damage me to a certain extent [and] prevent me from cultivating cultural relations. Many examples show that in order to cultivate these relationships, one does not have to be in service to the Russians. On the contrary, the imposed obligations that [went] with this position [were] really just a hindrance.15

But even this new post proved untenable, and on 23 February 1932 he was compelled to return to Germany. In November 1933, Zeiss -

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who had joined the Nazi Party (NSDAP) on 1 December 1931, and the National Socialist Physician's Organization also while residing in Russia16 - was appointed a professor of hygiene in the medical faculty of the Friedrich-Wilhelm University in Berlin.17 The Foreign Office praised Zeiss, stating that 'in view of the great service that Herr Professor Zeiss contributed for Deutschtum [Germandom] during his activities abroad, the Foreign Office, in order to be helpful to him, took pains to find a position after his return that would offer him a fruitful field of activity appropriate to his knowledge and experience.'18 Zeiss and the Auslandsdeutschtum The Auslandsdeutsche considered themselves German citizens, regardless of the fact that they lived abroad. Zeiss's activities on their behalf did not raise the suspicions of the Soviet authorities, yet his involvement with their cause was anything but casual. Zeiss's fourteen-page curriculum vitae, written after 1933,19 indicates that he had joined the Auslandsdeutsche movement during the years of the Weimar Republic.20 During the First World War, several newly formed organizations had argued strongly that the Auslandsdeutsche were losing their traditional economic markets and might also soon lose their cultural and ideological identity. Germany's defeat in the First World War and the Treaty of Versailles that followed were perceived by most Germans, whatever their political affiliation, as a 'disgrace' for the German nation. The political scientist and theoretician of the Auslandsdeutsche movement, Max Hildebert Boehm, explained: The attempts in the postwar period to fight against the regulation of Versailles and Saint-Germain, of the German people to survive a constriction of its political self-image, the spiritual shrinkage of the population of the remnants of the Reich from 1919 - this can all be summarized as an allGerman or ethnic German [volksdeutsche] movement of the transitional Reich of Weimar. In addition to the Volk as a nation-state and the Volk as a target of a new ethnic ordering [volkhafte Neuordnung], the idea of an 'independent Volk' becomes visible in this struggle, which essentially has to be understood as an international [struggle].21

The associations for 'Germans living across the border and abroad' (Grenz- und auslandsdeutsche Verbande) were characterized by their reluctance to accept the new German borders as determined by the

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Versailles treaty22 and by their refusal to support the Weimar government, which they denounced as 'communist.' As Carl Christian von Loesch, the director of the Institut fur Grenz- und Auslandsstudien, put it, supporters of the Auslandsdeutsche movement wanted a reform of Europe that would favour their goal of a grofideutsches Reich (Greater German Reich) that reached eastward to Russia: 'In the course of the last few years, it has become more clear that it is not possible to found a grossdeutsche state and create tolerable conditions for the foreign groups without simultaneously rearranging all of the relationships in Europe. The core region for such a reform in Europe is the ethnically mixed belt [Volkermischgurtel] between the eastern border of the German areas of settlement and the western edge of the Russian [settlements]/23 The political work of the Auslandsdeutsche movement focused on Ostpolitik. After the Treaty of Locarno was signed in 1925, its efforts to regain ceded areas of the former German empire became more 'aggressive' and 'public/ and the restructuring of the entire region of central East Europe was placed on the agenda. At the 1927 'East Conference' of the German Schutzbund fur das Grenz- und Auslandsdeutschtum (Alliance to Protect Germans Living on the Borderlands and Abroad), 'principles for future work in the East' were outlined: 'A European politics that is directed eastward, [this] must be the backbone of [our] allGerman [gesamtdeutsche] political aspiration ... [and it must] comply with a freedom of action in the east and southeast of Europe.'24 The personal and institutional interrelationships between the Grenzund Auslandsdeutschtum institutes and the so-called Jungkonservative Beivegungen ('young conservative' movements) were especially important. 25 The 'young conservative' movement - a term coined by the circle surrounding the writer Arthur Moeller van den Bruck - was a fluid constellation of organizations that sprang up and then either quickly disappeared or reappeared in unexpected new guises.26 There was a good deal of overlap in the political and economic interests represented in both the Auslandsdeutsche and the young conservative movements.27 It was the Juniklub that sparked a renewal of the volksdeutsche (ethnic German) movement.28 The Juniklub was specifically interested in the enforcement of ethnic borders as national borders and in the partitioning of Europe based on ethnic borders in which the German people should be the focal point.29 This close exchange between the postwar German ethnic associations (Eastern German, Baltic German, Alsatian German, and Sudeten German) and the young conservative movement,

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which shared nationalist and anti-communist sentiments, gave rise to a network that the leaders of the Auslandsdeutsche movement hoped would increase the political 'shock action' (Stofikraft) of their cause.30 One of the core institutions in the constellation devoted to Auslanddeutsche was the Deutsche Auslands Institut (German Foreign Institute - DAI). The DAI was founded in 1917 as a 'museum and institute for the study of the Auslandsdeutschtum and the promotion of German interests abroad.'31 The goal of the organization was to maintain ties with people of German origin living abroad and to preserve all signs of the 'Deutschtum abroad.' It worked alongside the Grenz- und Auslandsdeutschtum associations to produce a concise encyclopedia as well as to procure employment abroad for Germans. Indeed, the DAI saw itself as a platform for promoting German economic interests.32 The organization was intended to 'function as a central liaison office for all questions having to do with the practical relationships between the core-state and the foreign-living Volksdeutschtum [that] cannot be resolved through diplomatic means.'33 The DAI maintained a 'network of correspondents,' who were to target every possible 'centre of ethnic German settlement' and report on the 'conditions of each individual ethnic group [Volksgruppe] that was out of immediate view, in a swift and critical [manner].' The data would serve as material for other research projects.34 As Georg Leibbrandt explained, 'ethnic awareness [Volksbeiuufitsein] and a sense of shared identity among Germans across the world also present new tasks for science.'35 One of the DAI's most important projects was to assemble emigration records for genealogical purposes and to register all Auslandsdeutsche.36 The DAI was based in Stuttgart. Its Board of Directors and Scientific Advisory Committee comprised leading representatives from business, political, religious, and scientific institutions. It was financed by the Reich Home Secretary, the Foreign Ministry, the state of BadenWurttemberg, and various industrialists.37 As a public institution, it refrained from making ideological statements; however, it adopted 'the theoretical superstructure of other similar [private] organizations and felt thoroughly committed to its objectives.'38 Throughout his stay in the Soviet Union, Zeiss was a member of the DAI. He was not, as he claimed, only 'a corresponding member of the scientific advisory' of the DAI; he also participated in the annual DAI meetings in Stuttgart.39 During his visits to Germany, he lectured on Russia and published in Der Auslandsdeutsche - the DAI's newsletter articles about individuals of German ancestry living in Russia and

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their important contributions to the Russian nation.40 His cultural activities for the DAI focused on two areas: the demonstration of Deutschtum through medical historical studies, and the gathering of information on the living and working conditions of the Russian Germans in general and Russian-German doctors and scientists in particular. After his final return to Germany, he bequeathed to the DAI archive material he had collected on the 'Russian Deutschtum.'41 A Geomedical Case Study: The Volga Germans Zeiss's agenda for hygiene research was ranged widely: it included topography, epidemiology, pathology, anatomy, and history, on the assumption that Russia's diversity of 'known human infectious and tropical diseases/ its ethnic diversity, and its highly varied geography, climate, and zones of vegetation would provide many research opportunities.42 One of the magnets for Zeiss was the Volga German Republic, which he visited several times during and after his work for the German Red Cross medical expedition.43 Catherine the Great had opened the door to immigrants in the middle of the eighteenth century, and since that time, German settlers had been establishing themselves in Russia mainly in the region surrounding the lower Volga. By the early twentieth century there were more than half a million 'Volga Germans' in Russia - they were nearly one-third of all Russians of German descent. The First World War, the famine, and the Civil War of 1921-2 all had an enormous impact on life in the Volga Republic, resulting in poverty as well as population losses as the people migrated to other regions.44 The 'Volga German Workers Commune,' proclaimed in 1918, was awarded the status of the Volga German Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic in 1924, in recognition of the fact that the Volga Germans were endowed with their 'own historically founded region of settlement.'45 The principle of descent received only limited application, however, and not all Russians of German descent were awarded the status of a nation: 'In accordance with the Soviet definition of nation, which is founded on the territorial and not the individual principle/ only those groupings which were endowed with their 'own historically founded region of settlement' were awarded such status. This was the case for the Volga German Republic, where the so-called Volga Germans constituted more than two-thirds of the population. The founding of the Volga German Soviet Republic paved the way for new developments in the burgeoning fields of culture and education.

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The Soviet government supported this 'nationalization of civic life for national minorities.' For a number of years the official language of the Volga Republic was German, and German became the vernacular language there. German newspapers were published, German schools flourished, and a Department of German was established at the university in Saratov.46 As a German, Zeiss identified strongly with the descendants of the German settlers, regarding himself as their advocate. Between 1922 and 1932 he travelled to the Volga German Republic several times. In the travel reports he sent to the Foreign Office, he repeatedly accused the Reich government of failing to provide adequate assistance to German peoples living abroad and of contributing, through this neglect, to their suffering.47 In this Zeiss was not alone: the leagues representing the Auslandsdeutsche continued to appeal to the Reich government not to limit its relief campaign to medical assistance, even though any expansion of relief efforts would have been politically problematic in light of the domestic political situation and the climate of foreign relations following the First World War. O. Fischer, a physician who took part in the German Red Cross relief effort, wrote: 'Here I particularly wish to emphasize that, apart from monetary aid and the provision of necessities, which naturally are in limited supply given the difficult circumstances in Germany, moral support is also extremely important. It must finally become possible to re-establish the connection between Germandom on the Volga and in the homeland.'48 Although his contacts were largely limited to the Volga Germans, Zeiss was heavily influenced by his understanding of how national minorities were being treated in the USSR. Zeiss's report on his Saratov visit, which he submitted to the Foreign Office in 1926, indicates his approval of Russia's policies on national minorities, at least with respect to the German population: 'All in all, there has been marked improvement in their situation and noticeable progress, as evidenced by the steady stream of children who are learning German, and by the cultural support that the German minority is afforded. This could certainly serve as an example to Mussolini for how to provide national minorities with cultural support.' The report continues: 'If these developments are allowed to proceed without interference, the German minority in Russia will soon stand at the forefront of all minorities. The German university will of course become the model for all other minorities. The Soviet program and Lenin's principles will thus be realized.'49 Zeiss regarded the Volga Germans as the population that best corre-

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sponded to his nationalistic and conservative vision of Germandom abroad and to his own conception of the German Volkstum (national characteristics). He commented with approval on their resistance to assimilation, particularly when compared to the descendants of the German settlers living in the United States: 'In contrast, Russia's settlers of German descent have preserved their language and culture, some for hundreds of years, to the extent that in some regions of Russia one might imagine oneself to be among an entirely German people. One gains the impression that Germany can rely upon these settlers nearly as much as on nationals of the Reich itself, which is all the more reason why we should afford them special support.'50 In general, Zeiss believed that the political organization of the state was linked to its policies towards minorities and to cultural and physical well-being. The Volga Germans' ability to maintain their identity, he argued, had a positive effect on their well-being: The development within the individual federal states that largely have been accorded their own cultural life on a volkisch foundation ... has unleashed energies that have unfolded in all areas of national culture. More than any other branch of government in an independent republic or an "autonomous region," the health care system conceives of itself as guided by purely local issues. The healthy and the sick Kirghiz, Tatar, German ... or whatever they might be called, all require a careful assessment of their environment... and its sustaining ... or injurious ... forces.'51 In 1927, Zeiss submitted a 'working plan for a research concept' that was to be 'of great, practical and scientific importance not only to German scientific research, to German "ethnic studies" and to our knowledge of populations of German descent, but also to the Volga German Republic.' His research proposal linked cultural, philological, biological, and medical research questions in an unusual fashion, in a design intended to generate scientific support for the notion of a German Volk 'bound by blood.' The two-year project, which was to be supported by the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft, the government of the Volga German Republic, the Department of German at Saratov, the Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Blutgruppenforschung (German Association for Research on Blood Groups), and the DAI, was premised on the assumption that the Volga Germans were 'originally ethnic Germans, who emigrated nearly 200 years ago and established themselves in these sorts of closed settlements.'52 Research on blood groups and anthropological investigations were to go hand in hand with research on their prehistory. In his proposal, Zeiss articulated a biologistic

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approach to the questions surrounding regional variations in the spread of epidemics: The Volga German Republic is the probable endemic source of malarial infection in European Russia today. Recent investigations suggest... that certain blood groups are predisposed to malarial infection. This interpretation is deserving of greater practical attention. In any case, greater attention should be paid to predispositions to infectious disease. The Volga colonies, and indeed Russia as a whole, provide an excellent opportunity for conducting epidemiological studies that will be of great importance to the development of our knowledge of epidemics, a task whose leadership must remain under German control. Since we have arranged to collaborate with Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Blutgruppenforschung and the standing Kommission fur Blutgruppenforschung [Commission for Research on Blood Groups] in Kharkov ... the completion of my proposed investigation in the Volga region would serve to erect a new bridge between German and Russian science. In addition, the proposal falls within the scope of the Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Blutgruppenforschung, which has undertaken an agglutinative inventory of the German Volk- and language zones as one of its long-term projects.53

By the end of the 1920s, Zeiss had begun to refine a novel concept for research. With its linkage of medicine with racial biology, geopolitics, and population policy, it would be incorporated seamlessly into National Socialist conceptions of Lebensmum. As we shall see, both Zeiss's research methodology and his philosophy were permeated with a mode of thought that linked racial ideology with German culture and medicine. Geomedicine and Geopolitik, 1930-1933

Towards the end of his stay in Russia, Zeiss introduced the term 'geomedicine' into the medical literature.54 His initial definition of geomedicine was 'that branch of medicine that attempts to illustrate and explain results of medical research through geographic and cartographic methodologies.'55 As Zeiss conceived it in the late 1920s, geomedical research was to be interdisciplinary: medical researchers, biologists, geographers, and meteorologists were to devote their energies to explaining 'the connections between weather, soil, climate, and the occurrence of acute

302 Sabine Schleiermacher infectious diseases among humans, animals, and plants.' Historical investigation was yet another component of medical-geographical research. Zeiss claimed that he had borrowed much of his geomedical research methodology from his Russian scientific colleagues. For example, Russia had developed 'guidelines' for medical topography and geography that encouraged physicians to undertake geomedical investigations within the largely agrarian settings of their assigned regions.56 These geomedical investigations were motivated by political and economic considerations and were intended to link issues of epidemiology, anatomy and pathology, medical geography, and history. Zeiss's motivation may have been polemical: as Susan Solomon demonstrates in her chapter, he misinterpreted and misunderstood a number of aspects that were central to Russian medicine. Zeiss's geomedicine was not limited to mere descriptions of the development of disease within a geographical area; it also called for political action on the question that interested him especially - demographics and population policy: 'Whereas geomedicine gives statesmen the weapons necessary for the present and future security of the nation, [it also] provides doctors who are responsible for guarding over public health (and among these [we] again [mean] those ... in service to the state and hygienists) with the opportunity to make the nation's rulers aware of immediate and still threatening health dangers. [The control of these dangers] is thus a significant national political tool of domestic and international importance.' In this, as he was later to acknowledge, he came close to the thinking of the important geopolitician Karl Haushofer, who provided an ideological bridge between traditional German imperialism and National Socialism.57 Zeiss clearly distinguished geomedicine from another interdisciplinary field, social hygiene, which had been established during the Weimar years in Germany. He criticized social hygiene because of the priority it gave to social conditions in the development of disease and because he saw it as informed by a communist and socialist agenda. In his view, social hygienists focused too much on the medical needs of individuals, and too little on those of the nation and the Volksgemeinschaft (national community).58 In Zeiss's view, the field of social hygiene focused on the prevention of those diseases associated with industrialization and mechanization, ignoring the 'Volkstum rooted in the soil [das bodenverwachsene Volkstum].' He lamented that earlier formulations of social hygienic prin-

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ciples, which had implicitly 'supported measures protecting the maintenance of the farmer's health/ had been set aside.59 As he explained it, the social hygienists' foundation was 'the city landscape of the machine age, and not the German cultural and ethnic soil [Kulturund Volksboden] beyond that landscape, in other words, [it was not] the German village as the primordial cell for German unity.'60 He claimed that 'capitalism and Marxism, are both ... expressions of rootless urbanization' that have 'strangled German social hygiene.'61 In 1932, anticipating 'the great upheaval of our time,' he elaborated: 'Emerging out of the pampering and patronizing that is prevalent [in our timel, the concerns of the future Volkstumsstaates [ethnic nation! will lead to a new and unencumbered readiness of the individual to take responsibility for his own health to the benefit of his people ... volkisch-kollektive [focused on the Volk as a whole and not the individual], but [taking] full and personal responsibility of his own Volkstum without slogans about the class struggle.62 Zeiss's medical inquiries were characterized by anti-modern sentiments that drew strength from his cultural pessimism and from his hostility to the Weimar Republic. Conventional for its time, his Zivilisationskritik (criticism of civilization) reproached modern industrial society for being driven by rationalization, mechanization, and bureaucratization. According to Zeiss, technology and the natural sciences in conjunction with a capitalist economy and a republican form of government not only altered people but also stole from them their identification with their 'native soil.' He contrasted modern urban dwellers with farmers, whom he saw as connected to their 'blood and soil': 'In everquickening revolutions, technology hurtles people across the nation. [The individual] no longer needs his native soil because electricity perfects his [comfort and convenience] and thus his rootlessness. Because of electricity, the individual is "at home everywhere." It brings the city to the countryside, it has confirmed the final rootlessness of people in the first three decades of the twentieth century.'63 Zeiss's sentiments only grew stronger after he returned to Germany. In his 'ethnic concepts,' he formulated a distinctively pro-German, anti-democratic, and anti-Western world view similar to much of what was being widely disseminated by contemporaries such as Ernst Jiinger, Oswald Spengler, and the National Socialists in general. Part of his world view was that according to a biologically understood notion of the Volk, 'national unity among all of the regional and lineal segments [of the German people was] guaranteed.' Incorporating organic

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notions about society and referring to history and tradition, he concluded that each individual was determined only in terms of his blood connections; in practice, this divested people of all individuality. Only as part of 'a unified Volk could [the individual] be free/64 His observations of Soviet Russia continued to inform his thinking even after he left. He noted that in the Soviet public health system, social hygiene had a distinctly volkisch focus. In Russia, a physically healthy and spiritually healthy (geistig gesund) Volkstum had been fostered in conjunction with economic and political objectives: If the Bolshevists want to call these trends 'fascist/ then the most intelligent and reasonable among them will nevertheless admit that the Soviet Union employs the same or similar concepts to construct the nation and the social hygiene of the Volkstum - whether [this has to do with] the national majority or the minority groups. [This scheme is] consciously cultivated and will [continue to] be cultivated ... Since there is already a classless society in Russia, there is actually no 'class struggle' within the country anymore. Every small remnant [of a class society] is completely meaningless. The forces that have been freed up devote themselves more and more to nationally and socially focused political and economic goals.65

For Zeiss, the concept of the Volkstum was closely tied to the idea of Lebensraum (living space). Geopolitics represented the 'scientific foundation of the concept of Lebensraum'; it corresponded to 'the needs of German imperialism'; and it functioned as an ideological pillar of 'the National Socialists' expansionist program' (whose most important representative was Karl Haushofer).66 In this way, geopolitics was tied to notions of a pan-German empire, a 'GroGdeutsch.es Reich/67 as Franz Neumann would remark in 1942: 'After all, geopolitics is nothing other than an ideology of imperialist expansion. The little bit of reasonable geography that has remained ... is neither new nor has an especially important role in the [field of geography]. To a large extent, geopolitics is a mish-mash of ethical, military, economic, racial, demographic, historical and political considerations. It serves as a good example of the perversion of genuine scientific considerations in the interests of National Socialist imperialism/68 Zeiss borrowed the approach of Anthropogeographie from geopolitics and applied it to geomedicine. The categories that were particularly crucial for geomedicine were 'location' (the size, form, climate, and plant growth of an area) and geographical space (Raum) in relationship to

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people. Another important concept stemming from Anthropogeographie was the idea of uprooting (Entwurzelung) of people from the soil. Here, he was emphasizing as scientific truth the unity of the human being and the earth as well as the organic connection between the two.69 Blending these ideas with medical concepts, Zeiss argued for 'the necessity of a German geomedicine' directed towards Eastern Europe: 'In addition to geopolitical [ideas], geomedical concepts must be taken into consideration more than ever in the new eastern settlements. Those farmers' sons, fleeing from the urban proletariat [and] hopefully soon pouring [back to the countryside], return from a relatively urban domestication to a kind of Urform [primordial form]. The Landmann [propertied farmer] of eastern Prussia suffers from different diseases than the metal worker in Solingen... As a result, the settlers will have to greatly conform and adapt, [both] spiritually and physically. Just like transplanted animals and plants, transplanted people will have to develop new immunities [Immuntiatsverhaltnisse], especially weatherresistant sorts.'70 Later in the text, Zeiss incorporated the demographer Friedrich Burgdorfer's premise of a 'Volk ohne Jugend' (Volk with no youth)/ thereby raising the spectre of a shrinking German population. The construction of 'new settlements' would require 'younger' and 'healthier' people; 'an aging Volk' would have no resistance and would be unable to fight against 'dangers to the health [and] epidemics that struck from the East/71 In making this argument, Zeiss was far from alone. In a 1933 memorandum, the Arbeitsgemeinschaft fur Geopolitik (Association for GeoPolitics) also referred to the links between geopolitics and medicine, demography, and population statistics.72 Similarly, articles in the journal Geopolitik legitimated this approach by contending that in that science and 'national biology' (Staatsbiologie) were symbiotic. Indeed, 'biological polities' (Biopolitik), described as 'historical research informed by the natural sciences' illustrating 'the development of a Volkskorper [ethnic body] and its Lebensraum,' grew in importance. Biopolitics recognized the possibility of crossbreeding and racial elements in general. Thus it follows that biopolitics must investigate which migration groups [Wanderschichten] and which previous Lebensraume have determined and shaped the character of a given Volk. Consequently, the study of biopolitics must represent the entire set of biological prerequisites and conditions of a Volk. Simultaneously, biopolitics records the facts and conclusions that emerge from observing the succession of generations ... for example, the rising

306 Sabine Schleiermacher and waning of a Volkskorper, its social stratification in its transformation, its susceptibility to disease, etc. In this manner, [biopolitical] research must include space [Raum] in the broadest sense as well as the Volk in all of its transformations.73

Geomedicine also addressed questions about the evolution of sectors of the population within a geographical area. All of these notions of the Volk, community, blood, race, and the so-called organic whole informed Zeiss's scientific ideas. While criss-crossing Russia, Zeiss had observed a variety of national minorities. According to him, the core problem with Russia's national minorities was how 'those changes in lifestyle and habits ... physical and spiritual interbreeding with other ethnic elements ... military service, compulsory education, a collective economy, [and] work in the governing party alter the individual person in the context of settlement.' He assumed that 'severe physical and spiritual transformations, to some degree with traumas, [will] leave a mark on a minority.' Zeiss used the term 'dislocation diseases' (Versetzungskrankheiten), which suggested that 'a portion of the minority groups is irrecoverably ruined and will perish/ although the other portion would adapt to these changes. In the course of just six years, Zeiss would reverse his position: he would come to deplore the fate of the national minorities - particularly the Volga Germans - in Russia: 'Only culturally high-standing minorities who are strong in numbers and who stand out in terms of their performance above the majority population, even in a collectivist socialist economy, can maintain themselves over the long-term. [All] other minorities will eke out an existence for a while, [but] collectivization and socialization will have soon sucked them up into the majority, unless they prefer a life that is state-supervised [and] outside of the economy of the majority population, like that in a nature park or in 'Hagenbeck's Zoo.'74 Zeiss argued that in Russia the introduction of socialism and the attendant political changes were hastening the emergence of a new 'anthropological type' (Menschentyp) who, by incorporating the more or less 'good blood' that the national minorities have contributed to this 'new Russian,' ... will become decisive not only for the destiny of Russia, but also for the world ... In his physical constitution, this new Russian will certainly muster up a lot of immunities in contrast to 'the old Russian' ... And just as there are especially tough sorts of grains resistant to

Zeiss and Auslandsdeutschtum 307 cold or drought in Russia, although these are artificially bred by humans, the revolution [and] its sociological effects - which can be understood to have bred a human crop [Menschensaatzucht] - will produce a physically and spiritually [geistig] tougher sort than ever before, depending, of course, on the blood-mixing and environmental influences of the regional habitat [Heimat], [in other words, depending on] rather fixed medical-geographical factors.75

In envying the new Menschentyp, Zeiss did not consider its implications for the purity of the Volga Germans. Science and Politics: Geomedicine, Geopolitics, and Demographics after 1933 After his return to Germany, Zeiss continued his involvement with the Auslandsdeutsche movement. To sustain the work initiated by the Schutzbund fur das Grenz- und Auslandsdeutschtum and the Arbeitsgemeinschaft fur Volksgesundung (Association for Health of the Nation), a demographic research group was founded in 1934 within the Volksbund fur das Deutschtum im Ausland (VDA).76 This new organization hoped to collaborate with the administrative bodies of the government responsible for the Germans living in border regions and abroad as well as with the Reich Committee for Public Health and the NSDAP's Office for Racial Policy.77 The VDA, an offshoot of the Deutsche Schulverein founded in 1881, became the centre of the Auslandsdeutsche movement during the Nazi era. The organization also supported German scientific and artistic institutions, libraries, schools, and kindergartens abroad.78 Zeiss was a member of this research orgamzation.7Q During the National Socialist period, the organizations representing the interests of ethnic Germans urged centralization to ensure conformity with the policy of the new government. In National Socialist foreign policy, the 're-establishment of a national will of self-assertion and military capability' was claimed as 'the most important fundamental to conserve the German Volkstum and the German East.'80 The VDA took this as a priority.81 As a private organization, it took over the role of agent during the Nazi regime; as a non-governmental organization, it worked for the state in areas not accessible to the government. Indeed, the VDA proved significant in implementing a Volkstumspolitik abroad.82 Between the two world wars, the organization openly con-

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ducted propaganda to integrate the so-called Deutschstammigen (ethnic Germans) into the service of the National Socialist cause. In 1937 the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle (VDM), a contemporary 'cadre training unit for National Socialist population policy/83 came under the leadership of the VDA, and Karl Haushofer, a friend of Zeiss's, became the VDA's president.84 In its personnel and agenda, this new constellation of scientists had close connections with the Volkswissenschaftlicher Arbeitskreis (Political Studies Research Group) of the earlier VDA.85 The VDM focused on persuading scientists from all disciplines to contribute to the propaganda effort in support of the Volksdeutschtum. It dealt not only with the criteria for geographical 'demarcation/ but also with legal definitions of the populations living in these geographical regions. The VDA's Bevolkerungspolitische Arbeitskreis (Demographic Research Group) - of which Zeiss was also a member - 'worked on measures for population policy' and 'with the public health system of the volksdeutsche settlements abroad.' This organization emphasized, however, that it intentionally 'did not at all [want] to appear publicly.'86 Its work had this motto: 'Central Europe - the Reich alone does not comprise all German territory' (Mitteleuropa, nicht das Reich allein ist der deutsche Raum)87 The conditions necessary to actualize this image of Central Europe, devised during the Weimar Republic, now seemed present. Hans Steinacher, president of the VDA and former board member of the Schutzbund, was director of the Demographic Research Group; Hans Harmsen, a physician at the Inner Mission, the leading Protestant welfare organization, was its secretary.88 The research group wanted to draw upon trustworthy individuals (Vertrauensleute) at home and abroad who had specialized in the areas of public health, population policy, and statistics. With the help of such individuals, the members of the research group hoped to steer the demographic development in those regions having Auslandsdeutsche by registering biographical and health statistics and by studying the habits of ethnic German populations. In addition, the members planned to offer public health counselling and improved health care. In this manner, they hoped to bolster the Reich's political influence in the areas east of its borders. By surveying the Auslandsdeutschtum, the VDA researchers helped prepare the invasion of Poland in 1939 and the implementation of Generalplan Ost89 in 1942. Generalplan Ost, which called for the relocation of people, the redistribution of foodstuffs, and the implementation of a new administration, was intended to completely restructure Eastern Europe once it

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had been conquered. That plan represented the most comprehensive and radical materialization of the ideas of Zeiss and his colleagues.90 The working agenda for 1934-7 of the Demographic Research Group included the following points:91 (1) The implementation of volksbiologische surveys in the areas in which ethnic Germans resided. These surveys would help in the preparation and implementation of training courses for individuals in 'positions [having to do with] demographic science.'92 (2) The support of efforts to influence the staffing of the 'German Race Office in Transylvania.'93 (3) The distribution of financial donations to improve medical and pharmaceutical care for the German population abroad.94 (4) The preparation of a memorandum on the subject of 'marriage brokerage' (Eheanbanung und Ehevermittlung) for the purposes of 'blood revivification' (Blutauffrischung) in select remote areas of [German] ethnic settlement'95 in eastern and southern Europe to fend off the dangers of 'interbreeding' and thus the ruin of 'biological health/ as well as the loss of large families. Marriage brokerage would ensure the 'condition of maintaining an ethnic nature [volkische Art] and [a German] population:'96 (5) The research on those villages in the areas of German settlement.' By this, the registration of the population in terms of 'hygienic/ 'racial-hygienic/ 'medical/ and 'health' issues was understood. Sociological, agrarian-sociological, and political aspects were also mentioned. The study of village settlements was also seen as important in 'the context of national planning.' In 1934, Zeiss was co-editor oiArchivfiir Bevolkerungswissenschaft und Bevolkerungspolitik, a journal that was integrated into National Socialist population policy. The other editors were Arthur Giitt and Falk Ruttke, representatives of the Reich Home Secretary; Walter Gross, representative of the NSDAP Office for Racial Policy; Friedrich Burgdorfer, the director of the Reich Office for Statistics, and the journal's founder, Hans Harmsen. The focus of this journal was the demographic development of the 'grenz- und auslandsdeutsche' groups.97 Prior to 1933, Zeiss's ideas had been diffuse in their formulation; after that year his writings became both more pointed and more radical. He now called for 'demographic-ethnic studies' (Bevolkerungswissenschaft/ Volkskunde) that did not differentiate between anthropological, ethnological, and ethnographical methods. This new science was to focus on 'the granite foundation of the family upon which the national body is built.' The results of such research would enable scientists to serve the interests of the state, 'national medicine, and the volkische construction' of the nation.98 Zeiss argued for Raumkunde (the study of geographical

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space) and for the union of demographics and geopolitics, which constituted 'the science of the organic state/ For Zeiss the study of history was also a component of demographics in that it uncovered structural conditions as well as the social, political, and medical consequences of population growth in the past. Zeiss's declared aim was to secure the growth of the German Volkstum so that an 'infiltration' (Unterwanderung) or a 'surprise attack' (Uberrumpelung) could be resisted - especially at the 'border ramparts of the old Heimat' and on the 'venerable German cultural soil in the east and southeast/ Indeed, this was important in order to create 'bridgeheads/ This Volk/ explained Zeiss, 'must become resistant like winter-resistant wheat because it will have to live in a more frugal manner than before. A heroic struggle for the future existence of the [Volk] is approaching, a struggle whose size and magnitude are completely unknown to most Germans, [but that] nevertheless gives those who know of it courage and a will to fight/ Zeiss's catalogue of research questions for the field of demographic ethnic studies was divided into three main parts: (1) 'the structure of the Volkskorper''; (2) 'the Volkskorper in geographical space'; and (3) 'the Volkskorper in time/ The spectrum of questions stretched from the role of the family as a 'biological cell of the national body' to 'spaces for settlement/ 'racial spaces' (Rassenraum), and 'spaces of language, culture, food, and disease (or health)/ Here, 'space' was analogous to the notion of Lebensraum and included concepts such as 'uprooting/ the 'entrenchment of the Volkskorper/ and the state's role as 'protector' and 'bearer' of the community." Medical topography was another scientific methodology of interest to Zeiss, one that he employed in order to focus on the genetic condition of the population. With reference to historical lines of descent, he pointed out the significance of the migration of populations and the resultant tasks of the state with respect to population policy: Only strong, healthy, and noble people produce [strong, healthy, and noble children]. Thus, [we must] ensure healthy and strong marriages: [we must] seriously reject all who are too young, too old, all who are degenerate, deformed, weak due to excesses, all who are sick, consumptive, epileptic, somnambulistic, all those ridden with stones [of the kidneys, etc.], and finally all people... conceived immorally. [Instead, we must] promote marriages among healthy, robust, and well-mannered people. One does not want to admit that those very same people in a region have consistently reproduced their mistakes over centuries and have seasoned their own

Zeiss and Auslandsdeutschtum 311 blood through new well-formed citizens;... I believe that the consequences will soon become visible and the future generation will have the state's desires for improvement written all over its face [die Spuren der vom Staat beabsichtigten Veredelungan der Stirne tragen].m

Demographic history now became more important than ever. Zeiss wrote: It was most important to me to direct the eyes of the doctor and the historical researcher as well as the demographic historian towards the oftentimes completely ignored [subject of] medical topography ... Many of the issues of medical topography that are interesting to ethnic studies [Volkskunde] gush [forth] ... information about the racial composition of the population [who live on] a clearly defined and ... still easily overseen German landscape.101

The kind of research that Zeiss advocated can be situated within the German historical research on Eastern Europe of the day. Through research on the Volkstum, which constituted a 'comparative view' of the results from various disciplines, 'Volks- und Raumhistoriker' hoped to attain information about the 'power of permanence, the true and real in the fundamental existence of the Volk as well as [knowledge about] the agents of change, acculturation, deformation, and the alienation of old traditions that have been passed down/102 In 1935 Zeiss once again focused on the Auslandsdeutsche. They were of considerable importance for the occupation of Eastern Europe during the Nazi years, because they represented an 'ethnic bridge' (Volksbriicke).103 The registration and medical care of ethnic Germans was a task not just for doctors, but also for the DAI and the NSDAP.104 Zeiss believed that the Nazi regime's responsibilities regarding hygiene included the encouragement of 'synthetic and [political projects] and viewpoints, such as, for example, those offered by geomedicine and geopolitics, geography, [and] Raumforschung [regional/spatial studies].' This, of course, also involved 'research on the German Volkstum near the Reich's border within Europe as well as [those regions] outside of Europe.'105 Zeiss (along with the state) certainly recognized the political significance of geomedicine for the control of Eastern Europe as well as the Soviet Union and its surrounding areas. Although the methods of geomedicine had not yet been worked out during the Weimar Republic, the concepts resonated with the Nazi regime's expansionist politics.

312 Sabine Schleiermacher Zeiss not only recognized the connections between research and politics, but also deliberately aimed to establish and strengthen them. As Zeiss put it: 'German geomedicine has a most essential task to fulfill in the research of the east, without which a military, political, cultural, and economic acquisition of the east would be impossible.'106 The objective, as he claimed, was the 'acquisition of the east for our Reich and our future.' In this manner, geomedicine had, according to Zeiss, 'a guiding and decisive position.'107 He elaborated: The tasks of hygiene in medical service is to prevent the dangerous influences of a diseased region [Krankheitsraum] or at least to curb them as much as possible. Both [tasks] are dependent on medical geography. And just as a general staff or commander will overpower or clear away a dip [in the terrain] or a watercourse in a military area that an enemy might use, so too must [the science of] hygiene also accomplish this same task by overpowering or clearing away those vital and intruding epidemics. Just as a soldier makes change through intervention, the hygienist must often do likewise. [The hygienist] must alter the biogeographical manifestation [of a landscape] and thus also its map. Without a map, these exceptional feats would be impossible!108 In 1942, Zeiss and his former mentor, Ernst Rodenwaldt, published an epidemic atlas (Seuchenatlas) whose purpose was to inform the soldier about 'spaces of health' (Gesundheitsmum) and 'spaces of disease' (Krankheitsraum) in order to pave the way for successful military action.109 Population density, climatic relationships, and areas of epidemic were cartographically represented for the Mediterranean area, the Near East, the greater Caspian region, and Eastern Europe - thus also outlining regions of war and expansion. The war brought the opportunity to continue geomedical research of those regions. The Doctor as Geostrategist As a member of the conservative Auslandsdeutsche movement, Zeiss wanted to redraw the national boundaries of the German empire based on the so-called Volksgrenzen, or ethnic borders. Zeiss not only denounced the constitutionally democratic Weimar Republic but also made demands that involved more than rewriting the Treaty of Versailles. In service of these views, he developed a concept of geomedicine in which notions of 'Lebensraum' and 'blood and soil' as well as slogans like 'Volk ohne Raum' (a nation without space) were implicit.

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Zeiss's ideas of German 'culture' and 'ethnic soil' (Volksboden) rested on his basic assumption that the German Volk had certain areas of settlement at its disposal - settlements that were located primarily in Eastern Europe and, to a lesser extent, Russia. Eastern Europe was perceived as a colonial territory to be 'brought closer to the level of Central Europe socially, culturally, and economically through the supposedly superior cultural technology [Kulturtechnik] [resulting from! historical developments/110 At the same time, Eastern Europe also provided resources for new research. In this research, groups of people of German descent were seen as potential candidates for scientific investigation. They were registered and their genetic makeup was mapped and interpreted in climatological, geographical, and historical contexts. Biological and geopolitical concepts were interconnected and historically accented. Zeiss's thinking exposes the entanglement of science and politics. His concept of geomedicine was permeated by Germanic and volkischnationalist assumptions. Zeiss interpreted the results of his Russian research within the framework of his scientific interests, his ideological inclinations, and his conceptions of the state and nation. In a surprising way, his geomedical research relied only tangentially on the tools of the biological and social sciences. Zeiss's characterization of the Volga Germans was permeated with political assumptions that were not subjected to more profound theoretical reflections. His research on this population incorporated a peculiar and idiosyncratic mingling of cultural anthropological, philological, biological, and medical approaches. These in turn served to underpin an idealized, interconnected holistic system. Under National Socialism, demographic science was to become more radical and to grow in importance. That science rested on an organic notion of society which was reinforced by the fact that people of German descent outside the Reich lived in closed communities that allowed them to retain their German identity. Indeed, the extent to which Zeiss's research was integrated into the political mainstream and implicated in the political imperatives of the Auslandsdeutche and the National Socialist movements remains crucial to our understanding of his life and work. NOTES 1 Bundesarchiv Berlin (henceforth BArch Berlin), File notes from September 1921, Reichsministerium des Inneren, no. 9398. Cited in Wolfgang U. Eckart,

314 Sabine Schleiermacher

2 3 4 5 6 7

8

9

10 11 12 13 14

15 16

'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik von Weimar - Deutschland und Sowjetunion 1920-1932/ Medizin, Gesellschaft und Geschichte 11 (1992): 107143,atll2n28. See the account in ibid., 109ff. Archiv Humboldt-Universitat Berlin (henceforth AHUB), UK, Personalia, Z 12a, fol. 111. Statement of the Foreign Office, 20 April 1938. Eckart, 'Medizin und auswartige Kulturpolitik/ 115. AHUB, UK, Personalia, Z 12a, vol. 3, fol. 116. Notarized copy from the Foreign Office, 31 May 1933. 'Medizinische Bestrebungen in der Sowjetunion. Deutsch-russische Forschungsreisen,' Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, 10 August 1929. Auswartiges Amt, Politisches Archiv (henceforth AA Polit Archiv), R 66091a, fol. 112. Zeiss to the Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft, n.d. A A Polit Archiv, R 66091 a, fol. 37. Heinz Zeiss, 'Bericht iiber meine Reise nach Rostow a/D., Krasnodar und zu der Deutsch-Russischen SaatbauAktien-Gesellschaft (Drusag) im Kubangebiet vom 15.5.-2.6.1929.' Georg Schreiber founded the Forschungsstelle fur Auslandsdeutschtum und Auslandskunde in Miinster and also had close relations to the Deutsches Ausland-Institut (DAI). Beda Kleinschmidt, Auslandsdeutschtum und Kirche: ein Hand- und Nachschlagebuch auf geschichtlich-statistischer Grundlage (Miinster: Aschendorff, 1939), 17. BArch Berlin, R 73/223, fol. 174. Zeiss to Schreiber, 3 January 1930. AHUB, Hygienisches Institut II, fol. 196. Zeiss to Sven Hedin, 1937. AHUB, Nachlafi Zeiss, Fasc.l, fol. 28-33. Minutes from memory of a discussion with the Commissar for Public Health, 27 September 1930. BArch Berlin R 73/223, fol. 77. Zeiss to the German Embassy in Moscow, 20 August 1931. Biodata Zeiss. AHUB, UK, Personalia, Z 12a, vol. 3, fol. 4-5. In his resume Zeiss wrote that he had done research on social hygiene institutions in the Soviet Union, with the financial assistance of the Reich Ministry of the Interior. BArch Berlin, R 73/223, fol. 78f. Zeiss to the German Embassy in Moscow, 20 August 1931. Between 1920 and 1928, Zeiss was a member of the Deutsch Nationale Volks-Partei (DNVP). AHUB, UK, Personalia, Z 12a, vol. 1, fol. 57. Fragebogen Heinz Zeiss, 26 January 1936. After 14 January 1934, he was spokesman of the NSDAP headquarters at the medical faculty of the University of Berlin. AHUB, UK, Personalia, Z 12a, vol. 1, fol. 127. Questionnaire on the Nazi Party position of Heinz Zeiss.

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17 BArch Berlin, Reichsministerium fiir Wissenschaft, Erziehung und Volksbildung (REM), 'Kartei aller Hochschullehrer/ Fiche 13281. 18 AHUB, UK, Personalia, Z 12a, vol. 1, fol. 116. Foreign Office, 31 May 1933. 19 BArch Koblenz, N 1336/346. Curriculum Vitae Zeiss, n.d. 20 The understanding of Deutschtum in 1925 was: 'Deutschtum, the Volk in its ethnic distinctiveness [volkische Eigenart] who, in addition to sharing a common language, has been formed through the interplay of physical and spiritual Igeistig], geographical and historical factors; it includes all members of the German "tongue" who live within the Deutsches Reich and her neighbouring states as well as those disposed across the entire earth.' 'Deutschtum/ in Brockhaus, Handbuch des Wissens, vol. 1 (Leipzig: F.A. Brockhaus, 1925), 548. 21 Max Hildebert Boehm, Volkstheorie und Volkstumspolitik der Gegenwart (Berlin: Junker & Diinnhaupt, 1935), 32. Boehm was also a member of the scientific advisory committee of the Deutsches Auslands-Institut. 22 Many Germans felt that the First World War had been provoked. 23 Karl Christian von Loesch and Fr. Zehn von Unger, 'Zehn Jahre deutscher Schutzbund/ in Karl Christian von Loesch, ed., Zehn Jahre deutscher Schutzbund 1919-1929 (Berlin: Deutscher Schutzbund-Verlag, 1929), 36f. 24 Dorothea Fensch, 'Deutscher Schutzbund (1919-1936),' in Dieter Fricke (Hg.), Lexikon zur Parteiengeschichte, vol. 2 (Leipzig: Bibliographisches Institut, 1984), 290-310,302,303. Karl Christian von Loesch explained: 'We didn't have a choice: either stagnate or increase, or simply lose or win. Or to state it pointedly: let East Germany remain Slavic or re-Germanify [rtickdeutschen] those parts that were lost in 1919.' Karl C. von Loesch, 'Die Ziele/ in Karl Christian von Loesch and Hillen Ziegfeld, eds., Volk unter Volkern (Breslau: Ferdinand Hirt, 1925), 20. 25 Armin Mohler, Die konservative Revolution in Deutschland 1918-1932: Ein Handbuch. 2d ed. (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1972), 73. 26 The conjoining of the term 'young' with 'conservative' after 1918 was a departure from the traditional understanding of conservatism. In his study The Conservative Revolution in Germany in 1918-1932,' Armin Mohler emphasized that the young conservative movement certainly did not 'believe ... that everything in essence changes. Thus, for example, [conservatism] is foreign to the indispensable notion of the progressive-thinker that people are continuously perfecting [themselves], are in principle good, and are only prevented from this through adverse conditions ... Only the whole [das Ganze] is entitled to perfection; the individual only has access to perfection through his return to the whole, [to the national community].' In

316 Sabine Schleiermacher

27 28

29

30 31

32 33 34 35

this case, Mohler is referring to the publication by Arthur Moeller van den Bruck, Das dritte Reich, 3d ed. (Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlags-Anstalt, 1930); Mohler, Die konservative Revolution, 73,115. Mohler, Die konservative Revolution, 59. The Juniklub, which comprised intellectuals, journalists, members of the military, upper-level civil servants, and individuals from industry, based its name on the month that the Treaty of Versailles was signed in order to make its protest blunt. This organization hoped to provide a counterweight to the Novemberklub, founded in Berlin by leftist intellectuals. Volker Mauersberger, Rudolf Pechel und die Deutsche Rundschau. Eine Studie zur konservativ-revolutionaren Publizistik in der Weimarer Republik 1919-1933 (Bremen: Schiinemann-Verlag, 1971), 35,39. Boehm wrote: 'Rejection of the formal pacifist ideology of the minority, a view to the oppressed peoples and other nationalities in Europe irredenta, recovery of the idea ... of Central Europe as a constructive counter-ideal opposed to francophile Pan-Europeanism: All of these significant changes are initiated and pushed forward in a spiritual [geistig] and rabble-rousing [manner].' Max Hildebert Boehm, Rufder Jungen. Eine Stimme aus dem Kreise Moeller van den Bruck, 3rd ed. (Freiburg: Urban-Verlag, 1933), 18f., 19. For the thirty-three-point 'principle statement' of the Juniklub, see Volker Mauersberger, Rudolf Pechel und die Deutsche Rundschau, 36f. Boehm claimed that the 'manifesto' was lost, but Mauersberger discovered the document in the Rudolf Pechel papers. Von Loesch and von Unger, Zehn Jahre, 24. Ernst Ritter, Das Deutsche Auslands-Institut in Stuttgart 1917-1945. Ein Beispiel deutscher Volkstumsarbeit zwischen den Weltkriegen (Stuttgart: SteinerVerlag, 1976), 33. 'Jahresbericht iiber die Tatigkeit des Deutschen Auslands-Instituts im Jahre 1929/30,' Der Auslandsdeutsche 13 (1930): 416. Ritter, Das Deutsche Auslands-Institut, 52. Ibid., 39. During the Weimar Republic, Leibbrandt was collecting material on the history of the Russian Germans. In 1938, this material became part of the 'Leibbrandt Collection.' Leibbrandt was Under-Secretary in the Reichsministerium for the occupied regions in the East and a participant at the Wannsee Conference in January 1942. Gabriele Camphausen, Die zvissenschaftliche historische Ruftlandforschung im Dritten Reich 1933-1945 (Frankfurt am Main: Lang-Verlag, 1990), 218-24; Mechtild Rossler, 'Wissenschaft und Lebensraum': Geographische Ostforschung im Nationalsozialismus. Ein Beitrag zur Disziplingeschichte der Geographie, Hamburger Beitrage zur Wissen-

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36

37 38 39 40

41 42 43 44

45 46 47

48

317

schaftsgeschichte, vol. 8 (Berlin and Hamburg: Reimer-Verlag, 1990), 271. Georg Leibbrandt, 'Neue Wege zur Erforschung des Auslandsdeutschtums/ Der Auslandsdeutsche 13 (1930): 557f. Thomas Trupp, 'Genealogische Uberlieferungen des ehemaligen Deutschen Auslands-Instituts im Institut fiir Auslandsbeziehungen (Stuttgart) und im Bundesarchiv (Koblenz)/ DerHerold 13, no. 4 (1990): 120-8. Ritter, Das.Deutsche Auslands-Institut, 34f. Ibid., 52. BArch Koblenz, N 1336/346. Curriculum vitae Heinz Zeiss. Heinz Zeiss, 'Eine Nachkommin Immanuel Kants in Rufiland/ Der Auslandsdeutsche 11 (1928): 454f.; Heinz Zeiss and Professor Emil Meyer, '35 Jahre als deutscher Botaniker in Rufiland/ ibid., 549f. 'Meyer is an example of an Auslandsdeutscher (during the time of the Czar, he had to adopt Russian citizenship because of his position as a civil servant)... [He] served his Fatherland faithfully and devotedly in an exemplary way, never forgetting his homeland [Stammheimat]. Just the opposite - he is tied to Germany with all of the strings to his heart and cultivates personal and scientific contacts.' Ibid., 550; Heinz Zeiss, 'Dr. Hans Karstens, Vom Leben und Sterben eines deutschen Arztes in Rufiland/ ibid., 663f. AHUB, Hygienisches Institut II, fol. 332. Zeiss to the Verband der Deutschen aus Rufiland e.V., 25 November 1937. Heinz Zeiss, 'Die Bedeutung Rufilands fiir die medizinisch-geographische Forschung/ Munchner Medizinische Wochenschrift 43 (1925): 1836-8. BArch Berlin, 09.02 (Deutsche Botschaft Moskau), no. 414, fol. 237-243. Heinz Zeiss, 'Beobachtungen iiber die augenblicklich in den Wolgakolonien herrschende Malaria vom 25. September 1922.' See BArch Berlin, 9399, fol. 418f. Zeiss, 'Vorlaufiger Bericht iiber die Lage der Wolga-Fliichtlinge in Poltzk 14. August 1922.' Reichsministerium des Innern, Hilfswerk des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes fiir Russland; Christoph Gassenschmidt, Von der Revolution und der Partei getauscht: Die Autonome Sozialistische Sowjetrepublik der Wolgadeutschen 1924-1941 (Bonn: Kulturstiftung der deutschen Vertriebenen, 1999), 27. Gassenschmidt, Von der Revolution und der Partei getauscht, 26. Ibid.,29f. BArch Berlin, 09.02 (Deutsche Botschaft Moskau), no. 414, fol. 79-91; 85f. Heinz Zeiss, 'Bericht iiber meine Reise nach Saratow und Uralsk vom 10.29.3.1926.' BArch Berlin, 9401, fol. 38-39. Confidential report, Dr O. Fischer, DRK Berlin. Die Verhaltnisse in den Deutschen Schulen an der Wolga. Reichsminis-

318 Sabine Schleiermacher terium des Innern, Hilfswerk des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes fur Russland. 49 BArch Berlin, 09.02 (Deutsche Botschaft Moskau), no. 414, fol. 79-80. Heinz Zeiss, 'Bericht iiber meine Reise nach Saratow und Uralsk vom 10.29.3.1926.' 50 BArch Berlin, 09.02 (Deutsche Botschaft Moskau), no. 418, fol. 193-198. Heinz Zeiss, 'Bei deutschen Kolonisten,' n.d. 51 Heinz Zeiss, 'Der augenblickliche Stand medizinischer-geographischer Forschungen in der Sowjetunion/ Miinchner Medizinische Wochenschrift 78 (1931): 1477. 52 BArch Berlin, 09.02 (Deutsche Botschaft Moskau), no. 417, fol. 112-113. Heinz Zeiss an die Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft 7.10.27. The following quotations are from this document. 53 Ibid. 54 Zeiss began to publish on the meaning and substance of geomedicine as early as 1925. In these writings, he increasingly began to link geopolitical and geomedical considerations. It was not until the beginning of the 1930s that he began to make use of Haushofer's work. See Heinz Zeiss, 'Die Bedeutung Rufilands fur die medizinisch-geographische Forschung,' Miinchner Medizinische Wochenschrift 43 (1925): 1836-8. 55 In the following, I refer to Heinz Zeiss, 'Geomedizin (geographische Medizin) oder Medizinische Geographie?' Miinchner Medizinische Wochenschrift 78 (1931): 198-201. 56 Zeiss, 'Der augenblickliche Stand/ 1476. 57 Zeiss commented on his relationship to Haushofer: 'Basically, I thank [Haushofer], who created a glowing synthesis of the research of the geographer Friedrich Ratzel and the Swedish constitutional lawyer Rudolf Kjellen ... of Anthropogeographie, political geography, and theories of the state, for the discovery of geomedicine! Not that I would have thrown myself to Haushofer's feet. From the compelling truth of his doctrine, which he honed into a sharp scientific sword, the term geomedicine came to life in the infested landscape between the Volga and the Urals ... He literally had to get to know [erwandern] and experience the area - just as [the field of] geopolitics had to.' Heinz Zeiss, 'Die Geomedizin des Ostraumes,' Deutsches Arzteblatt 73 (1943): 140-2, at 140. 58 In his analysis, Zeiss does not distinguish between the different approaches within social hygiene. He praised Alfred Grotjahn for his 'national social' ideas, which, however, were not implemented politically. Heinz Zeiss, 'Die Notwendigkeit einer deutschen Geomedizin,' Zeitschrift fur Geopolitik 9 (1932): 474-84.

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59 Heinz Zeiss, 'Entwurzelung und Wurzellosigkeit/ Zeitschrift fur Geopolitik 10 (1933): 310-19. 60 Zeiss, 'Die Notwendigkeit einer deutschen Geomedizin/ 474-84. 61 Zeiss, 'Entwurzelung und Wurzellosigkeit/ 316. 62 Zeiss, 'Die Notwendigkeit einer deutschen Geomedizin,' 478. 63 Zeiss, 'Entwurzelung und Wurzellosigkeit/ 315. 64 For organic notions of Volk see Kurt Sontheimer, Antidemokratisches Denken in der Weimarer Republik (Munich: Nymphenburger Verlags-Handlung, 1968), 244. 65 Zeiss, 'Die Notwendigkeit einer deutschen Geomedizin/ 479. 66 Franz Neumann, Behemoth: Struktur und Praxis des Nationalsozialismus 19331944 (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, 1984), 176. 67 Ibid., 170. 68 Ibid., 187. 69 See Friedrich Ratzel, Anthropogeographie, 2d ed. (Stuttgart: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1899). 70 Zeiss, 'Die Notwendigkeit einer deutschen Geomedizin/ 482. 71 Ibid., 483. 72 'Denkschrift: Geopolitik als nationale Staatswissenschaft/ Zeitschrift fur Geopolitik 10 (1933): 301-4. 73 Louis von Kohl, 'Biopolitik und Geopolitik als Grundlage einer Naturwissenschaft vom Staate/ Zeitschrift fur Geopolitik 10 (1933): 305-10. 74 Heinz Zeiss, 'Sozialhygienische Betrachtungen iiber die nationalen Minderheiten in der Sowjetunion/ Munchner Medizinische Wochenschrift 79 (1932): 558-60, at 560. 75 Ibid., 560. 76 Founded in 1881, under the Weimar Republic the VDA was at the forefront of the 'Volk organizing' in those territories which the German Reich had been forced to surrender under the Treaty of Versailles. See Fensch, Verein fur das Deutschtum, 282-97, and Sabine Schleiermacher, Sozialethik im Spannungsfeld von Sozial- und Rassenhygiene. Der Mediziner Hans Harmsen im Centralausschufl fur die Innere Mission (Husum: Matthiesen-Verlag, 1998), 84136. 77 '[For those] regions of our German Volksgruppen that are beyond the [German] border, [demographic and racial questions] will be posited in the future in an organic manner and with close contact to the VDA through the Demographic Research Team [Bevolkerungswissenschaftliche Arbeitskreis] and in cooperation with all other German authorities that may come into question/ BArch Koblenz, N 1336/132, fol. 3. Denkschrift fur die Mitarbeiter des

320 Sabine Schleiermacher

78

79

80 81 82 83 84

85 86 87 88

89

90 91

Bevolkerungswissenschaftlichen Arbeitskreises, ed. Hans Harmsen, n.d. (after 1933). Kurt Possekel, 'Studien zur Politik des Vereins fur das Deutschtum im Ausland (VDA) in der Weimarer Republik' (Rostock: Diss., Univ. Rostock, 1967). Kurt Possekel, 'Verein fur das Deutschtum im Ausland (VDA) 18811945,' in Dieter Fricke, ed., Lexikon zur Parteiengeschichte, vol. 4 (Leipzig: Bibliographisches Institut, 1986), 282-97. In 1934, the 'Aryan certificate' was a prerequisite of membership. Michael Fahlbusch, Wissenschaft im Dienst der nationalsozialistischen Politik? Die 'Volksdeutschen Forschungsgemeinschaften' von 1931-1945 (Baden-Baden: Nomos-Verlag, 1999), 112. Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Nationalsozialistische Auftenpolitik 1933-1938 (Frankfurt am Main and Berlin: Metzner-Verlag, 1968), 169. Ibid., 173. Fahlbusch, Wissenschaft im Dienst der nationalsozialistischen Politik, 106. The term is that of Fahlbusch, ibid., 115. In 1937, the VDA's leader was put in charge of the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle (VDM). Karl Haushofer, a friend of Zeiss, became president of the VDA. Ibid., 57f. The research team was founded in Bernkastel-Kues in 1934 in the context of the Saarland referendum. Ibid., 110. AHUB, Hygienisches Institut, no. 262, fol. 287. Zeiss to the Deutsche Auslands-Institut, 23 January 1935. Cited from Fensch, Deutscher Schutzbund, 305. Members of this circle included the sociologist and historian Gunther Ipsen (Konigsberg), Prof. Meifiner (Greifswald), Frau Prof. Reiter (Berlin), and Frau Dr Use Szagunn (Berlin). AHUB, Hygienisches Institut, no. 262, fol. 287. Zeiss to the Deutsche Auslands-Institut in Stuttgart, 23 January 1935. See Mechtild Rossler, '"Wissenschaft und Lebensraum," Geographische Ostforschung im Nationalsozialismus. Ein Beitrag zur Disziplingeschichte der Geographie/ in Eckart Krause, Gunter Otto, and Wolfgang Walter, eds., Hamburger Beitrage zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte (im Auftrag der Universitat Hamburg), vol. 8 (Berlin and Hamburg: Reimer-Verlag, 1990); Mechtild Rossler and Sabine Schleiermacher, eds., Der 'Generalplan Ost.' Hauptlinien der nationalsozialistischen Planungs- und Vernichtungspolitik (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1993). Sabine Schleiermacher, 'Soziobiologische Kriegsfuhrung? Der "Generalplan Ost/" Berichtezur Wissenschaftsgeschichte 19 (1996): 145-56. The chronology has been determined from sources found in the Harmsen papers.

Zeiss and Auslandsdeutschtum 321 92 BArch Berlin, N 1336/132, fol. 3. 'Verhandlungsniederschrift iiber die 3. Sitzung des Bevolkerungswissenschaftlichen Arbeitskreises am Dienstag, dem 25. Juni 1935.' 93 Ibid. 94 Ibid., fol. 4f. 95 AHUB, Hygienisches Institut, no. 262, fol. 280. 'Verhandlungsniederschrift iiber die 4. Sitzung des Bevolkerungswissenschaftlichen Arbeitskreises am 1.11.1935.' 96 Hans Harmsen, Tamilie,' in Carl Petersen, Otto Scheel, Paul H. Ruth, and Hans Schwalm, eds., Handworterbuch des Grenz- und Auslandsdeutschtums, Bd. II (Breslau: Ferdinand Hirt-Verlag, 1936), 486. 97 Karl Lenz, 'Die Bevolkerungswissenschaft im Dritten Reich/ in Bundesinstitut fur Bevolkerungsforschung, ed., Materialien zur Bevolkerungswissenschaft, Heft 35 (Wiesbaden: BiB, 1983), 119f. 98 In the following, I refer to Heinz Zeiss, 'Aufgaben einer Volkskunde/ Archivfiir Bevolkerungswissenschaft und Bevolkerungspolitik 4 (1934): 19-35. 99 Ibid. 100 Heinz Zeiss, 'Medizinische Topographie als volkskundliche Quellen/ Archivfiir Bevolkerungswissenschaft 5 (1935): 175-82. 101 Ibid., 179. 102 Willi Oberkrome, 'Geschichte, Volk und Theorie. Das Handworterbuch des Grenz- und Auslandsdeutschtums/ in Peter Schottler, ed., Geschichtsschreibung als Legitimationswissenschaft 1918-1945 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp-Verlag, 1997), 104-22. 103 The term Volksbrucke, also known as Siedlungsstiitzpunkt, was coined by Walter Christaller in his book Theorie der zentralen Orte. It was later taken up by Konrad Meyer and further developed in the plans for Eastern Europe. Mechtild Rossler, 'Wissenschaft und Lebensraum,' 170f. 104 Wolfgang Hodermann, Tagung des Deutschtums aus aller Welt in Stuttgart/ Deutsches Arzteblatt 66 (1936): 1038f. 105 Tagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft fur Hygiene. Verhandlungen der Gesellschaft Deutscher Naturforscher und Arzte. 94. Versammlung zu Dresden vom 20. bis 21.September 1936 (Berlin, 1937), 202f. 106 Heinz Zeiss, 'Die Geomedizin des Ostraumes/ Deutsches Arzteblatt 73 (1943): 140. 107 Ibid. 108 Ibid., 141. 109 Heinz Zeiss, 'Einleitung/ in Heinz Zeifi, Seuchen-Atlas (Gotha: Perthes, 1942). 110 Ingo Haar, 'Kampfende Wissenschaft: Entstehung und Niedergang der

322 Sabine Schleiermacher volkischen Geschichtswissenschaft im Wechsel der Systeme/ in Wilfried Schulze and Otto Gerhard Oexle, eds., Deutsche Historiker im Nationalsozialismus (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, 1999), 221f.

PART THREE Bilateralism and Internationalism

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8 Castor and Pollux in Brain Research: The Berlin and the Moscow Brain Research Institutes JOCHEN RICHTER

Twins are special. Whenever we encounter them, we are drawn to their mixture of similarity and dissimilarity. The most famous twins in human history were the 'Dioscuri/ Castor and Pollux, the twin heroes of ancient Greek mythology, who have long enthralled the imagination because they were sired by different fathers: one was the son of the King of Sparta and thus mortal, the other the son of Zeus and thus immortal. In biology and the human sciences, especially in genetics, twins (Gemini or Gemelli) are a favoured object of study. They command our attention because of similarities in their disposition and also - depending on their biological and social environment - because of their differences in phenotypical development. This chapter looks at two national brain research institutes, one German, the other Russian - at their history and their (limited) collaboration in the period between the two world wars of the twentieth century. The Berlin and Moscow institutes for brain research, founded in Germany and the Soviet Union during the years of the Weimar Republic in quite different social and economic circumstances, were in effect 'twin7 institutes that shared similar research topics, methods, and structures. Their common founder and director was the Berlin brain researcher Oskar Vogt, who had distinguished himself as an entrepreneur at the turn of the last century by founding numerous institutes and launching a variety of scientific projects. The fact that the two institutes shared a founding director prompts us to examine the scientific 'traffic/ the division of labour, the mobility of scientific personnel and equipment, and the transport of scientific innovation across national boundaries. The currency of collaboration in this case was nothing less than the brain of Vladimir Il'ich Lenin, the founder of the Soviet Union.

326 Jochen Richter

The collaboration between these two institutes was an artefact of a particular moment in time. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, there had been close relations between German and Russian science, especially in the field of medicine. Building on this tradition, in the early 1920s Russian and German scientists made strong efforts to resume this collaboration, which had ceased with the outbreak of the First World War. Until the mid-1920s, a boycott imposed by the victors in the war prevented German scientists and politicians from participating in international organizations and enterprises.1 Similarly, Soviet Russia, the child of the October Revolution, was refused recognition until 1924-5, and even then it was granted only reluctantly. All of this gave rise to a convergence of political interests that culminated in the Treaty of Rapallo of 1922, which forged a unique alliance in Europe between two extremely different partners.2 The efforts of the scientists from both countries to resume their collaboration were strongly supported by the German Foreign Office in Berlin and the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs (NKID) in Moscow. In 1923 the German Ambassador to Moscow, Graf Ulrich von Brockdorff-Rantzau, established a special cultural department at his residence 'to concentrate on achieving all the goals that German scientific circles have directed toward Russia.'3 Our story begins in Germany, where, as early as 1898, Vogt established with the financial support of a patron, the armaments industrialist Friedrich Alfred Krupp, a private research institute in Berlin, the Neurologische Zentralstation (Neurological Institute). Nationalized in 1902, the Neurologische Zentralstation was integrated into the Friedrich-Wilhelm University in Berlin as a neurobiological laboratory.4 In 1919, on Vogt's initiative, the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute (KWI) for Brain Research was founded in Berlin. Until the official inauguration of the institute's new building in Berlin-Buch in 1931, the KWI for Brain Research recruited its personnel from the staff of the university's neurobiological laboratory (as of 1925 informally called by Vogt the Institute for Brain Research'), who were thus employees of both institutes. Although differentiated for fiscal and financial reasons, these two units were effectively a single institute. The university-based institute formally ended its independent existence in 1931 after the Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft took over all its personnel. The KWI for Brain Research, however, survived until 1945, when it was finally closed.5 In 1928, in a climate of increasingly close German-Soviet relations, the Soviet government invited Vogt to establish in Moscow the Institut mozga (the Institute for Brain Research). To ensure the kind of com-

Berlin and Moscow Brain Research Institutes 327 patibility that would facilitate collaboration and a division of labour, the Moscow Institute was deliberately modelled after its Berlin counterpart as a centre for cytoarchitectonical research.6 As we shall see, the balance of authority and prestige between the two institutes fluctuated over time. Like Pollux, who outlived his brother Castor, the Moscow Institute for Brain Research would survive its Berlin sister institute: since 1954 and to this day it has functioned as a scientific research institute of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences.7 In November 2003 it celebrated its seventy-fifth anniversary; thus for many years it has been the only institute still operating from the decades of German-Soviet scientific collaboration. This chapter will explore the founding of the Moscow Brain Research Institute - specifically, how the negotiations that led to its creation set the terms of collaboration and of division of labour between the two national brain research institutes. This collaboration, which transcended national and political boundaries, ended prematurely with the seizure of power by the National Socialists in Germany and the rise of Stalinism in the Soviet Union. Moscow's engagement of the Berlin brain researcher Oskar Vogt commands our interest even today. A re-evaluation of that engagement is especially compelling today because of the distorted historical perception of Vogt's activities in Germany and the Soviet Union in the decades following the Second World War. In East German (GDR) historiography, Vogt was celebrated as a 'pioneer of German-Soviet scientific relations' and therefore as a harbinger of the later 'brotherly' agreement between the GDR and the Soviet Union. In the former Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany), Vogt's investigation of Lenin's brain has been mocked as 'spectacular' or 'infamous' - a perception that has impeded historical understanding. In the Soviet Union, discussion of the topic gradually became an absolute taboo after the 1920s. Soviet/ Russian (medical) historians began paying attention again to Lenin's brain in particular - and to elite brain research in general - only after Gorbachev's perestroika and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Designing International and National Organizations for Brain Research By its very name, the institute that Vogt founded in 1898, the Neurologische Zentralstation, expressly reflected its founder's intention, which was to create a transnational network of brain research institutes around a central headquarters. These institutes would use regional anatomical

328 Jochen Richter

materials but would follow similar principles, which would generate reproducible results. In introducing this structure, Vogt was a pioneer in the international movement to institutionalize brain research; he was charting new lines of action even before the 'Brain Commission' of the International Association of the Academies took over the process of institutionalization in 1903.8 The need for cross-border scientific cooperation and coordination had become apparent in a variety of fields by the second half of the nineteenth century. The idea of crossing borders was initially indicated for costly astronomic, geophysical, and astrophysical research projects; at the beginning of the twentieth century, the same idea caught on in the neurosciences. Following a German initiative - launched independently of Vogt - the Central Commission for Brain Research, (the 'Brain Commission') was founded in London in 1903. The commission's chief aim was to establish an international network of brain research institutes based on common principles. As service institutions much like libraries or museums, the 'interacademic brain research institutes' of the Brain Commission were to be accessible to all interested researchers. To this end, the planned institutes as well as those already existing were to provide brain banks and archives with histological preparations. These were to be available at all times - in the case of brain research, this meant collections of brains and series of brain cuttings. Finally, if possible, the linked institutes were to function as methodological centres working on the refinement and economic application of techniques for anatomical investigation. Vogt's first brain research institute - nationalized in 1902 as the Neurobiological Laboratory of the Friedrich-Wilhelm University in Berlin met these criteria, but it was denied recognition as an interacademic brain research institute. At play were the personal animosities of the German initiators of the Brain Commission to Vogt, brought on by Vogt's insistence on acting alone in achieving his goals. Resistance to Vogt came in particular from the Berlin medical faculty, where it was led by the anatomist Wilhelm Waldeyer, who felt that the 'national status' of Vogt's institute had been forced upon them by Vogt's patron, Krupp.9 These animosities, bitter though they were, did not prevent Vogt from realizing his goals. The founding of the Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft (KWG) in 1910 and the subsequent opportunity to set up a Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research10 saw Vogt become heavily engaged in developing his initial ideas on organizing brain research.11 Vogt envisioned an 'international association of similar research institutes for the

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purpose of saving energy by means of a division of labour.' National institutes for brain research were to step beyond national boundaries and engage in 'mutual traffic/ They would 'shape this [traffic] internationally and draw the greatest possible benefit from the different talents of nations and races.'12 Vogt's proposal13 - which the KWG essentially accepted in the end was to set up a special brain research institute encompassing a host of neurosciences, from brain anatomy to neurophysiology, including neuropathology and clinical research on symptoms in neurology and psychiatry. His concept thus coincided fully with the ideas that the Brain Commission of the International Association of Academies had articulated in 1903. The Berlin Institute for Brain Research Mainly because of the First World War and its economic repercussions, another twenty years would pass before Vogt's concept could be fully realized. In the interim, the Berlin brain research institute expanded gradually. It started as a neurology practice in Berlin. Thanks to a mostly wealthy clientele (nobility, financiers, and others), Vogt was able to finance his private research institute.14 Vogt's wife, the French neurologist Cecile Vogt-Mugnier, joined the institute in 1899 as its first and most important researcher. After a brief phase of fine anatomical investigations on the brain, which Oskar Vogt published under the title Beitrage zur Hirnfaserlehre (Contributions to the Theory of Brain Nerve Fibers),15 Cecile and Oscar Vogt, together with their colleague Korbinian Brodmann from the Neurobiological Laboratory, turned after 1902 to the histological investigation of the architectonical structure of the cerebral cortex. Brain anatomy was thus the institute's initial interest and would remain its focus throughout its development. The methodological innovations developed by Vogt and Brodmann at the beginning of their collaboration were a decisive factor in the remarkable success of the architectonic brain research conducted by Vogt and his team. Unlike Vogt's most important competitor, the Viennese brain researcher Constantin von Economo, who preferred to dissect the brain into small blocks,16 Vogt relied exclusively on 'total cutting/ a method that required special instruments. In 1902, Brodmann presented in the Journal fur Psychologic und Neurologic two new instruments for cutting tissues embedded in paraffin: the macrotome and the microtome. The macrotome could be used to dissect the brain hemi-

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spheres - usually frontally - into five plane-parallel sections. From these sections, a consecutive series of total cuttings could be made of both hemispheres, from the frontal to the occipital lobe. At first, this was performed with the microtome, later on with the double-sled microtome developed by Vogt. After the panto-microtome was invented, both cutting procedures could be carried out in one stage.17 These cutting methods made it possible to prepare histological specimens extending across several regions of the cerebral cortex in such a way that the boundaries between regions remained distinctly visible. (While Brodmann distinguished a total of fifty-two areas based on the findings of his cytoarchitectonical studies in 1907 and 1909,18 the Vogts reported the existence of more than two hundred histologically distinguishable areas in the cerebral cortex based on their myelogenetic investigations in the 1920s.) Over the years, the scientific program of the neurobiological laboratory expanded into various branches. First, the comparative anatomy of the central nervous system of different animal genera was merged with human brain anatomy in order to explain evolutionary relationships as well as the transferability of brain architectonical results - for instance, from the primate brain to the human brain. Brodmann in particular gathered results from investigations on mammals - mainly on primates, lemurs, bats, carnivores, marsupials, and rodents. In 1909, he published the results of his investigations in his book Vergleichende Lokalisation der Hirnrinde (Comparative Localization of the Cerebral Cortex); this became the standard reference for architectonic brain research, and remains so to this day.19 The next important development - from neuroanatomy to the neurophysiology of the brain - occurred in 1907, when Cecile and Oskar Vogt published the results of their electrical experiments in stimulating the cerebral cortices of marsupials.20 From then on, neurophysiology and neuroanatomy became the two main pillars of the Berlin brain research institute. Thus the institute was initially divided into two laboratories: neuroanatomical and neurophysiological.21 The results generated helped place anatomical brain structures in a causal relationship with their physiological functions. The important step of moving from the normal anatomy of the brain to its pathological anatomy was taken by Cecile Vogt, most notably with two works published in 1911 on the Status marmoratus (Vogt syndrome) of the corpus striatum, which she had identified in cases of athetosis duplex.22 For the most part, Vogt's ideas on pathoarchitectonics and pathoclisis - which will be discussed in the next section, together with

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his visit to Moscow in January 1923 - were derived from these two works. 23 As might be expected, these thematic foci had implications for the structure of the institute. The evolving research agenda required new structures. In 1925 a genetics laboratory was incorporated into the Berlin institute. Vogt had planned this step years earlier; it finally became possible when he was offered the Soviet commission to investigate Lenin's brain. In return for accepting this commission, he promised to employ a young researcher from the Moscow Institute for Experimental Biology, Nikolai Vladimirovich Timofeev-Resovskii. Within a few years, Timofeev-Resovskii would become one of the most productive researchers at the institute as well as one of the most respected scientific members of the Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft.24 Two further structural developments occurred after the opening of the new building for the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research in Berlin-Buch in 1931: the founding of a chemistry department, and of a research clinic. The expansion was considerable: in 1915, when the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute was founded, it had five departments; by 1929 it had nine, when both the scientific departments and their associated technical departments are included. The most important prerequisite for realizing the institute's scientific program was the collection of specimens. By 1912 the institute had a collection of 120 human brains, numerous animal brains, and thousands of brain cutting series; these were archived in conformity with the Brain Commission's requirements. Because of its suitability for phylogenetic demonstrations, the institute's collection was considered a 'museum.' The institute established an efficient photographic and reprographic laboratory for taking microphotographs of the results of their research, for compiling atlases of the cerebral cortex structure, and for preparing the atlases for archiving and publication. In the institute's development and in its efforts at international collaboration, the medical journal edited by Vogt, the Journal fur Psychologic und Neurologic (JPsN), played a significant role. Vogt took over the journal from his teacher August Forel in 1896 as the Zeitschrift fiir Hypnotismus (Journal for Hypnotism) and continued it after 1902 under a new title, turning it into an international journal for neurobiological research. Under Vogt, the journal served primarily as an outlet for the scientific research emerging from his institutes. Between 1927 and 1934 it became the most important link between the Berlin and Moscow brain research institutes.

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In June 1919 the KWG founded the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research. For years after, the institute was little more than a financial shell used by Vogt to expand his neurobiological university laboratory, which was housed in an old Berlin tenement building.25 With the financial support of the Rockefeller Foundation, the German Reich, Prussia, and the city of Berlin, the impressive complex of new buildings for the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research was finally opened in Berlin-Buch in 1931.26 The new complex brought Vogt's original concept closer to realization. In 1931 the institute employed ninety people, with a two-to-seven ratio of scientists to clinical staff. In today's terms, the KWI for Brain Research was a complex institute for special medical research. It functioned as an interdisciplinary working group and had all the features that characterize medical-biological research institutes: specialists from diverse subject areas working on joint tasks (multidisciplinarity); basic research units with relatively independent tasks working on joint objectives (complexity); and interaction between basic, inquiring, and applied research. As well, it examined structure-function relations by combining morphological with physiological investigative methods and by connecting laboratory experimental research with clinically controlled experiments.27 Creating a Twin: The Moscow Brain Research Institute Scientific agendas were intertwined with political factors. Oskar Vogt and his wife Cecile travelled to Moscow in January 1923 to participate in the First All-Russian Congress for Psychoneurology. They were not the first Germans to go to Soviet Russia, but they were among the few who were not afraid of dealing with Russian colleagues who were in the service of a communist government. While in Moscow, the Vogts delivered a lecture on 'pathoarchitectonics and pathoclisis' and reported on their twenty-five years' experience in investigating the structures of the cerebral cortex.28 For the Vogts, pathoarchitectonics had to do with describing the pathological deviations from the normal architectonics of the cortex observed with certain neurological diseases, and pathoclisis involved describing the tendency or predisposition of certain areas of the cortex to be diseased and thus become the cause of a specific neurological disturbance. The Vogts' lecture made a profound and long-lasting impression on specialists in Moscow.29

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The strong impact the Vogts had on the Russian public must be seen in context. Lenin had fallen extremely ill, and since the end of 1922, an international medical team headed by the Breslau neurologist Otfried Foerster had been struggling to save his life. In their efforts to do so, they wondered whether the Vogts' concept of pathoclisis might suggest a treatment. Probably on Foerster's recommendation, the international medical team invited Vogt to visit and asked for his advice. The results of the consultation must have been sobering, for there is no indication afterwards in the medical reports of any significant change in Lenin's treatment.30 The Vogts' visit to Moscow continued to resonate after Lenin's death. After the autopsy, the Soviet leader's brain was removed and preserved. After deliberating for several months, the Politburo of the CPSU resolved towards the end of 1924 - following a recommendation from its appointed Committee for the Commemoration of Lenin - to submit the brain to a precise scientific investigation. In all likelihood, the impression left by the Vogts during their visit influenced the deliberations of the committee of medical experts. It was now irrelevant whether a practical therapeutic application might be derived from the subject of their lecture; it seems that Moscow neurologists were certain that the methods of architectonic brain research so skilfully demonstrated by Vogt might offer an excellent approach to diagnosing mental capabilities.31 In a very direct way, the Russians' engagement of the Vogts was galvanized by the interest in Lenin's brain, as was the collaboration that followed. There were palpable advantages to the Vogts' approach.32 The ability to measure the relative size of the cortical regions responsible for mental capabilities (this size varies widely among individuals) was the essential prerequisite for applying the investigative methods of brain architectonics to evaluate mental capabilities. Because of its quantitative character, brain architectonics has an advantage over methods such as psychology, which are based primarily on subjective assessments. Since architectonics can ascertain the size of the cortical regions involved in certain mental capabilities (in square centimetres or millimetres) and their relative share of the total available cortex (in percentage), it provides objective criteria for evaluating the individual characteristics of a brain.33 The Vogts' research agenda evolved over time. In the beginning, they were interested in investigating the brains of average healthy or ill human beings in general. In the 1920s, their interests broadened more

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and more to include the investigation of the brains of exceptional individuals. This rubric included both 'constitutional' criminals (that is, genetically determined criminals) such as murderers and other serious offenders on the one hand, and creative people such as artists and scientists as well as members of the political and economic elite on the other. In addition to its clinical objectives, the Berlin brain research institute pursued inquiries aimed at providing neuroanatomical criteria for the evaluation of 'elite brains' and (a target that then seemed possible) for the 'breeding of superior brains,' in particular through a selection process involving conscious sexual choice by one of the marital partners. This was eugenics. Eugenic ideas of breeding, such as those expressed by Vogt, were an element of many social Utopias; from the end of the nineteenth century on, various approaches to eugenic breeding had been advocated by social reformers, philosophers, biologists, and physicians with political persuasions ranging from the far left to the far right.34 Such ideas had been gaining social acceptance since Charles Darwin, particularly in Europe and North America at the beginning of the twentieth century. In Soviet Russia through the early 1930s, as in England (the birthplace of eugenics) and in Germany, eugenic ideas were being cultivated and sometimes even implemented. In 1919 a eugenics department was founded at the Moscow Institute for Experimental Biology, a scientific institute subordinate to the RSFSR's Commissariat of Public Health (Narkomzdrav). This department was the result of the joint efforts of the Russian biologist Nikolai Konstantinovich Kol'tsov and his superior, the People's Commissar for Health, the social hygienist Nikolai Aleksandrovich Semashko, who regarded eugenics as a logical development of hygiene and as the most significant aspect of a socialist program for public health.35 The Terms of Trade In a letter composed on New Year's Eve 1924, in rather old-fashioned but correct German, the seventy-year-old Nestor of Russian neurology, Lazar Solomonovich Minor, notified Oskar Vogt that he had been selected by the commission to head the investigation of Lenin's brain. Minor wrote: Today I was summoned to a meeting of a committee whose task it is to carry out the most exact investigation and description of the brain of the deceased V.I. Lenin. The view expressed at this meeting was that the investigation be complemented with a more exact cytoarchitectonic investigation in accordance with the current state of

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science. Everyone was inclined to consult you on this matter, perhaps even to have you perform this investigation in person/36 Although other alternatives had been explored, the committee and the Soviet government (which authorized Minor's letter) apparently considered Vogt the best and only possible choice. Nonetheless, Vogt's reputation - he directed his own brain research institute in Germany, but he did not have an academic chair - still required some enhancement in Russia. So on 2 February 1925 the Russian Academy of Sciences elected him as a corresponding member of the biology section. The memorandum, written by the biophysicist and academy member Petr Petrovich Lazarev, honoured Vogt as 'one of the most important authorities in the field of brain research with an original method for investigating the structures of the brain.'37 The fact that Vogt was invited to Moscow at the same time can hardly have been random. Vogt's leftist political tendencies - he leaned towards the ultraleft Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD) - also made him an attractive candidate. According to Dmitrii Volkogonov, Lenin's Russian biographer, Clara Zetkin, a Communist member of the Reichstag, commended Vogt to the Politburo as 'an internationally renowned person and his convictions correspond, so to speak, with those of a communist.'38 Although this characterization of Vogt's political views must be regarded as exaggerated, Vogt was the only one among the mostly conservative brain researchers in the West about whom such a political affinity could even be claimed. Besides all this, Vogt's personal relationships with the Public Health Commissar, Semashko, with the chairman of the Council of the People's Commissars (Sovnarkom), Nikolai Petrovich Gorbunov, and with the family of the (then still deputy) Soviet foreign minister, Maxim Maximovich Litvinov, told in his favour. In Germany, Vogt enjoyed a more or less friendly relationship with the president of the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft, Friedrich Schmidt-Ott, whom the German government had entrusted with the task of furthering German-Russian scientific relations. All of this made Vogt ideally placed to play the role of eminence grise in Germany's official scientific relations with the Soviet Union. Thus, three circumstances explain Vogt's appointment as director of the Moscow brain research institute: his internationally recognized professional competence, his left-leaning political convictions, and his strong international network of personal relationships. At Minor's request, Vogt travelled to Moscow in mid-February to consult with the committee. On 17 February he met with its members, among whom were the pathologist A.I. Abrikosov, the anthropologist

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V.V. Bunak, and two neuropathologists, L.S. Minor and V.V. Kramer. Acting as an official observer at the consultation was the deputy director of the Lenin Institute, Ivan Pavlich Tovstukha, who took the minutes, which he then signed along with the others.39 This background makes explicable the first question raised in the meeting - whether 'the cytoarchitectonic investigation [could] provide information on the material substrate of Lenin's genius.' According to the minutes, Vogt and every medical expert present said it could.40 We now know that this was exactly what the Stalinist fraction in the Politburo wanted to hear. Physicians and politicians were initially content to endorse the project on the grounds of its general scientific interest. While the scientists made every attempt to convince the Politburo of the importance of the undertaking, in no circumstances would they have anticipated the desired results. Setting the Terms In negotiating the terms of the commission, Vogt hoped to convince the committee members that it would be more expedient to perform the investigation at his Berlin institute. He argued that the investigation required extremely well-trained personnel and highly specialized instruments, which were available only at his institute. Furthermore, only in Berlin could the work be carried out under his constant direction and supervision. Moreover, the brain needed to be processed as quickly as possible. If it was immersed too long in the fixation liquid, the tissue would lose its ability to absorb the stain necessary for a microscopic investigation, and the investigation would no longer be possible. Vogt worked out an outline of his investigation program, which included correlating the anatomical results with psychological data. Vogt conceded that in certain conditions, the investigation could also be performed in Moscow, but he pointed out the potential risks of doing so. The Politburo debated the results of the meeting with Vogt on the following day and tersely resolved: The physician's recommendation to send Lenin's brain out of the country to be investigated is rejected.... We recommend that the investigation of the brain of Vladimir Il'ich take place in Russia.'41 Vogt yielded, agreeing to perform the investigation in Moscow. The contract between the 'Institute V.I. Lenin, represented by its deputy director I.P. Tovstukha, and Professor Dr. Oskar Vogt, director of the Neurological Institute of the University of Berlin,' is revealing.42

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Vogt was entrusted with the 'scientific investigation of Lenin's brain' and the 'general supervision of all the work.' The term of the contract was unlimited, as the undertaking was expected to take several years. Nine paragraphs stipulated the scientific task and the conditions required to ensure its fulfilment. Vogt would be responsible for providing the laboratory with personnel and instruments in rooms to be made available at the Lenin Institute; he would also be expected to train Russian physicians in the necessary cytoarchitectonical investigative methods. For its part, the Lenin Institute assumed the costs for equipping and maintaining the laboratory and agreed to reimburse Vogt for travel costs incurred as well as to pay $1,000 into his Berlin institute's 'Brain Anatomy' account for each stay in Moscow that was necessary to finish the work.43 Vogt countersigned this contract on 22 May 1925, as 'Director of the Neurobiological Institute of the University of Berlin.' His position as professor and department head at the university and as a scientific member of the KWG made it possible for him to conclude the contractual agreement with reference to the wishes of the Foreign Office and the consent of the Prussian Ministry for Science, Art and Education. He was thus able to skirt the university authorities and proceed without the express consent of the medical faculty. More diplomacy was required to gain the support of the KWG, however. As a private corporation under public law (unlike the autonomous and polycentric university), the KWG was a monocentric institution accountable to numerous stakeholders - at least with regard to how it shaped its international relations. Vogt therefore took care to secure the support of five high-ranking representatives of the Foreign Office, the Reich Ministry of the Interior, and the Prussian Ministry for Cultural Affairs before informing the president, the general director, and the treasurer of the KWG that in the future he would also be offering his services as a scientist to the Soviet Union. The German ambassador in Moscow, Brockdorff-Rantzau, the most prominent of the public servants who rushed to his support, justified Vogt's engagement by referring to the 'political interest' of the Reich. Particularly in view of competing French interests, 'everything must be done to further the connection between German scholars and Russian scholars, and between German science and Russian science.'44 As the KWG's general director, Friedrich Glum, admitted in his memoirs, this initiative ran counter to the KWG's strategy for international relations.45 Its goals were directed more towards integration with the

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West, and focused especially on rebuilding scientific relations with colleagues and institutes in Western Europe and overseas.46 Germany's temporary rapprochement with Soviet Russia, which was officially expressed in the 1922 Rapallo treaty, was largely tactical and found no support in the strictly conservative-minded KWG.47 The reaction of the KWG leaders to Vogt's plans in Russia was therefore reserved. Unquestionably, the contract between the Soviet government and a scientific member of the KWG was politically sensitive and therefore touched on the foreign political interests of the KWG. The minutes of the meeting with von Harnack, the president of KWG, provide astonishing testimony to the KWG's reserve when confronted with Vogt's fait accompli. Von Harnack chaired the meeting but did not once address the arguments advanced by Vogt and Graf BrockdorffRantzau. The silence of the three leading representatives of the KWG indicated that although they did not approve of Vogt's Russian plans, they were prepared to tolerate them. The interests of the Foreign Office and the German ambassador in Moscow trumped the KWG's reservations. Vogt's Soviet Russian engagement reflected Germany's foreign policy strategy, so the KWG representatives were prepared to support it. The Moscow Brain Institute: Expanding Mandates, Evolving Structures Preliminary work on Lenin's brain began at the end of February 1925 when at her husband's invitation Cecile Vogt arrived in Moscow together with Margarete Woelcke, the Vogts' chief technical assistant at the Berlin institute. In their luggage they carried all the equipment required for the cytoarchitectonical investigation: macrotome, microtome, incubators, Vogt's microscope, paraffin, stains, and chemicals, as well as a large supply of microscope slides with glass covers for specimens. The Lenin Institute found rooms for the laboratories in the Dmitrovka (today Pushkinskaia). Here, between 1925 and 1927, Lenin's brain would be microtomed and the sections stained for microscopic investigation. Since these accommodations were only provisional, Vogt devoted much of his time, apart from laboratory work, to planning a future brain research institute.48 In September 1925 he developed his initial ideas about the organization of the institute and presented them to the medical committee. At this time, he emphasized the importance of a sufficient number of technical assistants and of enough microtomes for them to do their work.

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Vogt set as the first goal the complete processing of the right cerebral hemisphere, defending this decision with the claim that Lenin's right hemisphere had been less subject to a pathological process. A series of adjoining sections were produced; each was to be photographed and then printed using a special procedure. Since each of these steps required special experience and technical skills, Vogt offered to bring one of the photographers from his Berlin institute to Moscow until a qualified Russian photographer could be found. In the interim, the negatives of the photos taken in Moscow would be sent to Berlin to be reproduced from printing plates. The medical committee agreed to most of Vogt's wishes, but insisted that he develop the technical capacities at the Brain Research Institute as quickly as possible in order to secure its autonomy and independence from the Berlin institute. Independence was a high priority. In January 1926, in a letter classified as 'absolutely confidential,' Semashko informed the Politburo that the required instruments and equipment were being purchased in Germany at Soviet expense.49 The technical work, however, was still being performed by only one German laboratory technician (Woelcke). At this point, two of the young physicians assigned to the scientific staff, Semion Aleksandrovich Sarkisov and Isai Davidovich Sapir, having finished their several-months-long postgraduate training at the Berlin Institute for Brain Research, took up their work in Moscow.50 By the time the institute was officially founded in November 1928, four more Russian physicians - the neuropathologist Ivan Nikolaevich Filimonov, Nikolai Semionovich Popov, his wife Idaliia Stankevich Popova, and Aleksei Chernyshev - had received the same training in Berlin.51 Over the next four years they were followed by other members of the first and second generation of the institute's staff.52 Semashko was keen to parlay a project that had political significance into a larger venture. In a letter dated 1 January he proposed that the existing Moscow institute, which had been established to investigate Lenin's brain, be gradually expanded into a general institute for brain research. Since the work on Lenin's brain would take several years and this work involved comparisons with other brains, this expansion could easily take place with little additional effort and expense. This expansion could prepare the ground for further scientific work in the same location. Semashko thus recommended that they immediately 'set about founding an institute for cytoarchitectonical brain research.'53 It is very likely that this idea originated with Vogt. It resonated with Semashko because at the time only one such institute existed in Soviet

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Russia (the brain research institute in Petrograd, founded by Bekhterev in 1918). For a country of Russia's size, two such institutes could hardly be considered a luxury. In a resolution dated 13 November 1928, the Council of Ministers (Sovnarkom) of the RSFSR approved the founding of the Moscow State Brain Research Institute.54 The 'Statutes of the V.I. Lenin Institute for Brain Research' issued by Narkomsdrav RSFSR defined the new institute as 'a scientific research institute ... with all the rights and privileges of the highest scientific institutes' of the Soviet Union.55 Thus, from the beginning it was made clear that even though Vogt was its director, the institute was to be a national (Russian) institute and not a German-Russian joint undertaking.56 Statute §1 declared that the institute's task was to investigate the architectonical characteristics of the cerebral cortex and human racial biology. The institute was thus venturing far beyond the initial specific task assigned to its staff - the investigation of a single brain (Lenin's brain) - and evolving into a general brain research institute like any other in the world, with an emphasis on cerebral architectonics. Over time, the institute's program would come to include the phylogenesis and ontogenesis of the human and vertebrate brain, from fish to primates, as well as neuroanatomy and experimental neurophysiology. After 1928, at the initiative of the Freiburg pathologist Ludwig Aschoff, the institute was assigned the additional task of conducting research on human race biology. In a narrower sense, 'race research,' as the department was nicknamed, was to study the geographical distribution of illnesses and their pathogenesis in climatically and culturally diverse regions. In reality, the German-Russian Laboratory for Comparative Race Pathology (as the unit was known officially) was an independent German-Russian research institute and was affiliated with the brain research institute only at the administrative level. The laboratory investigated selected diseases, such as goiter, stomach ulcers, and liver cirrhosis, among various ethnic groups in relation to their physical and cultural living conditions.57 Its mandate made the laboratory something of a foreign body within the institute. Vogt had incorporated it into the institute in the hope that - after fulfilling the tasks assigned by Aschoff - the laboratory would fall to his institute within a few years. The professional competence of his staff would them enable them to tackle the then still unresolved question of whether the brain had race-specific characteristics. It was to their advantage to have this topic listed in the institute's statutes! After 1928, the brain research institute was organized into two main

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departments, the brain research department (with the anatomical and anatomical-physiological laboratories) and the race biology department. Both departments had access to histology, photography, and collotype printing as service departments or groups (II, §4 from the institute statutes). Four years later, the institute, following the example of the Berlin brain research institute, added an electrophysiological department for research on electroencephalography. The museum, with its collection of ontogenetic and phylogenetic evolutionary series of animal and human brains, as well as its 'Pantheon of Brains' (a collection of brains from eminent Russian politicians, artists, and scientists), was built up over the years after the institute's founding. The term 'pantheon of brains' was coined by Bekhterev in 1927 for his collection of elite brains in the Leningrad Brain Institute. After Bekhterev's death in December 1927, Vogt appropriated the term for the Moscow institute. At about this time, Semashko proposed that the Leningrad pantheon be transferred to Moscow and added to the collection at the Moscow institute. This would concentrate the elite brain collection at a single location - a location, moreover, where the collection and investigation of elite brains had begun with Lenin's brain.58 The date of the transfer of the elite brains archived in Leningrad to the pantheon in Moscow is not known. However, it was most likely shortly before 5 March 1930 when Nikolai Popov notified Vogt, his boss, in Berlin that the Brain Institute had 'become a monopolist' in the Soviet Union in collecting brains from the famous deceased.59 A 1933 statute for the Brain Institute outlined the task of the pantheon as follows: The institute holds a pantheon of brains from significant persons from politics, science, literature, and art. Among the tasks of the Pantheon is to store the brains, as well as to collect and store all available materials characterizing the deceased person, publish the collected materials, and organize exhibitions for the purpose of popularizing the work of the deceased. Furthermore, the materials collected in the Pantheon are indispensable for the cytoarchitectonical investigation of brains from deceased celebrities.'60 Identical or Fraternal Twins In 1931 the Moscow institute had a relatively modest structure and was limited to the bare strategic essentials for an evolving general brain research program. In sharp contrast, its twin institute in Berlin, after a three-year preliminary phase, had ten to twelve departments.61 Only

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several years later, thanks to the application of cytoarchitectonical research methods, would it begin to resemble its Berlin twin, which by then, ironically, no longer existed. A snapshot of the twin institutes in 1929 reveals two important differences in their research agendas. The main task of both was to investigate normal and pathological human brains as well as various animal brains at different stages of phylogenetic and ontogenetic development. Only in some specific aspects were their research programs different: • At the Brain Institute, research on the 'elite' brains of exceptional people such as artists, scientists, and members of the political and economic elite had priority, notwithstanding the egalitarian ideology of the Bolsheviks. The initial focus on the investigation of Lenin's brain resonated with a deeply rooted veneration for authority in the Russian mentality and the predilection for genealogical investigation of prominent Russians and their families. In the 1930s, elite brain research in the Soviet Union fell into disrepute (probably not least because of the highly critical response to some reports in Russian newspapers in 1927 and 1929 and to Vogt's own first publication of the results of the investigation on Lenin's brain), after which it was conducted only in secret. At the Berlin institute, elite brain research was also carried out - depending on opportunity and supply - but there, it came nowhere near to attaining the importance it had in Moscow. In Berlin the Vogts only occasionally investigated elite brains; the last of these was the brain of Vogt's Swiss teacher, August Forel, who died in 1931.62 • At the Brain Institute, 'racial brain' research was of special importance for methodological reasons. Brain researchers considered investigations of racial brains necessary for as long as they assumed that factors of race could determine relevant differences in brain anatomy. The fact that the Soviet Union of the 1920s was home to more than two hundred ethnic groups made it ideally suited for such investigations. By the 1930s, such research could no longer be pursued because the term 'race' had become tainted by association with the fascist racial ideology; racial pathology was being disparaged as a pseudo-scientific endeavour. So this question remained open until 1964, when Sarkisov, declared unreservedly that research on racial brains at his institute and worldwide had found no racial-specific differences in the construction of the human brain, since individual variations outweighed all other differences.63 In Berlin, brains of dif-

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ferent nationalities or ethnic groups were so rare (because of the relative homogeneity of the German population) that it made no sense to establish a special research project on this question. The institutes differed not only in their research preoccupations, but also in their areas of technical expertise. The Berlin institute, which had been in existence since the beginning of the century, boasted a range of technical departments to which its twin in Moscow - preoccupied as it was with the study of Lenin's brain, and hobbled by scarce resources could only aspire. This unevenness in expertise paved the way for exchanges of personnel and a division of labour. To illustrate: The anatomical (cytoarchitectonical) laboratory in Berlin was vital to the painstaking cytoarchitectonical training of the scientific personnel of the Moscow institute. One by one, all scientific members of the anatomical laboratory at the Brain Institute were trained in the techniques of architectonical evaluation of brain cuts at Vogt's institute in Berlin.64 In the process, personal relationships were forged between the personnel of the two institutes, paving the path for smooth collaboration. The experimental-physiological laboratory in Berlin bloomed in 1930-1, soon after the laboratory adopted electroencephalography (discovered by Hans Berger in 1929) and made it applicable to architectonical brain research. In Moscow no counterpart existed until 1932. Its creation on the Berlin model at that point enabled Russian researchers to focus on the bioelectrical activity of the cerebral cortex and its application to architectonical research. Once introduced, electroencephalography spread throughout the USSR. Following the Berlin model, the Moscow institute established its own collection of vertebrate central nervous systems and brain cuttings, ranging from chordates, fish, amphibians, reptiles, and birds to mammals. For ideological reasons this collection very soon became much bigger and more important than the one in Berlin. Much more than a mere store of specimens, it was a phyletic museum with the pedagogical tasks of teaching 'atheist materialism' and Darwinism. It became a Mecca for school classes, platoons of soldiers, and workers' brigades. A museum workshop was added to produce models, panoramas, charts, and slides for visual presentations. After being fitted out with the latest visual and graphic equipment, the photographic and reprographic department came close to the

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technical standard of the Berlin institute. The same was true of its personnel, once the Russian photographers and lithographers had completed several months' training under Ernst Heyse, the director of the photographic department at the Berlin institute. The administration of these institutes was complex. Vogt was able to direct the Moscow Brain Institute during his visits to that city. In the interims, his Russian deputy Sarkisov took over. In 1925, Vogt visited Moscow several times, each time for a few weeks; in later years his visits were limited to official occasions such as the institute's opening ceremonies and consultations with the medical commission. He also visited in 1927 and in 1929 to give a report. By the time he visited the Moscow Brain Institute (together with Ludwig Aschoff) for the last time in September 1930, his influence had largely diminished because the institute had by then been incorporated into the Communist Academy. As the breaks between visits grew longer and longer, Vogt began to direct the institute from his desk in Berlin. Often he used the Russian personnel who visited his Berlin institute frequently for study purposes - to carry reports to him and to pass on his decisions to Moscow. Frequent telephone calls and an extensive correspondence attest to Vogt's constant willingness to tend to the needs of the Russian institute. Vogt's most important and successful scientific researchers were Semion Aleksandrovich Sarkisov and Ivan Nikolaevich Filimonov, both of whom later became highly respected members of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences. Well educated and trained at Russian medical universities and clinics, these researchers were politically safe candidates who could easily be integrated into the collaboration model envisioned by Vogt. Sarkisov was only thirty-one years old in 1926 when he was appointed to work at the Brain Institute. Having joined the Communist Party at an early age, he was considered ideologically reliable, so he was appointed Vogt's deputy as well as the institute's administrative director. As a native Armenian, he had a charming manner that made him a trustworthy partner in negotiations with the Germans. Sarkisov preferred research in electroencephalography and headed the institute's experimental-physiological laboratory. In 1936 he succeeded Vogt as director of the Moscow institute - a post he retained until his death in 1971. Filimonov, five years older than Sarkisov, joined the institute at the end of 1927. In contrast to most of his younger colleagues, Filimonov

Berlin and Moscow Brain Research Institutes 345 already had a few significant scientific achievements to his credit before being appointed to the institute. Filimonov primarily investigated the phylogenesis and ontogenesis of the central nervous system and contributed greatly towards answering questions about the individual variability of the human cerebral cortex. He directed the morphological (anatomical-histological) department at the Brain Institute and held the position of deputy director alongside Sarkisov. In this early phase, four scientific researchers - Sapir, the Popovs, and A.S. Chernyshev - were entrusted with work on the architectonics of the cerebral cortex of mammals, on methodological problems such as the exact measurement of the convex surfaces of the brain cortex, and on methodological problems involving the origins of preparational artefacts and their avoidance. Their trustworthiness proved their undoing. To illustrate, Sapir - a well known behavioural researcher in Russian psychology - was one of the few members of the Communist Party at the institute; nevertheless, he fell victim to one of the first Stalinist purges. In 1930 he was exiled from Moscow to Mogilev; most likely he spent the years until after the Second World War in a Siberian prison camp.65 Popov, seven years older than Sarkisov, had joined the Bolsheviks even before the October Revolution. As an 'old Communist/ he was highly respected. While studying medicine, he had worked for a long time as an 'orderly' at Lenin's sickbed in Gorki. For this reason, he was later considered for a position at the institute. For the very same reason, he was probably - along with Sapir - one of the first workers at the institute to suffer during the political reprisals of the 1930s. When appointed, Popov had neglected to mention that his father was a priest and that he himself was not the child of a worker or peasant. As punishment, he was sent in 1930 to work in medical services in Alma Ata in Turkestan.66 He died in a Soviet prison in 1938.67 A document dating from 1933 provides us with information about the personnel at the institute.68 According to it, the institute employed a total of six scientific researchers in 1928 and 1929. There were seven in 1930; then, during the 'period of turmoil' between 1930 and 1932, the institute made a quantum leap to twelve researchers (eight men, four women), most of them between twenty-five and forty years old. Six of them were of petit bourgeois background, two descended from workers, and two from peasants; another two researchers traced their families back to the aristocracy. In 1933 the institute employed a total of forty-five scientific and technical personnel, thirteen of whom were scientists.6Q

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The same document describes the schedules and duties of the scientific personnel. The official working hours for employees were from nine in the morning to four in the afternoon; in practice, however, they often worked until six or even eight in the evening. The schedule tells us that up to four-and-a-half hours a day were allotted to performing Party tasks (in 1932, four scientific researchers belonged to the Communist Party). Unfortunately, it is not clear whether this figure referred to the time required overall of all Party members or of each Party member! Of course, Party members were at least expected to attend the monthly trade union meetings, and the younger employees, those up to age, twenty-five were expected to participate in Komsomol (Communist Youth Association) events. Furthermore, the institute's employees were all members of, or were at least required to participate in, the Varnitso (All-Union Association of Scientists and Technicians for the Realization of Socialist Development in the USSR), the Osoviakhim (Society for National Defence), and the OPR ('socially useful labour,' such as helping with harvests), Saturday workdays, as well as in groups for studying Leninism, dialectical materialism, and so forth.70 Salaries for scientific personnel ranged from 300 rubles (for Sarkisov and Filimonov) to 225 rubles for the younger assistants. Laboratory technicians received between 150 and 100 rubles. The janitor was paid 80 rubles, the doorman 50 rubles.71 (It is possible that the differences in payment within a single category were connected with differences in working hours, but the document furnishes no information in this regard.) The Berlin institute was financed by the state, by contributions from supporting members of the KWG, and by donations as well as by Vogt's fees for his services as a physician. In contrast, the Moscow Brain Institute depended entirely on the state. The financial means for the institute's facilities and the annual budget came solely from the budget of the RSFSR Public Health Commisariat and later (after 1932) from the budget of the Central Executive Committee (TsIK).72 The institute did not use German financial resources - with one exception. The Foreign Office in Berlin approved 10,000 RM as a one-time donation for purchasing German specialist literature for the library at the Moscow Brain Institute, and the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft added another 5,000 RM to this amount.73 Of course, whenever necessary the Berlin institute offered its Moscow counterpart aid in the form of perquisites - for example, it trained its personnel in Berlin, helped it set up the photographic laboratory, and trained Russian

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photographers in Moscow under Ernst Heyse, the director of the photographic laboratory in Berlin. It also purchased literature, consulted in the matter of purchasing equipment, and so forth. On the other hand, the financing of the German-Russian Laboratory for Race Pathology was shared by both sides. The German contribution, divided equally between the Foreign Office and the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft, covered the costs (40,000 RM) for furniture, laboratory equipment, chemicals, non-durable materials, and the library. The Germans also paid the costs for German employees to travel between Germany and Russia as well as room and board for the German pathologists. The Russian contribution (yearly the equivalent in rubles of 4,000 RM, from the budget of the Public Health Commissariat) paid the substantial travel costs for medical expeditions within the country, the wages for the Russian assistants, and the operating costs (rent, heating, cleaning, gas, electricity, and water) for the laboratory.74 Just as important as the financial bonds between the two institutes was the journal that they shared, the Journal fur Psychologic und Neurologic, edited by Vogt. Though edited in Berlin, between 1928 and 1934 (volumes 36 to 43) the journal carried the subtitle 'Organ of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research, the Neurobiological Institute of the University of Berlin, and the Institute for Brain Research Moscow.' After the Neurobiological Institute closed in 1931, the journal's subtitle was revised to 'Organ of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research Berlin-Buch and the Institute for Brain Research Moscow.' Inter-Institute Collaboration: The Binding Effects of 'Object No. V When the Moscow Brain Institute was founded in November 1928, its structure was compatible enough with that of the Berlin Institute for Brain Research that collaboration between the two institutes was possible. Notwithstanding the official rhetoric about the importance of Soviet-German cooperation, there were constraints: as a state institute of the Soviet Union, the Moscow institute was required to possess a degree of autonomy that ruled out a lasting dependency on its Berlin twin. The dynamics of collaboration were set out first in Oskar Vogt's 'First Report on the Work of the Moscow Institute for Brain Research/ which was based on a lecture he delivered on 10 November 1929 in the Pantheon of that institute. Central to Vogt's report were the (still scant) results of his microscopic investigations of sections from Lenin's brain

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(carried out in Moscow) and the examination of the microphotographs sent to Berlin. In his own words, he declared: 'In layer III of the brain cortex, in many cortical areas, especially in the deeper regions of this layer, I found pyramidal cells of a size I have never before observed and in a number that I have never before observed.'75 On the basis of this observation, he concluded that 'our brain anatomical results show Lenin to have been a mental athlete.' This judgment, the gist of which Vogt had delivered two years earlier,76 elicited confusion and some derision in the scientific community.77 In the 1929 report, Vogt linked the scientific progress made to the unfolding interaction between the Moscow and Berlin institutes. With the benefit of hindsight, he distinguished three phases in the work. In the first phase, which encompassed the years 1925,1926, and the first half of 1927, Lenin's brain was dissected into a complete paraffin series.78 Personnel from both institutes participated in this at first predominantly technical work.79 In this period, Vogt recalled, the Germans had to teach their Russian colleagues the sophisticated cytoarchitectonical cutting and staining techniques.80 The second period spanned the latter half of 1927, when Oskar Vogt carried out 'the first examination of Lenin's brain,' for the most part in Berlin, but also during his stay in Moscow in November 1927.81 In this phase, the Russians were genuinely helpful: the many microphotographs of the brain specimens taken in Moscow were of considerable value. More important, by this point, after several month-long stays in Berlin, Sarkisov, Filimonov, Sapir, and the married couple PopovStankevich had completed their training in architectonical brain research under Vogt and his Berlin colleagues and had begun to assist in the investigations of sections of Lenin's brain. Vogt could now point in his reports to the scientific contributions of his Moscow students and connect them specifically with the results on Lenin's brain. These contributions included architectonical results that could 'serve as comparative material for the architectonical characterization of Lenin's brain' as well as results capable of 'furthering the physiological significance of the architectonical results in Lenin's brain.'82 If the two phases prior to 1929 were dedicated to the 'preliminary treatment of Lenin's brain,' the third phase was devoted to carrying out 'preliminary work for extensive investigations of Lenin's brain.' This preliminary work, which consisted of the collection of material as well as scientific investigations, was planned to be 'so far advanced in spring 1930 that more detailed investigations of Lenin's brain (analyz-

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ing and photographing the cortical sections under the microscope and then using these to map the brain's areas) could begin.'83 The material collection included both 'elite brains' and brains from different races living in the Soviet Union, which were to be dissected into series of sections.'84 In fact, this collection was well underway when Vogt wrote his report. In 1929, Vogt could boast that the collection had received an additional thirteen elite brains, bringing the total (including Lenin's) to fourteen. Among these were the brains of the Armenian composer Aleksandr Afanasievich Spendiarov, the physician and politician Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Bogdanov, the publicist Ivan Ivanovich Skvortsov-Stepanov, and Lenin's friend and comrade-in-arms Aleksandr Dmitrievich Ziurupa, as well as Vogt's first Russian colleague, the recently deceased neurologist Grigorii Ivanovich Rossolimo. By 1936, when the Moscow Brain Institute gave its final report on the results of the investigation on Lenin's brain, many other brains had been added to this collection. In tandem with the study of Lenin's brain, for the sake of comparison, studies were carried out on the brains of the Russian poet Vladimir Vladimirovich Maiakovskii, the politician Anatolii Lunacharskii, the German politician Clara Zetkin, and the Leningrad physiologist and Nobel Prize winner Ivan Petrovich Pavlov, among others.85 The single most important aspect of the preliminary work was what Vogt called the 'methodological investigations.' To compare different brains, each had to undergo the same preliminary treatment. Since this was not always possible, Sarkisov examined the differences in the swellings and folds of the brain caused by various technical treatments and arrived at figures that could be used to correct the variations caused by technique. These investigations were of great significance not only for the work in Moscow, but also for the work of the Berlin Brain Research Institute. Indeed, Idaliia and Nikolai Popov, together with Isai Sapir, concentrated on improving the Berlin institute's methods for measuring cortical areas and came up with results that were subsequently applied at both institutes. Vogt viewed the work on Lenin's brain as a template for every branch of anatomical brain research. But he was always alert and receptive to the potential implications of other brain research that might advance the study of Lenin's brain. An excellent case in point was Filimonov's findings on children's brains.86 Filimonov had 'identified three significant facts' in cortical layer III: first, 'layer III grows by pyr-

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amidizing the cells of layer II at the expense of layer III'; second, 'layer III develops late ontogenetically'; and lastly, he discovered 'cell degeneration ... nowhere in II-VII layers of the isocortex' - the youngest part of the cortex in terms of evolution. Vogt concluded that 'the proven incidence of larger cells in layer III of Lenin's brain is therefore a progressive phenomenon/87 Since human intellect had developed in recent evolutionary times, the identification of special structural characteristics in the most recently evolved part of the cortex was powerful evidence of high intellectual performance. Filimonov's findings, therefore, became one of the strongest arguments in Vogt's first.report as well as later on in the Brain Institute's final report. In the conclusion to his report, Vogt gave credit to his young Russian colleagues for their preliminary work, which had turned the Moscow institute into 'a centre for resolving the most critical problems in brain research.'88 He also paid tribute to Semashko, who had always shown 'the utmost understanding for all the institute's needs.' Collaboration under Strain, 1930-1932 In 1927-8, Soviet-German scientific relations, which had exhibited great vigour and variety, peaked. In no small part, the downturn that followed was caused by the international economic crisis, which greatly increased the expense of maintaining in Russia joint projects such as the German-Russian Laboratory for Race Pathology. Germany grew more reluctant to bear the rising costs.89 But economic stringency was not the entire story. Equally important if not more so, within both Germany and Russia, prevailing political conditions that had long supported scientific cooperation were changing. Having finally secured admission to the League of Nations, Germany was orienting its foreign interests more firmly towards the West. Relations with the Soviet Union were no longer a vital means of exerting pressure on Western nations. Concurrently, by the late 1920s, Soviet Russia had become something of an 'incompatible ally.' Domestic political changes in the Soviet Union were imposing frustrating conditions on German partners and making collaboration difficult and dangerous. The New Economic Policy (1921-8) was followed by the draconian measures of rapid industrialization and forced collectivization of agriculture. The 'Great Turn' saw every sphere of life marked by the distinction between 'friends' and 'enemies.' In the new, poisoned atmosphere, international collabo-

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ration was seriously constrained: all previous political guarantees of mutually beneficial German-Russian collaboration were in effect eliminated. Many of the leading scientific figures in the collaboration fell victim to the Stalinist purges. In 1930, Semashko and Gorbunov, like Ol'denburg and Lunacharskii a year earlier, lost their political offices to functionaries loyal to the party line. The Moscow Brain Institute was not immune to these winds of change. Vogt's November 1929 visit to the institute proved to be his last official one. At that point he learned that the Soviet government intended to terminate its status as a scientific institute of the Commissariat of Public Health and to subordinate it to the Communist Academy.90 Semashko assured Vogt that the change was purely organizational and would have no effect on the contract concluded with him. Since the institute was a Soviet one, not a German-Russian joint undertaking, Vogt had no grounds on which to object.91 Assurances notwithstanding, the takeover of the institute by the Communist Academy in March 1930 deprived Vogt of any influence over its subsequent fate. The transfer of the institute to the Communist Academy - an attempt to assert political control over it - heavily influenced and disturbed the international collaboration. Under the Communist Academy, the institute entered a downward spiral: initially operated as an independent institute, by 1932 it had been integrated as a morphological department into the Institute for Higher Nervous Activity, run by the Communist Academy. At that point, Vogt, now superfluous, was vehemently attacked in the Soviet press by the president of the Natural Science Department at the Communist Academy, Ernest G. Korman.92 For reasons that cannot be ascertained, the Brain Institute was resurrected after a two-year hiatus. Vogt always credited the revival to his protests;93 more likely, however, a temporary softening in the spring of 1932 of the hard ideological line in the Soviet Union made possible for a short time at least - new, more reasonable arrangements. Whatever the case, on 13 April 1932 the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party passed resolutions to re-establish the institute as an independent one and offered to reappoint Vogt as its director.94 On 7 May 1932 the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee (TsIK) ordered that the institute be re-established and incorporated into the association of scientific institutes maintained by its scientific committee. This entailed its transfer out of the jurisdiction of the Communist Academy. On 22 May 1932 the Natural Science Association of

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the Communist Academy issued the order to release the former Institute for Brain Research from the Psychoneurological Institute and to restore its independent status.95 In extensive letters addressed to Viacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov, the head of the USSR Council of People's Commissars (Sovnarkom),96 Avel' Safronovich Enukidze, the Secretary of TsIK USSR,97 and Anatolii Vasilievich Lunacharskii, head of the Scientific Committee,98 Vogt welcomed the measures and promised all possible support from Berlin, but not once did he mention the offer to reappoint him as director. His experience with Soviet authorities made the prospect unattractive, but political considerations made outright refusal inadvisable. The question was left unresolved. Privately, Vogt considered himself released from the matter; the Soviet government formally kept him on as the institute's director, while entrusting economic and disciplinary matters to Sarkisov, with Filimonov serving as Sarkisov's scientific deputy. The Final Report on Lenin's Brain (1936) The Moscow Brain Institute emerged from the two years of turmoil stronger than before. In 1929 it had employed only six workers; by May 1932 it had twenty, including six scientists, seven laboratory technicians, and two photographers.99 General neuroanatomical and neurophysiological investigations and research on the ontogenetic and phylogenetic developmental processes of the human and animal brain became once again the central focus of the institute. Benefiting from its informal relations with the Berlin institute - which had never really been interrupted - it made progress in setting up a neurophysiological department and soon achieved significant results in EEC research. From its founding, the new department was able to take advantage of a high-performance measuring device, the neurograph, which had been developed not long before at the Berlin institute by Jan Friedrich Tonnies.100 The revived institute saw one fundamental change: the investigation of Lenin's brain and elite-brain research in general were no longer included in the list of the institute's research areas. The collection of elite brains, however, remained on the list.101 Quietly and on the side, the institute's personnel determinedly pursued the work on Lenin's brain, concluding their investigations more or less in 1936. The submission of the final report was more an act of state than a scientific event. On 27 May 1936 the Soviet head of state Mikhail Kalinin

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informed the Politburo of the content of the final report on the investigation of Lenin's brain. This document, signed by the deputy director of the Moscow institute, Sarkisov, summarized in six printed pages the results of the investigations conducted since 1925. The report referred to a material collection consisting of 15 photographic albums, each with 50 microphotographs, and an explanatory text of more than 150 printed pages.102 In the reports, Vogt's Russian colleagues noted the prominence of the frontal region in Lenin's brain ('the frontal region in the brain of Vladimir Il'ich occupies 25.5% of the entire surface, in the brain of Skvortsov-Stepanov 24.0%, and in the brain of Maiakovskii 23.5%'). The report's authors touted the significance of these results, arguing that the frontal region, just like the lower parietal lobe, was of major importance for the higher nervous functions.103 These results confirmed Vogt's initial findings from the years 1927 and 1929 about 'Lenin's genius.' It is noteworthy that the results detailed in the final report were provided only as comparative quantities, and that comparisons were made only to other elite brains. References to 'normal brains' were missing. Furthermore, the correlation of anatomical results with Lenin's personality characteristics, which Vogt had intended to pursue, was left out. Lastly, Vogt's endeavours to carry out a comparison with brains from other ethnic groups - that is, with 'race brains' (Vogt's own term) - were omitted. These reports have since vanished - labelled 'sovershenno sekretno'104 (absolutely confidential) - into the Kremlin's safes. The Price of International Engagement The political winds in the Soviet Union took a turn unfavourable to international collaboration in the late 1920s and early 1930s. In Germany, too, an ill wind began to blow in January 1933, when the National Socialists came to power. In the months before 30 January 1933, the National Socialists and the Communists in the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research in Berlin-Buch coexisted peacefully, but this peace came to an end when Hitler seized power.105 At the time, the institute employed around one hundred workers, four of whom were members of the Communist Party and seven of whom belonged to the NSDAP. The political spectrum of the institute's personnel thus ranged from far left to far right.106 The institute was now the scene of bitter political battles; as suspicions and denunciations circulated wildly, every previously concealed difference erupted. It seems that Vogt's

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many activities - especially his relations with Soviet Russia and his employment of numerous Jewish, Russian, and Polish workers - had long been the object of careful observation by 'National Socialistminded' colleagues and employees within and outside the institute. In March and June of 1933, the Berlin-Buch institute was repeatedly raided by SA storm troopers, who, under the pretext of hunting for an underground member of the Communist International, searched Vogt's private apartment and arbitrarily hauled institute employees to interrogations in their headquarters and torture chambers.107 In later years, frequent but futile attempts were made to remove Vogt by terminating his post as institute director.108 In fairness, it must be noted that given his interest in eugenics and his social Darwinist tendencies, Vogt was not entirely unreceptive to National Socialist health doctrine and initially expressed his readiness to see 'unsuspected opportunities' in the new Reich.109 Nevertheless, he quickly came to realize - well in advance of most of his colleagues and the Germans generally - that 'National Socialism is an unexplored toxic bacillus. Hitler is an uneducated man, and the party consists of murderers and criminals.'110 The protests raised by the National Socialists against Vogt ran from 'abetting Communist activities' at his institute to accusations of being a communist himself. In a letter from the secret police to the Reich Ministry of the Interior, Vogt's contemptuous statements about National Socialism, 'his repeated favourable treatment of Jews, ... tacit permission of Communist propaganda, and employment of foreigners' became the subject of state police investigations.111 Most notably, Vogt's engagement in strengthening Soviet-German medical relations and his investigation of Lenin's brain were a thorn in the Nazis' side. Vogt repeatedly had to defend himself against rumours circulating in the press that his Berlin Institute for Brain Research was 'modelled after' the Moscow institute! While the accusation against Vogt of being a communist ultimately had to be dropped on the grounds that it was inadmissible in court, the Reich Ministry of Education decided in 1935, in view of the facts ascertained thus far, that Vogt 'was not the proper man to head a large and significant institute in the spirit of a national socialist state.'112 The campaign of vilification hit its target. After November 1934, Vogt was able to direct the institute only as a 'commissioner.' Effective 1 October 1935, he was retired 'by virtue of the law' from his function as 'department head of the Neurobiological Laboratory' (long defunct,

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since the laboratory had been transferred to the KWI for Brain Research in 1931). Faced with these circumstances, Vogt decided to leave the institute and continue his work in an 'institute for brain research and biology' that was being established for him and his wife in Neustadt. It would be two years before his designated successor, Hugo Spatz, a neuropathologist and a loyal National Socialist, took over his official duties in Berlin-Buch on 1 April 1937.113 For the KWI for Brain Research, Vogt's release from office meant a break with tradition in every respect. Brain cytoarchitectonics no longer figured in the research agenda of the institute; Spatz preferred neuropathology, whose department he entrusted in 1938 to prosector Julius Hallervorden from Brandenburg. After 1940, Hallervorden knowingly accepted for research purposes the brains from at least five hundred patients murdered as part of the National Socialist euthanasia program; in doing so, he exposed the institute to accusations of complicity in the murder of ill people.114 The appointment of the neurosurgeon Wilhelm Tonnis in 1937 as deputy director of the newly created department for experimental pathology and tumour research triggered another fundamental change in the research profile of the KWI for Brain Research. With the outbreak of the Second World War, the institute was for all practical purposes turned into a research clinic for air force pilots and other flight personnel with head and brain injuries. Research on war-related brain injuries - for example, on the effects of oxygen deficiency resulting from high-altitude flights - became the new focus of the institute. In 1944 the research clinic had to be evacuated and was converted into a military hospital for brain injuries. Basic research was pushed to the background in favour of the pressing need to provide medical care to the injured. As the air raids on Berlin intensified, entire departments of the KWI for Brain Research were evacuated to other German cities. Only the department for experimental genetics, which had become independent after Vogt's departure, was left behind, under the directorship of Timofeev-Resovskii. When the war ended, the Red Army initially put Timofeev-Resovskii in charge of the remnants of the former KWI for Brain Research in Berlin-Buch. In September he was taken to the Soviet Union; he was arrested there on 10 October 1945, charged with collaborating with the Nazis. The High Military Court of the USSR sentenced him to ten years in a concentration camp. This conviction sealed the decline of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research and ended the era of Soviet-German scientific cooperation.

356 Jochen Richter The Divided Twins

The vestiges of the brain research institutes that are at the centre of this story are visible even today. In Moscow, on Obukh Lane, the Russian Brain Research Institute, with its focus on cytoarchitectonics, still unmistakably reflects Vogt's conceptual signature.115 In Berlin-Buch, the imposing buildings of the former Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research have been integrated into the campus of the Max Delbriick Centre for Molecular Medicine.116 Each of these institutes has become an integral part of the landscape of scientific institutions in its own country. At one time, they had been joined at the hip. Looking back at the brain research institutes he had founded in Berlin and Moscow, Oskar Vogt wrote in 1932: In my opinion, the Moscow and Berlin brain research institutes constitute a collective (a working group). This concept is meant to express that both institutes worked on the same problems, but they applied a division of labour so that research efforts would not be duplicated; instead, the work of the one supported the other/117 It had been Vogt's dream as early as 1912 to create a network of institutes. In its details, the story of the Berlin and Moscow institutes was political in a way that Vogt might not have imagined. Like other SovietGerman engagements, the collaboration of the two brain institutes was forged and sealed in the 'spirit of Rapallo' between Germany and Soviet Russia; like other joint German-Soviet ventures, the contract that defined the terms of the cooperation in brain research involved a carefully calculated trade of asymmetrical 'goods' - the Germans gained access to a diverse Soviet subject population in exchange for Soviet access to German skills and equipment. But unlike other joint ventures, the collaboration between the Moscow and Berlin institutes was galvanized by the opportunity to study scientifically a political object - the brain of a political leader whose activities had changed the landscape of Europe. NOTES 1 Cf. Brigitte Schroder-Gudehus, 'Deutsche Wissenschaft und Internationale Zusammenarbeit 1914-1928' PhD dissertation, Universite de Geneve, 1966). 2 Gustav Hilger, The Incompatible Allies: A Memoir-History of German-Soviet Relations, 1918-1941 (New York: Macmillan, 1953).

Berlin and Moscow Brain Research Institutes 357 3 Giinter Rosenfeld, Sowjetunion und Deutschland 1922-1933 (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1984), 187. 4 Vogt's institute was the third in the series of brain research institutes established in Europe at the turn of the last century. The two predecessors of the Berlin Neurologische Zentralstation were the first institutes of their kind: the Neurological Institute of the University of Vienna, founded in 1882 by Heinrich Obersteiner, and, the Brain Anatomy Institute, opened by Constantin von Monakow in Zurich in 1886. Also, the Leipzig Psychiatric University Clinic, opened in 1882, successfully carried out myelogeneticoriented architectonic brain research under the guidance of Vogt's teacher, Paul Flechsig. 5 For more on the history of the Berlin Brain Research Institute and on the biography of Oskar Vogt, see J. Richter, 'Das Kaiser Wilhelm Institut fur Hirnforschung und die Topographic der Grosshirnrinde. Ein Beitrag zur Institutsgeschichte der Kaiser Wilhelm-Gesellschaft und zur Geschichte der architektonischen Hirnforschung/ in Bernhard vom Brocke and Hubert Laitko, eds., Die Kaiser-Wilhelm-/Max-Planck-Gesellschaft und ihre Institute. Studien zu ihrer Geschichte: Das Harnack-Prinzip (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter-Verlag, 1996), 349-408; Helga Satzinger, Die Geschichte der genetisch orientierten Hirnforschung von Cecile und Oskar Vogt in der Zeit von 1895 bis ca. 1927 (= Braunschweiger Veroffentlichungen zur Geschichte der Pharmazie und der Naturwissenschaften, ed. Erika Hickel, vol. 41) (Stuttgart: Deutscher Apotheker Verlag, 1998). 6 For more on the history of the Moscow Brain Research Institute, see J. Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos. Eine Chronik zur medizinischen Biographie Lenins und zur Geschichte der Elitegehirnforschung in Dokumenten. A Study in Cooperation with the Stalin Era Research and Archives Project of the University of Toronto (Ontario). (= Neuere Medizin- und Wissenschaftsgeschichte - Quellen und Studien, vol. 8, ed. Wolfgang U. Eckart) (Herbolzheim: Centaurus Verlag, 2000). Extracts from this book - translated into Russian - were published in the Russian journal Znanie-sila 1 (2004): 60-70. 7 B.Sh. Nuvakhov, I.E. Karneeva, and lu.A. Shilinis, Istoki, khronologiia i dinamika struktury Rossiiskoi akademii meditsinskikh nauk (Moscow: Izdatel'stvo 'Agraf,' 1995), 128,132,179. 8 J. Richter, The Brain Commission of the International Association of Academies: The First International Society of Neurosciences/ Brain Research Bulletin 52, no. 6 (2000): 445-57. 9 Ibid., 450-1. 10 Vogt's patron Krupp von Bohlen Halbach, son-in-law of the late Friedrich Alfred Krupp, was one of the founding members of the Kaiser Wilhelm

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Gesellschaft. He donated 400,000 marks for the foundation of the KWG, signalling Vogt simultaneously that he could dispose a sum of 1,000,000 marks for the creation of a KWG brain research institute. Cf. J. Richter, 'Das Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut/ 367-8. Oskar Vogt, 'Bedeutung, Ziele und Wege der Hirnforschung/ Nord und Sud, 36. Jhg, Bd 140 (1912), Erstes Februarheft: 309-14. O. Vogt, 'Uber Forscher und Organisation der Forschung,' Nord und Slid (Russian special issue!), 37. Jhg, Bd 143 (1912), Dezemberheft: 346-57. Archiv der MPG (Max-Planck-Gesellschaft Archives) in Berlin-Dahlem, I. Abt., Rep. 1 A, no. 1221, fol. 153. O. Vogt, Response to the question from the Prussian Ministry of Education and the Arts, 30 April 1911 (Antwort auf die Frage des Preussischen Kultusministeriums. Berlin, 30 April 1911). At the time when Vogt's private institute was nationalized in 1902, the annual budget for maintaining the institute was 29,150 marks, of which 6,550 marks were for personnel costs and 22,600 marks for material costs. The value of the equipment and instruments purchased when the institute was founded as well as the scientific collections of the Neurobiological Laboratory were estimated at 50,000 marks. Vogt estate in the C. und O. VogtInstitut fur Hirnforschung GmbH Diisseldorf (henceforth NL Vogt). Letter from the Minister for Cultural Affairs to F.A. Krupp on 19 April 1901, and letter from F.A. Krupp to the Minister on 30 April 1901. Vogt estate in NL Vogt). O. Vogt, Neurobiologische Arbeiten. Erste Serie: Beitrage zur Hirnfaserlehre. 1. Bd, I. Zur Erforschung der Hirnfaserung (Jena: G. Fischer-Verlag, 1902). Constantin von Economo, 'Wie sollen wir Elitegehirne verarbeiten?' Zeitschrift fur die gesamte Neurologie und Psychiatric 121, no. 3 (1929): 323-68, and no. 4: 374-6. K. Brodmann, 'Zwei neue Apparate zur Paraffinserientechnik/ Journal fur Psychologie und Neurologie (henceforth JPsN) 3 (1902): 169; O. Vogt, 'Das Pantomikrotom des Neurobiologischen Laboratoriums/ JPsN 6 (1905/6): 121-5. K. Brodmann, 'Beitrage zur histologischen Lokalisation der Grosshirnrinde. VI. Mitteil, Die Cortexgliederung des Menschen/ JPsN 10 (1907): 231-46; K. Brodmann, Vergleichende Lokalisation der Grosshirnrinde (Leipzig: Johann Ambrosius Barth, 1909), 130-65. K. Brodmann, Vergleichende Lokalisationslehre der Grosshirnrinde (Leipzig: Johann Ambrosius Barth, 1909). Cecile und Oskar Vogt, 'Zur Kenntnis der elektrisch erregbaren Hirnrindengebiete/ JPsN 8 (1907), Erg.-Heft: 277-456. Neurophysiological research at the institute reached its height when Oskar Vogt temporarily cultivated a close exchange of ideas with the Breslau neurologist and neurosurgeon Otfried Foerster after the First World War. As a

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neurosurgeon, Foerster had had the opportunity to conduct diagnostically based experiments with weak (faradic) currencies on the exposed brains of soldiers with head injuries. He was thus able to confirm the stimulus effects observed by Cecile and Oskar Vogt in various areas of the ape brain which Vogt had projected onto the architectonical homology of a human brain map - and ascertain the 'practically astonishing' correspondence between the Vogts' observations in animal experiments and his (Foerster's) experiments on human patients. C. Vogt, 'Quelques considerations generates a propos du syndrome du corps strie'; C.S. Freund and C. Vogt, 'Fin neuer Fall von Etat marbre des Corpus stratum/ JPsN 18 (1911), Erg.-Heft 4: 479-88,489-500. O. Vogt, 'Der Begriff der Pathoklise,' /PsN 31, no. 5 (1925): 245-55. For more on Timofeev-Resovskii, see Diane M. Paul and Costas B. Crimbas, 'Nikolai V. Timofeeff-Ressovsky/ Scientific American (February 1992): 64-70. In the past few years, two extensive biographies and source editions have been published: V.V. Babkov and E.S. Sakanian, Nikolai Vladimirovich Timofeev-Resovskii (1900-1981) (Moscow: Pamiatniki istoricheskoi mysli, 2002), and la.G. Rokitianskii, V.A. Goncharov, and V.V. Nekhotin, eds., Rassekrechennyi zubr. sledstvennoe delo N.V. Timofeeva-Resovskogo (Moscow: Akademiia, 2003). The estimated budget for the Berlin Brain Research Institute in 1925 earmarked 113,503 Reich marks in funds. From this amount, 53,000 marks were allotted to the Berlin University for the Neurobiological Laboratory and 60,501 marks to the Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft for the KWI for Brain Research. Archiv der Humboldt-Universitat zu Berlin (henceforth AHUB), Bestand Universitatskurator, no. 304, fol. 167. Letter from O. Vogt to the administration director of the Friedrich Wilhelms University on 6 July 1925, Anlage 6. Total investment costs for the KWI for Brain Research in Berlin-Buch amounted to about 3.5 million RM, with the KWG contributing 1,131,000 RM for building costs and the Rockefeller Foundation 1,323,000 RM. The rest of the amount was supplied by the finance ministries of the German Reich and Prussia - 500,000 RM respectively. Cf. J. Richter, 'Das KaiserWilhelm-Institut fur Hirnforschung/ 383. The annual budget of the KWI for Brain Research (for the year 1933) amounted to 287,351.12 RM; 197,294.27 RM were allotted to personnel expenses and 90,056.85 RM to material costs; the institute's assets were estimated at 2,243,477.62 RM. Archiv der MPG Berlin-Dahlem, I. Abt. Rep. 21, Nr. 1581. 'Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut fur Hirnforschung Berlin-Buch, Einnahmen- und Ausgaben-Rechnung 1933 und Vermogensiibersicht zum 31. Marz 1934.'

360 Jochen Richter 28 Oskar Vogt, Tathoarchitektonik und Pathoklise. Mit Projektionsdemonstrationen. Presented by M. Kroll/ Zeitschrift fur die gesamte Neurologie und Psychiatric 33 (1923): 14-15. 29 In a letter to Cecile Vogt in April 1923, Minor reported that he was elected as chairman of a scientific meeting in Moscow organized by students to analyse and evaluate the All-Russian Psychoneurological Congress: 'Ich hielt eine einleitende Rede, in welcher C. und O. Vogt ihr suum cuique erhielten.; dann kam als zweiter Referent... Prof. Kroll mit einem Bericht iiber die Arbeiten der C. und O. Vogt, speziell iiber die Pathoklisen. Auf einer grossen Tafel figurierten der personificirte Materialismus, der Empirische und Heuristische Parallelismus, der Monismus, die a und (3 Dualismi, welche einer schonen Briickenarbeit glichen. Wie Sie sehen, bleiben Sie bei uns in Moskau mit einem bleibenden Erfolg.' (I held an introductory speech, in which C. and O. Vogt received their suum cuique. Then the second speaker, Prof. Krol', reported on the research work done by C. and O. Vogt, especially on the Pathoclisis. On a big black board we made out the personified Materialism, the Empiric and the Heuristic Parallelism, the Monism, the a and (3 Dualisms, resembling a wonderful bridge construction. As you can see you are in Moscow in enduring memory.') NL Vogt. Letter from L. Minor to C. Vogt, 4 May 1923. 30 Cf. J. Richter, 'Medicine and Politics in Soviet-German Relations of the 1920s - A Contribution to Lenin's Pathobiography/ in Actes du XXXIIe Congres International d'Histoire de la Medecine, Anvers, 3-7 Septembre 1990 (Brussels: Societas Belgica Historiae Medicinae, 1991), 1063-71. 31 There were alternatives to Vogt: the Soviet Union had its own brain researchers with strong international reputations. In 1918, Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev founded his own brain research institute in Petrograd. Bekhterev's assistant (and later successor) was Viktor Petrovich Osipov, who had worked alongside Foerster as the head doctor of the Russian medical team tending to Lenin on his sickbed. It was proposed that the task be given to the Russian neuropathologist Pavel Evgenevich Snesarev, who had mastered the methods of cytoarchitectonical brain research before the First World War in Oskar Vogt's Berlin brain research institute. Other candidates from outside Russia included the Austrian brain researcher Constantin von Economo. 32 The cytoarchitectonics perfected by Oskar Vogt and his team go back to a discovery made by the Russian neuroanatomist Vladimir Alekseevich Bets at the end of the nineteenth century. Bets discovered a way to determine the number and size of localized neurons in the various layers of the cerebral cortex, as well as their quantitative variation from region to region. To

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do this, the cortex - only a few millimetres thick - is cut with a special microtome into extremely thin vertical sections, which are then stained on a microscope slide in order to differentiate the structures of the nervous tissue. Under the microscope, such cuttings reveal - vertically from layer to layer - a characteristic cytoarchitecture. Adjacent cortical layers with an identical cytoarchitecture form a region. The horizontal structuring of the cortex into regions, each with its different cytoarchitecture, is called architectonics. Of course, the major disadvantage of anatomical brain architectonics for the diagnostic evaluation of the mental capabilities of exceptional persons is that such observations can only be made post mortem. Ludger Wess, ed., Die Traume der Genetik. Gentechnische Utopien von sozialem Fortschritt (Nordlingen: Greno Verlag, 1989), 87. Regarding the international esteem of the Russian engagement in eugenics, consider the comment of the American geneticist Leslie Clarence Dunn, who, after visiting several genetic research centres in Europe in 1927, wrote: 'If the Rockefeller Foundation really wanted to do something for the international development of science, then it will start in the Soviet Union.' Quoted from Wess, Die Traume der Genetik, 54, and Peter J. Kuznick, Beyond the Laboratory: Scientists as Political Activists in 1930s America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), 120. NL Vogt. Letter from the Moscow neuropathologist Lazar Solomonovich Minor to Oskar Vogt on 31 December 1924. Izvestiia Rossiiskoi Akademii Nauk, series 6, vol. 18, nos. 12-18 (1924-25): 510-11. Dmitrii Volkogonov, Lenin: Politicheskii Portret (Moscow: Novosti, 1994), 2: 344-5. Only in 1989 did we learn from the notes of Stalin's private secretary Boris Bazhanov that Tovstukha was Stalin's secret secretary. According to the customary distribution of business in Stalin's office, Tovstukha was the secretary in charge of Stalin's semi-legal - or in insider parlance: 'semi-dark' affairs! B. Bazhanov, 'Kreml', 20e gody - Vospominanii byvshego sekretaria Stalina,' Ogonek no. 39 (September 1989): 26-30. Arkhiv Presidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii (henceforth APRF), /. 3, op. 22, d. 310, I. 1-2,6-8, minutes from the meeting of the medical committee for the investigation of Lenin's brain with Oskar Vogt on 17 February 1925, in the Lenin Institute. Quoted from the Russian source edition 'Material'no obosnovat' genialnost' Lenina,' Istochnik 1 (1994): 72-89. APRF,/. 3, op. 22, d. 310, /. 1-2, 6-8, quoted from Istochnik 1 (1994): 72-88. Contract between the V.I. Lenin-Institute and Oskar Vogt, April/May 1925, NL Vogt.

362 Jochen Richter 43 As a result of this agreement, considerable sums poured into the Berlin Institute for Brain Research between 1925 and 1929 solely for the benefit of Vogt's research on brain anatomy. In October 1925, Vogt opened a foreign currency account at the Berlin banking house Mendelssohn & Co. called the 'Dollar Account for the Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft/ to which at least $12,712.50 was credited in 1925 alone. Vogt received this sum from the Soviet government for the work he had performed so far on the investigation of Lenin's brain. NL Vogt. Letter from O. Vogt to the Bankhaus Mendelssohn & Co. on 6 October 1925. An additional account called 'Brain Research Russia' existed at least from January 1928 with a balance of 7,056.50 RM and $2,275.90 as of 23 January 1928, from which Vogt apparently paid for purchases necessary for the Moscow brain research institute. Ibid. Account statement from the banking house Mendelssohn & Co. on 1 January 1928. 44 Archiv der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, I. Abt. Rep. 21. Nr. 1577. Notes on the meeting on 23 May 1925, concerning the relationship between the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research and Russian institutes ('Aufzeichnung iiber die Besprechung, betreffend eine Verbindung des Kaiser-WilhelmInstituts fur Hirnforschung mit russischen Instituten vom 23.5.1925'). 45 Friedrich Glum, Zivischen Wissenschaft, Wirtschaft und Politik; Erlebtes und Erdachtes in vier Reichen (Bonn: Bouvier, 1964), 255. 46 In contrast to the moderate national conservative politics of the Foreign Office and the Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft, which favoured balancing policy of reconciliation with the former Entente powers and a politically motivated partnership of convenience with the Soviet Union, the KWG pursued an ultraconservative line that favoured shunning any relationship with the Soviet Union. 47 Bernhard vom Brocke commented on the foreign policy orientation of the Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft with the following observation: 'Neither Harnack nor Glum showed much enthusiasm for the pronounced Eastern orientation in the counter-boycott efforts of many German scholars who opposed Stresemann's Western orientation in foreign policy.' B. vom Brocke, 'Die Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft in der Weimarer Republik. Ausbau zu einer gesamtdeutschen Forschungsorganisation/ in Forschung im Spannungsfeld von Politik und Gesellschaft - Geschichte und Struktur der KaiserWilhelm-Gesellschaft. Aus Anlass ihres 75jahrigen Bestehens herausgegeben von Rudolf Vierhaus und Bernhard vom Brocke (Stuttgart: Deutsche VerlagsAnstalt, 1990), 315. 48 Rossiiskii tsenti khraneniia i izucheniia documentov noveishei istorii, Moscow (henceforth RTsKhlDNI,/. 16, op. 2, /. 1-2 reverse. Minutes from a meeting of the Committee for the Investigation of V.I. Lenin's Brain, 19 September 1925.

Berlin and Moscow Brain Research Institutes 363 49 The products purchased were developed by the Berlin brain research institute and manufactured by the Berlin company Sartorius. 50 APRF,/. 3, op. 22, d. 310, /. 18. Letter from Semashko to Politburo of the AilUnion Communist Party (Bolsheviks), 1 January 1926. 51 Sarkisov, Popov, and Sapir spoke German well enough to speak with Vogt and his German colleagues without an interpreter; the others started learning German. 52 Richter, 'Das Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut/ 379. 53 APRF, /. 3, op. 22, d. 310, /. 18. Letter from Semashko to Politburo of the AllUnion Communist Party (Bolsheviks), 1 January 1926. 54 Nuvakhov et al., Istoki, khronologiia i dinamika struktury, 128. 55 'Polozheniie o Gosudarstvennom nauchnom institute po izucheniiu mozga imeni V.I. Lenina/ Voprosy zdravookhraneniia 12 (1928): 92-3. 56 In his analysis of the founding of the Berlin brain research institute, Hubert Laitko has pointed out that the founding of every institute exists in a double time perspective, which includes the biographical as well as an epistemological perspective. Cf. H. Laitko, 'Personlichkeitszentrierte Forschungsorganisation als Leitgedanke der Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft/ in vom Brocke and Laitko, eds., Die Kaiser-Wilhelm/Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, 624. 57 For more, see Paul Weindling, 'German-Soviet Medical Co-operation and the Institute for Racial Research, 1927-c. 1935,' German History 10, no. 2 (1992): 177-206; Susan Gross Solomon and Jochen Richter, eds., Ludwig Aschoff: Vergleichende Volkerpathologie oder Rassenpathologie. Tagebuch einer Reise durch Russland und Transkaukasien (= Neuere Medizin- und Wissenschaftsgeschichte - Quellen und Studien, vol. 7, ed. by Wolfgang U. Eckart) (Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus-Verlag, 1998). 58 A double victory for the Moscow Brain Research Institute over its counterpart in Leningrad. The decision to commission the German brain researcher Oskar Vogt with the investigation of Lenin's brain had already been made at the end of 1924. Bekhterev and his institute had been ruled out as a possible candidate. Vasilii Babkov judged that the reason for the decision against the Leningrad institute was that Leningrad was too far from the centre of power for this task: The pantheon of brains ... was set up in Moscow and not in ... Leningrad, as Bekhterev wished. The reasons for this decision naturally arose from political expediency - that the highest government officials should always have immediate access to Object No. 1.' Vasilii Babkov in his review of the author's book 'Rasse, Elite, Pathos,' in Voprosy istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki I (2004): 182^1. 59 NL Vogt, File Nr. 57. Letter from Dr Popov to Prof. O. Vogt on 5 March (undated, probably 1930).

364 Jochen Richter 60 Quoted from Monika Spivak, Posmertnaia diagnostika genial'nosti. Eduard Bagritskii, Andrei Belyi, Vladimir Maiakovskii v kollektsii Instituta mozga (materialy iz arkhiva G. I. Poliakova) (Moscow: Izdatel'stvo 'Agraf,' 2001), 33. 61 O. Vogt, 'Das Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut fur Hirnforschung/ in Ludolph Brauer, et al., eds., Forschungsinstitute. Ihre Geschichte, Organisation und Ziele (Hamburg: Hartung, 1930), 2:116-21; cf. Helga Satzinger, Die Geschichte der genetisch orientierten Hirnforschung von Cecile und Oskar Vogt in der Zeit von 1895 bis ca. 1927 (Stuttgart: Deutscher Apotheker Verlag, 1998), 91. 62 O. Vogt, '1. Bericht uber die Arbeiten des Moskauer Staatsinstituts fiir Hirnforschung' (from a lecture held on 10 November 1929 in the Pantheon of the Moscow Institute for Brain Research), JPsN 40, nos. 3 and 4 (1929): 108-18. For more on elite brain research, see Michael Hagner, Geniale Gehirne: Zur Geschichte der Elitegehirnforschung (Gottingen: Wallstein, 2004). 63 S.A. Sarkissow, Grundriss der Struktur und Funktion des Gehirns (Berlin: Verlag Volk und Gesundheit, 1967), 84. 64 According to the institute's statutes from 1928, the anatomical laboratory and the physiological laboratory together constituted the morphological (architectonical) department. (In contrast to the Berlin institute, the statutes of the Moscow institute did not give the technical departments equal rank with the scientific departments!) 65 David Joravsky, Russian Psychology: A Critical History (Oxford and New York: Blackwell, 1989), 279,511n35. 66 Herwig Hamperl, Werdegang und Lebensweg eines Pathologen (Stuttgart: F.K. Schattauer, 1972), 139. 67 Monika Spivak, 'Vladimir Il'ich Lenin v Moskovskom Institute Mozga. Pamiati Doktora N. S. Popova.' http://www.plexus.org.il/texts/ spivak_lenin.htm. Accessed 13 February 2005. 68 Gosudorstvennyii Archiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (henceforth GARF), /. 7668, op. I , d. 433, /. 7-14. 'O nauchnykh kadrakh Instituta Mozga pri Uchenom Komitete CIK SSSR.' 69 After the opening of its buildings in Berlin-Buch, the Berlin Institute for Brain Research had ninety employees (excluding the nursing staff in th£ clinic). 70 Liberal regulations for political activity were in effect for the personnel at the Berlin institute. The conflict between the Communist and the National Socialist workers intensified at the beginning of the 1930s. The conflict reached its peak directly after the Nazis seized power and then stopped when Vogt strictly forbade any political activity at the institute. 71 GARF,/. 7668, op. l,d. 546, /. 61. 72 A finance plan for the Moscow Brain Institute exists only for 1934. The annual budget for the institute in 1934 amounted to 251,720 rubles. GARF,

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81 82

/. 7668, op. I, d. 1342, /. 10-11/Tematicheski-proizvodstvennyi Plan Cos. Instituta Mozga na 1934.' Auswartiges Amt, Berlin, Politisches Archiv (henceforth AA Polit Arch), R 64 856, fol. 137. Bundesarchiv Berlin (henceforth BArch Berlin), R 9215; cf. Susan Gross Solomon, 'Vergleichende Volkerpathologie auf unerforschtem Gebiet: Ludwig Aschoffs Reise nach Russland und in den Kaukasus im Jahre 1930,' in Solomon and Richter, eds., Ludwig Aschoff, 17-20. Vogt, '1. Bericht iiber die Arbeiten des Moskauer Staatsinstituts fur Hirnforschung,' 108-18. After a lecture delivered in 1927 by Vogt on the first results of the investigations on Lenin's brain, the Soviet party newspaper Pravda announced on 15 November 1927: The pyramidal cells in Lenin's were far more strongly developed, the connecting (associative) fibres far more numerous ... the extensive network between the pyramidal cells indicates that Lenin's associative (combinatory) ability was far more highly developed.' Marina Bentivoglio noted that the scientific community of neurologists was 'perplexed' by Vogt's report. Cf. M. Bentivoglio, 'Cortical Structure and Mental Skills: Oskar Vogt and the Legacy of Lenin's Brain/ Brain Research Bulletin 47, no. 4 (1998): 291-6. Constantin von Economo criticized Vogt's findings especially sharply (cf. note 16, above). Vogt, '1. Bericht iiber die Arbeiten des Moskauer Staatsinstituts fur Hirnforschung/ 109. As we know, this work initially required the concentrated efforts of both Vogts and of their chief technical assistant, Margarete Woelcke, who stayed and worked in Moscow for nearly the whole period. According to the procedure used by the Vogts in Berlin and later in Neustadt in Schwarzwald, the sections were most likely stained with Nissl's cresyl violet to depict the nerve cells and with Heidenhain's hematoxylin to depict the richly myelinated fibres. Vogt, 'I. Bericht iiber die Arbeiten des Moskauer Staatsinstituts fur Hirnforschung,' 109-11. The following articles were published by Vogt's Russian colleagues between 1927 and 1929 in the Journal fur Psychologic und Neurologie: N. Popoff, 'Zur Kenntnis der Grosse der Area striata'; I. Popoff, 'Uber einige Grossenverhaltnisse beim Affengehirn'; I. and N. Popoff, 'Beitrag zur Kenntnis der quantitativen Diff erenzen zwischen dem Menschen- und dem Affengehirn'; I.N. Filimonoff, 'Zur embryonalen und postembryonalen Entwicklung der Grosshirnrinde'; I.D. Sapir, 'Zur individuellen Architektonik der Grosshirnrinde'; S.A. Sarkissow, 'Uber die postnatale Entwicklung einzelner zytoarchitektonischer Felder beim Hunde,' JPsN 34-9 (1927-9).

366 Jochen Richter 83 Vogt, '1. Bericht iiber die Arbeiten des Moskauer Staatsinstituts fiir Hirnforschung/ 111. 84 Ibid. 85 The elite brain collection is still growing today. Spivak, Posmertnaia diagnostika genial'nosti, 54-7, lists twenty-eight names, some of whom Vogt had mentioned; other names mentioned by Vogt are not contained in Spivak's list. The most important names here are the following (in alphabetical order): Henry Barbusse, Andrei Belyi, Lev Vygotskii, Maksim Gorkii, Mikhail Kalinin, Aleksandr Karpinskii, Sergei M. Kirov, Nadezhda Krupskaia, Lev Landau, Mikhail Pokrovskii, Andrei Sakharov, losif V. Stalin, Konstantin Stanislavskii, Konstantin Tsiolkovskii. 86 I.N. Filimonoff, 'Zur embryonalen und postembryonalen Entwicklung der Grosshirnrinde/ JPsN 39, nos. 4-6 (1928): 334-89. 87 Vogt, '1. Bericht iiber die Arbeiten des Moskauer Staatsinstituts fiir Hirnforschung/ 114. 88 Ibid., 116-17. 89 Cf. Solomon, 'Vergleichende Volkerpathologie auf unerforschtem Gebiet.' 90 The Communist Academy was a cadre factory for training communist, ideologically sound young scientists, so-called 'red professors/ Founded in 1918 as the 'Socialist Academy' and renamed 'Communist Academy' in 1924, this educational institution had numerous natural and social science research institutes, among them the Psychoneurological Institute, founded in 1925 as the Institute for Higher Nervous Activity. 91 The takeover of the Moscow Brain Institute (a Soviet institute with a German director) was far simpler than the appropriation of the joint GermanRussian Laboratory for Race Pathology, which was affiliated with the institute. Cf. Solomon and Richter, eds., Ludwig Aschoff, 62. 92 BArch Berlin, R 73, no. 228. Based on a letter from O. Vogt to Staatsminister Schmidt-Ott, 12 May 1932. 93 Evidence for this claim has not been found in any archive. 94 APRF,/. 3, op. 22, d. 310, /. 41. 95 GARF,/. 7668, op. 1, d. 546, /. 58-61; Cf. Meeting of the CIK Presidium of the USSR on 28 May 1932, Angelegenheit Nr. PR. 62/3. GARF,/. 7668, op. 1, d. 546, /. 19-22. 96 BArch Berlin, R 73, Nr. 228. 97 BArch Berlin, R 9215, Nr. 420, fol. 63-67. 98 Ibid. 99 'Uber die wissenschaftlichen Kader des Hirnforschungsinstituts beim Wissenschaftlichen Komitee der UdSSR/ GARF,/. 7668, op. 1, d. 433, /. 7-14. Especially worthy of mention among the second generation of employees

Berlin and Moscow Brain Research Institutes 367 at the Brain Institute are the neuroanatomist Elisaveta Pigasevna Kononova (in 1932 she was appointed director of the Pantheon of Brains) and the neurophysiologists Mikhail Nikolaevich Livanov and Grigorii Poliakov. They contributed greatly to the lasting stability of the institute with their exceptional scientific achievements. 100 Jan Friedrich Tonnies, 'Der Neurograph, ein Apparat zur Aufzeichnung bioelektrischer Vorgange unter Ausschaltung der photographischen Kurvendarstellung/ Die Naturwissenschaften 20 (1932): 381. 101 'Workplan for Brain Institute from June 1,1932, to January 1,1933/ GARF, /. 7668, op. 1, d. 546, /. 33-5, and 'Five-Year Plan for Brain Institute for the Period 1933-1937,' ibid., d. 1012, /. 14-20. 102 APRF, /. 3, op. 22, d. 310, /. 54-63. The report was first published in a Russian source edition on the investigation of Lenin's brain in 1994: 'Material'no obosnovat' Genial'nost' Lenina/ Istochnik (1994): 81-7. A first publication by Moscow institute researchers appeared in 1993: OS. Adrianov, I.N. Bogolepova, S.M. Blinkov, and L.A. Kukuev, 'Issledovanie mozga Lenina,' Uspekhi fiziologicheskikh nauk 24, no. 3 (1993): 4052. 103 For more on the results, see O.S. Adrianov, I.N. Bogolepova, S.M. Blinkov, and L.A. Kukuev, 'Issledovanie mozga V.I. Lenina,' Uspekhi fiziologicheskikh nauk 24, no. 3 (1993): 40-52. Summarized in German in Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos, 89-93 and 302-7. 104 Jutta Petersdorf, 'Soversenno sekretno: Lenins Krankheit und Tod als Gegenstand geheimer Parteidokumente,' in Aloys Henning and Jutta Petersdorf, eds., Wissenschaftsgeschichte in Osteuropa. Europa litterarum artiumcjue scientiam communicans (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 1998), 205-19. 105 Richter, 'Das Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut,' 388. 106 Hans-Walter Schmuhl, Hirnforschung und Krankenmord. Das Kaiser Wilhelm-Institut fur Hirnforschung 1937-1945 (Berlin: Max-Planck-Institut fur Wissenschaftsgeschichte, 2000), 8. 107 Richter, 'Das Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut/ 388-90; cf. Kristie Macrakis, Surviving the Swastika: Scientific Research in Nazi Germany (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 65-6. 108 Satzinger, Die Geschichte, 93-4. 109 This is how Vogt expressed himself on 15 March 1935 in a letter to his school friend Graf Ernst zu Reventlow, who sat in the Reichstag as a member of the National Socialist fraction. NL Vogt. 110 The denunciation of a National Socialist cleaning staff member substantiated this remark. See Richter, 'Das Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut/ 388.

368 Jochen Richter 111 BArch Berlin, No. 3527 (Bestand RMI), fol. 259. Letter from the secret State Police to the Reich Ministry of the Interior, 28 December 1933. 112 Letter from deputy state secretary Kunisch of the Reich Ministry of Science, Education and Culture (Reichsministerium der Wissenschaft, Erziehung und Volksbildung) to the liaison staff of the NSDAP in Berlin on 31 July 1935. Cited from Schmuhl, Hirnforschung und Krankenmord, 12. 113 Ibid., 94-5, and Richter, 'Das Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut/ 388-92. 114 Jiirgen Peiffer, Hirnforschung im Zwielicht: Beispiele verftihrbarer Wissenschaft aus der Zeit des Nationalsozialismus. Julius Hallervorden - H. J. Scherer Berthold Ostertag, (Husum: Matthiesen Verlag, 1997), 12-55; and Schmuhl, Hirnforschung und Krankenmord, 14-21 and 34-52. 115 This conceptual signature is still quite perceptible today despite the scientific-technical innovations that the Moscow Brain Institute has undergone since the 1930s. This was the author's impression when he visited the institute for its fiftieth anniversary celebration in November 1978. 116 Without Vogt's Soviet-Russian engagement, the buildings would probably not exist. Their construction owes in part to the fact that when KWG made its decision to invest in 1927-8, Vogt's reputation had reached its height because of his Russian engagement. Obviously, this was the case not only in Germany but also in the United States, where the Rockefeller Foundation declared its willingness in 1929 to help finance the new buildings for the Berlin Brain Research Institute with more than 1.3 million German marks (that is, with more than one-third of the total investment sum). 117 NL Vogt. O. Vogt, undated fragment of a letter probably to A.S. Enukidze and A.V. Lunacharskii, 10 May 1932.

9 Eugenics, Rassenhygiene, and Human Genetics in the Late 1930s: The Case of the Seventh International Genetics Congress NIKOLAIKREMENTSOV

In the fall of 1936, nearly one thousand geneticists around the world were busily preparing for their seventh international congress, which was scheduled to meet in Moscow in August 1937. Suddenly, on 14 December 1936, the New York Times announced: Moscow Cancels Genetics Parley.1 Referring to 'unofficial sources/ the newspaper's Moscow correspondent reported that the Soviet government had cancelled the congress, that the congress's president Nikolai Vavilov - together with another prominent Soviet geneticist, Isaak Agol - had been arrested, and that the congress's general secretary Solomon Levit was under attack by party officials for 'holding German Fascist views on genetics.' The report's subhead provided what seemed to be a reason for the cancellation: 'Nazi racial theories ascribed to some scientists causes the dropping of world congress.' In the follow-up editorial published three days later under the telling 'Science and Dictators,' the newspaper elaborated the argument, suggesting that the Soviets had cancelled the congress because it would have given 'Nazi biologists' an opportunity 'to promulgate their peculiar views on race.'2 The news stirred quite a commotion among the world's geneticists, who immediately began bombarding Soviet officials with angry cables and letters. This campaign apparently had an effect: within a week, geneticists learned that Vavilov had not been arrested and that the congress had been not cancelled but 'postponed.' In the following months, Soviet geneticists indeed secured their government's permission to reinvite the congress to convene in Moscow a year later, in August 1938. But soon after, the Permanent International Organizing Committee for Genetics Congresses (PIOC) - composed of representatives of fifteen countries and presided over by the Norwegian geneticist Otto Mohr -

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decided to withdraw the congress from the Soviet Union and to hold it instead in Britain in 1939. Despite the relocation, Vavilov was elected as the congress's president, and nearly fifty of his compatriots submitted reports and exhibits for presentation at the congress. However, not a single Soviet geneticist appeared in Edinburgh in August 1939, and the 'Nazi racial doctrine' was not even mentioned at the congress's sessions. How might we understand this peculiar chain of events? Why and how did 'Nazi racial theories' enter the agenda of the Moscow congress? Did a 'German Fascist view on genetics' play any role in the cancellation of the congress? And why did the genetics community abstain from discussing 'Nazi racial theories' at the Edinburgh congress? In searching for answers to these questions, we will examine in close detail the content and context of interactions among three major groups of actors involved with the congress: Soviet geneticists, their domestic patrons, and their foreign peers. We will also look into the role that German emigre scientists, working both in the Soviet Union and in the United States, played in shaping various attitudes towards the 'Fascist view on genetics.' The Moscow Congress, Round One Early in May 1935, the PIOC Soviet representative Nikolai Vavilov received a letter from Otto Mohr inquiring about the status of the Soviet invitation (extended during the previous congress, held in Ithaca, New York, in 1932) to hold the Seventh International Genetics Congress in the USSR. Vavilov at once informed the PIOC chairman that he would discuss the matter with the government.3 According to Soviet rules, the hosting of an international congress required approval of the highest authorities - the Organizational Bureau (Orgburo) and the Political Bureau (Politburo) of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. To prepare the ground for such approval, Vavilov raised the issue at a sitting of the Presidium of the USSR Academy of Sciences. In a letter to that governing body, he noted that he had conferred with the commissar of agriculture, Mikhail Chernov, and the head of the Central Committee's science department, Karl Bauman, and that both had endorsed the idea.4 Not surprisingly, on 2 June, without much discussion, the presidium decided that 'it is desirable to have the congress convene in the Soviet Union in August 1937' and that it would petition the government for permission.5 On 3 July, Vavilov wrote to Mohr that he had secured the support of the major governmental agencies that funded genetic research - the Commissariat of

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Agriculture (Narkomzem) and the Commissariat of Enlightenment (Narkompros) - as well as that of the Academy of Sciences, for holding the congress in Moscow. 'As soon as I know more definitely about the decision of our Government, I shall immediately inform you/ he assured the PIOC chairman.6 Securing governmental permission took time. On 13 July the presidium sent an official petition to Bauman, who in turn sent his own recommendations to the secretaries of the Central Committee - Joseph Stalin (the general secretary), Andrei Andreev (who oversaw agriculture), and Nikolai Ezhov (who oversaw personnel and security issues). The question was placed on the agenda of the Orgburo, which on 31 July authorized the Academy of Sciences to host the congress and instructed the Science Department to prepare its suggestions regarding the organization and membership of the congress.7 Two days later the Politburo rubber-stamped this decision.8 At the end of August, Vavilov informed Mohr that he had secured the government's permission and that now it was the turn of the PIOC to confirm its acceptance of the official invitation sent by the Academy of Sciences.9 A month later, Mohr wrote Vavilov a personal letter telling him that the PIOC members had unanimously voted in favour of the Soviet Union as the best place for the congress. In mid-November, Mohr sent a letter of official acceptance to the Academy of Sciences presidium.10 As soon as the PIOC's official answer had arrived, the presidium proceeded to discuss a preliminary program and membership of the Soviet organizing committee. On 5 December, the presidium approved the membership and program prepared by Vavilov.11 A long-time party member, Deputy Commissar of Agriculture and President of the Lenin Academy of Agricultural Sciences (VASKhNIL), Aleksandr Muralov, was nominated chairman of the organizing committee. Vavilov and a vice-president of the Academy of Sciences, Vladimir Komarov, became vice-chairmen; director of the Institute of Medical Genetics, Solomon Levit - general secretary; a prominent American geneticist residing at the time in Moscow as a senior geneticist at the Academy of Sciences Institute of Genetics, H.J. Muller - head of the program committee; a senior geneticist at the Communist Academy Biology Institute, Mikhail Navashin - chair of the exhibition committee. The organizing committee also included such well-known Soviet geneticists as director of the Institute of Experimental Biology, Nikolai Kol'tsov; chairman of the genetics department at Moscow University, Aleksandr Serebrovskii;

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and chairman of the genetics department at the Institute of Plant Industry, Georgii Karpechenko. Also included were a number of officials from the Academy of Sciences and VASKhNIL: former VASKhNIL vice-president and now the permanent secretary ('CEO') of the Academy of Sciences, Nikolai Gorbunov; VASKhNIL member and head of the Odessa Institute of Genetics and Breeding, Trofim Lysenko; VASKhNIL vicepresident, Georgii Meister; and director of the Academy of Sciences Institute of Botany, Boris Keller. At the end of January 1936, the Politburo approved the proposed membership and commanded Muralov to present the organizing committee's suggestions regarding the congress's work in three months.12 As soon as all the formalities had been observed, the organizing committee began its work. On 17 February it held its first formal meeting, which was largely devoted to the program.13 The committee decided that the congress should focus on three subjects: genetic aspects of evolution, the breeding of domestic animals and cultivated plants, and human genetics. Neither 'German views on genetics' nor 'Nazi racial theories' were even mentioned during the discussion. Two months later, however, both subjects appeared on the congress's agenda. On 23 April the organizing committee held another meeting that amended the congress's preliminary program. The amendment was made at the request of more than thirty American geneticists, who had asked the organizing committee to add to the program a 'discussion of questions relating to racial and eugenic problems.'14 In fact, the request had been initiated by Julius Schaxel, a German emigre biologist working at the time in Moscow. Schaxel had been a professor at the University of Jena and director of that university's Institute of Experimental Biology. He had been dismissed from all his posts, as 'a Marxist,' in June 1933, shortly after the Nazis came to power. He moved to the Soviet Union, where he came to head a laboratory of developmental mechanics at the Academy of Sciences.15 In late November 1935, after the decision to hold the congress in Moscow had been approved by all interested parties, Schaxel sent a letter to his former compatriot Walter Landauer that included a suggestion to 'put to discussion [at the congress] the national-socialist race theory.'16 A graduate of the University of Heidelberg, Landauer had left Germany in 1924 for the United States, where he became a geneticist at the Storrs Agricultural Station and, a few years later, a professor in the Department of Animal Genetics at the University of Connecticut. Landauer remained deeply interested in the situation in his country of

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birth, so he responded eagerly to Schaxel's suggestion, which resonated so well with his own disposition.17 He prepared a draft letter and circulated it among practically all American geneticists involved in human genetics; many of them enthusiastically supported the proposal. On 2 April, he sent the letter along with his explanatory note to the congress's secretary, Levit. In his note, Landauer also suggested that 'Russian ethnologists working with racial minorities may well take a prominent place in the discussions.'18 A few days later, Levit also received letters from the world-renowned British biologist Julian Huxley and a prominent American geneticist, Herbert Jennings (on sabbatical in England at the time), who added their signatures to the request of their American colleagues.19 This request posed a problem for the organizing committee. In the early 1920s, in the Soviet Union as elsewhere in the world, eugenics had provided a launching pad for the rapid institutionalization of genetics, and a number of leading Soviet geneticists, notably Kol'tsov and Serebrovskii, had published extensively on various aspects of eugenics. A decade later, however, eugenics had been banned as 'bourgeois' science.20 In 1930 the Russian Eugenics Society had been dismantled, and its oracle - Russian Eugenics Journal - discontinued. Obviously, placing 'eugenic problems' on the congress's agenda would have been politically unwise. Not surprisingly, the organizers decided that 'reports on the disciplines related to genetics'21 should not be included in the program. They agreed, however, that the final session of the congress would be devoted to a discussion on 'human genetics and race theory'; in this way, any mention of eugenics and 'eugenic problems' was omitted altogether.22 The organizing committee's decision was endorsed at the highest levels. In June, the head of the Central Committee Science Department, Bauman, wrote a lengthy memorandum titled 'On Preparations for the VII International Genetics Congress' for Stalin and the head of the highest government agency - the Council of People's Commissars (SNK) Viacheslav Molotov. Bauman emphasized that 'scientific studies in human genetics could not be advanced without criticism of racial theories, and, thus, the congress would have to devote a considerable place to discussing and criticizing these theories.'23 He noted that the initiative in putting this issue before the congress had originated with 'a group (33 individuals) of prominent American and British geneticists with anti-Fascist attitudes' and that Huxley and Jennings were to deliver keynote reports on the subject. Bauman suggested that 'in light

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of the particular importance' of this discussion at the congress, it was necessary to organize in advance a wide campaign 'on the scientific criticism of racial theories' in the Soviet and Western press. Such a campaign, he noted, would serve as a means 'to mobilize scientists and the intelligentsia as a whole against Fascism.' It was necessary, Bauman emphasized, to put to 'maximum use the anti-Fascist feelings of foreign scientists.' I was unable to find in the archives any response from either Molotov or Stalin to Bauman's memo. It seems, however, that such a campaign 'on the scientific criticism of racial theories' was indeed initiated during the summer. On 18 June 1936 a Soviet newspaper, Izvestiia, published a lengthy article titled The Race Doctrine, Science, and Proletarian Internationalism.' Authored by Schaxel, who had initiated the inclusion of 'racial issues' in the congress program, this article was a ferocious attack on Nazi race doctrine and on the 'biological foundations' of Fascist policies. Citing Huxley and a prominent American anthropologist, Franz Boas, Schaxel contrasted the views of 'progressive Western scientists' with the Fascist 'nonsense' promulgated by many German biologists and politicians. He noted that 'American geneticists had proposed that the race doctrine be discussed at the Seventh international genetics congress' and that this proposal 'had been accepted by the Soviet organizing committee.'24 At the beginning of September the Academy of Sciences presidium listened to Muralov's report on the organizing committee's activities to date and approved its plan of preparations as well as its preliminary scientific program, which included the proposed discussion of 'human genetics and racial theories.'25 At the end of the month, Muralov and Levit sent a lengthy memorandum on the congress's scientific program to the Science Department.26 This memorandum listed six major subjects to be discussed at the congress: (1) evolution in light of genetic research; (2) plant genetics and breeding; (3) animal genetics and breeding; (4) genes, mutations, and structural bases of heredity; (5) distant hybridization and polyploidy; and (6) human genetics and racial theories. It also named the Soviet and foreign geneticists who had been invited to deliver keynote reports on these subjects. A leading Soviet specialist in medical genetics, Sergei Davidenkov, along with Julian Huxley, Otto Mohr, Herbert Jennings, and a prominent British human geneticist, Lancelot Hogben, had been nominated to speak on 'human genetics and racial theories.' Science Department officials again endorsed the program.27

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The Soviet authorities apparently saw the discussion on 'human genetics and racial theories' as an opportunity to denounce fascism and 'fascist views on genetics/ In turn, their German counterparts viewed the proposed discussion as a serious threat and even considered boycotting the Moscow congress.28 As recently unearthed documents reveal, in August 1936 the Reich Foreign Ministry arranged several meetings on the subject of the Moscow congress with representatives of the Reich Ministry of Propaganda, the Reich Ministry of Science, the Reich Ministry of Education, and the Secret State Police (Gestapo).29 After the reasons for and against attending the congress had been discussed in detail, the meetings' participants concluded that 'the congress would be used by the Soviet side to denounce German racial theory in front of the world and as a means of Bolshevik propaganda.' The officials felt that German delegates should not attend the congress and should convince 'friends of Germany and German racial theory' that they 'must also stay away from the congress.' Only if this collective boycott proved impossible, the bosses decided, would German geneticists attend the congress, but even then, 'the German delegation must be comprised only of a small number of exemplary representatives.' Before leaving for Moscow, the delegation would meet in Berlin 'to receive tactical and political instruction for their behavior while at the Moscow Congress'; also, 'the delegation would be ordered to withdraw from the Congress as soon as the behavior of the Soviets or their friends gives cause.' In October the Reich Foreign Ministry again advised the Gestapo: 'There is no doubt that every scientific congress in the Soviet Union will be used directly or indirectly as a propaganda forum against national socialist Germany.' Meanwhile, preparations for the Moscow congress continued in full swing. By the end of October the organizing committee had received responses from more than eight hundred geneticists from all over the world. Reflecting the relative strength of various national communities, the largest number of letters had arrived from the United States (369), then Britain (83), Germany (82), Canada (32), Japan (25), Sweden (22), the Netherlands (20), China (16), France (15), Switzerland (15), Poland (14), and India (13).30 At the beginning of November, the organizing committee prepared its Bulletin no. 1 and sent it to the printers.31 Everything seemed to be going smoothly. Suddenly, on 14 November 1936, the Politburo decided 'to cancel the convocation of the Seventh international genetics congress in the USSR in 1937.'32 As I have detailed elsewhere, the main reason for the cancel-

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lation was the congress's 'unpreparedness' to serve the propaganda goals of its party patrons - first of all, to demonstrate to foreign participants the wonderful advances of Soviet science.331 was unable to find any documentary evidence that the inclusion of the discussion 'on race' in the congress program had directly prompted the Politburo's decision, though perhaps it contributed to the growing atmosphere of distrust that had begun to permeate Soviet genetics and geneticists by the end of 1936. If anything, for the Soviet authorities, 'racial genetics' presented a good reason not to cancel; better if they held the congress and used it to denounce fascism. As it turned out, the Politburo's decision played into the hands of the Germans. Human Genetics = Eugenics = Racism The New York Times article of 14 December, which broke the news of the cancellation to the world, nevertheless, asserted that 'Nazi racial theories ascribed to some scientists [had] cause[d] the dropping of world congress.'34 Furthermore, Soviet geneticists themselves 'confirmed' this assertion to their Western colleagues. In January 1937, Otto Mohr received a private letter from Vavilov that lent some support to this claim: 'About seven months ago we received a collective letter from America, signed by many geneticists, asking us to include a discussion of the racial problem in the program of the Congress. Personally I was somewhat in doubt as to its necessity, but other members of the Organizing Committee insisted on its inclusion. The letter of the foreign geneticists was published in our newspapers, and there appeared undesirable commentaries in the German press. The Soviet government disapproved of inclusion of this question in our program'.35 As we have seen, however, during the summer and fall of 1936 the 'Soviet government' had repeatedly endorsed the 'inclusion of this question' in the congress's program. Vavilov was apparently referring not to the congress's actual cancellation in November, but rather to more recent developments. It seems likely that Vavilov was writing to Mohr under the sway of events that had occurred during the last few weeks. Two sets of interrelated events seemed especially important in shaping Vavilov's next actions. One was an attack on the congress's general secretary Solomon Levit, his Institute of Medical Genetics, and human genetics generally, which unfolded during November and December.36 The other was an attack on 'Mendelian' genetics mounted by Lysenko and his supporters, which culminated in a discussion on 'issues in

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genetics/ conducted at a special session of VASKhNIL from 19 to 29 December. As noted in the New York Times article, Levit and the staff of his institute had been accused of holding views 'resembling the racial nonsense of German Fascists' and of 'imitating their methods in their own scientific work.' Indeed, in November 1936 Levit came under heavy fire from party officials. There are certain indications that the stimulus for this attack came from within Levit's institute (from its party cell) and was inspired not by Levit's science but by his political 'affiliations.' Prior to joining the Bolsheviks, Levit had been a member of the Mensheviks - a fraction of the Russian social-democratic party that had parted ways with Lenin's 'majority' before the 1917 revolution and that had been banned shortly after the Civil War. In the early 1920s, after joining the victorious Bolsheviks, Levit became an enthusiastic proponent of efforts to introduce Marxism into science and medicine: he founded the 'Leninism in medicine' society and was very active in various ideological battles of the time. During the mid-19308, however, many of the 1920s party radicals were accused of association with Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bukharin, and other 'oppositionists' and fell victim to the purges. It seems likely that Levit's troubles came from this quarter.37 The Great Terror, inaugurated by the first show trial of the so-called Kamenev-Zinoviev bloc in August 1936, made Levit's former association with the Mensheviks, together with his active engagement in the ideological debates of the 1920s, more than sufficient for some Vigilant' party member to denounce him to the local Party committee. It seems highly probable that that is exactly what happened during the fall of 1936. Furthermore, there are some indications that the attack on Levit was part of a larger plot to implicate the patrons of his institute, high-ranking officials of the Commissariat of Public Health (Narkomzdrav) - the commissar Grigorii Kaminskii and his deputy, chairman of the Soviet Red Cross Society, Khristian Rakovskii - in the Trotskyist conspiracy.'38 One of Levit's strongest critics was the head of the science department of the Moscow City Party Committee, Ernst Kol'man, who obviously had been informed of the situation in Levit's institute by a party vigilante. On 5 November 1936, Kol'man sent (outside of channels) a long memorandum to Molotov with 'information on the situation on the scientific front.'39 The memorandum's central theme was 'the recent sharpening of the class struggle on our scientific front.' As a major problem, Kol'man listed 'the fascisization of scientific theory';

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noting Levit's previous association with the Mensheviks, he named him as one of the main proponents of such 'fascisization.' Kol'man explained: This has a particular significance, because Levit is the secretary of the organizing committee of the international genetics congress.' He continued: The convocation of this congress here in 1937 is absolutely unprepared. The congress's composition promises to be fascist, and there is complete theoretical disarray among our geneticists.' Molotov read Kol'man's memorandum attentively and underlined the above-quoted passages with red pencil. Perhaps this denunciation played a role in the appearance in Izvestiia, some ten days later, of a satirical article that portrayed Levit as an overly ambitious scientist who claimed to have entered the pantheon of world science, succeeding Darwin and Marx.40 In November, Levit was several times called to the local Party committee for explanations and recantations; on 5 December these resulted in his formal expulsion from the Communist Party.41 At that time the attack was directed at Levit personally, and his involvement with genetics was mentioned only in passing. In early May 1937, when the fate of Levit's institute was discussed in Narkomzdrav, the commissar Kaminskii admitted: The question of Levit had been decided along lines related not to genetics as such, but to his previous mistakes. These questions need to be separated, as a question about Levit himself and [thel separate questions [about his work]. Aside from his political mistakes, there are questions about his concrete work.'42 Although the initial attack on Levit had been ignited by his 'political mistakes,' his science was soon construed as one of those mistakes. In early December 1936 the mouthpiece of Party ideologists, Under the Banner of Marxism, published an article by Kol'man under the slashing title The Black-Guard Nonsense of Fascism and Our Medical-Biological Science.' This article ferociously attacked Levit and his co-workers for holding 'Fascist views' on human genetics.43 The journal's next issue carried a disparaging review of the latest publications by Levit's Institute of Medical Genetics.44 Furthermore, at the Ail-Union Congress of Neurologists and Psychiatrists held in late December, several participants attacked Levit and his co-workers for adhering to 'Fascist views' on human genetics.45 The equation of human genetics with eugenics and Nazi racism figured prominently in practically all pronouncements against Levit and his staff. During the 1930s, in the minds of many people in the Soviet Union, human genetics still resonated strongly with its earlier incarnation -

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eugenics. This 'resonance' was obviously heard clearly by the Soviet leadership. Students of human genetics tried hard to distance themselves from its discredited predecessor, inventing new names for their studies, such as 'anthropogenetics' or 'medical genetics/ and publishing numerous diatribes against 'bourgeois eugenics.' Yet, as one of the participants in the Narkomzdrav discussion of Levit's institute noted: 'Now [human] genetics is considered by the masses of physicians from the point of view of eugenics/46 As witnessed by the discussion on 'issues in genetics' at the VASKhNIL session in December, many agricultural scientists and officials shared this view. Opponents of 'Mendelian' genetics repeatedly accused leading geneticists - particularly members of the congress organizing committee Kol'tsov and Serebrovskii - of promoting eugenics. Although the name of Levit was not even mentioned, several supporters of Lysenko bitterly criticized Levit's teacher Serebrovskii for his earlier eugenics publications. The critics focused on an article by Serebrovskii, published in 1929 in a bulletin edited by Levit, that advanced the idea of using the techniques of artificial insemination perfected in the Soviet Union for 'positive eugenics.'47 As a result of this attack, on the last day of the session, 29 December, Serebrovskii delivered a 'repentant' speech in which he acknowledged 'a whole number of rude political and antiscientific, anti-Marxist mistakes' that he had made in his eugenics work.48 Quite possibly, the attack on Levit was not the only event that made human genetics suspect in the eyes of the Soviet leadership. In his letters to Huxley, H.J. Muller confided that in a way, he might have been personally responsible for the troubles, for he himself had inspired Stalin's unfavourable attitude towards genetics in general and human genetics in particular.49 Indeed, on 5 May 1936, Muller sent Stalin a copy of his recently published book Out of the Night, which advanced his long-held ideas on 'positive eugenics.'50 In a letter sent along with the book, Muller urged Stalin to implement his ideas in the Soviet Union.51 Castigating 'the evasions and perversions of this matter ... seen in the futile mouthing about "Eugenics" current in bourgeois "democracies," and in the vicious doctrine of "Race Purity" employed by the Nazis as a weapon in the class war,' Muller suggested that the well-being of the nation could be radically improved through the artificial insemination of willing women with the sperm of 'gifted individuals.' The rhetoric and especially the timing of Muller's letter to Stalin just two weeks after the Academy of Sciences presidium had acceded

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to the request of Western geneticists to include the issue of race in the congress's program - suggests that Muller perhaps deliberately timed his appeal to Stalin as part of the anti-fascist campaign planned by the geneticists in the summer of 1936. Muller told Huxley that he had received no response to his letter, but had learned unofficially that Stalin 'has been reading the book, is displeased with it, and has ordered [an] attack against it.' He implied that the assault on Serebrovskii (whose ideas had laid a foundation for Muller's own program) at the December VASKhNIL session had been a result of Stalin's order. Stalin might well have been displeased with Muller's ideas, but Muller was likely exaggerating his own importance in the whole affair. It seems much more probable that the attack on Serebrovskii was linked to the assault on his pupil and collaborator, Levit. In accordance with the norms of Soviet scientific culture, many scientists (and not just Lysenko's supporters, as the congress of neurologists and psychiatrists held in late December 1936 made clear)52 perceived publications against Levit in the central newspapers and party magazines as the beginning of a new public campaign against eugenics and hurried to join the witch-hunt.53 Even before the direct attack on Serebrovskii at the VASKhNIL session, Levit's editorship of the journal where Serebrovskii's infamous article of 1929 had appeared was cited as one of Levit's 'grave mistakes.' Lysenko's supporters simply capitalized on the ongoing campaign to draw Serebrovskii (and later Kol'tsov) into the camp of condemned 'bourgeois eugenics.' What appeared even more damaging for human genetics was that ever since Hitler's ascent to power, the very term 'eugenics' (particularly its German variant, 'Rassenhygiene'54) had in Russia become strongly associated, if not equated, with the explicit racist policies of the Nazis. From 1933 to 1936, Soviet geneticists published a number of articles, along with Russian translations of articles by their Western colleagues, attacking the Nazi's for resorting to genetics to justify their racial theories and policies.55 Yet despite the considerable effort of Soviet geneticists to 'expose' Rassenhygiene and to dissociate - in the words of one of them - 'real genetics' from its 'perversions' in the Nazi propaganda and policies,56 in the minds of many, human genetics had fascist connotations. Even its methods, such as twins studies, came to be labelled 'Fascist' - as happened, for instance, during the abovementioned discussion of Levit's institute in Narkomzdrav.57 This 'association' of human genetics with fascism became especially poisonous as the relationship between the Soviet Union and Germany

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deteriorated. In the fall of 1936 the onset of the Spanish Civil War brought the two countries to the brink of open conflict: the USSR was the only state openly supporting the Republicans, while Germany backed Franco's insurgents. The Soviet press launched an extensive campaign of anti-fascist propaganda that portrayed Nazi Germany as the Soviet Union's worst enemy.58 Furthermore, a number of the accused at the show trials of the Great Terror were charged with spying for Germany. The deterioration of Soviet-German relations 'sensitized/ as it were, both Soviet authorities and Soviet scientists to the alleged links among human genetics, eugenics, and Nazi racism. This sensitivity was readily apparent in the Soviet response to the actions of Western geneticists triggered by the events in Moscow. The New York Times announcement that the congress had been cancelled and that Soviet geneticists had been arrested prompted Western geneticists to launch a wide-ranging campaign in support of their Soviet colleagues. As part of this campaign, geneticists in Britain, Scandinavia, and the United States sent letters and telegrams to Soviet diplomats as well as to their own state officials. In addition, American geneticists placed the issue of the congress on the agenda of the annual meetings of the American Genetics Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, 'with a hope/ as the society secretary Milislav Demerec put it, 'that the opinion of American scientists may help to open the eyes of responsible factors in Russia.'59 The campaign in the West obviously did 'open the eyes' of the Soviet authorities, for on 21 December, Izvestiia published an unsigned editorial article that, unbeknown to its readers, was edited by Stalin personally.60 The editorial announced that Vavilov had not been arrested; furthermore, the congress had been not cancelled but only postponed, because many Soviet scientists involved had 'requested more time for preparation.' It also fiercely refuted all the accusations levelled in the New York Times that the Soviet Union was restricting academic freedom: 'Real freedom for research work, real intellectual freedom exists only in the USSR where science works not for the benefit and not under the hire of a narrow group of capitalists, but for the good and in the interest of the peoples of all mankind.'61 The very next day, Izvestiia carried a lengthy Telegram to the New York Times' by Vavilov himself, which reiterated the main points of the editorial.62 Both the editorial and Vavilov's 'telegram' were immediately reprinted by the New York Times.63 However, neither the editorial nor Vavilov's 'telegram' responded to another major claim by the Times: 'Nazi racial theories

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ascribed to some scientists causes the dropping of world congress.' Neither publication even mentioned Levit, human genetics, eugenics, race, or 'Nazis' views on genetics.' Apparently, in the Soviet Union, by the end of December 1936, the entire subject had become a 'taboo.' The Moscow Congress, Round Two The renewed negotiations between Soviet geneticists and their party patrons over the re-invitation of the congress to Moscow also testify to the heightened sensitivity of both Soviet scientists and their party patrons to the alleged links among human genetics, eugenics, and German fascism. Ever since learning about the government's decision to cancel the congress in late November 1936, Soviet geneticists had been using every means at their disposal to lobby the Party apparatus to reinvite the congress to Moscow. They were encouraged by the Izvestiia announcement that the congress had merely been 'postponed.' Geneticists did not even suspect that Stalin had personally edited the article, but they certainly knew that such a statement could not have appeared without approval at the highest levels. As Muller remarked in his letter to Huxley written on New Year's Eve: 'It should not be assumed that the Congress will not be held here at all.'64 On 15 January 1937 the Academy of Sciences presidium chaired by the newly appointed president, Vladimir Komarov, resolved 'to appeal to the head of SNK V.M. Molotov regarding the changes in the structure and timing of the International Genetics Congress.'65 A few days later, Komarov and Gorbunov, in close consultation with Muralov and Vavilov, began drafting a long memorandum to Molotov, elaborating the changes they deemed necessary in the congress's arrangements. The academy officials were not the only ones concerned with the congress. On 30 January, Stalin and Molotov received a memorandum from lakov lakovlev, the former Commissar of Agriculture, who had recently been appointed head of the Central Committee's Agricultural Department, and who was a staunch supporter of Lysenko's agricultural nostrums. Apparently sometime in late December or early January - perhaps as a result of Stalin's involvement with the Izvestiia editorial - lakovlev was entrusted with examining the work of the congress's organizing committee. He conducted a thorough investigation both of its activities and of the congress's scientific program, and found them unsatisfactory. In his opinion, the program 'had been prepared in such a way that it would have given upper-hand to the supporters of fas-

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cist genetics.'66 Among the subjects that would be particularly open to this undesirable situation, lakovlev listed 'human genetics/ lakovlev suggested that the congress be held a year later, in August 1938. But 'in order to ensure the state's interests at the congress/ he offered a plan of action that included dropping the discussion on 'genetics and race' from the program and ensuring the presence of an 'overwhelming majority of scientists from democratic countries and opponents of Fascist genetics/ A key source for lakovlev's assessment may have been the scientific secretary of Vavilov's Institute of Genetics, Mikhail Prokhorov. A Party member, throughout the 1930s Prokhorov headed agricultural departments in various provincial Party committees. In October 1936 he was appointed to the Institute of Genetics.67 Just a month into his new job, Prokhorov notified party bosses of the institute's 'unpreparedness' to host the congress. What is more, he declared that 'at the Congress, we would be forced to allow a disproportionately large number of reports by foreign scientists, and obviously to a large degree we would have to give the Soviet stage to Fascists.'68 It is quite likely that given his long association with the Party apparatus in charge of agriculture, Prokhorov was the source of information for the assessment of the organizing committee's 'mistakes' by lakovlev. At the beginning of February, Stalin and Molotov received another piece of information regarding the congress from the head of the science department, Bauman: 'As you know, the question of genetics congress and the discussion on issues in genetics, which had been held at the session of VASKhNIL in December 1936, aroused great interest among foreign scientists, particularly in the USA/69 As an illustration, Bauman enclosed copies of the letter by Landauer to Schaxel of 26 December 1936, as well as Schaxel's response. Bauman noted that 'all the information coming from us says that the genetics congress is not cancelled, but postponed' and that there had been many inquiries from abroad regarding the exact date of the congress. He concluded: 'I consider it expedient to permit the convocation of the congress in the USSR in 1938/70 The interest of Bauman's addressees was obviously piqued by the correspondence he enclosed, particularly by the last two paragraphs of Landauer's letter, which Molotov marked on the margin with red pencil: In light of contradictory information [available in the United States], naturally, everyone feels that they know only part of the truth. Those who are instinctively anti-Russian, of course, are saying that this is merely the

384 Nikolai Krementsov newest demonstration of the absence of freedom in Russia and of the weakness of the government. Although these conclusions are perhaps stupid, one should not underestimate their effects. Those who sympathize with Russia are unable to provide a rational explanation. We knew that Vavilov had published a note to the effect that the whole affair had nothing to do with intellectual freedom. As far as I understand, this note is aimed at the foreign bourgeoisie. At least, if I understand the situation correctly, in Russia there could be discussed or published anything that is not treason. A question that comes to mind of true friends of Russia is whether certain generalizations of Mendelian genetics are considered to be treason? Is it considered impermissible to apply to humans [the principles of] genetic diversity in the same form that had been established for other animals? These are the main questions that need elucidation.71 Molotov also marked two last paragraphs in Schaxel's letter, which purported to answer Landauer's questions: The freedom of the Soviet citizen is not only written in in the new Constitution, but is firmly embedded in the conscience of the masses, and here it is not Utopia anymore. Because of this, if some scientists, like Serebrovskii, talk about artificial insemination of women to improve the race or, [like] Kol'tsov, talk about selective advantage of mass mortality from infectious diseases, our public reacts very sharply, for they see in this a return to barbarity that in our country is completely eliminated. Our people feel offended by suggestions that sound like the Nuremberg laws of German Fascism on sterilization, castration, and special barracks for breeding humans. For such scientific nonsense our scientists are never being persecuted, least of all, arrested. But their thoughts are publicly exposed as mistaken in general and special publications. They have every opportunity to continue their scientific work.72 The same day, Molotov forwarded Bauman's package to his deputy Valerii Mezhlauk for action. Mezhlauk notified the boss that 'the issue is under control. Comrades from the Academy of Sciences promise to give their proposals in two days/73 Indeed, keeping their promise, two days later, on 7 February, Komarov and Gorbunov sent their memorandum to Molotov, who at once forwarded it to Mezhlauk.74 A special section of the memorandum addressed the issue of the congress's program. Stating that the most important, central problems were 'evolutionary theory in light of the

Eugenics, Rassenhygiene, and Human Genetics 385 newest genetic advances' and 'questions of practical genetics and the breeding of agricultural plants and animals/ Komarov and Gorbunov suggested that 'the discussion of racial problems in light of genetics initiated by American scientists' be removed from the program, because 'there are special eugenics congresses to address questions of eugenics/ The academy officials also noted that the majority of invited speakers would be scientists from the United States, Britain, France, and Scandinavian countries. They also implied that a German delegation to the congress would be neither large nor authoritative, for 'a large number of leading German geneticists ([Richard] Goldschmidt, [Kurt] Stern, and others) emigrated from Germany during Fascism/ The memorandum concluded with the suggestion that the congress be convened in August 1938. Over the course of a month, however, Mezhlauk did not answer the Komarov-Gorbunov memorandum. At the beginning of March the Academy of Sciences officials again sent it to Molotov. This time the head of the government himself read the memo and presented the issue to the Politburo. On 19 March 1937, the Politburo made the following decisions: 'To approve the Academy of Sciences suggestion on the transfer to August 1938 of the meetings of the Seventh International Genetics Congress in the USSR. To delegate decisions on the membership of the organizing committee and scientific program to SNK.'75 Two days later these decisions were issued as the SNK top-secret decree no. 469 and forwarded to the Academy of Sciences.76 Although they had to abandon hopes of any discussion on 'genetics and race/ Soviet geneticists obviously had succeeded in persuading their party patrons of the necessity of holding the congress in Moscow. The negotiations between Soviet geneticists and their Party patrons clearly demonstrate the Soviet authorities' fear that the congress might become a vehicle for pro-fascist propaganda. This fear was reinforced by the suspicion that human genetics had 'links to fascism.' As we have seen, it was a key point in lakovlev's assessment of the organizing committee's 'mistakes.' He stated that the proposed discussion 'would have given upper-hand to the supporters of fascist genetics.'77 It is unlikely that the members of the organizing committee knew the contents of lakovlev's letter, which was sent to Stalin and Molotov on 30 January. However, the November-December campaign against Levit and his institute, together with the attack on Serebrovskii's 'eugenic mistakes' at the VASKhNIL session, made it clear that the very subject of human genetics had become entangled in a 'racial' and 'eugenic'

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muddle and was politically dangerous. This is why, in their memo to Molotov sent a week after he had received lakovlev's assessment, Komarov and Gorbunov themselves suggested that the entire session on human genetics be dropped from the congress's program. Characteristically, the reason given by the Academy of Sciences officials was that 'discussion of the racial problem in light of genetics' was the prerogative of 'special eugenics congresses,' which were 'to address questions of eugenics.'78 Thus, even the academy officials involved in the preparation of the genetics congress conflated human genetics with eugenics and racism. After the PIOC decision to withdraw the congress from Russia, the issue of the 'Fascist links' of genetics remained a major point of concern in the negotiations between Soviet geneticists and their Party patrons over the Soviet delegation's attendance at the congress in Edinburgh. In February 1938, in his letter to Molotov, Vavilov notified the head of SNK that he had been elected president of the forthcoming congress.79 He asked Molotov for permission to accept the presidency, 'for it honors not myself, a humble scientist, but my country; such honor is not often bestowed on Soviet scientists.' Vavilov also pointed out that 'there is every reason to believe that Fascist Germany would not allow its geneticists to take part in the congress, because ... a Swedish geneticist, stringent antifascist, [Gunnar] Dalhberg, had been appointed the chair of the section on human heredity.' Academy of Sciences president Komarov included a similar statement in his appeal to Molotov regarding the forthcoming congress in Edinburgh.80 Genetics and Race in the Eyes of Western Geneticists The alleged links of genetics to eugenics and Nazi racism, which many Western geneticists believed had been responsible for the cancellation of the Moscow congress, coupled with Western geneticists' perceptions of the general situation in genetics in both the USSR and Germany, played a crucial role in the PIOC's decision to withdraw the congress from Moscow and profoundly influenced the preparations for the congress in Edinburgh. In September 1939, in his report on the congress's work in Edinburgh, its acting president, Francis A. Crew, observed: The chief qualifications demanded of those who undertake the organization of an international scientific conference in these days would seem to be an unwarrantable optimism and a complete disregard for current political events.'81 Yet in their attempts to organize the international congress,

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geneticists found themselves continuously caught in the 'force field' of political tensions among Hitler's Germany, Stalin's Russia, and Western democracies. After the news of the congress's 'postponement,' many Western geneticists apparently felt that if the congress were held in the Soviet Union, it would be automatically drawn into the political muddle, and that was an eventuality they tried to avoid. As Mohr quite openly stated in a memorandum circulated among the PIOC members in July 1937: The science of genetics comes in an exceptional position in so far as some of its principles and practical bearings are apt to be interpreted in a political light. This relation has during recent years been brought to the very foreground of public attention. Several members of the International Committee have expressed in their letters the view that under the conditions prevailing in Europe at present it would be advisable to hold the next congress in a country where this situation is least likely to be felt.'82 The 'political light' Mohr was alluding to most certainly meant the different attitudes of German and Soviet authorities towards the issues of human genetics and its 'relation to race.' Many Western geneticists viewed the situation in Soviet genetics through the prism of German genetics and considered the situation in both countries to be very similar. As the editor of the Journal of Heredity, Robert Cook noted in a letter to the Soviet Ambassador to the United States, Aleksandr Troianovskii: 'We cannot avoid expressing our regret that Soviet Union scientists seem in danger of being exposed to the same kind of mental crucifixion that German scientists have recently suffered under the Nazi regime.'83 Western geneticists assumed that their colleagues in both Germany and the Soviet Union were being forced to comply with the ideological doctrines propounded by their state patrons - the 'genetic superiority of Nordic race' in Germany and the 'genetic equality' of all ethnic groups in the Soviet Union. In December 1936, in the wake of the troubles with the Moscow congress, the resolution adopted by the American Society of Naturalists reiterated: The scientific world can place no reliance upon reports of research carried on under conditions which limit its freedom by an enforced agreement with any preconceived views or dogmas.'84 Many Western geneticists saw the political regimes in both countries as dictatorships under which 'academic freedom' did not and could not exist; furthermore, they saw their discipline in both countries becoming a 'red-hot political issue.'85 Since Hitler's ascent to power, the persecution of left-wing intellectuals combined with the anti-Jewish legislation had forced many geneti-

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cists to leave Germany. At the very time when the troubles with the congress were beginning, in November 1936, even the German representative on the PIOC, Richard Goldschmidt, moved to the United States. Particularly in Britain and the United States, geneticists worked hard to help their German emigre colleagues find jobs outside Germany.86 Yet despite the efforts of several German emigres (notably Landauer and Schaxel) to induce the international genetics community to wage an organized campaign against the persecution of their colleagues in Germany, the community as a whole seemed reluctant to take collective action.87 A leading American specialist in human genetics, Charles Davenport, remarked in his answer to Landauer's solicitation in November 1935: Though science is international and the advancement of any scientific worker is of interest to all the workers in the same field, still I am in some doubt as to how far the scientific workers in one country should interfere in the public policy of another country, even though that policy affects the scientific work of a colleague in that country/ He deemed any action on the part of world geneticists fruitless: 'You, like me, know of many ... cases in which scientific colleagues have been cruelly handled. We are glad to help them individually in any way we can, but there is no use to write protests to H[er]r Hitler/88 (A year later, after the New York Times report on Vavilov's supposed arrest, Davenport apparently changed his mind and decided that writing protests to 'Comrade Stalin' might be of some use.89) Geneticists all over the world had watched in alarm the growing deployment of 'genetics language' in Nazi propaganda and political pronouncements, as well as the mounting usage of the Nazi rhetoric of Aryan racism by certain German colleagues. Some of them even published lengthy critiques of Nazi racial concepts and policies.90 In 1936, Mohr confided to the Columbia University geneticist Leslie C. Dunn that a colleague of Mohr's who had recently spent a month in Berlin 'was perfectly horrified at the wild and barbaric spirit down there/91 This explains why, when German emigres Julius Schaxel and Walter Landauer initiated the request in the spring of 1936 that the Moscow congress discuss 'genetics as related to race theories/ more than thirty American geneticists eagerly supported this initiative, as did some of their Soviet and British colleagues. Obviously geneticists wanted to dissociate their discipline from 'Fascist nonsense/ In the eyes of many people abroad (and not just geneticists), the situation in the Soviet Union during 1936 and 1937 - the growing Great Terror, with its mass arrests and executions of 'oppositionists' - was very similar to the one in Hitler's Germany. At that very moment,

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genetics also became a politically charged issue in the Soviet Union, largely for two reasons: the assault on Levit, and Lysenko's attack on 'formal' genetics. The apparent similarity of the general situations in Germany and the Soviet Union led many Western geneticists to believe that the reported arrests of Soviet colleagues had been related to their scientific views. At the same time, many Western geneticists attributed the congress's cancellation to the Soviet authorities' negative attitude towards their field as a whole - an attitude that had been inspired to a certain degree by the Nazi abuses of genetics. Many scientists outside of the Soviet Union actually believed the New York Times headline - 'Nazi Racial Theories Ascribed to Some Scientists Causes the Dropping of World Congress.' And this caused some of them much anguish. As Jennings confessed in a letter to Dunn: 'I fear that the movement which was made to press upon the Congress the desirability of a discussion of race problem (I signed the letter) was an unfortunate one.'92 In the spring of 1936, when Landauer undertook the initiative to include in the congress's proceedings a discussion on race, not all American geneticists had been of the same mind about the proposal. Davenport, for example, refused to add his signature to the request, because he thought it had been formulated in too vague terms and hence 'it might arouse just an angry, political debate and bring genetics into bad repute.'93 Some geneticists supported such a discussion as a matter of principle but thought that an international congress, particularly one held in the USSR, was not the best place for it. One geneticist suggested that it would be better if the issue were discussed instead at a meeting of the American Genetics Society, 'though even in this gathering,' he surmised, 'it will be hard for some members to avoid letting personal factors influence their scientific opinions.'94 Nevertheless, he was certain that the society was 'big enough and cosmopolitan enough' to express a weighty opinion on its own, and that it would be 'politically safe for its members to follow their scientific data to whatever conclusions they may lead.' He was certain, he added, that 'neither Russian, German, Italian, nor Japanese geneticists dare do this.'95 He further suggested that the society 'might ask for its report to be included in the Proceedings of the International Congress, and that it would be wisest to ask for this inclusion without public discussion of it, but perhaps accompanied by an individual secret vote, with the total recorded, to indicate to what extent the International Congress approved of it.' Other American geneticists, however, thought that the whole idea

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was a bad one. As Demerec put it to Landauer: 'As a geneticist I would hate to see our congress involved in a question which borders on politics and which would stir up a great deal of both desirable and undesirable publicity/96 Some worried that the proposed discussion would place their German colleagues in an awkward position: 'At the forthcoming congress is it not probable that any geneticists present who may have political opinions favorable to the present German government will automatically be driven into a defensive attitude (whatever their real scientific opinion may be) on practices adopted by Germany? If German official delegates are there, they will certainly have to support their Government's practices. On the other hand, if German representatives are not present, it would be claimed by German propagandists that any conclusion unfavorable to them, which might be reached by the congress, was biased and not an international one.'97 Others worried that the request could land their Soviet colleagues in trouble. Demerec, for example, warned Landauer: 'As you know, there is less freedom for discussion in Russia than in any other country, including both Germany and Italy. The idea of inequality among individuals of the human species is against the doctrine of those now in power and a discussion on this subject may not be tolerated. I recall that a few years ago one of the prominent Russian geneticists was in trouble because he expressed his view on this subject too freely.'98 Demerec's worries were certainly justified by the private messages he had received from Soviet colleagues, who told him that among the reasons for the congress's cancellation 'some influence had the inclusion of the question on racial problems which was included according to the request of thirty-two American geneticists. The Soviet government found it not reasonable to have the discussion of this problem in our country, where this problem does not exist at all.'99 A Russian emigre geneticist working at the time in the United States, Theodosius Dobzhansky, suggested in December 1936 that to remedy the situation, 'it might be good if some American geneticists would compose a sort of short popular treatise on the subject "genetics is the opposite of a Nazi theory," and send such a treatise to Moscow.'100 However, he was not very hopeful about the success of such an action. After December 1936 it was clear to many scientists involved that even if the congress were to meet in Moscow, the discussion of 'race in relation to genetics' would not be possible. They evidently deemed such a situation unacceptable. As Jennings remarked: 'I have something of a feeling that [the congress] should not meet in a country

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where free and open discussion is not permitted, and it was [this] consideration that induced me to sign the letter [asking for the inclusion of the discussion on race in the congress's program].'101 The suspicion that the proposed discussion might have led to the congress's cancellation weighed heavily on Western geneticists' minds; there is no doubt that it contributed to the PIOC's decision to withdraw the congress from Moscow, despite their Soviet colleagues' repeated pleas to the contrary. The reluctance of Western geneticists to see their discipline entangled in a political controversy appeared to be the major reason for the congress's withdrawal from Moscow. Yet even though the PIOC moved the congress to 'safe' ground in Britain, the international community still had to deal with 'red-hot political issues' that plagued the field - particularly 'racial and eugenical questions in relation to genetics.' The British organizers discussed thoroughly the composition of the congress's scientific program with their colleagues at home and abroad, and these 'questions' caused them much anxiety. Western geneticists had to decide how to deal with the very subject that they thought had caused the 'postponement' of the Moscow congress. The issue soon assumed even greater urgency. After the decision to withdraw the congress from Moscow was made public, the British Eugenics Society approached the congress's organizers with the suggestion that an international eugenics congress be held jointly with the genetics one.102 In November 1937, Mohr heatedly advised Muller, who had recently moved from Moscow to Britain and become chair of the program committee for the Edinburgh congress: 'Look out for one thing. Don't mix the genetics congress with a eugenics congress!! Keep the two apart. A letter from eugenics circles made me a little afraid. They of course want to join. The International Committee doesn't want [anything] of the sort, I am sure. Human genetics at our Congress should rank with genetics in other animals.'103 Knowing that the chairman of the organizing committee, Francis Crew, had long-standing relations to the British Eugenics Society (as a member of its governing council), Mohr also asked Muller to relay this advice to Crew. The organizers apparently heeded Mohr's counsel.104 A well-known antifascist, Gunnar Dahlberg, was put in charge of the congress's section T,' which dealt with the issues of human heredity. Dahlberg made sure that reports submitted to his section touched on neither Rassenhygiem nor eugenics. Furthermore, he invited Mohr to deliver a keynote address at the section's plenary meeting.

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However, shortly before the congress opened in Edinburgh, an opportunity presented itself for those geneticists who felt the need to express their opinion on the issue. On 4 August, the same day he received Vavilov's letter announcing the Soviet withdrawal from the congress, Crew also received a cable from the editor-in-chief of the news agency 'Science Service/ Watson Davis, asking him and the congress's 'representative participants' to provide him with 'several hundred words discussing how could [the] world['s] population [be] improve[d] most effectively genetically.'105 Crew, of course, was far too busy and forwarded the request to Muller, who enthusiastically attended to the task. Muller wrote a long memorandum and sent it to Crew, Cyril Darlington, Huxley, Hogben, Haldane, and Joseph Needham asking them to add their signatures. Muller carefully worded the memorandum, which soon became known as the 'Geneticists' Manifesto.'106 He did not use the word 'eugenics,' nor did he mention directly German 'Aryanism,' with its emphasis on the hereditary superiority of the 'Nordic' race. Although the main thrust of the manifesto was that 'the effective genetic improvement of mankind is dependent upon major changes in social conditions, and collective changes in human attitudes,' German 'attitudes' towards genetics received ample attention. The second major hindrance to genetic improvement,' stated the manifesto, 'lies in the economic and political conditions, which foster antagonism between different people, nations, and "races."' It stressed: The removal of race prejudices and of the unscientific doctrine that good or bad genes are the monopoly of particular people or of persons with features of a given kind will not be possible, however, before the conditions, which make for war and economic exploitation have been eliminated. This requires some effective sort of federation of the whole world, based on the common interests of all its people.' Muller did not attempt to make his memorandum an 'official statement' of the congress or a subject for public discussion at one of the sessions. Instead, he personally asked a number of participants to add their signatures to those of their British colleagues. His quest met almost universal approval: 'With very few exceptions all those asked to sign it did so.' Fourteen geneticists added their signatures to the original seven. But, of course, Muller obviously approached only those who, he knew, shared his views.107 At the congress itself, even though Soviet geneticists were absent and German geneticists were in the majority among the contributors to

Eugenics, Rassenhygiene, and Human Genetics 393 section T/ none of its six sessions on human genetics even mentioned eugenics or 'questions of race in light of genetics.' Reflections The story of the Seventh International Genetics Congress brings into sharp relief the tensions that were mounting during the 1930s within the international scientific community regarding the relationship between genetics and eugenics - in particular the latter's German variant, Rassenhygiene. As many historians have persuasively demonstrated, the early association with eugenics was crucial for the institutionalization of genetics, in that it provided the fledging discipline with suitable arguments for establishing its 'external' legitimacy in the eyes of prospective patrons.108 In Germany, for example, as Paul Weindling has aptly observed, 'eugenics nurtured an increasingly active and well-funded community of geneticists.'109 The history of the institutionalization of genetics in Britain, the United States, the Soviet Union, and Scandinavia suggests that Weindling's observation is equally applicable to the relationship between eugenics and genetics in other countries. In the 1910s and 1920s, many would-be geneticists around the world utilized their links to eugenics to foster the establishment of their field as an academic discipline. They referred repeatedly to the contributions their discipline might make to 'bettering humankind' to justify its right for existence and to claim their share of the resources available at the time for research in eugenics. During this period a number of geneticists participated regularly in the international eugenics congresses. By the mid-1930s, genetics had been firmly established as an academic discipline, and its practitioners' need for 'external' justifications receded dramatically. Geneticists had developed their own research programs - relating to the chromosomal and cytoplasmic mechanisms of heredity, developmental and population genetics, and the mutability and expression of genes, to name but a few - which had very little (if any) relevance to the concerns of their early partners and patrons in the field of eugenics. By the early 1930s a new generation of geneticists had entered the field. They were engaged mainly in these new and exciting avenues of research - mapping chromosomes, searching for mutagenes, deciphering biochemical intricacies of the gene's actions, and uncovering the distribution of various genes in wild populations and paying scant attention to anything else.110 As a result, although

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some geneticists maintained their interest in eugenic research as well as their links with eugenic institutions, genetics as a whole became quite distanced from its 'foster parent/ One might even suggest that by the 1930s the relationship between genetics and eugenics had been in a certain sense reversed relative to the previous decade: eugenicists were now trying to justify their various claims by referring to the newest genetic research111 and were seeking to forge an alliance with genetics on the domestic and international scenes. Evidence of this was their attempt to organize a joint congress in Edinburgh. There were, however, two exceptions to this general picture: Germany and Soviet Russia. In the USSR after 1930, eugenics was branded a 'bourgeois' science and virtually disappeared, while studies in human genetics continued under the names of 'anthropogenetics' and 'medical genetics/ In contrast, after Hitler's ascent to power, eugenics in the form of Rassenhygiene came to dominate genetic research in Germany, as witnessed by the 1934 meeting of the German Genetics Society.112 The differing relations between eugenics and genetics reflected trie diverging interests of the state patrons of science in Germany and Russia. The political connotations of human genetics in the 1930s posed a considerable challenge to the international genetics community. The majority of Western geneticists were reluctant to see their discipline embroiled in a political controversy. As the secretary of the Dutch Genetics Society, Hagedoorn, warned Mohr in the spring of 1937: 'Your committee would do wise to eschew any of the violently politicallyminded countries, such as Germany, Italy or Russia/ Ironically, the Italian representative on the IOC, Alessandro Ghigi, declared in his response to Mohr's memorandum: 'I am of the opinion that the scientists of all the world ought to prevent that science could serve as a basis for contrasting political-social points of view. This would be a rather dangerous precedent/113 In December 1936, Jennings mused: 'Will men wish to go [to Russia] to discuss a subject which is considered a red-hot political issue?'114 A few months later, the international genetics community answered this rhetorical question with a definitive no. Clearly, German 'racial' genetics threatened to undermine the discipline's consensus over questions of human heredity, as well as a major tenet of scientific internationalism - the universality of produced knowledge. To be sure, a number of Western and Soviet geneticists published critiques of German 'racial' genetics and racial policies.115 And as we have seen, some of them wanted to meet the 'German challenge' at the Moscow congress by organizing a special discussion on

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'eugenical and racial questions in light of genetics'; their hope in this was to strengthen the discipline's consensus regarding 'racial' genetics. Their efforts failed. Even after the congress was relocated to Britain, the genetics community as a whole decided to abstain from any direct confrontation with the proponents of 'racial genetics.' It would steer clear of the issue throughout the 1930s. Soviet geneticists found themselves in a particularly vulnerable position. Initially, in an effort to use the congress for anti-fascist propaganda, the Soviet leaders endorsed the discussion on 'genetics and race.' But with Soviet-German relations deteriorating as a result of the Spanish Civil War, they deleted the entire session on human genetics from the congress's program, apparently fearing that the congress would become a vehicle for Nazi propaganda. Furthermore, as we have seen, by the beginning of 1937 the active use of 'genetics language' in Nazi political pronouncements had led the Soviet leadership to view all research in human genetics as 'Fascist.' The story of the congress as told here also illuminates the particular role played by the German emigre biologists Julius Schaxel and Walter Landauer in shaping the attitudes of the two largest genetics communities - the Soviet and the American - towards the interconnections among human genetics, eugenics, and Rassenhygiene. Schaxel and Landauer shared not only left-wing political convictions but also a particular concern over the state of genetics in their former country. Together they alerted world geneticists to the 'Nazi abuses' of their discipline and spearheaded the campaign to place 'issues of race' on the congress's agenda.116 However, each had to adapt to a different cultural and political milieu; and as demonstrated by their correspondence over the congress's cancellation cited earlier, each in a way became 'more Catholic than the Pope' in his devotion to the creed - American or Soviet - prevailing in his new home. As is characteristic of many recent immigrants, each of these men came to identify almost entirely with the values and culture of his adoptive country. Schaxel, for instance, consistently used the pronoun 'our' in depicting the situation in the Soviet Union - 'our people,' 'our country/ 'our public.' Furthermore, after moving to Moscow, he joined the Communist Party (he had been a social democrat in Germany) and apparently served as an unofficial 'Party curator' of the congress. In early October 1936 he was entrusted with an inspection of the organizing committee's preparations; ironically, it was his report that raised the spectre of 'fascist domination' at the congress. Schaxel warned the sci-

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ence department that among the scientists invited by the organizing committee to attend the congress, 'there were many fascists/117 It also seems certain that Schaxel himself provided Bauman with copies of his correspondence with Landauer, perhaps in the hope that it would help reinstate the congress in Moscow. His 'services' were appreciated, for after the Politburo permitted Soviet geneticists to reinvite the congress to Moscow, Schaxel became a member of the new organizing committee. In contrast, after moving to the United States, Landauer's political views evolved from a 'radical' socialism towards a much more moderate 'liberal-democratic' outlook.118 Furthermore, he was far removed from the nodes of power in the American genetics community. Although he had initially succeeded in recruiting a number of colleagues to sign the request for a discussion on 'genetics and race/ after the Moscow failure he abandoned his quest. Unlike yet another German emigre, Franz Boas, who prodded the American Anthropological Society in 1939 into adopting a strong resolution condemning Nazi racial policies and 'racial anthropology/119 Landauer apparently lacked the necessary clout to inspire his fellow-geneticists to a similar action. In the end, the efforts of Landauer and Schaxel proved fruitless. Neither succeeded in stirring his adopted community into launching a broad campaign against Rassenhygiene and German abuses of genetics - albeit they failed for different reasons. Soviet geneticists, though initially quite enthusiastic about the proposed discussion on 'racial' genetics, were 'disciplined' by the Soviet authorities into abandoning the entire subject of human genetics. In the United States, the American Genetics Society, though not under any political pressure from authorities, chose of its own accord to remain silent. Although during the late 1930s many individual geneticists published extensive critiques of Rassenhygiene and eugenics, the story of the Seventh International Genetics Congress demonstrates that the majority of world geneticists wanted to keep their professional pursuits separate from the political entanglements inherent in issues of race and eugenics. NOTES 1 'Moscow Cancels Genetics Parley/ New York Times (henceforth NYT), 14 December 1936,18. 2 See 'Science and Dictators/ NYT, 17 December 1936,26. 3 Mohr to Vavilov, 16 April 1935. A copy of this letter is preserved in the

Eugenics, Rassenhygiene, and Human Genetics 397

4 5 6

7

8 9 10 11

12 13 14

15

16 17

American Philosophical Society Library, Philadelphia, PA (henceforth APS) in the L.C. Dunn Collection (henceforth Dunn Papers). The Russian State Archive of Economics (Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv ekonomiki, Moscow) (henceforth RGAE),/. 8390, op. 1, d. 656, /. 2-2 reverse. The Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Arkhiv rossiiskoi akademii nauk, Moscow) (henceforth ARAN),/. 2, op. 1-1935, d. 83, /. 186. Vavilov to Mohr, 3 July 1935. A copy of this letter is preserved in the Dunn Papers and among the documents of Otto Mohr housed at the Anatomical Institute of Oslo University (henceforth Mohr Papers), found by Guil Winchester. I am grateful to Guil for providing me with the copies of Mohr's correspondence. The Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History (Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv sotsial'no-politicheskoi istorii, Moscow) (henceforth RGASPI),/. 17, op. 114, d. 590, /. 49. RGASPI,/. 17, op. 3, d. 970, /. 9 Dunn Papers, Vavilov to Mohr, 29 August 1935. ARAN,/. 2, op. 1-1935, d. 83, /. 171-2. ARAN, /. 2, op. 1-1935, d. 83, /. 165-165 reverse; published in Mezhdunarodnye nauchnye sviazi akademii nauk SSSR, 1917-1941 (Moscow: Nauka, 1992), 183-4. RGASPI,/. 17, op. 3, d. 974, /. 73. ARAN,/. 201, op. 3, d. 3, /. 41-4. ARAN,/. 201, op. 5, d. 2, /. 35-7. American geneticists to Levit, 2 April 1936. The signatories of the letter were Edgar Altenberg, T.H. Bissonnette, C.B. Bridges, George Child, L.J. Cole, R.C. Cook, L.T. David, P.R. David, W.F. Dove, L.C. Dunn, W.H. Gates, A.J. Coldforb, Myron Gordon, G.W. Gowen, Mark Graubard, H.R. Hunt, F.B. Hutt, Viktor Jollos, Walter Landauer, E.W. Lindstrom, C.C. Little, B.C. MacDowell, O.S. Margolis, J.T. Patterson, Raymond Pearl, H.H. Plough, Oscar Riddle, L.H. Snyder, L.J. Stadler, Alexander Weinstein, and P.H. Whiting. On Schaxel's life and work, see Dieter Fricke, Julius Schaxel, 1887-1943: Leben und Kampfeines marxistischen deutschen Naturwissenschaftlers und Hochschullehrers (Leipzig: Urania-Verlag, 1964); and Heinz Penzlin, ed., Theoretische Grundlagen und Probleme der Biologic: Festveranstaltung und wissenschaftliche Vortragstagung am 20 und 21 Marz 1987 an der Friedrich-SchillerUniversitat Jena, aus Anlass des 100 Geburtstages von Julius Schaxel (Jena: Universitat Jena, Abteilung Wissenschaftliche Publikationen, 1988). Dunn Papers, Schaxel to Landauer, 28 November 1935 and 3 May 1936. In his political outlook, Landauer was a socialist-democrat. See his early writings on various aspects of the post-First World War political develop-

398 Nikolai Krementsov ment in Germany, which have been recently published in English translation: Hugh Clark, Julius Elias, and Peter Bergmann, eds., The Antecedents of Nazism: Weimar: The Political Papers of Walter Landauer, Transactions of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences 56, no. 2 (2000). 18 ARAN,/. 210, op. 5, d. 2, /. 40-1. Landauer to Levit, 2 April 1936. 19 See ibid., /. 34, Huxley to Levit, 15 April 1936; and ibid., /. 38, Jennings to Levit, 9 April 1936. 20 On the history of Soviet eugenics and its role in the institutionalization of Soviet genetics, see Mark B. Adams, 'Eugenics in Russia/ in Mark B. Adams, ed., The Wellborn Science: Eugenics in Germany, France, Brazil, and Russia (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990), 153-216. 21 Emphasis has been added. 22 ARAN, /. 201, op. 3, d. 3, /. 19-21. 23 Bauman to Stalin and Molotov, 26 June 1936, in the State Archive of the Russian Federation (Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii, Moscow) (henceforth GARF),/. 5446, op. 18a, d. 192, /. 37-40. A copy of this document was found by V.D. Esakov in the Archive of the President of the Russian Federation (Arkhiv Presidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii, Moscow) (henceforth APRF),/. 3, op. 33, d. 210, /. 34-7 and recently published in V. Esakov, ed., Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro (Moscow: ROSSPAN, 2000), 214-16. In the publication, the document is undated, but the original found in GARF is dated 26 June 1936. 24 See lu. Shaksel', 'Rassovoe uchenie, nauka i proletarskii internatsionalizm/ Izvestiia, 18 June 1936,2-3, here - 2. 25 ARAN,/. 201, op. 3, d. 16, /. 17. 26 ARAN,/. 201, op. 3, d.2,1.1-5. Muralov and Levit to the Central Committee's Science Department, 28 September 1936. 27 See GARF,/. 5446, op. 18a, d. 192, /. 46-52. 28 Among archival materials seized by the Soviet Army in Germany after the end of the Second World War, there is a file on the Seventh International Genetics Congress. See GARF,/. 501, op. 3, d. 341, /. 1-39.1 am particularly grateful to Carola Sachse for directing my attention to these documents and providing copies. All the following quotations are from this source. 29 Apparently, the Gestapo kept close tabs on Schaxel, and it was his June Pravda article on the 'race doctrine' that prompted these high-level discussions on the congress. 30 See GARF,/. 5446, op. 18a, d. 192, /. 46. 31 A copy-edited text of the bulletin is preserved in ARAN,/. 201, op. 3, d. 49. 32 RGASPI,/. 17, op. 3, d. 982, /. 40. 33 See Nikolai Krementsov, International Science between the World Wars: The Case of Genetics (London: Routledge, 2005).

Eugenics, Rassenhygiene, and Human Genetics 399 34 'Moscow Cancels Genetics Parley/ NYT, 14 December 1936,18. 35 Vavilov to Mohr, 4 January 1937, the Central State Archive of ScientificTechnical Documentation (Tsentral'nyi gosudarstvennyi arkhiv nauchnotekhnicheskoi dokumentatsii, St Petersburg) (henceforth TsGANTD),/. 318, op. 1-1, d. 1436, /. 58-58 reverse. I was unable to find any publication of the letter in Soviet newspapers. The only publication that mentioned the letter was an article by J. Shaxel published in Izvestiia in June 1936. See Shaksel', 'Rassovoe uchenie, nauka i proletarskii internatsionalizm/ Izvestiia, 18 June 1936, 2-3. 36 During 1936, Soviet policies run contrary to certain principles and findings of human genetics. Two governmental decrees announced in July 1936 are particularly noteworthy in this respect: a new anti-abortion law, and the Central Committee's resolution on the so-called 'pedological perversions in the system of Narkomproses.' 37 Unfortunately, the documents related to Levit's expulsion from the Communist Party, subsequent arrest, and execution are still unavailable. 38 See Brat'ia Tur, 'V pylu uvlecheniia/ Izvestiia, 10 December 1936, 3. 39 GARF,/. 5446, op. 29, d. 30, /. 185-90. Kol'man to Molotov, 5 November 1936. 40 Brat'ia Tur, 'Kontramarka v Panteon,' Izvestiia, 16 November 1936,4. 41 See ARAN, /. 2, op. 1-1935, d. 83, /. 100. 42 GARF,/. 8009, op. 1, d. 113, /. 27. 43 See E. Kol'man, 'Chernosotennyi bred fashizma i nasha medikobiologicheskaia nauka,' Pod Znamenem Marksizma (henceforth PZM), no. 11 (1936): 64-72. 44 See L. Karlik, Trudy Mediko-geneticheskogo instituta im. M. Gor'kogo,' PZM, no. 12 (1936): 169-86. 45 See To lozhnomu puti,' Pravda, 26 December 1936,4. 46 GARF,/. 8009, op. 1, d. 113, /. 24. 47 See A.S. Serebrovskii, 'Antropogenetika i evgenika v sotsialisticheskom obshchestve,' Trudy Kabineta Nasledstvennosti i Konstitutsii Cheloveka pri Mediko-Biologicheskom Institute, no. 1 (1929): 1-19. 48 See, Biulleten' IV Sessii [VASKhNIL], no. 8 (30 December 1936): 21. 49 Muller to Huxley, 9 and 13 March 1937. Copies of Muller's letters are preserved among his papers held at the Lilly Library of the University of Indiana, Bloomington (henceforth Muller Papers) and among the Cyril Darlington collection held at the Bodleian Library of Oxford University (henceforth Darlington Papers). 50 See H.J. Muller, Out of the Night: A Biologist's View of the Future (New York: Vanguard, 1935). 51 Among Muller's papers in the Lilly Library, I found two copies of a text that had been identified as Muller's letter to Stalin. The first, undated and

400 Nikolai Krementsov

52 53

54

55

56 57 58

untitled typed text, which begins with the words 'As a scientist/ is located among Muller's writings. See Muller MSS, Writings, Box 3, Folder 1936. The second, titled The Social Dimensions of Human Biological Evolution/ represents a slightly abridged version of the first and is dated 4 May 1936. See Muller MSS, General papers, 1936,4 May. Recently, a Russian translation of the letter has been found in Stalin's personal archive. See Tis'mo Germana Miollera - I.V. Stalinu/ Voprosy istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki, no. 1 (1997): 65-78. A comparison of all three texts demonstrates that the first copy found in the Lilly Library is the complete English text of the letter. Following citations from Muller's letter to Stalin are given from this source. See To lozhnomu puti/ Pravda, 26 December 1936,4. On the general rules of 'Soviet scientific culture' during the Stalin era, see Nikolai Krementsov, Stalinist Science (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997). On the history of German eugenics and Rassenhygiene, see Sheila Faith Weiss, Race Hygiene and National Efficiency: The Eugenics of Wilhelm Schallmayer (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987); Robert N. Proctor, Racial Hygiene (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988); Peter Weingart, Jiirgen Kroll, and Kurt Bayertz, Rasse, Blut und Gen (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1988); and Paul Weindling, Health, Race, and German Politics between National Unification and Nazism, 1870-1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989). See, for instance, L.Kh. Khogben [Hogben], 'Biologicheskie osnovy fashisstkoi filosofii/ Uspekhi sovremennoi biologii 3, no. 4 (1934): 413-30; Dzh. B.S. Kholdein [Haldane], 'Genetika i sovremennye sotsial'nye teorii/ ibid.: 42630; Z. Berman, 'Rasovye teorii germanskogo fashizma/ ibid.: 431-9; G.I. Meller [Muller], Genetika protiv ucheniia o "chistote rasy/" ibid.: 525-41; E.A. Finkel'shtein, 'Evgenika i fashizm/ in Rassovaia teoriia na sluzhbe fashizma (Kiev: Gosmedgiz, 1935), 37-88; Z.A. Gurevich, 'Fashizm, "rasovaia gigiena" i meditsina/ in ibid., 89-125. See also Levit's introduction to the fourth volume of the proceedings of his Institute of Medical Genetics: S. Levit, 'Predislovie/ in Trudy mediko-geneticheskogo instituta, vol. 4 (Moscow: Biomedgiz, 1936), 5-16. G. Frizen, 'Genetika i fashizm/ PZM 3 (1935): 86-95. See GARF, /. 8009, op. 1, d. 113, /. 23-7. As part of this campaign, in December 1936, the influential journal Advances in Modern Biology published a Russian translation of the last chapter of Julian Huxley and Alfred Haddon's book, We Europeans. See Dzhulian Khaksli and A.K. Khegdon, 'Rassovyi vopros - teoriia i fakty/ Uspekhi sovremennoi biologii 5, no. 3 (1936): 928-39.

Eugenics, Rassenhygiene, and Human Genetics 401 59 Demerec to East, 16 December 1936. This letter is preserved in the collection of Demerec's papers at the APS (henceforth Demerec Papers). 60 See RGASPI,/. 588, op. 11, d. 199, /. 6-12. 61 See 'Otvet klevetnikam iz "Sains Sends" i "N'iu-Iork Taims,'" Izvestiia, 21 December 1936,1. 62 See Telegramma akademika N.I. Vavilova v amerikanskuiu gazetu "N'iu lork Taims/" Izvestiia, 22 December 1936,4. 63 See 'Moscow Defends Delay on Genetics/ NYT, 22 December 1936,19; and 'Vaviloff Defends Science in Soviet/ NYT, 23 December 1936,8. 64 Muller to Huxley, 31 December 1936. A copy of this letter is preserved in the Darlington Papers, C. 109, J. 107. 65 ARAN, /. 201, op. 3, d. 16, /. 11. 66 Cited in Esakov, ed., Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 246. Emphasis is in the document. 67 For Prokhorov's biographical data, see ARAN,/. 411, op. 6, d. 2756. 68 ARAN, /. 2, op. 1-1935, d. 83, /. 101. Prokhorov to Gorbunov, 16 November 1936. Underlined by Prokhorov. 69 See GARF, /. 5446, op. 20a, d. 524, /. 26-21. Bauman to Stalin and Molotov, 5 February 1937. All of the following citations are from this source. These documents have been published recently by Esakov (see Esakov, Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 246-7), from the copies he found in the Presidential Archive. However, the copy of Bauman's letter from this archive is not dated. This led Esakov to assume that Bauman's letter prompted the Politburo decision on holding the congress in August 1938, adopted in March 1937 (see below). 70 On Molotov's copy the last sentence is underlined in red pencil. 71 Unfortunately, Landauer's letter was given in Russian translation, and I was unable to find the English (or German?) original in the archives in either the United States or Russia. The following citations are my translations from the Russian text. 72 Schaxel's letter was also given in Russian translation, and I was unable to find the German original in the archives in either the United States or Russia, though there are indications that it had been sent and received by the addressee. See Dunn Papers, Dunn to Landauer, 23 February 1937. The following citations are my translation from the Russian text. 73 See GARF,/. 5446, op. 20a, d. 524, /. 27-26. 74 For the complete text of the memorandum, see GARF,/. 5446, op. 20a, d. 524, /. 39-32, Komarov and Gorbunov to Molotov, 7 February 1937. All of the following citations are from this source. 75 RGASPI,/. 17, op. 3, d. 985, /. 5. 76 See GARF,/. 5446, op. 1, d. 128, /. 95, and op. 20a, d. 524, I 51.

402 Nikolai Krementsov 77 Cited in Esakov, Akademiia nauk v resheniiakh Politbiuro, 246. Emphasis is in the document. 78 See GARF, /. 5446, op. 20a, d. 524,1. 39-32, here - /. 34. Komarov and Gorbunov to Molotov, 7 February 1937. 79 ARAN,/. 2, op. 1 (1939), d. 159, /. 1-3. Vavilov to Molotov, 20 February 1938. All the following citations are from this source. 80 See also ARAN, /. 2, op. 1 (1939), d. 157, /. 2. Komarov to Molotov, 21 February 1938. 81 F.A.E. Crew, 'Seventh International Genetical Congress/ Nature 144 (16 September 1939): 496-8, here - 496. 82 Mohr to the IOC members, 21 July 1937. There are numerous copies of this memo in the files of individual geneticists. I quote from a copy preserved in ARAN,/. 201, op. 5, d. 4, /. 1-8. 83 Cook to Troyanovskii, 19 December 1936, The Archive of Russian Foreign Policy (Arkhiv vneshnei politiki Rossii, Moscow) (henceforth AVPR),/. 192, op. 3, d. 53, papka 24, /. 57. 84 'Scientific Freedom/ Nature 139 (30 January 1937): 185. 85 Dunn Papers, Jennings to Dunn, 24 December 1936. 86 On the general efforts of American colleagues to help refugee scholars, see Stephen Duggan and Betty Drury, The Rescue of Science and Learning: The Story of the Emergency Committee in Aid of Displaced Foreign Scholars (New York: Macmillan, 1948); for a historical analysis of this theme, see G. Gemelli, ed., The 'Unacceptables': American Foundations and Refugee Scholars between the Two Wars and After (Brussels: Peter Lang, 2000). 87 See, for instance, Davenport Papers, Landauer to Davenport, 19 October 1935. 88 Davenport Papers, Davenport to Landauer, 23 October 1935. 89 See Davenport Papers, Davenport to the Secretary of State, 17 December 1936. 90 See, for instance, Julian Huxley and Alfred Haddon, We Europeans: A Survey of the 'Racial' Problem (London: Jonathan Cape, 1935). 91 Dunn Papers, Mohr to Dunn, 9 September 1937. 92 Dunn Papers, Jennings to Dunn, 22 December 1936. 93 Davenport Papers, Davenport to Landauer, 13 March 1936. 94 This and the following citations are from a copy of a letter by one of Landauer's correspondents, which was sent to Milislav Demerec and is preserved among the Demerec Papers. Unfortunately, the copy is unsigned, and I was not able to find the original. It seems possible that the author of the letter was C.C. Little. See Demerec Papers, [unidentified] to Landauer, 6 March 1936.

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103 104

105 106

107

108

109

110

111

Emphasis is in the original. Demerec Papers, Demerec to Landauer, 16 March 1936. See Demerec Papers, [unidentified] to Landauer, 6 March 1936. Demerec Papers, Demerec to Landauer, 16 March 1936. ARAN,/. 201, op. 5, d. 1, /. 23. Vavilov to Mohr, 9 December 1936. Dunn Papers, Dobzhansky to Dunn, 21 December 1936. Dunn Papers, Jennings to Dunn, 22 December 1936. See Mohr Papers. Mrs C.B.S. Hodson to Mohr, 25 September 1937. Mrs C.B.S. Hodson was the secretary of the Bureau of Human Heredity, an arm of the British Eugenics Society. I am grateful to Guil Winchester for calling my attention to this correspondence. Muller Papers, Mohr to Muller, 16 November 1937. Mohr's general attitude towards eugenics is partially illuminated in Nils Roll-Hansen, 'Eugenic Sterilization: A Preliminary Comparison of the Scandinavian Experience to that of Germany/ Genome 31 (1989): 890-5. The cable was reproduced in Muller's letter to Darlington, 4 August 1939, Darlington Papers, C. 110. J. 131. The manifesto was published in the Journal of Heredity after the congress had ended. See 'Men and Mice at Edinburgh/ Journal of Heredity 30 (1939): 371-4. The original signatories were Crew, Haldane, Harland, Hogben, Huxley, Muller, and Needham. Additional signatures were those of G.P. Child, P.R. David, G. Dahlberg, Th. Dobzhansky, R.A. Emerson, John Hammond, C.L. Huskins, W. Landauer, H.H. Plough, E. Price, J. Schultz, A.G. Steinberg, and C.H. Waddington. See, for instance, Barbara A. Kimmelman, 'The American Breeders Association: Genetics and Eugenics in an Agricultural Context/ Social Studies of Science 13 (1983): 163-204; Daniel Kevles, 'Genetics in the United States and Britain, 1890-1930: A Review with Speculations/ in Webster, Biology, Medicine and Society, 193-215; Adams, 'Eugenics in Russia'; Krementsov, International Science between the World Wars. Paul Weindling, 'The "Sonderweg" of German Eugenics: Nationalism and Scientific Internationalism/ British Journal of the History of Science 22 (1989): 321-33. For instance, at the 1934 annual meeting of the American Genetics Society, only two out of fifty-two reports touched on the issues related to eugenics. See 'Papers Read at the Pittsburgh Meeting of the Genetics Society of America/ American Naturalist 69 (1935): 55-83. For instance, R. Ruggles Gates used extensively the results of genetic studies on geographical races in deer mice to justify his idea that four major

404 Nikolai Krementsov

112 113 114 115 116

117 118

119

races of humankind - black, white, brown, and yellow, as he defined them - were in fact separate species. See R.R. Gates, 'Genetics and Race/ Man 37 (February 1937): 28-32. See Zeitschrift fur inductive Abstammungs und Vererbugsehre 67, no. 2 (1935). Mohr Papers, Alessandro Ghigi to Mohr, 22 April 1937. Dunn Papers, Jennings to Dunn, 24 December 1936. See, for instance, Huxley and Haddon, We Europeans, and Rassovaia teoriia na sluzhbe fashizma. In the spring of 1935, Schaxel was expelled from the German genetics society. He tried to induce world geneticists into organizing a public campaign against the society and sent a number of letters to his colleagues in various countries. One of the addressees was Landauer, who tried to stir the American genetics society into action, but failed. See ARAN,/. 201, op. 3, d. 10, /. 1-3. This evolution is particularly apparent in a comparison of his early political statements - written while he was still in Germany - with the views expressed in the correspondence with his closest friend in the United States, Leslie C. Dunn, during the 1930s, preserved among Dunn's Papers. For details, see Peter Kuzhnik, Beyond the Laboratory: Scientists as Political Activists in 1930s America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), esp. ch. 6, 'Franz Boas Mobilizes the Scientists against Fascism/ 171-94.

PART FOUR Scientific Migration to 'the Other'

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10 Home Away from Home: The Berlin Neuroanatomist Louis Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia ULRIKE EISENBERG

The late nineteenth and early twentieth century was a time of lively scientific contact between Russia and Germany, especially in the natural sciences and medicine. Such contacts often began when Russian academics went to Germany to study. Having once made contact with their foreign colleagues, scientists from each country strengthened and broadened their ties abroad by attending conferences and publishing in one another's countries. Since few Germans spoke Russian, the language was usually German. The First World War disrupted many of these contacts, but the 1920s saw an unprecedented peak in bilateral relations between Russia and Germany. The 1922 Treaty of Rapallo restored diplomatic relations and facilitated trade between the two. The Treaty of Berlin (1926), which addressed a variety of political and economic matters, included an agreement that one partner would remain neutral if the other were attacked by a third party.1 In the mid-1920s, scientific contact resumed and became more institutionalized than it had ever been. In 1925 a German delegation of scientists under the leadership of Friedrich Schmidt-Ott, president of the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Association for German Science), travelled to the 200th anniversary celebrations of the Russian Academy of Sciences. In the course of his visit, cooperative projects aimed at promoting exchanges of knowledge were approved at the highest levels. In the same year, the joint journal Deutsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift was founded, and in the following years, joint medical expeditions were undertaken to remote Soviet republics, supported by the Notgemeinschaft, the German Foreign Ministry, and the Soviet Commissariat of Health. The German-Russian Institute for Race Pathology in Moscow was founded in 1927.2 Germany had lost its

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colonies in the First World War, and the vast, ethnically diverse Soviet Union offered enormous research opportunities, which the new agreements now opened up to German scientists. Interest in Soviet Russia cut across political lines, as Michael DavidFox shows in his chapter. The bourgeois-conservative Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas (Society for the Study of Eastern Europe) was extremely active during this period. This society - founded in 1913 by Otto Hoetzsch, professor of East European history at Berlin - included members from scientific, business, and political circles. Among its many other activities, the society organized the 1927 Russian Natural Science Researchers' Week in Berlin.3 Meanwhile, in leftist circles, the Gesellschaft der Freunde des Neuen Russland (Society of Friends of the New Russia), founded in 1924, published the journal Das neue Russland. The historical record indicates that German-Russian medical relations were especially well developed at the cutting edge of scientific fields and that, more often than not, it was scientists who were outside the mainstream of their fields in their home countries who were most active in crossing borders. To illustrate: in 1926, his way smoothed by agreement between Schmidt-Ott and N.P. Gorbunov, the secretary of the Council of People's Commissars, the Heidelberg neurologist and psychiatrist Karl Wilmanns carried out a 'syphilis expedition' to Soviet Buriatiia. Wilmanns was seeking a large population on which to test his hypothesis about the relationship between treatment with Salvarsan and susceptibility to neurosyphilis.4 In Germany the hypothesis was highly controversial, but Wilmanns received support from the Notgemeinschaft to carry out his research in the Soviet republic of Buriatiia.5 For Wilmanns the trip to Buriatiia was a success: his scientific hypothesis was tentatively confirmed. But relations with his Soviet colleagues were strained. Proud of the advanced state of medicine in Germany, Wilmanns felt himself superior to his Russian counterparts with their 'lax work ethic' and their new emphasis on social medicine, and he apparently let these sentiments show.6 He did not take part in the second expedition in 1928, which finally disproved his hypothesis. A contrasting case is that of Ludwig Aschoff, professor of pathology at Freiburg, whose first contacts with Russia dated back to 1913, when Russian medical students came to study with him. In 1923, now a world-renowned pathologist, he was invited to a conference in Russia. Four years later, with the support of the Russian Commissariat of Public Health and the Notgemeinschaft, he founded the German-Russian Laboratory for Comparative People's Pathology in Moscow.7 Aschoff,

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whose stature in German science was secure, had no need to travel to Russia to boost his reputation, but the ethnically diverse nation offered perfect opportunities for large-scale field studies in comparative ethnic pathology. Predictably, the potential political uses of Aschoff's work drew attention in some German quarters. Under pressure from the Notgemeinschaft on the one hand, and from the increasingly influential brain researcher Oskar Vogt - whose institute housed Aschoff's laboratory - on the other, Aschoff's plans for research on comparative people's pathology were reshaped into research on race pathology. In 1930, displeased by the political pressure on his scientific work, Aschoff began distancing himself from the Moscow lab. By this point, German-Russian collaboration in this field had effectively come to an end. Although Aschoff wanted to close the laboratory, the German Foreign Office insisted that it be kept open 'for political reasons' until 1932.8 Finally, there is the case of Oskar Vogt, who, like Louis JacobsohnLask, was a member of the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases; there, the two men often discussed topics of neuroanatomy. Jacobsohn-Lask was working on the nucleic cell structure of the spinal cord and brainstem; Vogt's interest was the cell structure of the human cortex. Jacobsohn-Lask was doing basic neuroanatomical work that aimed to point from a cell's structure and its elements to its function. Vogt, in contrast, was describing the cortex's cell layers, with less focus on the cell's elements and their functions. Also, he associated a cell's size with a human being's genius. In 1924, Vogt was appointed to conduct the cytoarchitectonic study of Lenin's brain. He was highly respected in Russia, yet in Germany he had been denied an academic career. Vogt was officially the director of the Moscow Brain Research Institute until 1936, though he was present there on a regular basis only until 1930. His cytoarchitectonic research methods continued to be standard practice at the institute.9 Like Vogt, Aschoff, and Wilmanns, Jacobsohn-Lask had a research agenda (in comparative neuroanatomy) that pushed him to the margins of the German scientific community. Professional factors aside, Jacobsohn-Lask's Jewish background and his family's political activism placed him increasingly at odds with his home country. His research agenda was unconventional for Germany, but it brought him into contact with Russian scientists. Paradoxically, at a time when scientific contact between Russia and Germany had virtually ceased, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask was finding acceptance and recognition in the Soviet Union; indeed, he immigrated there in 1936.

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In some ways, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask belongs among the group of German scientists who developed and nurtured contacts with their Russian colleagues. He worked primarily as a neuroanatomist, but before the First World War he was also a practising neurologist. As a neuroanatomist, he conducted basic research: around 1900, he published fundamental works on anatomical methods for studying the central nervous system, and around 1908 he conducted studies on the tracts and nuclei of the spinal column, as well as on the nuclei of the brainstem. He had developed a morphological-structural cell analysis method that helped him identify whether a cell's function was motor or sensory. This allowed him to assign cell types to the appropriate nuclei. His work was taken up by certain German periodicals and manuals. For decades his studies were among the few standard works on the subject; they were considered among the most significant results of his basic research. In the United States some of these works were cited as recently as the 1970s in several standard texts, including those by the neuroanatomists Hart wig Kuhlenbeck10 and Ariens Kappers. Another important research subject and method that Jacobsohn-Lask pursued from the turn of the century until his death in 1940 was comparative neuroanatomy. He explored various neuroanatomical problems from the perspective of evolutionary biology. Most of his work in this field was published in the 1920s; it culminated in the publica-tion of a photographic atlas of comparative anatomy, the first three volumes of which appeared in 1934 and 1935 in Berlin. Yet in other ways, Jacobsohn-Lask stands apart from the German scientists mentioned above. In contrast to those of Wilmanns, Aschoff, and Vogt, Jacobsohn-Lask's contacts with Russian scientists - even in the 1920s - were not part of the official projects of the German Foreign Ministry or the Notgemeinschaft. Like Aschoff and Wilmanns, Jacobsohn-Lask travelled to the Soviet Union during this period; however, his 1927 visit was not for the purpose of researching a specific topic, but rather to attend the All-Union Neuropathology Conference in Leningrad and Moscow. While there, like his compatriots, Jacobsohn-Lask showed an interest not only in the medical aspects of the young Soviet society, but also in the broader political changes taking place there. But as we shall see, in Jacobsohn-Lask's case, the interest was undoubtedly sparked by his wife, the writer Berta Lask, who was a communist activist. Perhaps the most outstanding difference between Jacobsohn-Lask and his colleagues Aschoff, Wilmanns, and Vogt was his intensive

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 411

engagement with Russia even in the 1930s,11 which culminated in his immigration in 1936. This was made possible by an invitation from the Commissariat of Public Health, which included an offer of a small research laboratory. Official German-Russian scientific relations were no longer a factor in this invitation. On the contrary, Jacobsohn-Lask's immigration to the Soviet Union was used to create a politically useful narrative: an 'important' German professor is saved from Nazi Germany, which persecutes its best scientists, thereby exhibiting its contempt for the sciences.12 Indeed, the Gestapo accused the highly praised Jacobsohn-Lask of a 'serious break in loyalty to the German Reich.'13 The Soviet Union - so the narrative runs - which holds the sciences in especially high regard, offers the persecuted scientist new opportunities to continue his research. On the basis of personal papers and unpublished materials, I attempt in this chapter to go beyond the official spin to address two riddles that lie at the heart of the story of Jacobsohn-Lask: What role did his Russian scientific contacts play in his immigration and new life in his adopted country? And to what extent was his scientific contribution of more than mere political significance to the Soviet Union? Jacobsohn-Lask in His World Louis Jacobsohn - who in 1919 took the name of his wife, Berta Lask14was born the youngest son of a Jewish family on 2 March 1863 in the city of Bromberg in the province of Posen. In the 1870s the family moved to Berlin in the hope that the environment there would be less anti-Semitic and would thus offer their children better educational opportunities. Louis Jacobsohn was raised in a liberal household without strict religious instruction. He studied medicine at Berlin University and received his doctoral degree in 1889 at the Second Medical Clinic of Charite Hospital. Shortly after that, he joined the Berlin Medical Society, of which the neurologist and psychiatrist Emanuel Mendel15 was a leading member. After practising briefly as a physician, Jacobsohn trained first with Mendel, and after 1894 with the anatomist Wilhelm Waldeyer.16 These years would shape his future: under Mendel and Waldeyer, he learned the clinical and anatomical research methods that formed the basis of his later scientific work, and he made his first contacts with Eastern European colleagues. As a neurologist with an international reputation, Mendel functioned like the hub of a wheel: he had numerous foreign students, most of

412 Ulrike Eisenberg

whom were from Eastern Europe. Colleagues and students regarded him as an excellent teacher of clinical neurology, psychiatry, and neuroanatomy17 and as a sociable, good-natured, and unassuming person.18 His polyclinic, with its many patients and its attached laboratory, provided him with an exceptional variety of material for his clinical demonstrations, which were famous for being 'richer and more unusual than anywhere else in Germany/19 Apart from Jacobsohn-Lask, his many students included Lazar Minor from Moscow, Edward Flatau20 from Warsaw, Hugh Talbot Patrick21 from Chicago, and Paul Schuster22 from Berlin, all of whom became leading neurologists - the first three became chairs of their departments. Jacobsohn befriended Flatau, Patrick, and Schuster, who were working under Mendel at the same time. These friendships were to endure for the rest of Jacobsohn's life. In 1882, Mendel founded the Neurologisches Zentralblatt, the official publication of the prestigious Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases. At the time, Mendel was researching progressive paralysis. Along with Minor, he was one of the first proponents of the theory later confirmed - that progressive paralysis is of syphilitic origin.23 Through Mendel, Jacobsohn was introduced early in his career into the circle of Berlin neurologists and given the opportunity to publish his first scientific works. For nearly thirty years Jacobsohn would play a key role in the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases. He sat on the membership commission and served for many years as secretary. Jacobsohn would publish many of his subsequent works in the Neurologisches Zentralblatt. Jacobsohn obtained postdoctoral qualifications in neurology and neuroanatomy at Berlin University in 1900. Until 1933 he held lectures there in both fields and also offered popular courses in neuroanatomy. But notwithstanding all his accomplishments, he never attained a position higher than unsalaried lecturer. Jewish scientists were usually denied professorships despite legislation passed in 1848 that granted them equal status as academic instructors. As a Jewish professor, Mendel, too, remained an unsalaried lecturer, but he was able to work in a university environment for almost his entire teaching career, and some of his lectures were better attended than those of the full professors.24 At the time Jacobsohn was teaching, there were many Jewish unsalaried lecturers, especially in Berlin, who taught neurology and even headed neurological departments at Berlin's municipal hospitals and the Jewish hospital. Examples include the aforementioned Paul Schuster as well as Hermann Oppenheim,25 Fritz Heinrich Lewy,26 and Hugo Liepmann.27

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 413

Together with the chair of the Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases Department, they were responsible for teaching neurology. Paul Rothig28 and Jacobsohn also taught neuroanatomy. Although these men were not in the academic spotlight, they were highly influential in the education of doctors, and became the centre of what may be considered a distinct school of neuroscience. They engaged in lively professional exchanges with one another and with professors at meetings of medical societies, in which they often played leading roles.29 Beginning in 1904, Jacobsohn worked in Mendel's neurological polyclinic and the affiliated laboratory, both of which were physically attached to the university's Polyclinic Institute.30 After Mendel's death in 1907, Jacobsohn became interim director of the institute, and always hoped that he would eventually become its official director.31 The institute provided him with a combination of clinical work, anatomical work, and teaching, just as it had done for Mendel. By this time, Jacobsohn was already more deeply involved with neuroanatomical than with clinical matters, but he continued to present his work at the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases, which was for him the leading venue for scientific exchange. He published in anatomical journals, yet he tended to associate with neurological circles, even though anatomists would have been at least as interested in his work as neurologists were. We may hypothesize that the history and tradition of his education coupled with his ties to Mendel, his teacher, account for Jacobsohn's gravitating to the community of neurologists - though there is no conclusive evidence to confirm this assumption. Thus, in his position as an unsalaried lecturer of neurology, Jacobsohn may be considered typical for his time.32 Besides those academics mentioned above who taught neurology, Oskar Vogt, director of the Neurobiological Institute (and from 1919 director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research), his wife Cecile, and his assistant Korbinian Brodmann are also worthy of mention. Vogt had numerous foreign assistants and students who travelled to Germany to learn his methods for investigating brain architecture. Vogt had no professorship either, nor did he hold lectures at the university, but he often attended meetings of the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases and took part in its discussions. Atypical for a neurologist was Jacobsohn-Lask's increasing preoccupation with neuroanatomy. In his later years in Germany, his continued emphasis on basic research in this field put him out of sync with his contemporaries, making him a marginal figure in his own profes-

414 Ulrike Eisenberg sion. In discussions of his colleagues' presentations at the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases, Jacobsohn earned a reputation as a contentious debater with eccentric opinions.33 Looking Outward In 1893, Mendel introduced Jacobsohn to Edward Flatau. Originally from Poland, Flatau had studied medicine in Moscow, and Minor had been one of his teachers. After finishing his studies he had spent six years in Germany, where he received the special training necessary to complete his qualifications as a neurologist. Jacobsohn and Flatau first worked on similar topics under Mendel;34 later they continued their collaboration in Waldeyer's laboratory and published their first book together.35 Flatau and Mendel, in turn, eventually made contact with Minor in Moscow. The first verifiable encounter between Jacobsohn and Minor took place in 1897 at the International Conference of Internal Medicine in Moscow. Jacobsohn and Flatau had travelled to the conference to display specimen drawings, which they had prepared to illustrate the comparative anatomy of the nervous system.36 In 1897, immediately after the Moscow conference, Mendel, Flatau, and Jacobsohn embarked on their first joint project. At the suggestion of the Samuel-Karger Verlag, a Berlin-based medical publishing house, they followed examples set in other fields of medicine and founded an annual journal devoted to their specialty: the Jahresbericht tiber die Leistungen und Fortschritte aufdem Gebiete der Neurologic und Psychiatric.37 As it developed, the Jahresbericht attempted to report on all new publications in the entire field of neuroscience. It was divided into two sections corresponding to the two major areas: neurology and psychiatry. The neurological section comprised six chapters, focusing first on basic principles: colouring techniques and anatomical research methods for the central nervous system, anatomy of the central nervous system, physiology, and pathological anatomy. The largest of the subchapters concerned the pathology of the nervous system and was divided into a general section on etiology, symptomatology, and diagnostics, followed by descriptions of the individual diseases. The diseases, in turn, were grouped according to anatomical criteria. Next came a chapter on functional diseases - a category that included epilepsy, hysteria, migraine, and Basedow's disease, among others. This was followed by a chapter on traumatic diseases of the nervous system. The final chapter of the neurological section dealt with therapy for treating neural diseases.

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 415

A surprising three-quarters of the nearly thirteen-hundred-page Jahresbericht was devoted to neurology, and only one-quarter to psychiatry. The section of the journal devoted to works on psychiatry was also divided into six main chapters. These contained reports on studies in psychology, etiology, and diagnostics, as well as a special section in which the diseases were discussed. There were chapters on criminal anthropology, forensic psychiatry, and therapy. It is impossible to say whether the strong focus on neurology was a function of the editors' preferences or whether much more work was actually being published on neurology than psychiatry. We do know that as a newly emerging field, neurology captured the imagination of physicians in a variety of countries around 1900. Most of the Jahresbericht's contributors came from Berlin, several from elsewhere in Germany. But other European countries were also represented: there were contributors from Italy, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, and Austria-Hungary. Eastern European contributors were considerably more numerous than their Western European counterparts.38 From Russia, the co-editors Mendel, Flatau, and Jacobsohn recruited not only Lazar Minor but also Vladimir Bekhterev39 from St Petersburg. Minor, born in Vilnius in 1855, was raised in a religious, liberal, and politically active Jewish family.40 After completing his medical degree in Moscow, he worked with the Moscow anatomist and physiologist Aleksandr Ivanovich Babukhin41 and in the clinic of Aleksei lakovlevich Kozhevnikov42 - the 'father' of Russian neurology and psychiatry. Minor had been interested in German and French neurology long before his first contact with Jacobsohn. For further specialization, Minor had gone to Paris to work with Jean Martin Charcot43 and to Berlin to work with Carl Westphal44 and Emanuel Mendel. In 1884, after finishing his training, he became a lecturer at the Moscow University Clinic. In the years that followed, he won international recognition as a neurologist, especially with his research on spinal cord trauma.45 Like Mendel, he was an advocate of the theory that posterial spinal sclerosis is of syphilitic origin. In spite of his international reputation, Minor was denied an academic career because of his Jewish faith until 1917. After the revolution, when discrimination against Jews was officially forbidden, he became professor of neurology at the Second Moscow State University. Minor was also a Kremlin physician. Together with several colleagues, he founded the Moscow Society of Neuropathologists and Psychiatrists. He won renown not only for his clinical work but also for his research on epilepsy, traumatic spinal diseases,

416 Ulrike Eisenberg

and the etiology of syphilis, as well as for his campaign against alcoholism.46 Minor, however, remained loyal to the Jahresbericht up to the start of the First World War. His departmental affiliation fit with his area of specialization: traumatic and other diseases of the spine. Bekhterev had completed his training in Paris under Charcot in 1884, shortly after Minor.47 He then went on to head the psychiatric clinic at Kazan University before moving to St Petersburg in 1893, where he became a professor at the Academy of Military Medicine. In 1897 he also received the chair for neurological diseases at the St Petersburg Medical Institute for Women. Bekhterev is credited with founding an important neurological school in Russia that gained international recognition. Around the turn of the century, he researched numerous topics in the areas of pathological anatomy and histology of the nervous system. At the Jahresbericht, however, he was responsible not for reviews of work in anatomy, but for the clinical rubric 'Localized Muscle Spasms/ and he reported on new works on convulsive tics, myoclonia, and myotonia.48 His name stops appearing on the masthead of the Jahresbericht after 1904. Minor's student Mikhail Krol' joined the staff of the journal in 1906. From 1904 to 1906, just before joining the Jahresbericht, he had worked in Berlin with Jacobsohn and Vogt, who had taught him neuroanatomical research methods. After they had founded the Jahresbericht, the collaboration among Jacobsohn, Flatau, and Minor intensified once again with the publication of the Handbuch der pathologischen Anatomic des Nervensystems in 1904. Like the Jahresbericht, the Handbuch was published by the Karger Verlag in Berlin. The staff included some of the most important neurologists not only in Germany, but in Russia as well. Among the Germans were Emanuel Mendel, the prominent neurologist Hermann Oppenheim, and Friedrich Jolly, who at the time was Professor of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases at Berlin University.49 The Russians Vladimir Bekhterev and Grigorii Ivanovich Rossolimo,50 as well as Liverii Osipovich Darkshevich,51 - who at the time was Bekhterev's successor at Kazan, contributed chapters to the publication. The Handbuch was one of the first textbooks for the fledgling field of the pathological anatomy of the nervous system, and was cited until the 1970s.52 It constituted a connecting axis between some of the most important representatives of neurology and neuroanatomy in Berlin on the one hand, and the representatives of the most significant Russian neurological schools in St Petersburg, Moscow, and Kazan on the other.

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417

The evidence indicates that between 1908 and 1910, in the very period when Jacobsohn was researching the nuclei of the brainstem and spinal cord, he was collaborating intensively with Russian and American students, who were developing his ideas further and expanding on his work by researching nuclei of the diencephalon. Some of these works became well known. Around 1910, Jacobsohn worked with his American student Edward Fall Malone - who later became a neuroanatomist - and his Russian student Marcel Natanovich Neiding on nuclei of the diencephalon. Both students published works on this subject in Berlin. Neiding was a neurologist and neuropathologist, and became chair for nervous diseases at Odessa in 1922.53 The famous Russian neurologist Mikhail Krol',54 who co-founded the Belorussian University in Minsk in 1921, worked in Jacobsohn's laboratory between 1904 and 1906. However, he did not publish during this period.55 The practice of German professors having Russian students was widespread. However, no other collaborative work between German and Russian neurologists during this period resulted in the joint publication of a periodical or book. One of the few exceptions was the publication years later of the journal Ergebnisse der Neurologic und Psychiatric, in which Minor, Flatau, and Bekhterev participated. Under the editorship of the neurologist Heinrich Vogt from Wiesbaden56 and R. Bing from Basel,57 one volume of the journal appeared in 1913 and another in 1917; publication was then discontinued.58 In 1932, Minor wrote a chapter on hereditary tremors for the second edition of the Berlin neurologist Max Lewandowsky's Handbuch der Neurologie. Minor also edited several Russian translations of books by German neurologists. In his entire bibliography, however, there are no other works that, like the aforementioned Handbuch and Jahresbericht, were published in collaboration with German colleagues. If actual collaboration was minimal during these years, German and Soviet neuroscientists had substantial contact at international and German conferences. In 1897 the International Medical Conference in Moscow was attended by a variety of German neurologists - Jacobsohn, Flatau, and Mendel, Alfred Goldscheider,59 P. Jacob, Karl Moeli,60 Hermann Oppenheim, Bernhard Pollack, and Ernst von Bergmann.61 The First International Conference of the Neurosciences was held in Amsterdam in 1907. Leading the German delegation was the Berlin chair, Theodor Ziehen;62 other Berliners attending in an official capacity were Hermann Oppenheim and the philosophy professor Carl Stumpf ,63 Still others from Berlin participated independently, including

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Richard Cassirer,64 Max Lewandowsky,65 Hugo Liepmann, and Cecile and Oskar Vogt. Jacobsohn did not attend. Minor was also absent, but Flatau and Bekhterev travelled to the conference - the latter as head of the Russian delegation. Altogether, more than five hundred participants are recorded.66 Another important point of contact between German and Russian neurologists was the Society of German Neurologists and Psychiatrists, which had many foreign members. This society was founded in 1907 on Hermann Oppenheim's initiative. The first chairman was Wilhelm Erb,67 who like Mendel and Minor was one of the first advocates of the syphilitic etiology of posterial spinal sclerosis.68 The society's annual conferences offered these researchers the opportunity to exchange ideas. Minor and Flatau were members from the society's inception. Louis Jacobsohn-Lask did not join until 1928.69 New Directions Among the many casualties of the First World War was scientific exchange between Germany and Russia. It was nearly impossible for scientists from one country to travel to the other, and journals were often published in abbreviated editions. Collaboration also dwindled in the professional societies: the Society of German Neurologists and Psychiatrists, for example, recorded no new members from Russia in the years 1914 to 1925. The Jahresbericht did continue publication after the German declaration of war in 1914, and in 1915 and 1916 the Russian contributors were still listed on the masthead. From 1915 onward, however, there was no collaborative work. As senior editor, Jacobsohn assumed responsibility for the departments not only of the German, but also of the Russian editors who were enlisted into military service. In 1918 there was a change in editorship: Oswald Bumke, who at the time held the chair at Breslau,70 became editor. The rest of the staff also changed at that point, and Russian staff were no longer listed on the masthead. There is no available information on how this change in editorship came about. In a letter to his wife, Berta Lask, Jacobsohn described negotiations with the Samuel-Karger Verlag 'on the continuation of the Jahresbericht.'71 There is no documentation on the outcome of these negotiations. The old records were lost when the publisher fled Germany.72 For Jacobsohn, these years provided few opportunities to do laboratory work. He had taken over Mendel's laboratory as interim director

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after his mentor's death in 1907, and retained that position until it was closed in 1914. In its place, Jacobsohn was given a lecture hall and a small room at the Anatomical Institute.73 Thus he was denied the opportunity to do independent clinical work and had little time for research. As well, the war had dramatically changed his personal circumstances. Although he was not drafted to fight at the front, he was obliged to serve as a consultant in various civilian and military hospitals. Since opportunities to do laboratory work had become scarce, in the years that followed Jacobsohn turned his attention to new areas of research: education and juvenile criminology. As early as 1911, his own children attended one of Berlin's first alternative schools, a so-called 'Freie Schule,' founded by the school reformer Berthold Otto.74 In the same year, he began to serve as a medical expert to the Berlin Juvenile Court. In this capacity he examined more than 1,500 juvenile offenders, mostly during the war. He submitted expert evaluations of the mental and emotional conditions of young offenders, their motives for committing crimes, and their family circumstances. He also tried to evaluate the 'ethical' sense of the young offenders. Jacobsohn refined a questionnaire formulated by Guy Fernald, an American psychiatrist working in an institution for juvenile delinquents in Concord, Massachusetts.75 Young offenders were asked to respond to seven brief stories about 'offences against decency' (two examples: a young, hungry boy from a poor family takes some bread in a baker's shop while the baker is outside; a young boy murders his stepfather who has maltreated his mother). The juvenile's ethical sense was measured by a special numerical system worked out by Jacobsohn,76 and the scores were compared against those of people with 'normal ethical ability.' In the Berlin scientific community, Jacobsohn's work on the moral development of young people stimulated new discussions on this topic and on the relationship between morals and intelligence. Much later, the renowned psychologists Jean Piaget and Lawrence Kohlberg would take up the issue.77 In the course of this work, Jacobsohn concluded that social factors were decisive in causing youths to turn to crime78 - an opinion that was shared by Vladimir Bekhterev.79 In associating poverty with crime, Jacobsohn was placing himself at odds with the widespread assumption that criminal behaviour is caused by a genetic predisposition. He may well have been influenced by his wife, who, although she had yet to join the German Communist Party (KPD), was doing social work with poor working-class families.80 In February 1922, while his friend Lazar Minor

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was visiting Berlin with his family, Jacobsohn had an 'animated and lengthy' discussion with Minor about his 'psychological work.'81 Minor, like Jacobsohn, was interested in the scientific aspects of social problems; he had been studying alcoholism and its physical and social consequences since before the turn of the century and would continue to do so into the 1930s. Perhaps Jacobsohn's social work early in his career made him more receptive to the Soviet Union years later. In 1919, with the war over, Jacobsohn was forced to vacate even his small workroom in the Anatomical Institute. He was allowed only to deliver lectures at the university. In order to continue his anatomical research, he set up a laboratory in his home; there, in September 1921, he began offering courses in practical anatomy, which were poorly attended.82 His scientific interests turned from various aspects of neuroscience to neuroanatomy until he came to devote himself entirely to the latter. In 1921 he published his last article about his psychological research.83 During the 1920s, Jacobsohn-Lask found himself increasingly marginalized in the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases, which had been his primary scientific community. His anatomical work was discussed at the society's conferences, but he was no longer active in the mainstream of German neuroscience. Although he had overseen military hospitals during the war, he was not involved in research on war-related injuries to the nervous system - a subject of particular relevance at the time. Political considerations may have played as large a role as scientific ones in the marginalization of Jacobsohn-Lask. His wife, Berta Lask, was a communist, and was Germany's first revolutionary-proletarian woman writer.84 She was an active supporter of striking workers in the early 1920s and made several trips to the Soviet Union. The conservative medical community was probably aware of her activities.85 In these years, perhaps as a defence against his own marginalization, Jacobsohn-Lask constructed a similarity between himself and his friend and colleague Lazar Minor. Though he did not admit to feeling anti-Semitism in the Germany of the 1920s, yet at the same time, he insisted that it was anti-Semitism that had kept Minor in the position of a mere unsalaried lecturer for so long. Indeed, it was not until the October Revolution of 1917 that Minor was officially granted status equal to that of his colleagues. Minor emphasized that even after the revolution there was 'anti-Semitism smouldering below the surface.'86 State-sanctioned anti-Semitism had been officially ended in Russia -

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though government policy could not stamp out deep-seated resentment of Jews. Jacobsohn-Lask, too, had remained an unsalaried lecturer for his entire career, and at the end of the war he had been relegated to his laboratory at home. It is possible that he chose to interpret the discrimination against his friend Minor as anti-Semitism so as not to feel alone with his own fate. It is also possible that JacobsohnLask attributed his own marginalization to anti-Semitism because he could not countenance the alternative: that he had been marginalized for professional reasons. He never gave official expression to this parallel between himself and Minor; nevertheless, it may have been an important factor in the long and close relationship between the two. It is worth noting that in spite of Minor's Jewish background and bourgeois-liberal attitudes, he did hold the directorship of the Department of Neurology at the Second State University in Moscow until his retirement in 1932, and made frequent visits to the Kremlin as a consultant.87 He was officially regarded as one of the Soviet Union's best neurologists - a standing that Jacobsohn-Lask did not enjoy in Germany. German-Russian Interactions in the 1920s In Weimar Germany, the Soviet Union fascinated a startling range of political, social, and artistic groups. Indeed, the 'new Russia' was considered a 'true Mecca for painters, writers, and journalists.'88 Clubs, societies, and periodicals were founded whose aim was to promote exchanges between the two countries. Despite his many years of contact with Russia, Jacobsohn-Lask was not a member of any of these groups. His only contact was with the Society of Friends of the New Russia in Germany, which began publishing the journal Das neue Russland in 1924. In 1928, Das neue Russland carried a short report by Jacobsohn-Lask about his conference trip to Moscow and Leningrad in 1927 and his visits to various Soviet clinics and scientific institutes. The publication of this report may reasonably be attributed to his wife's commitments rather than to his own. Berta Lask published an article in almost every edition of the journal.89 In 1923 she became a member of the KPD; her three grown sons, Ludwig, Hermann, and Ernst, would join as well over the next few years. In 1924 she joined the Union of German Writers90 and began to learn Russian.91 She visited the Soviet Union for the first time in 1925 with a delegation of German, French, and Belgian teachers. In 1928 she was a founding member of the Association of Proletarian-Revolutionary Writers.

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Yet Berta's husband was a member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) from 1918 to 1931, although he was never very active in it.92 He tended to be critical of communism. In a 1964 interview, Berta Lask mentioned her husband's reports of his convention trip to Moscow and Leningrad in 1927,93 which were published in the SPD newspaper Vorwarts. In these reports he criticized 'some things in the Soviet Union' - a stance that would cause her problems with her comrades when she next visited that country.94 Jacobsohn-Lask did not direct his criticism at the economic problems of the country or the social activism of the state; indeed, he approved of the legal and financial equality of workers and academics. He was, however, sceptical of all forms of fanaticism. During his 1927 visit to Moscow, his wife introduced him to a number of German emigres. He described them as 'devout communists' who were defending 'the Soviet system with all the fervour of absolute conviction' and 'with a religiously fanatical belief that only this path will lead men to true freedom and liberate them from capitalism's heavy yoke.' Among these emigres, JacobsohnLask 'was in a difficult position as a non-communist,' as he himself wrote. He criticized them for being out of touch with the realities in other countries, where it would be impossible for a minority, however determined, to bring about the changes taking place in the Soviet Union. He also questioned whether communism could succeed in the long term in a vast multinational state such as the Soviet Union.95 During a visit to a prison, he asked about political prisoners, to whom he was not allowed to speak. He received the relatively honest answer that the government was not sentimental about such prisoners, nor could it afford to be. They were, he was told, simply dispatched to distant places where they could have no political influence; the ones who seemed most dangerous were shot. Far from regarding them as criminals, the government greatly respected them for their uncompromising and principled stance. But because the very survival of the Soviet state was at stake, such measures were essential to national security.96 In discussions with several communists, Jacobsohn-Lask expressed his fear that the oppositional stance of many formerly prominent politicians could result in a 'political shakeup,' and that one of them could 'install himself as sole dictator ... similar to Napoleon after the French Revolution.' Everyone to whom he expressed this fear denied that it was possible and insisted that the people were so full of Marx's teachings they would 'stone' any dictator.97 These assurances did not lessen his scepticism, however.

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 423 Despite his wife and sons' political commitment and the sympathy for the new socialist state that was widespread in leftist circles, Jacobsohn-Lask remained politically detached; he concentrated on his neuroanatomical research. He was not involved with the Deutsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift, the Berlin-based medical journal founded in 1925 and published in German and Russian.98 Neurologists figured prominently on the editorial board, which included the Moscow neurologist Grigorii Ivanovich Rossolimo, the neurosurgeon Nikolai Nilovich Burdenko, and the Breslau neurologist Otfried Foerster." Nor was Jacobsohn-Lask involved with the periodical Osteuropa. Zeitschrift fiir die gesamten Fmgen des europaeischen Ostens.100 Nor is there any evidence that Jacobsohn-Lask took part in the much publicized Russian Natural Science Researchers' Week, organized in June 1927 by the German Society for the Study of Eastern Europe, at which Russian and Ukrainian scholars from various disciplines had the opportunity to present their work.101 The Russian Commissar of Public Health, Nikolai Aleksandrovich Semashko, delivered the opening address at the event.102 Representing Germany was Oskar Vogt,103 director of both the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Brain Research in Berlin and the Moscow Brain Research Institute. In his contacts with Russia, Jacobsohn-Lask found himself in competition with Vogt. In December 1924 the Commission for Preserving the Memory of V.I. Lenin appointed Vogt to conduct cytoarchitectonic research on Lenin's brain. Indeed, the invitation to Vogt was issued by Jacobsohn-Lask's friend Lazar Minor, who was a member of the commission. Minor must have been impressed by a lecture Vogt and his wife Cecile had delivered the previous year in Moscow, during which they introduced their new method of architectonic brain research.104 Significantly, there is no evidence that Minor's esteem for Vogt had any negative impact on Minor and Jacobsohn-Lask's relationship, which the two maintained and deepened through frequent correspondence and family visits.105 Research on the brains of the elite was already popular in the Soviet Union. It was also being done under Bekhterev in Leningrad at the only Soviet brain research institute in existence up to that time. The invitation was a perfect opportunity for Vogt: on the one hand, it would allow him to expand on his cytoarchitectonic research and win him even greater popularity; on the other, it would bring him closer to realizing his dream of establishing national brain research institutes in different countries based on a common model.106 Furthermore, the

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appointment boosted Vogt's political (though not necessarily his professional) reputation within Germany at a time when closer contacts with the Soviet Union were becoming a national priority. With financial help from the German Reich, Prussia, and the Rockefeller Foundation, he was able to expand his brain research institute in BerlinBuch.107 But the political support that Vogt enjoyed could not disguise the fact that his work was highly controversial in German and other Western European professional circles. He was criticized not only for his technique of series sectioning, but also for associating Lenin's genius - and some physical functions in general - with the size of certain brain cells.108 Jacobsohn-Lask was sceptical of Vogt's research on Lenin's brain. He expressed this with irony in a banquet address attended by one hundred guests of honour at the First All-Union Neuropathology Conference, held in Leningrad in December 1927.109 Shortly before the conference, Jacobsohn-Lask received a letter from his son Hermann, who had read an article in the Vossische Zeitung critical of Vogt's study of Lenin's brain. In the letter, Hermann asked whether this was the same Vogt as his father's 'dear friend.'110 The rivalry had begun years earlier. Even before the First World War, fierce arguments often broke out at the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases between Jacobsohn-Lask and Vogt over professional issues. These arguments continued to reverberate for decades.111 As time went on, in some ways, the playing field became less level. Although Vogt was not an academic instructor like Jacobsohn-Lask, his long acquaintance with the Krupp family of industrialists, whom he had served as personal physician, ensured financial support for his own neuroanatomical research institute. Jacobsohn-Lask finally set up a modest laboratory in his own home in the 1920s; by contrast, the founding of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research under Vogt's direction in 1919 constituted a very considerable improvement in Vogt's working conditions.112 The see-saw in the fortunes of Vogt and Jacobsohn-Lask would continue. By 1930, Vogt's influence in the Soviet Union was on the decline. He had not shown any significant new findings from his study of Lenin's brain since 1927.113 Furthermore, as Stalin's political influence continued to rise, Lenin's genius was no longer a central concern.114 By contrast, Jacobsohn-Lask introduced his photographic atlas of comparative neuroanatomy at the International Physiologists' Conference in Leningrad in 1935, and was invited that same year to continue work on the atlas in the Soviet Union. In an ironic twist of fate, Vogt was asked many years later to submit an assessment of this very atlas. His judg-

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ment was devastating: Vogt pronounced the work outdated and described the many photos as technically substandard even for the time the atlas was published.115 For Jacobsohn-Lask, 1927 was a high point in the competition with Vogt. In contrast to Vogt, he took part in the All-Union Neuropathology Conference in Moscow and Leningrad, held in December of that year. Jacobsohn-Lask was one of only two Germans who accepted the invitation.116 He and his colleague Fritz Heinrich Lewy117 were seated in the front row as guests of honour, and Jacobsohn-Lask delivered an opening address. It has yet to be determined whether Jacobsohn-Lask's invitation to the conference was based on his proposed paper, titled 'Crossing of the Nerve Tracts/ or whether he was invited because of his personal association with Minor.118 Jacobsohn-Lask made no secret of that connection: in 1924 he had published a paper that he had dedicated to his 'friend and colleague Lazar Minor, with fond affection, on the fortieth anniversary of his doctorate/119 The role played by the personal connection cannot be ignored. Seen objectively, Jacobsohn-Lask's paper clearly did not fit in with the orientation of the conference, which was clinical, not neuroanatomical.120 In the paper, Jacobsohn-Lask attempted to explain the phenomenon of nerve-tract crossing in phylogenic terms, using the method of comparative anatomy between vertebrates and invertebrates. His approach was evolutionary-morphologic. In Jacobsohn-Lask's view, the development of the crossing phenomenon was analogous to the development of the central nervous system, the study of which was his actual goal. He postulated that all animals indeed share a common origin, but that they developed early on into divergent classes - a view that is coming back into fashion.121 With this thesis, which he refined a few years later in his five-volume photographic atlas of the comparative anatomy of the nervous system, he accepted at least the basic Darwinian theory of the common origin of all species. A causal explanation for the crossing phenomenon has not yet been found. Research is being done on this problem in the fields of molecular biology and genetics.122 According to Jacobsohn-Lask, his paper was highly praised in Russia - this, in marked contrast to its reception in Germany.123 Still, although Minor had translated the work, and some Russian neurologists spoke German, the paper was not discussed. Jacobsohn-Lask said that this was due to organizational problems involved in coordinating social events with conference presentations. We may also assume, however, that the neurological community represented by the confer-

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ence participants was an inappropriate forum for discussing a primarily neuroanatomical topic.124 All in all, Jacobsohn-Lask considered the conference, with its accompanying banquets and addresses, more a social than a scientific event. For him, the encounters with 'old colleagues and students' were the most important aspect of the meeting. Jacobsohn-Lask's former student Mikhail Krol', who in the meantime had become professor of neurology at Minsk, delivered an address in honour of his former teacher, extolling his scientific achievements.125 Jacobsohn-Lask spoke for the last time to Vladimir Bekhterev, just a few days before the latter's sudden death.126 In the course of his trip, Jacobsohn-Lask visited several clinics. On the way to Moscow he stopped in Warsaw and stayed with his old friend Edward Flatau. In Leningrad, where he arrived a few days before the conference started, he visited Vladimir Bekhterev's institutes and clinics. For two days, Bekhterev personally led him on a tour of his 'little medical city.'127 In Leningrad, Jacobsohn-Lask also visited Ivan Petrovich Pavlov's institute. He was critical of Pavlov's personal qualities and of the status accorded his research in reflexology, which exerted an influence on the entire field of neurology in the Soviet Union.128 From Leningrad, Jacobsohn-Lask travelled to the conference in Moscow, after which he visited the neurological clinics at both of Moscow's universities. He described Rossolimo's clinic at the First Moscow State University as relatively new, with modern equipment, large lecture halls, and bright rooms. The clinic housed a famous neurological collection featuring the brains of the 'fathers of Russian neurology,' Aleksei lakovlevich Kozhevnikov and Sergei Sergeevich Korsakov. In contrast, he noted that Lazar Minor, the head of the Department of Neurology clinic at the Second Moscow State University, had to make do with a small room that served as a lecture hall, and which reminded Jacobsohn-Lask of the 'stage of an improvised village theatre.' The clinic building was 150 years old; it was large and dark and had 'gloomy wards' and 'bad iron bedsteads.'129 On his journey back to Berlin, Jacobsohn-Lask stopped in Minsk, where Krol' led him on a tour of his new university clinic. Like many Russian scientists working in the 1920s and into the mid19308, Krol' was interested in developing close scientific contacts with German colleagues. There were a variety of means available for such contact. As it had been before the war, the Society of German Neurologists and Psychiatrists was a useful meeting point.130 Generally, more Russians participated in German neurological conferences than Germans in Russian conferences. One reason was undoubtedly the Ian-

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 427

guage barrier: most of the Russian doctors who attended German conferences had completed part of their education in Germany, while hardly any German doctors had studied in Russia. A second reason, presumably, was anti-communism, which was widespread in Germany - especially in bourgeois circles. There was another possibility for exchanging scientific results: many articles by Russian scientists appeared in German neurological and anatomical journals. Russian journals printed reviews of German texts until well into the 1930s. Professional Peaks and Valleys Late in Life Jacobsohn-Lask withdrew from the Berlin scientific community in the late 1920s. In the isolation of his small home laboratory, he devoted himself to his magnum opus - the atlas. Now sixty-six, he lectured only rarely at Berlin University. He continued teaching his neuroanatomical laboratory course until the summer semester of 1929; after that, he gave only a few more lectures until the 1932-3 winter semester. His publications of the late 1920s and early 1930s were no longer presented or discussed at the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases. One can assume that Jacobsohn-Lask effectively withdrew from the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases as early as 1927. In January of that year he delivered a ceremonial address on the occasion of the society's sixtieth anniversary.131 Up to that point, he had served on the membership commission for many years. He attended almost every meeting and was an active participant in discussions. In February 1927, he moved that the society change its procedure for electing the leadership and proposed a large annual scientific meeting to which colleagues from outside the Berlin circle would also be invited. Both proposals were rejected by Karl Bonhoeffer, a professor of neurology and psychiatry.132 Perhaps Jacobsohn-Lask found his circle of colleagues in Berlin too narrow and set in its ways, and desired more open discussion that extended beyond the Berlin horizon. Whether he withdrew from the society because of this conflict remains a matter of speculation. The minutes of the meeting do not offer any clues. However, he continued to seek contact with others in his profession. A year later, he joined the Society of German Neurologists and Psychiatrists and began regularly attending its annual conferences. By contrast, Jacobsohn-Lask's alter ego, Lazar Minor, now over seventy, was reaching the apex of his scientific and political career. He was awarded the Science Worker of the USSR medal in 1927. That

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same year, he and some of his colleagues founded the Moscow Society of Neuropathology and Psychiatry. In 1927 he co-founded the Association for the Fight against Alcoholism, and in 1928 the All-Union Society of Opponents of Alcohol. In 1931, together with Mikhail Krol',133 he was sent as an honorary delegate to the First Neurological World Conference in Bern.134 Minor was one of Russia's internationally famous neurologists. Thus, in spite of his advanced age, his bourgeois-liberal attitudes, and his Jewish faith, he was useful as a representative of Soviet science, which drew on 'the best traditions of outstanding Russian schools' for the 'further development of socialist society.'135 Paradoxically, while Minor was being lionized for his achievements, he was publishing very little scientific work.136 He was now more active in the area of science policy, whereas Jacobsohn-Lask was devoting himself exclusively to finishing his scientific magnum opus. Though we may see a parallel between the barriers to advancement that they encountered during their early careers, Jacobsohn-Lask and Minor followed very different professional paths in their later years - in all likelihood a reflection of the divergent political developments in their respective home countries. In Germany, Jacobsohn-Lask became a marginal figure in his field because his professional interests no longer coincided with those of the Berlin scientific community. At the same time, he became increasingly isolated socially because of his Jewish background, and probably also because of his wife's political views. Leaving Home After the National Socialists took power in 1933, Jacobsohn-Lask, now seventy, was no longer able to lecture or conduct courses at the university.137 This, coupled with his long isolation from the Berlin scientific community, made conditions extremely unfavourable for his continuing research in Germany. He clearly would have preferred to complete his life's work in his home country. His family suffered persecution and fled the country, yet for a time he himself remained in Berlin. His wife, Berta Lask, left Germany in June 1933. In March of that year she had gone underground. She was arrested shortly thereafter and spent three months in 'preventive detention.' She was released in June and fled across the 'green' border to Prague. Acting on the wishes of the KPD, she immigrated a few weeks later to Moscow, where she lived under the pseudonym 'Gerhard Wieland' in order to protect her family members who were still in Germany. In Moscow she was a

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member of the German Commission of the Association of Soviet Writers and worked for various periodicals and for international radio.138 Her three adult sons immigrated to the Soviet Union in 1934 and 1935. Louis Jacobsohn-Lask was clearly reluctant to move, and remained in Berlin with his daughter-in-law Dora and granddaughter Marianne. Although he could barely tolerate life under the Nazis, whose regime permeated every aspect of society, he was loath to abandon his beloved homeland now that he was an old man.139 In 1934 and 1935, shortly before the enactment of the Nuremberg Laws,140 the first three volumes of his photographic atlas were completed. Unable to find a willing publisher, he published them himself.141 He pasted the several hundred photos of the brains of all variety of animals into the books by hand, and had the accompanying descriptions printed. He sent a few copies of his work to German colleagues. One was the Berlin neurologist Paul Schuster,142 with whom he had been friends since they had worked together under Mendel. Another was Otfried Foerster, a professor at Breslau, who enthusiastically praised the atlas. German biographical yearbooks continued to list Jacobsohn-Lask, and he was mentioned in German and various foreign journals. Thus it was with a sense of accomplishment that Louis JacobsohnLask registered for the Fifteenth International Congress of Physiologists. The event was to take place in August 1935 in Leningrad and Moscow, and he intended to present a paper on his atlas. His encounters on that trip would make it possible for him to immigrate several months later. In August 1935 he travelled first to Leningrad, where he met his son Ludwig. He was travelling privately, in contrast to the official German participants, who had had to apply to the Reich Ministry of Education for permission to attend the conference. The ministry wanted the German delegation to represent its nation's academic-medical establishment in a 'united and effective' manner. Thirty scientists were selected. The topics of their papers dealt mostly with industrial medicine, though some were from other areas, such as physiology. The applicants were required to be 'politically impeccable' from a National Socialist perspective in order to form a bulwark against the German emigres and 'non-Aryan private doctors' who were supposedly agitating against Germany in Russia. The ministry feared that its official delegation would be eclipsed by all the emigres and private attendees who were expected at the conference. This fear was also evident in the negotiations over the official languages of the conference: the ministry had demanded as a condition of German participation that German be

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accepted as a conference language. In July 1935, after several rounds of negotiations, this condition was finally accepted in a concession to the German Ambassador to Moscow; the conference languages would be English, French, Italian, and German.143 In all, more than 1,400 scientists took part in the Leningrad conference. Four hundred papers were presented. Ivan Petrovich Pavlov, now eighty-six years old, delivered the opening address. Topics from all areas of physiology were discussed. Jacobsohn-Lask's 'Vergleichende iibersicht des Zentralnervensystems der Tiere und des Menschen' was included in the Evolutionary Physiology section of the conference.144 Though the content of the paper could indeed be related to evolution, the subject matter was anatomical, not physiological. For JacobsohnLask, who was now barred from participation in public life in Germany, this paper was an opportunity to present his magnum opus to a large international community of research scientists. Among the four hundred who spoke at the conference were several neurological scientists, but none of Jacobsohn-Lask's Russian neurological associates were present.145 Why Jacobsohn-Lask's non-physiological topic was accepted for presentation at the conference remains a mystery. On the one hand, the organizers undoubtedly wanted as broad a spectrum of topics as possible; indeed, there were two hundred presenters from Western countries, one hundred of whom were from the United States. On the other hand, personal connections may also have played a role in Jacobsohn-Lask's selection. One of the three chairmen of the Evolutionary Physiology meeting was Julius Schaxel.146 Before the conference, the Reich Ministry of Education had red-flagged Schaxel,147 who, although not a member of the KPD, was known for his Marxist views. He had been politically active as a board member of the Association of German Universities and as an employee of the Thuringian Ministry of Education, and he had been loud in his opposition to race theory. In April 1933 he had been dismissed from the university. He had fled Jena, via Switzerland, for Leningrad, where he received a chair in biology and zoology at the Academy of Sciences. In 1935, before the conference, he transferred to Moscow, where he was named director of the Laboratory of Evolutionary Mechanics at the Severtsov Institute of Evolutionary Morphology, which was part of the Soviet Academy of Sciences.148 Jacobsohn-Lask and Schaxel must have known each other, at least by name. They came from different fields: Schaxel was a biologist, while Jacobsohn-Lask's field was medicine, which meant that they had

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moved in different scientific circles in Germany. Still, they shared similar approaches to research, and Jacobsohn-Lask's atlas was presumably of interest to Schaxel. Schaxel, a member of the Jena school of comparative neuroanatomy, was considered a Lamarckian: he believed in the transformation of species during the course of evolution through the inheritance of acquired characteristics, and he was sceptical of genetic-mathematical theories.149 Jacobsohn-Lask did not postulate the inheritance of acquired characteristics, and therefore cannot be considered a Lamarckian. However, he did assume a relationship of dependence in organisms between form and function (his work on crossing of nerve paths, in particular, reveals this assumption150), though he tended to expect changes in form to occur over longer periods of phylogenesis, and he did not express an opinion on the mechanism of inheritance. Schaxel himself delivered a paper titled 'Uber den Einfluss der Funktion auf die Formbildung' (About the Influence of Function on Form).151 In this paper he postulated the form-influencing effect of the functions of various organs and cells on the 'prefunctional' tissue.152 Jacobsohn-Lask was the only one to take part in the discussion of Schaxel's presentation. Had Jacobsohn-Lask found a new scientific circle? The Leningrad conference may certainly be seen as a point of contact with other colleagues. His neuroanatomical atlas, with its emphasis on evolution, was of interest not only to medical scientists but also to biologists, zoologists, and anatomists. Since only a few copies existed, the conference served to amplify interest in it and to introduce researchers from other circles to Jacobsohn-Lask's 'Lebenswerk.' As at other conferences, the social events were probably far from insignificant. The organizers threw extravagant celebrations: 'In honor of the guests ... the caviar was flowing in torrents.'153 It is possible that these Leningrad scientific and social contacts, more than any other factor, facilitated Jacobsohn-Lask's immigration. There is no evidence that either Minor or Krol' intervened on their friend's behalf. After the conference, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask travelled to Moscow with his son Ludwig, where he met his wife. No records indicate that he visited Minor. In Moscow, he rubbed shoulders with high-ranking officials. At the end of August 1935, after spending a few days with his wife at a dacha154 at the invitation of Narkomzdrav (the Russian Commissariat of Public Health), he met with the head of the Narkomzdrav Department of Foreign Scientific Affairs, Vol'f Moiseevich Bronner.155 Bronner was one of the key contacts for German doctors who wished to immigrate to

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the Soviet Union. In his capacity as a Narkomzdrav official, he worked alongside the Amerikanskaia evreiskaia ob"edinennaia agronomicheskaia korporatsiia (Agrodzhoint), an organization whose goal was to help alleviate the shortage of doctors by recruiting German doctors to come to the Soviet Union. In pursuit of this goal, Agrojoint also facilitated the immigration of some Jewish doctors. Bronner selected the doctors he deemed suitable and directed the necessary documents to the visa department of the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs.156 It is unclear whether Schaxel brought Bronner and Jacobsohn-Lask together. But it is known that Schaxel did provide Agrojoint with evaluations of the doctors who were recommended, and since he had just met Jacobsohn-Lask in Leningrad, we can assume that Schaxel took the initiative on Jacobsohn-Lask's behalf. Furthermore, Schaxel had contact with the Moscowbased initiative 'kommunistisches Arzteaktiv/157 most of whose members also belonged to the KPD. They had contact with other German communist emigres,158 among them probably Berta Lask and Ludwig Lask. Whatever connections worked in his favour, Jacobsohn-Lask was able to arrange the meetings and manage the formalities necessary for emigration more quickly and easily than most of his colleagues, who emigrated with the help of larger organizations.159 The decision to emigrate was not an easy one for Jacobsohn-Lask, and he did so only after receiving contractual guarantees of working conditions that would allow him to complete his life's work, the photographic atlas.160 Bronner first conveyed to him an offer from a large Moscow hospital to head its neurological department. Jacobsohn-Lask declined the offer on the grounds of his advanced age.161 He wanted to complete his scientific work, and he did not believe that his health would permit him to continue that work while heading a large clinic. A few days later he returned to Berlin. Meanwhile, Bronner sought another solution. In October 1935, Jacobsohn-Lask received a letter of invitation from Evgenii Aleksandrovich Nielsen,162 director of the Sechenov Institute of Physical Therapy in Sevastopol. Nielsen was able to offer Jacobsohn-Lask workspace and materials for the completion of his work, as well as a salary of eight hundred rubles a month and an apartment.163 Jacobsohn-Lask accepted. He was pleased to find an opportunity that would allow him to complete his work. Jacobsohn-Lask's entry visa arrived at the Soviet Embassy in Berlin in December 1935. The German authorities, however, would not issue him an emigration permit because the Gestapo wished to continue its

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 433 investigation of Berta Lask's whereabouts. Therefore, Jacobsohn-Lask left the country in 1936 with a tourist visa.164 Shortly before his departure, his scientific collection, library, and laboratory equipment were picked up during the night with a Soviet diplomatic car and brought across the border,165 Scientific Life in Sevastopol It is unclear why the decision was made to send Jacobsohn-Lask to Sevastopol. Jacobsohn-Lask himself cited various reasons, such as the severe housing shortage in Moscow and the more favourable southern climate. In Moscow he was received by his family and his friend Lazar Minor. Before his departure for Sevastopol he visited Bronner one more time. Bronner introduced him to Khristian Georgievich Rakovskii,166 who was the Narkomzdrav Chairman of the Sechenov Institute. Rakovskii promised Jacobsohn-Lask all the help he would need for his research.167 In Sevastopol, Berta Lask worked for the Internationale Rote Hilfe (IRH),168 while Louis Jacobsohn-Lask set up his laboratory in two small rooms with a darkroom. At first he worked alone; later he was assisted by a doctor named Fanny Oserskaia. He was welcomed to his new country with several articles in Pmvda and various local papers, which hailed him as a world-famous scientist who had escaped 'barbarous Germany.'169 The articles stressed how progressive the Soviet Union was compared to Germany, as evidenced by the importance it accorded the sciences. Jacobsohn-Lask was a welcome example in support of such claims. Despite Jacobsohn-Lask's high official status, his work was impeded by daily power shutdowns and shortages of material.170 He complained to Rakovskii but never received a reply, so he sent his son Ludwig to speak to him directly. This had no effect either, and JacobsohnLask finally confronted the commissar, Grigorii Naumovich Kaminskii, personally.171 Only then did his working conditions improve somewhat.172 In the following years, however, problems arose again and again. There were often material shortages, and his assistant was sometimes withdrawn without explanation. Jacobsohn-Lask made numerous requests and complaints to Nielsen, the institute director, and to Narkomzdrav directly.173 In 1936, the same year he arrived in Sevastopol, Jacobsohn-Lask's photographic atlas of comparative neuroanatomy was given a thorough

434 Ulrike Eisenberg

review in the academic journal Neuropatologiia, psikhiatriia i psikhogigiena. The senior editor of the journal was Mikhail Krol', who had become one of the country's leading neurologists. Krol' did not review the atlas himself; the author of the article was Aleksei S. Chernyshev. Chernyshev had published several neuroanatomical works in Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and did research on the conductive pathways in the brain - a topic on which Jacobsohn-Lask had written some wellknown works after the turn of the century. In the 1930s, Chernyshev worked at the Moscow Brain Research Institute under Oskar Vogt, and later under Sarkisov.17* It is uncertain, however, whether the old contact to Krol' had any influence on the publication of the review, or if Chernyshev's scientific interests were the decisive factor. To my knowledge there is no record of any direct contact between Chernyshev and Jacobsohn-Lask. Overall, the review was favourable. Chernyshev emphasized Jacobsohn-Lask's detailed description of phylogenesis and ontogenesis of the nervous system. However, he criticized the fact that Jacobsohn-Lask did not consider the 'architectonic' of brain cells as a method of research. This method, of course, had been developed by Vogt, Chernyshev's teacher at the Moscow institute.175 In early 1937, Jacobsohn-Lask sent ten newly hand-produced copies of the first three volumes of his atlas to the Soviet Institutes of Neuroscience. One recipient was Boris Innokent'evich Lavrent'ev, director of the morphological department of the Ail-Union Institute of Experimental Medicine in Moscow.176 Lavrent'ev had participated in the International Physiologists' Conference two years earlier in Leningrad, presenting a paper there titled 'Histophysiology of the Synapses/177 He was one of the founders of Russian histophysiology and experimental neurohistology and had worked at the All-Russian Institute of Experimental Medicine in Moscow since 1932. In the 1920s and early 1930s he had published several papers in the German periodical Zeitschrift fiir mikroskapisch-anaiomische Forschung. We can assume that Jacobsohn-Lask was familiar with these papers, though no records confirm this assumption. One of Lavrent'ev's most important areas of research was the phylogenic and ontogenic development of nerve structures and their functional significance. He postulated the unity of form and function in evolutionary history. Lavrent'ev thus shared some of Jacobsohn-Lask's research interests and was keenly interested in his work. It is possible that the two men also had contact in Sevastopol. Located near the Sechenov Institute was the Biology Station of the Academy of Sciences,

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 435

founded in 1871,178 a leading research institution in the fields of embryology, comparative anatomy, and experimental morphology.179 We can assume that Lavrent'ev himself, as director of the morphological department of the All-Union Institute of Experimental Medicine, worked closely with and had also visited the station. In 1936, Jacobsohn-Lask, whose area of research was comparative anatomy and embryology, received animal material through that station for the completion of the fourth volume of his atlas of the central nervous system of animals and humans in 1936. This indicates he had direct scientific contact with the station.180 The fourth volume was intended to illustrate the comparative architectonics of the occipital brain and midbrain of all classes of vertebrates. Available records do not tell us whether it was Lavrent'ev himself rather than his colleagues who had contact with the station, nor do they indicate whether Jacobsohn-Lask dealt personally with the neighbouring institute. Unfortunately, I am aware of no evidence showing that Jacobsohn-Lask continued or intensified his contact with the station. However, according to a letter of September 1937 from Jacobsohn-Lask to the Deputy Commissar of Health, Propper, Lavrenf ev had suggested merging Jacobsohn-Lask's Sevastopol laboratory with the Academy of Sciences in order to facilitate collaborative work.181 There is no evidence that this merger took place. In December 1937, three months after Jacobsohn-Lask's letter to Propper, Narkomzdrav approached him to ask if he would like to continue his research at the Moscow Brain Research Institute, where he could engage in a constructive exchange of ideas with colleagues. There was no mention of any collaboration with the Academy of Sciences or the Biology Station. Up to that point, Jacobsohn-Lask had had little contact with the Moscow institute. He may have met Sarkisov - who had worked for years under Vogt and become director of the institute in 1936 - at the Leningrad Physiologists' Conference in 1935; both men had delivered papers there. Sarkisov had also received a copy of the atlas in 1937. Jacobsohn-Lask agreed to come to Moscow, but first he wanted to finish the fourth volume of his atlas. He also imposed a series of conditions for his transfer, such as the creation of an 'independent research department' with its own rooms and a photo lab, the continued employment of his assistant Oserskaia, and the provision of a larger apartment with a bathroom. Furthermore, because he hardly spoke Russian, he worried about communication problems.182 His demands prevented the transfer from ever taking place.183 Clearly, he was not so desperate to be at the best location that he was willing to transfer at any cost. Because of

436 Ulrike Eisenberg

his heart condition, the climate in Sevastopol was much more suitable to him than the climate in Moscow, and he actually hoped to stay where he was.184 Jacobsohn-Lask continued to have occasional contact with Sarkisov, though this could not be considered collaboration. In his capacity as a Narkomzdrav neuroscientif ic advisor, Sarkisov travelled to Sevastopol in 1939 to attend a celebration at the Sechenov Institute. He did not mention Jacobsohn-Lask's laboratory in his speech, and Jacobsohn-Lask was not allowed to make an official address. No reasons were given for these omissions. It is unclear whether Sarkisov knew of the animosity between Jacobsohn-Lask and Vogt, whether Jacobsohn-Lask's marginalization stemmed from personal differences between himself and Sarkisov or Nielsen, whether his refusal of the position at the Moscow institute two years earlier played any role, or whether that refusal had to do with his political background and the general prejudice against foreigners. The latter explanation is most likely: in 1939, Sevastopol was declared a city at war, and many people of foreign origin - even those with Soviet citizenship - were expelled.185 Jacobsohn-Lask requested workspace and an apartment in Moscow.186 It is uncertain whether details such as the availability of living or workspace were once again to blame, but this request was rejected. In any case, Jacobsohn-Lask stayed with his wife in Sevastopol until his death in May 1940, Sources show that his last contact with Sarkisov was in January 1940, when Jacobsohn-Lask requested the loan of a series of cerebral cortex specimens from apes, which he needed to finish his atlas.18' No records indicate that he ever received the specimens. Jacobsohn-Lask's work remained unfinished. Jacobsohn-Lask entered negotiations with the publisher Biomedgiz concerning the publication of the fourth volume of his atlas. Victor Minor, the son of his friend Lazar Minor, was to translate the text, but he delayed the work so long that the publisher cancelled his contract.188 The volume did not go to press before the author's death.189 Louis Jacobsohn-Lask died in May 1940 in Sevastopol before completing the fifth volume of his atlas. He bequeathed all the materials to Narkomzdrav and the Academy of Sciences. What actually happened to the materials remains unclear. Jacobsohn-Lask was honoured with a ceremonial funeral in Sevastopol. A band from the Black Sea Fleet accompanied him to his final resting place.190 The Institute held a scientific conference in his honour, and Aleksei Chernyshev wrote an obituary for the renowned journal Nevropatotogiia i psikhiatriia, in which he highlighted Jacobsohn-Lask's most important scientific works and praised his interest in his adoptive country.191

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 437 Conclusion

Why is the biography of Louis Jacobsohn-Lask appropriate for illustrating the relationship between the German and Russian medical communities? Why was the Soviet Union interested in the research of a German outsider? Jacobsohn-Lask was a marginal figure in the German neurological community. In the first years of the twentieth century he did play an important role in the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases: he sat on the membership commission, served for years as secretary, was usually present at meetings, and was an eager - sometimes quarrelsome - participant in discussions. Until the First World War, his neuroanatomical work - especially his research on nuclei of the spinal cord and brainstem - sparked lively debate even among his clinical colleagues. When the war began, he lost access to his labs and lecture halls. At that point he turned his attention to social issues that had long interested him and began to study them systematically. This new emphasis in his work was probably influenced by his wife, Berta, who was socially active during this period - especially on behalf of poor working-class families - and who joined the KPD in 1923. With this change in emphasis, Jacobsohn-Lask no longer fit into the neurological landscape of either Berlin or Germany as a whole, and he became more and more of an outsider. His wife's increasing political activism may have exacerbated his alienation. In the 1920s, Jacobsohn-Lask made another scientific shift: he began to devote himself entirely to the field of comparative neuroanatomy, which had no direct connection to clinical issues. His work was discussed with less enthusiasm at the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases. He presumably continued his association with the society because his many years of involvement there made him feel at home among these neurologists, even though his scientific work would have been better placed in a community of anatomists. Having become a marginalized figure, and faced with obstacles to his work, Jacobsohn-Lask strengthened his connections to Russia, which were already in place. The famous Moscow neurologist Lazar Minor introduced him to the Russian neurological community. Early in their careers, Jacobsohn-Lask and Minor had collaborated and published fundamental works on neurology, and an enduring friendship had developed between the two men. In 1927, Jacobsohn-Lask was invited to attend the All-Union Neurologists' Conference as a guest of honour; there, he delivered a paper on a topic in comparative neu-

438 Ulrike Eisenberg

roanatomy. The paper was received with interest, and Jacobsohn-Lask felt honoured. Yet once again the topics being discussed at the conference were more clinical than anatomical in nature. Professionally, it seems that he was something of an outsider in this community as well. We can assume that at that point, the invitation to the Soviet Union was based more on political and social considerations, and on Jacobsohn-Lask's personal relationship with Minor, than on the scientific contribution he was likely to make to the conference. Jacobsohn-Lask was not one of Germany's leading neurologists; it was perhaps more important that he was a well-known German scientist who had demonstrated a certain open-mindedness and interest towards the Soviet Union. Furthermore, his wife was a recognized communist writer. At the time of his immigration nearly ten years later, however, Jacobsohn-Lask was of interest to the Soviet Union primarily because of his qualifications as a highly specialized doctor. Some authorities wished to appoint him director of a Moscow neurological clinic. He turned down that offer, however, and was sent instead to the Sechenov Institute in Sevastopol. The Sechenov Institute was equipped for physiotherapeutic work and was not well suited for his neuroanatomical research. Was he intentionally kept at a distance from the Moscow Brain Research Institute? Why was he not offered a chance to work there from the beginning? It is not likely that his work was unknown at the Moscow institute: in 1936, the same year he arrived in the Soviet Union, his atlas was reviewed by Chernyshev, an institute associate. Were Jacobsohn-Lask's differences with Vogt a factor as late as 1936? Or was it simply the housing shortage and difficult living conditions in Moscow that made it impossible for him to work at the institute there? Though working conditions were difficult in Sevastopol, the living conditions were bearable for Jacobsohn-Lask. For the first time in many years he was receiving money for his research activities. Colleagues began showing interest in his work again. This interest came no longer from neurological circles, but rather from neuroanatomists and neurobiologists. But he did not really have access to colleagues working on similar topics with whom he could share ideas. JacobsohnLask and his research would have fit in perfectly among this community of Russian evolutionary biologists and neuroanatomists; in Germany hardly anyone was still interested in his work. Yet JacobsohnLask never really collaborated with Russian researchers during his years in Sevastopol. He was elderly and in poor health, and he concen-

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 439

trated on his goal of finishing the atlas. Furthermore, when the war began, foreigners in the Soviet Union were increasingly excluded from public life,1 What became of Jacobsohn-Lask's research material after his death - whether it was used later, and who might have used it remains unknown, Jacobsohn-Lask was an outsider in the Soviet Union as well. Nevertheless, up to the time of his death, he had contact with important - and by the end of the 1930s, influential - Russian researchers such as Lavrenf ev and Sarkisov, who clearly regarded his work as so important that they sought collaboration between his lab and their own labs. Their efforts failed in part because of the increasingly difficult political conditions for foreigners in Russia, and also because of JacobsohnLask's advanced age and physical frailty. In spite of the difficult political situation, he was buried with pomp. Moreover, a scientific meeting was held in Jacobsohn-Lask's honour at the Sechenov Institute, and Aleksei Chernyshev, one of the most important associates at the Moscow Brain Research Institute, wrote an obituary that appeared in a leading journal. If Jacobsohn-Lask was an outsider during the heyday of Soviet-German relations in the 1920s, he may ultimately have been more influential in Russia than such scientists as Karl Wilmanns or Ludwig Aschoff, who had benefited from the official scientific exchange programs that still existed in the 1920s.193 Jacobsohn-Lask occupies an intriguing position in the history of German-Russian medical relations. He made contacts in Russia early in his career through colleagues whom he met during his studies. He was not a typical representative of German neurologists, but was in fact something of an outsider. His wife and children were active communists who afforded him insight into Soviet politics and society; their views no doubt influenced his own. Thus his contacts with Russia and the Soviet Union had personal, professional, social, and political aspects. Because these aspects intersect in the person of Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, his life and work offer valuable insight into medical relations between Germany and Russia. NOTES This research was done in connection with my doctoral thesis, TKe Vertreibung der Berliner Neurologic. Louis Jacobsohn-Lasks (1863-1940) Beitrag zur Neuroanatomie,' in medical history at the Free University, Berlin (2005), I would

440 Ulrike Eisenberg like to thank *Mira Lask, Ruth Kessentini, and Dina and Peter Lask of Berlin for giving me access to Louis Jacobsohn-Lask's private papers, Berlin (henceforth cited as Jacobsohn-Lask Collection); and Mark Klingler of Chicago for translating this essay from German. 1 Dtv-Atlas zur Wdtgeschichte (2) (Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag, 1966), 165, 2 Jochen Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos. Eine Chronik zur medizinischen Biographie Lenins und zur Geschichte tier Elitegehirnforschung in Dokumenten (Herbolzheim: Centaurus-Verlag, 2000), 9-10. Susan Gross Solomon and Jochen Richter, eds., Ludwig Aschoff: Vergleichende Volkerpathologie oder Rnssenpathologie. Tagebuch einer Rtise durch Russland und Tmnskaukasien (Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus, 1998). 3 Hoetzsch was a member of the Reichstag for the German's People's Party (Deutsche Volkspartei). 4 The term 'neurosyphilis' (or 'metasyphilis') refers to advanced forms of syphilis that attack the central nervous system. 5 For Wilmanns's expedition, see Susan Gross Solomon, 'Das Reisetagebuch als Quelle fur die Analyse binationaler medizinischer Unternehmungen/ in Jochen Richter, ed., Karl Wilmanns, Lues, Lamas, Leninisten: Tagebuch einer Reise durch Russland in die Burjatische Republik im Sommer 1926 (Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus, 1995), 1-42. 6 Ibid., 20, 7 Later called the German-Russian Institute of Race Pathology. 8 Solomon, TDas Reisetagebuch,' 30,45-7. 9 For the Brain Research Institute and Vogt's role, see Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos. 10 The young neuroanatomist Hartwig Kuhlenbeck immigrated to the United States from Germany shortly after the National Socialists came to power. There he gained recognition, especially in comparative neuroanatomy. 11 I have found little evidence of contacts with his Russian colleagues in sources that are available to the public, but have looked instead at the facobsohn-Lask Collection and various other personal documents from Jacobsohn-Lask and his family. 12 This position became evident in numerous Soviet newspaper articles that appeared after Jacobsohn-Lask's arrival, bearing such titles as 'From Fascist Germany to Scientific Work in the USSR' (Pravda, 20 March 1936). 13 Landesarchiv Berlin, File A Rep. 093-03, 'Finanzamt Moabit West,' no. 50482/42, p. 170/38. Letter of the Gestapo to the Reichsfuhrer SS und Chef

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 441

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der Deutschen Polizei im Reschsministerium des Innern, Berlin, 19 October 1937. Lask took his wife Berta's surname in order to carry on the Lask family name, as her only two brothers had died in combat in the First World War, Berta and Louis Jacobsohn used the double name, and all four children took the name Lask. When Berta became a writer, she usually called herself simply 'Berta Lask.' Emanuel Mendel was born in Silesia in 1839, the son of a Jewish businessman. He obtained his doctoral degree in Berlin in 1860 and his postdoctoral qualification in psychiatry at Berlin University in 1871. He died in Berlin in 1907. Although he was not religious, Mendel was a leading figure in the Central Association of German Citizens of the Jewish Faith, which was founded in 1893 to defend the civil rights of Jewish citizens, Uta Fleckner, 'Emanuel Mendel (1839-1907). Leben und Werk eines Psychiaters im Deutschland der Jahrhundertwende' (Med. diss., Freie Universitat Berlin, 1994), 14. Wilhelm von Waldeyer (1836-1921) received his postdoctoral qualification in anatomy and psychology at Breslau in 1864; he became professor of pathological anatomy at Breslau in 1867; at Strasbourg from 1872 to 1883; and at Berlin between 1883 and 1917. He authored abstracts and textbooks on anatomy and evolution and introduced the term 'neuron' for the entire nerve cell. Mendel was not responsible for any new anatomical discoveries, but he was famous for his teaching method, Theodor Ziehen, 'Emanuel Mendel/ obituary, Neurologisches Centralblatt 14 (1907): 642-6. Fleckner, Emanuel Mendel, 16. Edward Flatau (1868-1932) studied medicine in Moscow, receiving his degree in 1892. Between 1893 and 1899, he trained in Berlin under Ernst von Ley den, Alfred Goldscheider, Emanuel Mendel, and Hermann Oppenheim. He was a leading neurologist in Poland and founder of an important Polish neurological school. Hugh Talbot Patrick (1860-1939) studied medicine in Wooster and New York, receiving his degree in 1884. Between 1891 and 1894, he did his training in neurology and psychiatry in Europe under Emanuel Mendel and others. In 1896, he became professor of neurology and psychiatry at the Chicago Polyclinic; from 1899 he was professor at Northwestern University. He had regular contact with Jacobsohn until his death. Paul Schuster (1867-1940) studied medicine in Bonn, Munich, and Berlin, receiving his degree in 1890. He took his training in Greifswald in pathol-

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ogy from 1892 to 1893 and in Berlin under Mendel from 1893 to 1904. He became titular professor and neurological department director at the Municipal Hufeland Hospital in Berlin in 1910, His teaching licence was revoked in 1933. He emigrated to Great Britain in 1939 with the help of his son, who resided there. Schuster published works on traumatic disorders of the nervous system and numerous other neurological diseases, Emanuel Mendel, Die progressiiv Paralyse der Irren (Berlin: Hirschwald, 1880). Fleckner, Emanuel Mendel, 16. Hermann Oppenheim (1858-1919) studied medicine in Gottingen, Bonn, and Berlin, receiving his degree in 1881; he trained under Westphal and Jolly in Berlin (Charite) between 1883 and 1891. Oppenheim received postdoctoral qualifications in neurology in Berlin in 1886 and became titular professor of neurology at Berlin in 1893, In 1891 he founded a private polyclinic. Oppenheim taught students from all over the world. In 1898 he resigned from his position as lecturer at the university and limited his activities to the polyclinic. Oppenheim was the author of a famous textbook on neurological diseases, which became a standard text and was reprinted for decades; he also published many works on war injuries and traumatic neurosis. Fritz Heinrich Lewy [Frederic Henry Lewey] (1885-1950) studied medicine in Berlin and Zurich and obtained his degree in 1910. Lewy trained in physiology at Breslau, in psychiatry at Munich and Breslau, and in medicine at Berlin (Charite). He received postdoctoral qualifications in neurology at Berlin in 1921 and became titular professor in 1923. Lewy published works on tonicity and movement, as well as on various neurophysical topics, and coedited Die Biologie der Person, a manual of constitutional biology, from 1926 to 1931. Lewy contemplated establishing a special neurological clinic in 1932. He immigrated to Britain in 1933 and then to the United States in 1934, where he taught at the University of Pennsylvania. Hugo Liepmann (1863-1925) studied medicine and philosophy at Berlin and received degrees in philosophy in 1885 and medicine in 1895. He trained in Breslau from 1895 to 1899 under Wernicke and became resident at the Municipal Insane Asylum in Berlin-Dalldorf in 1900. In 1907 he was named assistant medical director. Liepmann received postdoctoral qualifications in psychiatry and neurology in Berlin in 1904, became titular professor at the Herzberge Insane Asylum in 1905, and was director between 1914 and 1917. Liepmann was named honorary professor at Berlin in 1919. He published works on neurological disorders resulting from alcoholism, on psychological disorders resulting from brain diseases, and on aphasia and apraxia.

Neuroanatoinist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 443 28 Paul Rothig (1874-1942 [?]) studied medicine in Berlin, receiving his degree in 1898. He was assistant at the Berlin University Anatomical Institute and was named titular professor in 1918. Rothig became adjunct professor of comparative brain research at Berlin in 1930. He had his teaching licence revoked in 1933. Rothig served for many years as city councillor in Charlottenburg. In 1929 he submitted a proposal to the Kaiser Wilhelm Society for the creation of an institute of comparative brain research, but no such institute was created. His field was the comparative anatomy of invertebrates. Rothig maintained close contact with Aliens Kappers in Holland. 29 For example, Hermann Oppenheim., Emanuel Mendel, and Hugo Liepmann each served as chairman of the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases, which was the most important Berlin forum for neurosciendfic discussions. Manfred Wolter, 'Neurologic im Spiegel der 1867 gegriindeten Berliner Gesellschaft fur Psychiatric und Neurologic/ in Bemd Holdorff and Rolf Winau, eds., Geschichte der Neurologie in Berlin (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2001), 76. In addition, in 1907 Oppenheim founded the Society of German Neurologists ('Nervenarzte'). Roland Schiffter, 'Romberg und Oppenheim auf dem Weg von der romantischen Medizin zur modernen Neurologie/ in ibid., 94. Louis Jacobsohn himself worked as reporter for the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases from 1897 to 1900 and was a member of the admission committee of the same society from 1915 to 1926. Neurologisches Centmlblatt 16, no. 7 (1897): 336; 16, no. 19 (1897): 905-28; 19, no. 13 (1900): 633-7; Archiv fur Psychiatric undNervenkrankheiten 59 (1918): 314; ZentraMutt fur die gesamte Neurologie und Psychiatrie 28 (1922): 243; 43 (1926): 350. 30 This Polyclinic Institute was headed by Alfred Goldscheider (1858-1935), who in 1919 became one of the very few Jews in Germany to achieve fee rank of full professor. In 1919 the institute was renamed 'III. Medical Clinic' of Charite. 31 Geheimes Staatsarchiv Berlin, HA I, Rep, 76 Va, 2d section, no. 142, folios 72 and 82, 'Das Laboratorium fur normale und pathologische Anatomie des Nervensystems (Mendel).' 32 Shulamit Volkov, ]udisches Leben und Antisemitismus im 19. und 20. fahrhundert, (Munich: Beck, 1990), pp. 158-60, and Archive of Humboldt University, Berlin (hereafter AHUB), file no. 14, (1908), 'Anatomisches Institut/ unsigned letter to the Ministerium fur geistliche, Unterrichts- und MedLzinalangelegenheiten, 3 March 1908. Wilhelm Waldeyer is presumed to be the author. 33 In a 1950 article on the Berlin neurologists, the neuropathologist Julius Hallervorden wrote: 'With pointed irony, O. Vogt and Bielschovsky dis-

444 Ulrike Eisenberg missed remarks by Jacobsohn, who customarily held an opposing point of view.' Julius Hallervorden, 'Der Berliner Kreis/ in Willibald Scholz, ed., 50 Jahre Neuropathologie in Deutschland 1885-1935 (Stuttgart: Thieme, 1961), 109. 34 During their time with Mendel, Flatau and Jacobsohn both worked on nerve tracts, but they did not yet publish together. In 1894, Flatau published his book Atlas des menschlichen Cehirns und des Faserverlaufs in Berlin, which was translated into English, French, and Russian. Jacobsohn worked on pyramidal tracts: 'Uber die Lage der Pyramidenvorderstrangfasern in der Medulla oblongata,' Neurologisches Centralblatt 14, no. 4 (1895): 348-54, 35 They produced one of the first manuals of comparative neuroanatomy, which was respected internationally as a reference work for decades to come. Edward Flatau and Louis Jacobsohn, edsv Handbuch der Anatomie und vergleichenden Anat&rnie des Zentralnervensystems der Saugetiere (Berlin: Karger, 1899). 36 Neurologisches Centralblatt 16, no. 19 (1897): 928. 37 Flatau and Jacobsohn, 'Foreword/ Jahresbericht ttber die Leistungen und Fortschritte auf dent Gebiete der Neurologie und Psychiatric 1 (Berlin, 1898). 38 There are several possible explanations. Many Eastern European colleagues studied in Germany for extended periods, often coming with a facility in spoken and written German. They maintained contact with teachers and colleagues, which facilitated professional exchange and collaboration. The general political context should also be taken into account: Germany traditionally had close ties with imperial Austria-Hungary, which included Bohemia, Moravia, and Galicia; tensions were greater between Germany and its rivals England and France. Dtv-Atlas zur Weltgeschichte, 77-83. 39 Vladimir Bekhterev (1857-1927) received his doctorate in 1881 at the Medical and Surgical Academy in St Petersburg, specializing in brain anatomy research, and did his postdoctoral qualification in neurology and psychiatry. Isidor Fischer, Eiographisches Lexikon der hervormgenden Arzte der letzten fiinfzig Jahre (Berlin and Vienna: Urban & Schwarzenberg, 1932-33}, 85-6; and L.R. Grote, Die Medizin der Gegenwart in Selbstdarstellungen, vol. 6 (Leipzig: Grote, 1927), 1. See also Daniel P. Todes, 'Pavlov's Physiology Factory,' his 88, no. 2 (1997): 230-2. Todes describes Pavlov's and Bekhterev's careers and the 'interweaving' of their lives, including their 'mutually respectful relations' at the beginning until 'a clash over experimental results' erupted around 1906, giving rise to their subsequent competition. 40 Minor's father, Salomon Minor, was a rabbi known for his liberalism and social and political activism. He founded the first municipal Sabbath school in Vilnius and was the first rabbi in Russia to preach in the Russian Ian-

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guage. In 1869 he became rabbi of the large Moscow Jewish congregation. He actively opposed the resettlement of Moscow Jews, and was thus banished from the city in 1892. He later returned to Vilnius, where he died in 1900. Lazar Minor's brother, Osip M., was born in Moscow in 1861. He joined the Social Revolutionaries while a student in Moscow and was arrested for the first time in 1883. He became a leader of the Party of Social Revolutionaries and was mayor of Moscow from'1917 to 1918. He immigrated to Paris in 1918, where he died in 1934. Rossiiskaia Evreiskaia Entsiklopediia (hereafter REE), vol. 2 (Moscow, 1995), 287-8; Arno Lustiger, Rotbuch: Stalin und die Juden (Berlin: Aufbau Verlag, 1998), 311-12. Aleksandr Ivanovich Babukhin (1827-1891) was professor of physiology in the Moscow University Department of Medicine in 1865, and professor of histology, embryology, and comparative anatomy in 1869. In 1888 he became the first Moscow professor of bacteriology. Babukhin performed important research in anatomy and physiology of the peripheral nervous system. Bol'shaia Souetskaia Entsiklopediia (hereafter BSE), 3d. ed., vol. 2 (Moscow, 1970), 506. Aleksei lakovlevich Kozhevnikov (1836-1902) was professor of psychiatry and neurology at Moscow University and founder of the Moscow psychiatric school He was one of Korsakov's instructors. Fischer, Biographisches Lexikon, 806. Jean-Martin Charcot (1825-1893) was founder of the French psychiatric school in Paris. Carl Westphal (1833-1890) obtained his postdoctoral qualification in psychiatry in Berlin in 1861. He was senior lecturer in 1869 and professor of psychiatry in 1874. Julius Pagel, Biographisches Lexikon heruorragender Arzte des 19. Jahrhunderts (Berlin and Vienna: Urban & Schwarzenberg, 1901), 1843; and Johannes Asen, Gesamtverzeichnis des lehrkorpers der Universitat Berlin (Leipzig: Harrasowitz, 1955), 215. The topic of his paper at the 1897 Moscow conference was traumatic spinal damage, particularly central hematomyelia. From 1887 on, Minor wrote about alcoholism - for example, Chisla i nabliudeniia iz oblasti alkogolizma (Statistics and Observations on Alcoholism) (Moscow, 1910). He visited foreign rehabilitation centres for alcoholics and established similar centres around Moscow. Mikhail Krol', et al., 'L.S. Minor (1884-1934), celebrating the 50th anniversary of his doctorate,' in Sovetskaia nevropatologiia, psikhiatriia i psikhogigiena 3, nos. 2-3 (1934): 2-8. He was also a student of Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920) and Paul Flechsig (1847-1929) in Leipzig. Muscular and neuromuscular diseases, respectively.

446 Ulrike Eisenberg 49 Friedrich Jolly (1844-1904) succeeded Carl Westphal at Charite Hospital in Berlin in 1890 (Fischer, Biographisches Lcxikon, 717). 50 Grigorii Ivanovich Rossolimo (1860-1928) studied medicine in Moscow. He was professor of neuropathology at the First Moscow State University in 1917. Rossolimo specialized in children's psychoneurology, and was cofounder of the Korsakov Journal of Neurology and Psychiatry {Fischer, Biographisches lexikon, 1329). 51 Liverii Osipovich Darkshevich (1858-1925) was professor at Kazan, Department of Neurology and Psychiatry. He trained in Western laboratories between 1882 and 1887. Darkshevich founded the first Russian clinic for alcoholics, and with Bekhterev co-founded the Society for Neuropathology and Psychiatry in Kazan, in 1893. Darkshevich was professor at the Department of Neurology and Psychiatry at the First Moscow State University in 1917. He was among the first to support the theory of the syphilitic etiology of posterial spinal sclerosis. Barbara and Gunter Albrecht, eds., Diagnosen. Arzteerinnerungen aus dem 20. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Buchverlag Der Morgen, 1977), 600. 52 This last reference to the handbook occurred in 1978. Hartwig Kuhlenbeck, The Central Nervous System of Vertebrates: A General Survey of its Comparative Anatomy with an Introduction to the Pertinent Fundamental Biologic and Logical Concepts, vol. 5, Part II. Mammalian Telencephalon (Basel and New York, 1978), 35. Kuhlenbeck originally hailed from Germany, had worked at Jena University, and immigrated to the United States in 1933 for political reasons. In 1959, two Russian neuroanatomists mentioned the handbook: Oleg Sergeevich Adrianov and Tatiana A. Mering, Atlas Mozga Sobaki (Moscow, 1959), 219. 53 Marcel Natanovich Neiding (1884-1949) published works on symptoms of intoxication of the nervous system, neuro-oncology, and tropical-neurological diseases. 54 Mikhail Krol' (1879-1939) received his medical degree in 1901 in Moscow. After his return to Russia in 1906, he worked for many years under Lazar Minor and became one of Russia's leading neurologists in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1921 he founded the Medical Faculty of the Belorussian University in Minsk, where he was director of the Department of Neurology and Psychiatry from 1923 to 1932. He became director of the Medical Faculty in 1930. In 1932 he was called to Moscow to replace Minor, who was retiring. Bol'shaia Meditsinskaia Entsiklopediia, vol. 12 (Moscow, 1980), 143-4; Who Was Who in the USSR? A Biographic Directory (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1972), 318; REE, vol. 2 (Moscow, 1995), 95. 55 in a speech delivered to the Soviet Neurological Conference in 1927, Krol'

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 447

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expressed his admiration for the 'remarkable work' that emerged from Jacobsohn's 'humble workshop.' Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, Vier Wochen in Sowjetrussland (1927), unpublished. Heinrich W. Vogt (1875 Regensburg- ?) received his degree in 1899. He became resident at the Gottingen Mental Hospital in 1901; lecturer at Gottingen University in 1903; and assistant at the Zurich Brain Anatomy Institute in 1904; and finally an unsalaried lecturer in 1905. He worked at the Bad Pyrmont Clinic and Sanatorium between 1905 and 1907; at the Frankfurt am Main Neurological Institute in 1907. He was a professor in 1909 and later professor at Breslau in 1935. He retired in 1948. Paul Robert Bing (1878 Strasbourg-1956 Basel) received his degree in Basel in 1902. He was resident for neurology and psychiatry ('Nervenheilkunde') in Frankfurt am Main, Berlin, and London, and had a psychiatric and neurological practice in Basel in 1905. He was lecturer for neurology and psychiatry at Basel University Polyclinic in 1907; founded the Swiss Neurological Society in 1908; and served as its president from 1919 to 1922. Bing was associate professor in 1918 and founded the Swiss Archive for Neurology and Psychiatry in 1919. In 1926 he served as chairman of the university neurology laboratory, and from 1932 to 1948 as professor of neurology and psychiatry at Basel. Bing published works on topical diagnostics of the brain and spinal cord. Walther Kilty and Rudolf Vierhaus, eds., Deutsche Biografische Enzyklopadie, vol. 1 (Munich: Saur, 1995), 533. Unlike the Jahresberkht, the journal treated various problems in neurology and psychiatry but did not offer an overview of the whole field. See H. Vogt and R. Bing, eds., Ergebnisse der Neuroiogie und Psychiatrie (Jena: 1913 and 1917). The reason the journal ceased publication is unknown. Alfred Goldscheider (1858-1935) studied medicine in Berlin, receiving his degree in 1881 and his postdoctoral qualifications in internal medicine in 1891. He was director of Moabit Municipal Hospital in 1894; titular professor in 1895; associate professor in 1898; and adjunct professor ('ordentl. Honorar-Professor') in 1907. He served as director of Virchow Hospital from 1906 to 1910; was director of the University Polyclinic Institute in 1910; director of the Berlin University Third Medical Clinic in 1919; and full professor between 1919 and 1926. Goldscheider published work on neural physiology and the physiology of pain; the spinal cord; and neuron theory. Karl Moeli (1849-1919) studied medicine in Marburg, Wiirzburg, and Leipzig, receiving his degree in 1873. He was resident for internal medicine at the Rostock Clinic and Munich, and for psychiatry at Charite Hospital in Berlin (under Carl Westphal). Moeli received postdoctoral qualifications in psychiatry in Berlin in 1883. He served as director of the Dalldorf Munici-

448 Ulrike Eisenberg

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pal Insane Asylum 1887. Moeli was associate professor in 1891 and held the post of director of the Herzberge Municipal Insane Asylum from 1893 until 1914. He was a member of the Ministry of Culture's department of medicine and published work on forensic psychiatry and organic diseases of the nervous system. Ernst von Bergmann (1836-1907) was professor of surgery at Dorpat in 1871; at Wlirzburg in 1878; and at Berlin in 1882. He introduced asepsis to surgery and was a pioneer of brain surgery. Theodor Ziehen (1862-1950) was a philosopher, psychologist, psychiatrist, and neuroanatornist He received his medical degree in Berlin in 1885 and his postdoctoral qualifications at Jena in 1887. Ziehen worked at the Jena Psychiatric Clinic under Binswanger from 1886 to 1896; as associate professor at Jena in 1892; and as professor of psychiatry at Utrecht in 1900, Halle in 1903, and Berlin from 1904 to 1912. Ziehen served as a private instructor at Wiesbaden from 1912 to 1917 and as professor of philosophy at Halle between 1917 and 1930. Also present were Carl Bonhoeffer from Breslau, Max Nonne from Hamburg, Ludwig Edinger from Frankfurt, and Wilhelm Erb from Heidelberg. Richard Cassirer (1868-1925) received his medical degree in Breslau in 1891. He was resident at the Breslau Clinic for Nervous Diseases (under Carl Wernicke) from 1891 to 1893; worked at the Berlin Polyclinic for the Mentally 111 (under Oppenheim) in 1895; and received his postdoctoral qualifications in 1903. Cassirer was titular professor in 1912 and co-directed the polyclinic with R. Hirschfeld between 1919 and 1925. Max Lewandowsky (1876-1918) received his medical degree in Halle in 1898 and his postdoctoral qualifications in physiology in Berlin in 1902. He trained in clinical neurology and psychiatry in Heidelberg (under Bonhoeffer and Nissl) and in Paris (under Pierre Marie). Lewandowsky worked as a neurologist and psychiatrist in Berlin in 1905 and became titular professor in 1909. He was the editor of Handbuch fur Neurologic in Berlin 1910-14 and founded Zeitschrift fur die gesamte Neurologic und Psychiatric in 1910. Compte Rendu des Travaux du ler Congres International de Psychiatric, de Neurologie, de Psychologic et de 1'Assistance des alienes, tenu a Amsterdam du2A7 Septembre 1907 (Amsterdam, 1908), ix-xxiv and 911-27. Wilhelm Erb (1840-1921) received his postdoctoral qualification in internal medicine in Heidelberg in 1865, becoming senior lecturer in 1869. Erb was a professor at Leipzig in 1880 and at Heidelberg in 1883. He postulated a causal relation between syphilis and posterial spinal sclerosis as early as 1879. Fischer, Biographisches Lexikon, 370. Deutsche Zeitschrift fur Nervenheilkunde 122, nos. 1-2 (1931): 8.

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 449 69 Verhandlungen der Gesellschaft Deutscher Nervenarzte. 18. Jahresversammlung, gehalten zu Hamburg 13-15. September 1928 (Leipzig, 1929), 213. We do not know why Jacobsohn-Lask did not join the society until 1928. In 1906, before the society was founded, he wrote to Hermann Oppenheim that he considered that neurology and psychiatry belonged together 'organically/ To separate them would narrow the horizons of both neurologists and psychiatrists. Zum 50. Jahrestag der Grundung der Gesellschaft Deutscher Nervenarzte 1957 (Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Neurologic e.V., 1958). JacobsohnLask withdrew from the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases in 1928; perhaps he joined the German society in search of further professional exchange. 70 Oswald Bumke (1877-1950) acquired his postdoctoral qualification in psychiatry in Freiburg in 1904. He served as professor of neurology and psychiatry at Rostock from 1914 to 1916; at Breslau from 1916 to 1921; at Leipzig from 1921 to 1924; and at Munich from 1924 to 1945. Albrecht & Albrecht, eds,, Diagnosen., 522. 71 Stiftung Archiv Akademie der Kiinste (hereafter SAdK) Berlin, Berta Lask Collection, no. S 37. Louis Jacobsohn, 'Liebe Berta' letter from Nuremberg, 23 October (no year). 72 Information from the Samuel Karger publishing house, now located in Basel. 73 AHUB, Files of the Department of Medicine, no. 1460, folio 10. 74 Berthold Otto (1859-1933) was one of the first German school reformers. In his school, all children were educated together, with age not taken into account. The lessons were determined by the children's interests and curiosity. 75 Guy Fernald, The Defective Delinquent Class Differentiating Test/ American Journal of Insanity 68 (1912): 523-94. Jacobsohn did not have access to the original; he only knew a report by the German Hugo Marx, who visited Fernald in 1912. Hugo Marx, 'Reiseeindriicke eines Gefangnisarztes in den USA,' Vierteljahrsschrift furgerkhtliche Medizin und offentliches Sanitatswesen 3, no. 43 (1912): 395-412. 76 Louis Jacobsohn, 'Gibt es eine brauchbare Methode, um AufschluS iiber das sittliche Gefuhl eines Jugendlichen zu bekommen?' Neurologisches Zenfra(W«H38,no.2(1919):71-3. 77 Jean Piaget published his works on moral psychology from 1924 to 1932. During the Second World War, this topic was no longer discussed. Then in 1958, Lawrence Kohlberg began to examine young boys in Chicago. Like Jacobsohn, he used the so-called 'stories of dilemma/ but he cited Fernald, not Jacobsohn. Horst Heidbrink, Einfiihrung in die Moralpsychologie, 2d ed.

450 Ulrike Eisenberg (Weinheim and Basel: Belte-Verlag, 1996), 45-62, and Lawrence Kohlberg, 'Moralische Entwicklung und demokratische Erziehung,' in G. Lind and J. Raschert, eds., Moralische Urteilsfahigkdt. Eine Auseinandersetzung mil Lawrence Kohlberg (Weinheim and Basel: Beltz-Verlag, 1987), 26. 78 Louis Jacobsohn, 'Die Kriminalitat der Jugendlichen und ihre Verhiitung/ Monatsschrift fitr Krimimlpsychologie und Strafrechtsreform (Heidelberg, 1917), 577-600, and Louis Jacobsohn, 'Die Kriminalitat der Jugendlichen (mit Beriicksichtigungder Kriegsverhaltnisse),' Jahresberichl fiber die Leistungen und Fortschritte aufdem Gebiete der Neurohgie und Psychiatrie 19 (1916): xxxi-xxxiv. 79 Wladimir von Bechterew, Das Verbrechertum im Lichle der objektiven Psychologic, trans. T. Rosenthal (Wiesbaden: Bergmann-Verlag, 1914). 80 Berta Lask always maintained that her interest in working with poor people intensified when her husband told her about his poor patients, to whom he offered free treatment in his polyclinic. Sometimes she accompanied her husband on his home visits. SAdK Berlin, Berta Lask Collection, no. S 23,2. E. Weifi and G. Duwel, interview with Berta Lask, Berlin, 3 March 1964. 81 SAdK Berlin, Berta Lask Collection, no. S 37. Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Liebe Berta/ letter, 18 February 1922. 82 Ibid. 83 Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Uber eine Methode zur Feststellung des sittlichen Verstandnisses bei Fursorgezdglingen,' Zentralblatt fur Vormundschaftswesen, Jugendgerichte und Filrsorgeerziehung 3/4 (1921): 33-6. 84 In 1928, she was the only woman among the few founders of the 'Bund proletarisch-revolutionarer Schriftsteller' in Berlin, together with Johannes R. Becher, Kurt Klaber, Karl Griinberg, and Hans Lorbeer, and vice-chairwoman of the Bund. Walter Pollatschek, 'Nachwort/ in Berta Lask, Stille und Sturm (Munich: Damnitz, 1975), 357, and Karl Griinberg, 'Berta Lask/ in Neue Deutsche Literatur 1 (1954): 167-9. 85 Berta Lask wrote several dramas about the lives of workers, which in the 1920s were forbidden to be performed. Together with the director of the workers'1 theatre in Kassel, lise Berend-Groa, she developed the proletarian 'Massenspiel/ part of the agitprop movement. After the performance of her drama Thomas Mtinzer in 1925 at Eisleben, she was accused of high treason, but the charge was quashed in 1927. Walter Pollatschek, 'Nachwort/ in Lask, Stille und Sturm, 365, and Russian Centre for the Preservation and Study of Documents of Modern History [hereafter RTsKhlDNI], Moscow, /. 495, op. 205 (Komintern/Kaderabteilung), d, 1415, /. 191. File 'Berta Lask/

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 451 86 Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Vier Wochen,' 24-5. 87 From a personal conversation in Berlin with Jacobsohn-Lask's daughterin-law, Mira Lask, 19 June 1995. 88 Joseph Roth, Reise nach Rutland, Feuilktons, Reportagen, Tagebuchnotizen 1919-1930 (Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch, 1995), 273. 89 Berta Lask (1878-1967) was raised in a liberal Jewish household. She was the daughter of a teacher and a paper factory owner. After her marriage to Louis Jacobsohn in 1901 in Berlin, she became interested in the living conditions of urban workers' families and devoted herself to social work. From 1919 she had contact with communist artists' circles, and she published poems and plays. One of her two brothers was Emil Lask, a famous philosopher (neo-Kantian), who died as a soldier in the First World War. 90 Schutzverband Deutscher Schriftsteller. 91 RTsKHDNI, /. 495, op. 205, Komintem/Kaderabteilung, d. 1415, /. 180. 92 Ibid. 93 Jacobsohn-Lask's trip to Moscow and Leningrad to attend the All-Union Neuropathology Conference coincided with Berta Lask's several-month study trip to Russia, during which she participated in the International Conference of Revolutionary-Proletarian Writers in Moscow. The pair visited Soviet factories and worker's clubs and talked with German communist emigres. 94 SAdK Berlin, Berta Lask Collection, no. S 23,6, interview with Berta Lask by E. Weifi and D. Diiwel of the Slavic Studies Institute, 3 March 1964. Unfortunately, I was not able to find the Vorwitrts articles mentioned. 95 Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Vier Wochen.' 96 Ibid,, 43. 97 Ibid. 98 The editors-in-chief were Nikolai Aleksandrovich Semashko, Russian Commissar of Public Health, and the Berlin internist Friedrich Kraus. 99 Otfried Foerster (1873-1941) was appointed the first German chair for neurology at Breslau in 1921, where he remained until his retirement in 1940. Kurt Kolle, 'Grosse Nervenarzte (Stuttgart: Thieme, 1956), 267-74. 100 The Society for the Study of Eastern Europe, founded in 1913, appointed Otto Hoetzsch as editor-in-chief. Hoetzsch was professor of Eastern European history at Berlin. 101 One of the speakers was the geneticist Nikolai Kol'tsov, from the Institute of Experimental Biology in Moscow. 102 Nikolai Aleksandrovich Semashko (1874-1949) was the founder of Soviet social hygiene. He studied in Moscow and Kazan, and resided in Switzerland and France between 1906 and 1917. Semashko was the First Commis-

452 Ulrike Eisenberg sar of Public Health in the Soviet Union and served in that post from 1918 to 1930. 103 Oskar Vogt (1870-1959) was a neurologist, psychiatrist, and neurobiologist. He founded the Central Neurological Station (Neurologische Zentralstation) in 1898, renamed in 1902 to the Neurobiological Laboratory, and again in 1915 the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research. He also founded the Moscow Brain Research Institute for the study of Lenin's brain in 1925. Vogt retired in 1937 but continued to work at his private brain research institute in Neustadt/Schwarzwald. 104 Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos, 48-9. 105 For example, at a 1922 meeting of the two families - the precise reason for which cannot be ascertained - the two neurologists met, and Minor reported on the difficult conditions prevailing in the Soviet health system - the scarcity of newer medications, of bandages, and even of food for the sick in Moscow. Jacobsohn-Lask presented Minor with several neuroanatomical specimens at this meeting. SAdK Berlin, Berta Lask Collection, no. S 37. Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Liebe Berta,' letter, 18 February 1922. 106 Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos, 65. 107 Ibid., 66. 108 Ibid., 77-8. 109 Jacobsohn-Lask expressed his pleasure at the recognition his work received in Russia. He told his audience he had come in order to 'get to know the New Russia/ He said he was astonished at how his brain was able to take in all the new impressions; he had the impression that 'my brain is beginning to grow; the number of ganglion cells, especially in the cerebral cortex, is increasing ... to such an extent that if an outstanding brain researcher were to examine my brain at this moment, he would undoubtedly find characteristics that, according to the latest research, are typical of a genius' (Jacobsohn-Lask, *Vier Wochen'). 110 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Hermann Lask, letter to Jacobsohn-Lask, November 1927. 111 At a meeting of the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases on 17 February 1908, Vogt's lecture 'On Myeloarchitectonic Cortical Regions' was discussed. Vogt emphasized the agreement of his results with those of his colleague Korbinian Brodmann, at which Jacobsohn-Lask warned against overestimating the studies and politely commented that 'the power of suggestion cannot be completely ruled out.' Vogt responded angrily that Jacobsohn-Lask had repeatedly misunderstood him. In 1913 the rivals engaged in an argument lasting several weeks over the development of a microtome. Vogt claimed that he had developed the instrument;

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 453 Jacobsohn-Lask, after extensive research into the matter, attributed it to Strasser and Aschoff in collaboration with the company Sartorius. In response, Vogt dismissed Jacobsohn-Lask's method as outdated. Meeting reports of the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases, Neurologisches Centralblatt 5 (1908): 227; Neurologisches Centralblatt 12 (1913): 786; and Neurologisches Centralblatt 13 (1913): 864. In 1961 in an article on the Berlin Circle, Julius Hallervorden wrote: 'With pointed irony, O. Vogt and Max Bielshovsky dismissed remarks from Jacobsohn, who customarily held an opposing point of view.' Willibald Scholz, ed., 50 Jahre Neuropathologie in Deutschland 1884-1935 (Stuttgart, 1961), 109. 112 Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos, 53. 113 Ibid., 74-5. 114 Ibid., 79. 115 The German Academy of Sciences in Berlin asked Vogt for his assessment in 1957. A short time before, Berta Lask and her son Ludwig had proposed to the academy that a new edition of the atlas be published to coincide with Jacobsohn-Lask's hundredth birthday. Because the Academy of Sciences' medical elite still regarded Vogt, in spite of his advanced age, as the highest authority among German brain researchers, they were not willing to submit the work to other authorities, and the proposal for a new edition was rejected. Archive of the German Academy of Sciences, Berlin, Dr Mendel, academic advisor to the German Academy of Sciences's medical class, letter to 'Herrn Jacobsohn-Lask/ 15 July 1957.1 was not able to determine whether this Dr Mendel was a relative of Jacobsohn's teacher Emanuel Mendel. 116 Jacobsohn-Lask attributed the poor attendance of German scientists to the Christmas season and the harsh Russian winter. Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Vier Wochen/1. 117 Lewy had made contact with Russian colleagues through the Deutsch-russtsche medizinische Zeitschrift, and had published an article in the periodical's first issue. F.H. Lewy, 'Die gehirnpathologischen Grundlagen der Stoffwechselkrankheiten,' Deutsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift, no. 1 (1925): 20. 118 Personal contact between Jacobsohn-Lask and Minor intensified in the 1920s, and came to include their families. Berta Lask stayed with Minor during several of her visits to the Soviet Union; the Minor address served as a point of contact between Lask and her family in Berlin while she was travelling around the country. SAdK, Berta Lask Collection, no. S 40/1, Berta Lask, 'Liebe Kinder' and 'Lieber Louis' letters, 16 September 1925.

454 Ulrike EJsenberg 119 Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Die Kreuzung der Nervenbahnen und die bilaterale Symmetrie des tierischen Korpers/ Abhandlimgen aus der Neurologic, Psychiatria, Psychologic und ihren Grenzgebieten 26 (1924). The editor of this series was Karl Bonhoeffer, who at the time was professor at Berlin. 120 The main topics were in dinical neurology: syphilitic diseases, epilepsy, diseases of the vegetative nervous system, and exogenous nervous diseases. 121 Current genetic research has taken up this problem. Genes have recently been discovered that are common to invertebrates and humans. Detlev Arendt, Ulrich Technau, and Joachim Wittbrodt, 'Evolution of the bilaterian fbregut/ Nature 409 (2001): 81-5. 122 T. Kidd, et al., 'Roundabout controls axon crossing of the CNS midline and defines a novel subfamily of evolutionary conserved guidance receptors/ Cell 92, no. 2 (1998): 205-15. 123 In May 1924, Jacobsohn-Lask presented his theories to the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases. The only participant in the discussion was the neurologist Richard Henneberg, who expressed his disagreement with the choice of topic, asserting that only teleological explanations could be offered for the origin of the crossing phenomenon. Minutes of the 12 May 1924 meeting of the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases, Zentralblatt filr die gesamte Neuralogie und Psychiatric 38, nos. 3-4 (1924): 94-6, 124 Just as Soviet neurologists were more likely to discuss clinical topics, so neuroanatomy was an area of secondary importance among German neurologists in the 1920s. As Jacobsohn-Lask himself noted: 'At present, anatomical research in the area of the nervous system is not considered very important - at least not as important as it was some thirty years ago.' Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, T3ie Grundeinteilung des sekundaren Vorderhirns (Telencephalon) nach den Fortschritten der anatomischen Forschungen der letzten 60 Jahre,' Zeitschrift fur die gesamte Neurologic und Psychiatrie, 109 nos. 4/5 (1927): 793. 125 Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Vier Wochen/ 18. 126 Jacobsohn-Lask attended his memorial ceremony. He found it pompous and demeaning to the departed. Ibid., 24. 127 Ibid., 11-15. 128 Jacobsohn-Lask described Pavlov as a choleric man who would not tolerate criticism, and called the Pavlov 'cult' an 'obligatory fashion disease in Russia.' Ibid., 15. 129 Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Vier Wochen/ 24-5.

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 455 130 Krol' joined the society in 1925. In September 1929, at the society's nineteenth annual meeting in Wurzburg, he presented a paper on the pathology of spinal tumours. Lazar Minor and his son Victor Minor attended some of the society's meetings as well. 131 Jacobsohn-Lask, 'Die Grundeinteilung des sekundaren Vorderhirns/ 793-812. Jacobsohn-Lask delivered this address at the society banquet on 30 January 1927. 132 Minutes of the 14 February 1927 meeting of the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases, Zentralblatt fiir die gesamte Neurologic und Psychiatrie 47(1927): 245. 133 By this time, Krol' had become one of the Soviet Union's most important and successful neurologists. With his combination of scientific research activity and clinical work, he fulfilled the political requirements for the 'struggle for healthy nerves.' He considered his own work to be a part of the broader socialist health program, which he thought was already exerting a 'wholesome influence on the central nervous system.' Mikhail Krol', 'Die neurologische Forschung/ in 'Sowjet-Medizin/ insert in Berliner TageUatl, 6 December 1932,577.5,15. 134 Ww Was Who, 389. 135 M. Vladimirskii, Commissar of Health, introduction, 'Sowjet-Medizin/ insert in Berliner Tagesblatt, 6 December 1932,577.5,1. 136 'L.S. Minor 1884-1934,' Souetskaia nevropatoiogiia, psikhiatriia i psikhogigiena 3, nos. 2-3 (1934): 8. 137 Jacobsohn-Lask's personal file at the Friedrich Wilhelm University of Berlin contains no dismissal certificate, as specified, for example, by the Law for Reinstatement of Career Civil Service of 7 April 1933. It is possible that the official reason for his departure was his age: he turned seventy in 1933. 138 RTsKhlDNI/. 495, op. 205, d. 1415,I181-2. 139 He later wrote in his diary: 'Love of the homeland is the soul's deep rootedness in the soil and the people of a relatively small patch of our Earth. The younger the seedling that is planted in this patch of ground - the longer it has drawn nourishment from its soil and joy from the sunshine above it - the deeper and firmer the roots that hold it there/ JacobsohnLask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, Das Buch meiner Cedanken, 192939,29 [25 June 19391. 140 On 15 September 1935, the following laws were enacted: the 'Reichsbiirgergesetz' (Reich Citizens' Law), which deprived Jews of civil rights, and the 'Gesetz zum Schutz des deutschen Volkes und der deutechen Ehre' (Law for the Protection of the German People and German Honour),

456 Ulrike Eisenberg which prohibited marital and non-marital relations between Jews and 'citizens of German or racially related blood.' Dtv-Atlas zur WeStgeschichte, 2 (1970): 205. 141 Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, Das Zentralnervensystem tier Tiere und des Menschen. Dargestellt in photographischen Abbildungen, 1. Teil; DieNervenzelkn, dieNervenfasern und die Neuroglia. Die Sinnesorgane, IL Teil: Das Riickenmark (Berlin-Lichterfelde: 1934); and Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, Das Zeniralnervensystem der Tiere und des Menschen, Dargestellt in photographischen Abbildungen, III, Teil: Die Entwicklung des Gehirns und die Darstellung der ausseren Gestalt des Gehirns (Berlin-Lichterfelde, 1935). 142 Paul Schuster (1867-1940) was a prominent Berlin neurologist. He worked with Emanuel Mendel from 1893 to 1904 and was later director of the Department of Neurology at the Municipal Hufeland Hospital. Schuster emigrated to London in 1939. 143 BArch Berlin, file R 4901/2949, fol. 86, 92,172,197,205. 144 'Proceedings of the XVth International Physiological Congress, Leningrad-Moscow, August 9th to 16th, 1935,' Sechenov journal of Physiology of the USSR 21, no. 5-6 (1938): 597. 145 The reason for the absence is unclear. In Lazar Minor's case, his advanced age and the difficulty of the journey may have prevented him from attending. 146 Julius Schaxel (1887-1943) studied biology, philosophy, and psychology in Jena. He received a philosophy degree in Jena (Plate) in 1909 and studied marine zoology at the Naples Zoology Station in 1911. He was professor of general biology and zoology in Jena in 1916 and founder and director of the Institute of Experimental Biology in Jena in 1918. Schaxel was engaged in wide-ranging activities in popular science. Carola Tischler, Flucht in die Verfolgung. Deutsche Emigranten im sowjetischen Exil (Miinster, 1996), 77; Use Jahn, ed., Geschkhte der Biologic (Heidelberg and Berlin, 2000), 945. 147 BArch Berlin, file R 4901/2949, fol. 197. 148 Tischler, Flucht, 76-7, and Jahn, Geschkhte der Biologie, 945. 149 Konrad Senglaub, 'Neue Auseinandersetzungen mit dem Darwinismus,' in Jahn, Geschichte der Biologie, 559. 150 Jacobsohn-Lask states that an organism adapts to its environment by developing new parts - either symmetrically or asymmetrically. In the course of evolution, he adds, the body has developed from a round shape to an elongated shape in order to facilitate the search for food at the anterior end. Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, Die Kreuzungder Nervenbahnen (Berlin, 1924), 87,96. 151 About the influence of function on form.

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 457 152 'Proceedings of the XVth International Physiological Congress/ 590-91. 153 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to his son Hermann, 25 August 1935. 154 The Russian word for vacation house or summer house. 155 Vol'f Moiseevich Bronner (1876-1937) studied medicine in Tomsk and Berlin. As a student he took part in revolutionary student movements. He returned to Tomsk in 1902 and was in exile in Paris between 1906 and 1913, where he did research at the Institute Pasteur and studied at theSorbonne. He returned in 1913 and was arrested again. He did an internship at the Moscow University Clinic in 1915 and worked for Narkomzdrav from 1918 onward. Bronner founded the State Venereologkal Institute in Moscow in 1921, and served as professor of dermatological and venereal diseases in Moscow from 1931 to 1935. He was arrested in 1937 and allegedly died of a heart attack during interrogation. REE, vol. 1 (Moscow, 1994), 176. See also Tischler, Flucht. Two sources confirm Jacobsohn-Lask's appointment with Bronner: in a letter to his son Hermann (dated 25 August 1935, Jacobsohn-Lask Collection), Jacobsohn-Lask writes that he was to have an appointment on the following day at the Commissariat of Health, at which the terms of a possible move to the Soviet Union would be negotiated. His son Ludwig stated the same information in a resume dated 4 May 1937, now located in the Comintern Archive in Moscow (RTsKhlDNL /. 495, op. 205, d. 5748,;. 64). This file indicates that it was Bronner himself who delivered the invitation from a major Moscow hospital to head its neurological clinic, and who later conveyed the invitation from the Sechenov Institute in Sevastopol. 156 Tischler, Flucht, p. 67. For a thorough description of Agrojoint's work and how the organization came into being, see ibid., 65-70. 157 Communist medical collective. 158 Tischler, Flucht, 77. 159 Jacobsohn-Lask met Bronner at the end of August 1935; his visa arrived in December. Most of his colleagues who wanted to work in the Soviet Union had to wait at least six to nine months for their visas. Ibid., 67 and 76. 160 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to his son Hermann, 25 August 1935. 161 RTsKhlDNL/, 495, op. 205, d. 5748,164. 162 E.A. Nielsen (1872-1960) studied medicine at the Military Medical Academy in St Petersburg until 1896 and was at the Military Hospital in Warsaw from 1896 to 1913. He published papers on the nervous system and alcoholism. Nielsen was co-founder of the Institute of Physical Therapy in

458 Ulrike Eisenberg Sevastopol in 1913. He worked at various spas. He was professor of physiotherapeutic medicine at the University of Tashkent in 1931 and served as director of the Sechenov Institute in Sevastopol from 1934 to 1951. Nielsen worked primarily on therapy for diseases of the nervous system. Voprosy kurortologii (1965): 568-69, and Voprosy hirortologti (1973): 171-72. 163 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Evgenii Aleksandrovich Nielsen, postcard to Jacobsohn-Lask, 26 October 1935. 164 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to his son Hermann, 17 February 1936. 165 From a personal conversation with Jacobsohn-Lask's daughter-in-law, Mira Lask, 3 February 1996. 166 Georgievich Rakovskii (1873-1941), a Social Democrat from 1889, was first active in the Bulgarian workers' movement, then in the workers' movements in Switzerland, Germany, France, Romania, and Russia between 1890 and 1903. He took part in the Farmers' Revolt of 1907 and sympathized with Trotsky during the First World War. Rakovskii was a delegate to the Ukrainian Assembly of Commissariats from 1919 to 1923 and served as Soviet envoy to England between 1923 and 1925, and to France between 1925 and 1927. He was exiled to Siberia in 1928 because of his association with the Trotskyist opposition. Rakovskii was readmitted to the Communist Party in 1934. He served as Red Cross delegate to Tokyo. He was arrested in 1938 and died in prison in 1941. Who Was Who, 471. 167 RTsKhlDNI/. 495, op. 205, d. 5748, /. 64. 168 The International Red Aid was founded on the model of the Red Cross. It was a communist relief organization that aimed at social aid and at support of national minorities as well as political prisoners and their children. '70/20 lahre Rote Hilfe/ http://www.rote~hilfe.de [Accessed 10 January 2005], 169 Red Black Sea Sailor; P, Akulov, Tol'ko v nashey strane vysoko tsenyat nauku' [only in our country is science so highly valued], Krasnyi Chernomorets (Sevastopol), 28 June 1936. 170 Maiakkommuny [Community Lighthouse] (Sevastopol) no. 182,9 August 1936. 171 Grigorii Naumovich Kaminskii (1895-1938) was Commissar of Health from 1934 to 1937. He was arrested in 1937. Tischler, Flucht, 66. 172 RTsKMDNI,/. 495, op. 205, d. 5748. Comintern Archive, resume by Ludwig Lask, 4 May 1937. 173 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to Nielsen, 19 December 1936, and letters to Propper, 15 June and 20 September 1937.

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask iii Russia 459 174 Aleksei Chernyshev, 'Zur Frage der pathologischen Anatomie und der Leihmgsbahnen des Kleinhirns bei Hirnaffektionen/ Archivfur Psychiatric und Nervenknmkheiten 75 (1925): 300-54. The work cited here identifies him as assistant to the anatomical prosector of the Semashko Hospital in Moscow. He undoubtedly was also familiar with Jacobsohn-Lask's earlier works, which would have been of professional interest to him. Chernyshev was born in 1894. He worked as an assistant at the Neurosurgical Institute and then as director of the Brain Diagnostics Laboratory from 1917. From 1927, he was an associate at the Moscow Brain Research Institute under Oskar Vogt. Richter, Rasse, Elite, Pathos, 324. 175 Aleksei S. Chernyshev, L. Jakobsohn-Lask, 'Das Zentralnervensystem der Tiere und des Mensehen (Atlas, Darstellung in Photographien)/ in • Mikhail B. Krol', ed., Nevwpatologiia, psikhiatriia i psikhogigiena 11 (1936): 1902-3. 176 Besides Lavrent'ev, other recipients of the atlas were the Pavlov Brain Institute in Leningrad, Sarkisov at the Brain Research Institute in Moscow, Aleksandr Mikhailovich Grinstein in Kharkov, the Psychoneurological Institute in Odessa, Leonid Ivanovich Omorokov at the Clinic for Nervous Diseases in Kazan, Sakharchenko at the Institute of Nervous Diseases in Tashkent, M. Amosov at the Clinic for Nervous Diseases in Baku, and N.S. Tretiakov in Saratov, Louis Jacobsohn-L-ask, letter to Narkomzdrav, 15 June 1937, unpublished, 177 Sechenov Journal of Physiology of the USSR 21, nos. 5-6 (1938): 295-6. 178 The Biology Station in Sevastopol, together with the Zoology Station in Naples (founded in 1874), was one of the first and most famous biological research stations in the world that was not connected with a university. Heinz Penzlin, 'Die theoretische und institutionelle Situation in der Biologie an der Wende vom 19. Zum 20. Jahrundert/ in Jahn, Geschichte der Biologic, 437. 179 Recalling the city that was later destroyed by the Germans, Berta Lask wrote of Sevastopol in 1944: 'Famous scientific laboratories and resort facilities stood on the shore of the bay; visible from afar, the column-decorated white walls of the Academy of Science's Biology Station and the Sechenov Research Institute.' SAdK, Berta Lask Archive, file 62, Berta Lask, unpublished manuscript, May 1944. 180 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, unpublished report on his scientific activity in the Neurohistological Laboratory of the Sechenov Research Institute at Sevastopol in 1936. 181 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to Deputy Commissar Propper, 20 September 1937: 'Professor Lavrent'ev, who is inter-

460 Ulrike Eisenberg ested in my work, is of the opinion that my laboratory should be united with that of the Academy of Science because the connection is much stronger than with the Sechenov Institute, which serves essentially medical purposes. Such a union would undoubtedly be of great advantage to my work. Should this be possible, I would be very grateful. The union would also allow me to continue my work here in Sevastopol,' 182 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to Deputy Commissar Propper, 27 December 1937. 183 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Propper-Grashchenkov, letter to JacobsohnLask, 8 February 1938. 184 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to Ills daughter-in-law Mira, 25 February (no year; probably 1938 or 1939): 'Our relocation is still quite uncertain. The apartment problem seems to be the hurdle. Lef s hope that the political situation soon improves, and that we can remain here. I'll find no better place than here for preserving what little strength I still possess.' 185 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to PropperGrashchenkov, 31 July 1939: "But now the city has been declared a war zone. Foreigners and former foreigners are expelled daily.' 186 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to PropperGrashchenkov, 31 July 1939. In the lower margin of the letter are notes made by Propper-Grashchenkov dated 5 August 1939, apparently a brief protocol of a discussion about the matter at Narkomzdrav. In the note, Sarkisov points out that a one-bedroom apartment will have to be found. 187 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to Sarkisov at the Moscow Brain Research Institute, 3 January 1940. 188 Jacobsohn-Lask Collection, Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, letter to his daughterin-law Mira, 25 February (no year). 189 His last documented communications with Lazar Minor were in 1936. Ernst Lask, Jacobsohn-Lask's youngest son, developed a severe case of tuberculosis. He was living in Moscow at the time; Lazar and Victor Minor brought him to the First University Clinic and arranged for first-class medical treatment SAdK, Berta Lask Collection, no. S 67, Ludwig Lask, letter to his parents, 18 May 1936. In the following years, only the difficult contact with Victor Minor as translator is documented. Lazar Minor retired in 1932 at the age of seventy-seven and was succeeded by Mikhail Krol'. Minor died in Tashkent in 1942,1 have not yet discovered when and in what circumstances he left Moscow. 190 SAdK, Berta Lask Archive, file 62, Berta Lask, manuscript from May 1944, Sevastopol.

Neuroanatomist Jacobsohn-Lask in Russia 461 191 A, Chernyshev, 'L.I. lakobzon-Lask/ Nevropatoiogiia i psikhiatriia 9, no. 10 (1940): 95, 192 His sons Ludwig and Hermann were held for several years in Russian prison camps because of their association with German communists who had fallen out of favour with the authorities. jacobsohn-Lask describes in his diary the atmosphere of fear and distrust in the population, which he himself must have felt as well. Louis Jacobsohn-Lask, Das Btich meiner Gedaiiken, unpublished diary, 35. 193 While Wilrnanns clearly felt himself professionally superior to his Soviet colleagues, Jacobsohn-Lask never expressed such feelings. His work in Sevastopol was hindered by day-to-day inconveniences, and occasionally by what he felt was a lack of respect at the Sechenov Institute for his work. But neither his Soviet colleagues nor any authorities ever attempted to influence his choice of research topics - in contrast to Aschoff s experience.

11 Crossing Over: The Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians to the Soviet Union after 1933 CAROLA TISCHLER

Since the early 1990s there has been an outpouring of research on the forced emigration of Jewish professionals and scholars from Germany after 1933.1 In the literature on the 'unwanted/ studies of German-Jewish emigre physicians have occupied a prominent place.2 Some scholars have examined not only the fate of individual Jewish physicians but also the impact of their emigration on the specialties and institutions they left behind.3 Other scholars have tracked the flight of German physicians to such far-flung places as Britain, the United States, France, Sweden, Palestine, and also Egypt, Portugal, and Monaco,4 and explored how well they adapted to their new surroundings. For all the outpouring of literature, one small exile movement has yet to be investigated systematically - the departure of some sixty Jewish physicians from Germany to the Soviet Union between 1934 and 1937. In the main, the scant attention to the Soviet Union as a land of asylum was a function of the fact that for many years materials on foreign relations topics were highly classified. The declassification of some of these Soviet holdings, coupled with the increased accessibility of party archives since the early 1990s, has led to an enormous increase in historical knowledge of the Soviet Union under Stalin. Research on German exile has been facilitated during this time as well by the fact that Russia has acknowledged the existence of, and made available, files stolen by the Germans and returned to the Soviet Union by the Red Army after 1945. To be sure, some research on the German exile in the Soviet Union had already been published prior to the opening of the archives. However, this research focused solely on those exiles who were communists.5 In the 1930s the Soviet Union was a sanctuary for members of

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 463

the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) who had been persecuted in their homeland. In a report dated May 1936, the KPD estimated that 4,600 party members had fled to the USSR; this made the Soviet Union home to the largest colony of KPD exiles,6 The number of political emigres from all the German political parties was approximately 30,0007 Apart from KPD members, only a small percentage of German Jews considered the Soviet Union as a possible or desirable destination. Tsarist Russia was remembered as the land of pogroms. To the GermanJewish middle class, the Soviet worker and fanner's state did not seem a viable alternative to persecution in Germany. The language barrier certainly contributed to the diminished appeal of the Soviet Union as a destination for emigrants. Nonetheless, increasing restrictions in Germany kindled interest in the Soviet Union among Germany's Jews. The Soviets found it a challenge to categorize the German-Jewish exiles, According to the official Soviet definition, a political Emigre was someone who faced a long prison sentence or even a death sentence for activities on behalf of the revolutionary cause. Apart from those few German Jews who were sympathetic to communism, most did not support the overthrow of the capitalist order. This led the Soviet government to classify Germany's Jews as economic rather than political refugees. The implications of this for German Jews were profound: neither the Communist International nor the International Red Aid would assume responsibility for this group, as they had done for members of the KPD. Even so, the USSR did provide refuge to many German-Jewish individuals on a case-by-case basis. For example, it admitted a group of Jewish physicians,8 only a few of whom were affiliated with the KPD. In this respect, they differed in both background and education from the numerous skilled German workers who entered the Soviet Union seeking employment in the wake of the Great Depression.9 Marginalized and impoverished by the National Socialists and denied the opportunity to practise medicine in other Western European nations, these Jewish physicians obtained permission to live and work in the USSR, where their skills were desperately needed. This chapter focuses on this unique group of emigres. A close study of this small group speaks volumes about the Soviet system of the 1930s, its internal dynamics, and its relationship to the outside world. The chapter opens with a discussion of the work physicians did in the Soviet Union in the 1930s of how German exiles perceived the Soviet medical system. By the early 1930s the German press

464 Carola Tischler

was reporting heavily on the 'new' Soviet medicine; most of the information for these stories was furnished by German physicians who were sympathetic to the Bolshevik experiment.10 For the most part, the information accessible to German readers dealt with the principles of the new Soviet medicine, the structure of the health administration, and the delivery of services. There was little publicly available information on the day-to-day conditions in which Soviet physicians worked. German physicians who worked closely with Soviet physicians and who were in a position to observe Soviet medicine 'on the ground' produced reports for 'internal consumption' by the German Foreign Office and by the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Association for German Science), which underwrote many of the cooperative activities. Among the German physicians who reported regularly to these institutions were Oskar Vogt, Ludwig Aschoff, Karl Wilmanns, and Heinz Zeiss.11 The surprise registered by German emigr£ physicians at some aspects of the Soviet medical system they encountered when they arrived in Russia points not only to differences in the development of medicine in the two countries, but also the lacunae in the foreign coverage of Soviet health care policies and practices. Analysis of the bureaucratic procedures associated with the reception of German emigre physicians sheds light on the interplay of divergent interests within the Soviet administration. The Commissariat of Public Health of the RSFSR (Narkomzdrav), which was responsible for the supply of physicians, hoped to recruit medical personnel to areas of the country with a shortage of doctors; the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs (Narkomindel) was interested in controlling immigration through the allocation of visas; non-governmental actors such as the Obshchestvo zdravookhranenie evreev (Society for Jewish Health, or OZE) were interested in the welfare of Jews in the Soviet Union. Whether the complex procedures and Byzantine relations increased or decreased room for manoeuvre in the system is of no small interest. Finally, it has been customary to think of the Soviet system of the 1930s under Stalin as relatively immune to foreign pressure. This chapter suggests that the Soviet government was far from hermetically sealed. A number of Soviet institutions - notably Amerikanskaia evreiskaia ob'edinennaia agronomicheskaia korporatsiia 'Agrodzoint/ or Agrojoint - actually cooperated with foreign organizations active in the USSR. It must remain a matter of speculation whether Agrojoint was accorded special latitude because of the unique skills of the GermanJewish emigre physicians on whose behalf it worked, or whether it was believed that offering refuge to emigre's from fascist Germany would be

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 465 of propaganda benefit to the Soviet Union. Whatever the case, this chapter demonstrates that Agrojoint retained influence in Russia well into the 1930s, until collaboration with foreign entities disintegrated under Stalinism. The Position of Soviet Jews after the October Revolution Under the tsars, Russian Jews had been subject to numerous restrictions stemming from a deeply rooted anti-Semitism. These restrictions ranged from the curtailment of rights to violent pogroms.12 The stabilization of the Bolshevik regime in the early 1920s, with its attendant economic and political transformations, also had momentous consequences for Jewish survival. Because the majority of Jews lived in small towns and worked as shopkeepers, craftsmen, or small businesspeople, the abolition of private property undercut their basis for survival. In the first two decades after the revolution hundreds of thousands of Jews left the Soviet Union, emigrating first to Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, and Romania. Some of these Jewish refugees later continued on to Western Europe and the United States.13 Even after this wave of emigration had crested, 2.6 million Jews remained in the Soviet Union. About half of them were assigned to the legal category of lishentsy. This marginalized them: lishentsy could not vote and were subject to many additional restrictions, which were passed on to their children.14 In 1929 nearly 39 per cent of Soviet Jews were still classified as lishentsy}5 There were two possible paths for 'declassed' Soviet Jews to integrate themselves into society: agricultural settlement, and later, following the onset of industrialization, employment in industry.16 The movement for agricultural settlement was quite extensive. In 1924, Komitet po zemel'nomu ustroistvu trudiashchikhsia evreev (the Committee on the Settlement of Jewish Toilers on the Land, or Komzet), was founded- In the 1920s this government committee - which worked in close cooperation with the non-governmental organization Vsesoiuznoe obshchestvo zemel'nogo ustroistva trudiashchikhsia evreev (Ozet), founded one year later - promoted the settlement of Jews in Ukraine and Crimea. Settlements were also established in Belorussia (present-day Belarus), often on the grounds of abandoned estates. The settlement movement received support from numerous foreign organizations. These targeted settlement regions were not extensive enough to accommodate large-scale agricultural resettlement. To complicate matters further, the ongoing debate on the nationality question in the Soviet

466 Carola Tischler

Union touched on, among other things, the issue of a national territory for the Jews. Two proposed locations for a Jewish national territory were mooted in the mid-1920s: Crimea, whose interior was only thinly settled following the expulsion of the Turkish Tatars by the Russians at the end of the nineteenth century, and Birobidzhan, a far Eastern region near the Chinese border. In the end, the Birobidzhan option won out. In April 1928, several hundred settlers arrived in Birobidzhan; however, the harsh conditions of the uncultivated territory compelled nearly half the new settlers to depart within a few months. Despite these setbacks, Birobidzhan was decreed a Jewish national territory in 1930, and in May 1934 it was declared a Jewish autonomous region.17 Several factors had played a role in tilting the government's decision towards Birobidzhan. An autonomous territory for Jews, besides offering marginalized Jews with an opportunity for integration would provide an ideological alternative to Zionism, which was vehemently opposed by the Soviets. Last but not least, the Soviet government hoped to fortify the border region - a goal that assumed increased importance after Japan occupied Manchuria in 1931 and 1932. The industrialization that commenced in the late 1920s in the Soviet Union understandably made Soviet Jews less interested in agricultural resettlement. Because of its remote location and difficult conditions, Birobidzhan became less and less appealing. Even though the number of settlers returning from Birobidzhan was declining, in 1930 the rate of returning settlers was still 23 per cent. Given the critical shortage of workers, especially in construction, a decision was made to recruit foreign labour to Birobidzhan. The foreign organizations that had supported other Soviet settlement projects from the beginning of the 1920s also became involved in the Birobidzhan project, while maintaining a largely neutral stance towards it. At the same time, in many countries new Jewish Communist organizations similar to Ozet were founded to support the resettlement project. These included Ikor (Idishe kolonizatsye organizatsye [Association for Jewish Colonization in the Soviet Union]) in the United States; Prokor (Argentinskoye obshchestvo sodeisrviia evreiskoi kolonizatsii v Birobidzhane [Argentinian Society for the Promotion of Jewish Colonization]) in Argentina; and in Germany, Geserd (Gesellschaft zur Forderung des Judischen Siedlungswerkes in der UdSSR [German Society for the Advancement of Jewish Settlement Work in the USSR]). These organizations gave their wholehearted approval to the project and helped Ozet settle Jews who were willing to immigrate to Birobidzhan. In 1932, Geserd helped a group of nearly sixty individuals to leave Germany for the Far East, A second

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 467

group was to follow, but Geserd was disbanded and destroyed immediately after the National Socialists came to power, which effectively eliminated this path to immigration.18 Ozet was the Soviet international organization charged with maintaining contacts with foreign organizations affiliated with the Communist Party. For its part, Komzet was supposed to maintain links with foreign Jewish organizations active in the Soviet Union under governmental agreements. There were three such societies: Agrojoint, EKO (Evreiskoe kolonizatsionnoe obshchestvo [Jewish Colonization Society]), and ORT (Soiuz obshchestv remeslennogo, zemledel'cheskogo i industriarnogo truda sredi evreev [Jewish Union of Artisan, Agricultural, and Industrial Labour]). Each of these organizations had a branch office in Moscow where a delegate and staff maintained contact with the home office. All three supported the various Jewish settlement projects in the USSR in a variety of ways. After the USSR was founded in 1922, EKO concluded its first agreement with the Soviet government in February 1923.19 In its first years, EKO focused on supporting the establishment of technical and agricultural schools. Also, it helped establish a network of credit cooperatives in the Jewish settlement regions in Ukraine, Belorussia, and Russia. By the time these credit cooperatives were disbanded in 1930, they had more than 100,000 members. A1926 agreement also permitted EKO to involve itself in agricultural resettlement. EKO does not seem to have been involved in German Jewish immigration after 1933. By this point, ORT, founded in Russia in 1880 with the goal of training Russian Jews in the trades and agriculture through a network of vocational schools, was well established. The legal basis for its activities was an agreement endorsed by the Soviet government in March 1926 between ORT and the People's Commissariat for Foreign Trade. During its first two years, ORT focused on supporting agricultural projects. After 1928 it shifted its focus to the promotion of industrial and technological projects; it offered assistance with the transportation and assembly of equipment acquired abroad and the training of local workforces. The world headquarters of ORT was established in Berlin in 1921. This may explain why Moscow's ORT delegate, la.S. Tsegel'nitskii, repeatedly seized the initiative to provide refuge to German Jews in the Soviet Union after Hitler seized power. Whatever the case, in October 1933, Tsegel'nitskii wrote once again to Komzet on behalf of ORT. As Agrojoint would do later, he emphasized that the admission of highly qualified German specialists would be of economic benefit to

468 Carola Tischler

the Soviet Union. German Jews could fill a pressing need for three categories of workers: (1) specialists in light industry, especially in the lumber, textile, and metal industries, but also in the chemical industry; (2) engineers and technicians with extensive experience in heavy industries; and (3) specialists employable in agriculture, such as electrical engineers and hydro-engineers. Some physicians were also needed. The costs would be covered partly by foreign Jewish organizations and partly by the specialists themselves.21 Significantly, in Tsegel'nitskii's appeal, the political payoffs of accepting German Jewish refugees - an improvement of the Soviet image abroad, support for the battle against fascism, and a weakening of the Zionist movement were assigned far less weight. Because neither Komzet nor Ozet had the authority to act on ORT's petition, the letter was passed on to the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs (Narkomindel). Komzet was enjoined to reply to ORT that decisions about permission to immigrate could be made only on an individual basis. Narkomindel's delegate for Western Europe, David Stern, confidentially informed B.I. Trotskii, Komzet's deputy chair, that the government was concerned that a general settlement agreement might result in anti-communist propaganda. However, if the applicant already had a work contract with a Soviet institution, Narkomindel would generally be willing to issue a visa.22 This response to ORT's petition by the division of Narkomindel in charge of Western Europe reflected the Soviet government's disinclination to open its doors to larger groups of German Jews. In late 1933 the Jewish press in the United States reported that Petr Germogenovich Smidovich, the head of Komzet, had declared that the Soviet Union had issued an invitation to German Jews to help build the Jewish socialist republic in Birobidzhan.23 This report greatly interested the Jewish public. Six months later the communist press felt compelled to qualify its report. The disclaimer appeared in the Rundschau: The Soviet Union has expressed its willingness to accept Jewish emigres from the very start. Not, however, to fulfill the wishes of Jewish nationalists and not to satisfy a philanthropic point of view, but only in accordance with the conditions and requirements of the Soviet power, whose strength and protection is the best insurance, the best future security also for the masses of Jewish workers abroad. Of course the Soviet Union may only accept immigrants as its circumstances permit. It may not, as the Zionists do, lure immigrants into precarious conditions, but rather may only accept immigrants when it can provide them with food and lodg-

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 469 ings, with work and the satisfaction of basic cultural needs ... The immigration of qualified foreign Jewish workers to Birobidzhan - and qualified they must be for this region - has not yet begun this year.24

A ban on foreign immigration was issued in autumn 1932 because of the harsh living conditions in Birobidzhan. It was not until April 1935 that the TsK VKP(b) (Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party/Bolsheviks) gave Komzet permission to recruit one thousand families and five hundred individuals from abroad for 1936. Komzet passed the guidelines on to Ozet. However, the Central Committee's authorization still did now allow Ozet to begin recruitment, and the required invitation from the Birobidzhan authorities was not forthcoming until the following year. According to telegraphed instructions dated April 1936, space was initially guaranteed for 245 families and 325 individuals.25 But this quota did little to alter the immigration status of German Jews. The Soviet authorities were mainly interested in Jews from the former Russian border states, believing that they would adjust more easily to the harsh conditions.26 ORT had thus failed to provide German Jews with a refuge in the Soviet Union. Only one organization, Agrojoint, achieved limited success in this regard. Agrojoint and the Emigration of Physicians Agrojoint began its activities in Russia in the early 1920s, with efforts to help combat the famine that had followed the Russian Civil War. In 1921, alongside the American Relief Administration (ARA), a JewishAmerican organization called the Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) was actively engaged in famine relief. In July 1924 the JDC founded Agrojoint as an independent division to provide assistance to Soviet Jews.27 Joseph A. Rosen, Agrojoint's first director, was born in Moscow in 1876 and had studied agriculture in Russia and Germany. After spending some time in Siberian exile for his socialist activities, Rosen immigrated to the United States in 1903. He brought two strengths to his directorship: he was a successful agronomist, and he possessed the necessary knowledge of the language and the country. He would remain director of Agrojoint until it was disbanded in the Soviet Union in 1938. Rosen died in New York in 1949.28 Agrojoint had several point people in Russia: S.E. Liubarskii worked in the Moscow Department of Agriculture; LA. Groer worked in the Department of Industry; M.J. Ratner headed the Department of Finance;

470 Carola Tischler

and several other staff worked in subordinate positions. Besides its Moscow central office, Agrojoint maintained regional branches in Kherson, Krivoi Rog, and Simferopol'. Until 1928, financial support for Agrojoint's work was provided solely by the JDC. Between 1928 and 1935, Agrojoint's activities were also supported by a private foundation, the American Society for Jewish Farm Settlement in Russia (AMSOJEFS). Its president, James N. Rosenberg, collected $8 million for Jewish colonization activities, $5 million of which was donated by Julius Rosenwald. Between 1924 and 1937 the JDC provided $16 million for projects in the Soviet Union; a large part of this amount was in the form of a loan. Roughly half the 250,000 Jews who resettled in the Crimea and in Ukraine before 1935 received direct support from Agrojoint, which sponsored the building of houses, donated tractors, pumps, reapers, and other agricultural equipment, and supported vocational schools and credit cooperatives. Agrojoint was also involved in health care. Since the state health care system did not cover the Itshentsy, a network of medical aid societies was established in the Jewish settlement regions.29 In a 1934 report, Rosen described Agrojoint's work in the medical field: The declassed population, the category to which practically 70 percent of the Russian Jews belonged at that time - among whom, in addition to the 'normal' extent of common sickness, specific troubles, such as favus, tuberculosis, trachoma etc. were widely spread - could get no attention whatever. With the direct and active participation of the Agrojoint, Medical Aid Societies were organized in 54 towns and cities of Ukraine and Belorussia with a predominantly Jewish population. We helped them to open ambulatory hospitals and summer camps for children; we imported equipment and medical supplies and organized various enterprises and shops in conjunction with the Mutual Aid Societies in order to provide them with regular incomes. We invested altogether close to a million dollars in this work and thereby helped to render much-needed medical assistance in millions of cases.30

In performing these services, Agrojoint managed to acquire experience in providing health care. When the legal category of lishentsy was abolished, this medical aid network was absorbed by the state health care system. Rosen was aware of the severe shortage of physicians in the Soviet Union. His knowledge and personal contacts (his brother-in-law was Grigorii N.Kaminskii, the People's Commissar of Public Health)31 may

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 471

have been what tipped the scales in favour of what was to become the only successful Soviet project on behalf of German-Jewish physicians. In April 1934, Rosen informed Bernhard Kahn, head of the Agrojoint bureau in Paris, that the Commissariat of Public Health (Narkomzdrav) was prepared to invite two hundred German physicians to enter the Soviet Union in groups of ten to fifteen,32 According to the agreement, the OZE (or OSE), a Jewish physicians' aid society founded in Germany in the 1920s and now located in Paris, would act as gobetween for the applicants.33 A multistage and quite cumbersome process was laid down. The OZE collected the application documents from each candidate; these included a curriculum vitae, references, diplomas, and a declaration that the candidate had agreed to work without salary paid in hard currency. The documents were then sent to Agrojoint in Moscow, which forwarded the papers to Narkomzdrav. The department responsible for evaluating the applications was the Obshchesoiuznoe biuro zagrankhnoi sanitarnoi informatsii (All-Union Bureau of Foreign Sanitary Information) headed by Vol'f Moiseevich Bronner.34 Bronner was in charge of selecting from among the candidates those physicians who met Soviet requirements. The application files and Narkomzdrav's assessment were then forwarded by Agrojoint to the visa division of the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs. The opportunities for immigration were well publicized. A variety of Jewish refugee aid organizations disseminated information about the Soviet immigration project to German-Jewish physicians. Most of the applicants had already left Germany for France, Belgium, Luxemburg, Italy, and England but had failed to obtain a permit to continue practising medicine in the new country of residence. In May 1934, before the official channels of application had solidified, the OZE sent three physicians to Moscow unofficially via Intourist. The ostensible reason for this strategy was that these three doctors were living in particularly difficult conditions in Germany. Rosen, who was visiting Paris at the time, had approved of the plan. Fritz Rosenthal and Walter Domke arrived in Moscow on 14 May 1934; Adolf Boss arrived two weeks later. The three physicians were supposed to find work before their tourist visas expired, but only two succeeded. Domke obtained a post at the Moscow Institute of Hygiene, and Boss was offered a position at the Clinic for Skin and Venereal Diseases, headed by Bronner himself. Rosenthal failed to obtain a work permit and continued on to China with a letter of recommendation to the Jewish community of Harbin.35 Subsequently, Agrojoint instructed OZE to follow official channels,

472 Carola Tischler

which proved to be extremely time consuming. In early June of 1934, OZE sent the applications of nineteen physicians to Moscow, The next three physicians were not given permission to leave for Moscow until December 1934. Two more groups of three physicians each departed in January and March 1935. By this time, Narkomzdrav had rented a house to Agrojoint in Malakhovka, a dacha town located nearly an hour from Moscow, where the incoming physicians would be provided with room and board upon arrival. The house had space for ten to fifteen people. During their permitted stay of two months, the new arrivals were to find work. If a physician could not make satisfactory work arrangements within this time frame, he would be required to leave the Soviet Union. All arrivals were thus expected to have sufficient funds for a return trip as well as a return visa. The OZE was instructed to encourage the physicians to study Russian while waiting for their applications to be approved. The lessons could be continued later in Malakhovka. Once permission to enter was granted, the physicians were instructed to bring sufficient warm clothing, household goods, and bedding. They were also advised to obtain hard currency so that they could purchase necessities from the Torgsin shops.36 Unlike the foreign specialists recruited during the first Five Year Plan/7 the new emigres were to be paid in rubles. The emigre physicians were to report to the local health authorities, not to Agrojoint, and were to have the same rights as Soviet physicians. Most would be employed in rural areas, although approval was granted to assign a few physicians to Moscow and other large cities. The plan also called for a careful selection prior to approval for immigration. Once the emigre physician had found employment, Agrojoint would begin the process of obtaining permission for the family to immigrate. Obtaining a visa once these requirements were met was generally unproblematic.38 It is not clear how many physicians were actually able to enter the Soviet Union under this agreement. The numbers may have been exaggerated slightly in a few instances to highlight Agrojoint's success. The total number of family members who were able to immigrate is even more difficult to determine, since the documents refer by name to only a fraction of those who entered. We know that the wives and children of the emigre physicians obtained permission to follow without difficulty. (Only a small number of the physicians were women.) In a few instances the physician's parents were also permitted to join the family in the Soviet Union. According to a list dated between mid and late 1937, a total of fifty-eight physicians entered the Soviet Union. Thirty had immigrated before January 1936; another twenty-four had been

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 473

granted permission to enter the Soviet Union by July of that year. The last four physicians arrived in Moscow between January and April 1937.39 This list is the most likely to be accurate. Of the fifty-eight physicians cited by name, eleven later left the Soviet Union. (Two departed in December 1935, one in February 1936, and one in December 1936, the remainder between February and July 1937.) As the list shows, the actual results fell short of the original agreement between Agrojoint and Narkomzdrav, The number of physicians admitted by the Soviet Union was significantly lower than planned, and most of the physicians arrived alone rather than in groups. The majority of physicians for whom ages were registered were between thirty and forty years old. Most were general practitioners and internists, although a few specialists, including radiologists, venereal disease experts, dentists, and psychiatrists, were also admitted. The Physicians at Work Besides Domke and Boss, the two doctors mentioned above, other physicians who initially remained in Moscow included Erich Sternberg (Gannuskina Neuropsychiatric Institute), Siegfried Gilde (Institute of Nutrition), John Levin (Neuroprophylactic Institute), Jenny CohenPhilipps (Red Cross Dental Clinic), Eduard Wolf (Lesgaft Polydinic), and Alfred Korach (an organizer of industrial hygiene and social welfare institutions). Max Hautemann obtained a position in the Khimki clinic near Moscow, Lajos Szekely and Edith Szekely-Sussmanovich, a married couple, were hired by a Leningrad bacteriological institute. As envisioned in the original plan, most of the remaining physicians were employed in the Jewish settlement regions in Crimea and Ukraine. A few of the physicians asked to be sent to the Volga German Republic, where they hoped to encounter fewer language difficulties. This latter group included Margot Benjamin, Theodor and Edith Auerbach, and Ernst Ascher, who had entered the Soviet Union under the aegis of the Rote Hilfe (International Red Help, founded in 1921 in Germany) before being taken on by Agrojoint. Benjamin arrived in December 1934, Theodor and Edith Auerbach in April 1935, and Ascher in 1935. A series of letters written to the staff of the Moscow Agrojoint office indicate the living and working conditions that faced the physicians in the provinces. The subjects of the letters varied. Many were letters of appreciation to Agrojoint for its support during the initial stay in Moscow. These letters typically included an initial report on the working

474 CarolaTischler conditions in the new place of employment. Some letters dealt with the repayment of expenses incurred by Agrojoint. Other letters addressed the shipment of medical or personal supplies or the arrival of family members. The letters survived because copies were made for the New York Joint Distribution Committee, for Narkomzdrav, and for the KPD leadership in Moscow.40 Little is known about how copies were distributed. It is most likely that the wishes of the local health authorities, the Ail-Union Bureau of the Foreign Sanitary Information, and the physicians themselves were all taken into account. Because they were intended only for internal use, many of the letters offer an especially revealing glimpse of the daily lives of the emigres. It is noteworthy how little the letter writers had to say about the society in which they worked - a society in the throes of political upheaval. Walter Finke arrived in Moscow on 9 January 1935 before being transferred to Novo-Zlatopol' in Ukraine. His letter is dated 1 March 1935: Dear friends, Now that I have worked one month in the Jewish settlement, I would like to give you and anyone who might be interested a brief report. Above all a great deal of flexibility is required to acclimate to the countryside. But with the proper attitude and a willingness to do without urban amenities, this country offers unparalleled opportunities to work. For example, in a local raion [area] of a few thousand families, I am establishing a pediatric practice, something that is very necessary and satisfying as it is greeted with great appreciation and good will on the part of the authorities. Of course I must provide other services along with my colleagues, including managing a small fifteen-bed hospital, an outpatient clinic with approximately 30-50 patients a day, and so on; it's a great deal of work, but not as exhausting as in the city. You can judge how much I enjoy my work by the fact that I turned down a job offer from a medical institute in the city. The material compensations are: 500 rubles a month, Vi a cow, 1 pig, a vegetable garden, free lodging, permission to eat and purchase in the canteen, etc. Even more important than material security (which is rather lacking in comforts) is the friendly reception that I have encountered here. Especially for our sort [i.e., /ews], who are tolerated at best but not permitted to work in other countries, it is immensely gratifying to be appreciated as a physician, and this alone should suffice for my colleagues to join me here. In any case, I ask you to tell any of my colleagues who are considering coming here that [I] am happy and content.41

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 475 Wilhelm Mainzer, a graduate of Frankfurt University, found employment not far from Walter Finke. After fleeing to Amsterdam in 1933, he had arrived in the Soviet Union in late June 1935, On 1 August 1935, he wrote to Agrojoint from Ratendorf: I have been director of the Ratendorf clinic for 14 days. My area includes 6 Jewish and 1 German village, and 1 Ukrainian sovkhoz [Soviet state farm]. I provide medical care to a total of 2000 persons. One akouscherka (midwife) and one sanitarka work with me. There is also a coachman who cares for the horse and wagon and the clinic property. In addition to six hours of work in my capacity as a physician, I also have sanitation tasks: I visit the brigades at the harvest campaign on the steppe, monitor the health condition and hygiene of the iaslis [nurseries], carry out prophylactic immunizations, etc. I also manage the pharmacy. I am comfortable materially. I receive 1V$ stipends, a total of 500 rubles per month. The kolkhozniki [collective farmers] literally wait on me hand and foot. A house is being built just for me. I have been given a cow, a garden of Vi hectare, food, and delivery expenses for furniture that I have acquired. Now we are building a small maternity ward that I designed and will also head. There is also electricity and the train station is only 15 kilometres away. One of my colleagues, Finke, who works 20 kilometres from here, is also sai agreeable support. Of course many things are still primitive, but I can see daily how conditions are improving, and when something needs to be said or when something isn't working properly, then I can turn to the raion newspaper. I think that I will settle in very well here.42 Walter Friedlander arrived in Moscow in March 1936. A graduate of Freiburg University, he had worked as a physician in Berlin from 1926 to 1932. In 1936 he was sent to Magnitogorsk, the showcase industrial city constructed from scratch as part of the first Five Year Plan. By 1932, the city had more than one-quarter of a million inhabitants, many of whom were peasants who had been dispossessed during the dekulakization and collectivization.43 Friedlander wrote from Magnitogorsk

on 26 May 1936:

Please forgive me that I have not yet written to report my first independent steps in the Soviet Union. Agrojoint spoiled us immensely in Moscow, which made independence in the first days rather difficult. Now that we have adjusted a bit and our work has begun, we've overcome our initial anxieties. Everything went smoothly and according to plan. After a

476 Carola Tischler very pleasant journey, we were greeted at the train station by Mr. Prochorowitsch himself, along with three other leading officials and a German physician who has lived here for three years. We took great comfort in this honourable reception and were able to quickly console ourselves about the hotel room, which in its details and overall left a great deal to be desired. We were given one day to rest, and on the second day 1 was introduced to the glavn. much [chief of staff] of the hospital. He assigned me to the department of internal medicine, where 1 am in charge of a station along with another physician. It is very distressing to have to admit that here, in a place where physicians are so sorely needed, the language barrier still makes it difficult for me to accomplish everything that must be done. Language is a crucial prerequisite for this work, particularly in interactions with patients, etc., and I can hardly emphasize enough how important it is to study Russian intensively while still in Moscow, My language skills are sorely lacking and now I must focus all my energy at work and during my leisure hours on the language. If s a good thing that my ability to communicate with my colleagues is so poor that I am constantly forced to try to express myself in Russian somehow. But, as I said, it gives me a somewhat guilty conscience that the state is paying me a salary for language studies. Once I can speak reasonably well, there will be more work for me to do here than is physically possible, for the shortage is incredible. My wife has already found work in the orchestra of the local movie theatre, and she has the prospect of giving instruction in the music school. She has adjusted very well and is especially satisfied with her work, which is a much different situation than it was in Germany.44

Max Giinther, who was born in Wesel-Rees in the Ruhr, arrived in the Soviet Union with his wife and his daughter, Ruth, in May 1936. He was assigned to Kuibyshev, a town that was founded in the sixteenth century on the banks of the Volga and called Samara until it was renamed in 1935 in honour of the Communist leader V.V. Kuibyshev. On 15 November 1936, Giinther wrote to the head of Agrojoint: We actually did end up moving into our little house on the 25th of Oct. and live here quite 'kulturno' [in a cultured way]. Even though we only have the third room until further notice, I hope that we will be able to keep it because the accommodations, though almost princely for one person, are too small for two. It is not yet completely finished. We will not have water for another 8-14 days, although that is not terribly bother-

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 477 some. We have been sent an excellent 'dom rabotniza' [housekeeper], who also does some rounds in the clinic. Ruth is attending an excellent kindergarten, and plays in the clinic's courtyards, where there is much to see and hear because of the new construction. In the summer a garden will be set aside for us and the exterior of the house will be renovated. Materially we will manage well, even now we won't have to spend all our income right away, and when we both know the language better we will be able to earn quite a bit more. We live without having to restrict ourselves in any way, and eat better than in Germany, Our belongings arrived in perfect condition apart from a few scratched corners on our furniture that can be repaired. We can listen to radio from around the world and we are pleased that our belongings have arrived and we have been able to furnish to our own taste. We thank you again for all of the help you have given us with this. The work in the clinic is not easy since there are hardly any trained physicians, but the collective is good and I think that 1 will be able to assert myself and prevail. All modern remedies are available to me and 1 am able to manage the language in the daily work even with mentally ill patients. I am very involved in training young physicians and believe that my training will be extremely useful for them in spite of my language deficiencies.43

These and other letters, written in 1935 and 1936, document a striking similarity of experience in spite of the differences in personality of their authors. The work was generally perceived as very satisfying from the start. After a certain period of adjustment to the conditions and the language, many physicians took on a second job - a common practice among their Soviet colleagues as well. Most of the physicians had high-level positions, and the majority of the wives were able to find employment appropriate to their training without undue difficulty. Many of the wives worked at their husbands' clinic. Elli Hass, for example, worked in Voronezh as a bookkeeper. Paul Scheuer's wife worked in Crimea as a lab assistant. Irina Sussmanovkh first worked in Crimea as a fel'dsher [paramedic]. When her husband, Ernst Sussmanovich, accepted a new position in Kurman, she became the editor and proofreader of the German section of the local newspaper. Some wives found work in other fields. Klara Heymann was employed as a language teacher in Yalta. In Moscow, Kathe Korach worked as a nursery school teacher, while Josephine Boss worked as a designer in the House of Fashion. They all described their salaries as satisfactory. This stood in contrast to the housing situation. The emigres com-

478 Carola Tischler

plained often that they were being housed in provisional accommodations for longer than had been expected. From time to time the Moscow Agrojoint office was able to exert pressure to obtain the promised housing from the local authorities. The housing in the settlement regions was generally more spacious than in the cities. However, the greatest variations among the emigres related to their acclimatization and their social contacts. The ease of 'settling in' depended on the personality of the individual, on the surroundings, and on the length of time the emigres had to wait for their families to join them in the Soviet Union. In a few instances the physicians attempted to recruit colleagues from the holding station in Malakhovka to their own location, or to maintain written contact with their new contemporaries in exile. In May 1936, Agrojoint asked the regional health departments that had German physicians on staff to prepare reports about their work. The responses were favourable, and most of the health departments requested that additional physicians be sent.46 The Crimean health department sent the most detailed report. Eleven Germans had been working in the administrative region since 1935. The report emphasized that the German physicians' work had often improved the image of the clinics to which they were attached. A number of physicians had been awarded prizes, such as a stay in a rest home, for their excellent work. The report concluded: 'The Ministry of Health has determined that the selection of medical specialists working in Crimea was good. We would be happy to welcome additional emigre physicians to Crimea.'47 However, a few criticisms were raised, although the collective noted that these issues had largely ceased to be problems: 'a) At the start of their work, a few physicians did not display sufficient respect and love for the medical institution for which they worked. As a result the condition of the institution declined after the arrival of the German specialists, b) Some of the physicians were observed to display arrogance toward the Russian language, Russian medicines, and even toward the patients, c) At the start of their work in the countryside, a few of the physicians began to introduce the system of private practice.'48 This last point reflects the unfamiliarity of German physicians with the Soviet system of state medicine. All physicians in the Soviet Union worked in hospitals or clinics. The workday was normally six hours, which made it possible for physicians to take on one and a half or even two full-time posts. Private practice was permitted in the Soviet Union but was so highly taxed that it was not lucrative.49

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 479

As the first two points suggest, adjustment to the new conditions did not always go as smoothly as the letters would imply. Formulations such as 'initial anxieties' and 'we ... live here quite "kulturno"' hinted at the enormous gap that existed between a modem German hospital and a clinic in a poor region in the south of Russia. In contrast to the German communist workers, the Jewish physicians who arrived in Russia came largely from the middle class. Their culture shock was partially reduced by the preparatory efforts of the Agrojoint staff in Moscow. Adjustment was somewhat easier for those German physicians who had come to the Soviet Union from exile in a third country, since these emigres were especially appreciative of the opportunity to resume the practice of medicine. Yet even these physicians faced a significant adjustment to local standards of medical equipment. Clearly, the German emigre physicians did not always hide their concerns from the local Soviet authorities. In a meeting held by the Crimean Department of Health with local physicians in July 1936, many doctors complained about the lack of medications and medical instruments, especially functional microscopes and X-ray machines.50 From the mid-1920s on, German physicians visiting Russia had noted some of these primitive conditions, but their reports were 'for internal circulation.'51 To be sure, the reports in German journals published by Soviet spokespeople for the new Soviet medicine were laudatory. What is intriguing is the positive tone of the reports published in those same journals by German physicians who attended Soviet medical conferences: those reports highlighted the social ethos of Soviet medicine, the great advances in patient access to care, and the design of the polyclinics, which broke down specialization.52 Agrojoint and the KPD Agrojoint had asked the local authorities to report on the emigres' work because of the delays in assigning physicians that began in spring 1936. The numbers of German physicians who hoped to immigrate to the Soviet Union now exceeded the quota approved by Narkomzdrav. In addition, bottlenecks were beginning to develop between Narkomzdrav's approval of applications and Narkomindel's issuing of visas. In December 1935, OZE began to urge Moscow to speed up the processing of applications that had been approved, for some physicians already faced waiting periods of eight or nine months, which threatened to exhaust their financial reserves.53 In May 1936, OZE noted once again -

480 Carols Tischler

this time in a letter to the Paris Agrojoint office - that 'we have been waiting for months for the arrival of visas for a number of physicians, dentists and pharmacists. According to a letter from Agrojoint dated April of this year, their papers are in order and were given to Narkomzdrav quite some time ago. The circumstances of a number of candidates are quite desperate, one shot himself more than a month ago after exhausting all means of survival.'54 A decision was then made to send another physician to Moscow on an Intourist visa. Again, the 'unofficial' emigre managed to find employment shortly upon arrival. Astonished by this turn of events, OZE asked Bernhard Kahn why Agrojoint had categorically rejected the unofficial channel, which had once again proved to be the quickest route to success.55 Of course, neither the Paris nor the Moscow Agrojoint office was to blame for these delays. A list of applicants approved by Narkomzdrav had been languishing in the visa division since May 1936. As Narkornindel informed Agrojoint, such a mass immigration of Jewish physicians would have to be approved at the governmental level. However, given that the list contained a total of only seventeen names, the term 'mass immigration' was clearly an exaggeration. Rosen then wrote a long letter to Kaminskii reporting on the work that had already been accomplished and describing future plans; to this he attached copies of favourable testimonials and administrative requests for additional physicians. He concluded by urging the commissar to lobby the government to continue the project.56 As yet another solution to the visa difficulties, Agrojoint also proposed obtaining letters of recommendation from German communists who lived in Moscow. 'Before we apply to Narkomindel for entry permission for the lists I mentioned/ Groer wrote to Julius Schaxel in April 1936, 'it would be useful to know if the candidates are politically suited to the USSR. Your evaluation, and the evaluation of the others whose priority is the interests of the USSR, could be of great assistance in solving this problem, since only worthy applicants will remain on the visa application list.'57 Schaxel had lived in Moscow since 1935.58 He and his colleagues, whom Agrojoint hoped could help with the visa difficulties, were members of the Moscow Communist Physicians' Collective. The collective was governed by a five-member board of directors that included Leo Friedlander and Herbert Pelz and had Lothar Wolf as its chairman, In the summer of 1934, Fritz Heckert had asked Wolf to assemble and organize the German KPD physicians living in Moscow. A party mem-

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 481

her since 1922 and long active in KFD social policy organizations in Berlin, Wolf and his wife, Martha Ruben-Wolf, had been forced to flee Germany in 1933. Martha Ruben-Wolf was also a physician and active in Communist Party politics. They had toured the Soviet Union together several times in the 1920s and had published accounts of their experiences.59 In February 1934 the Wolfs arrived in Moscow with their two children by way of Paris. The communist immigrants to the Soviet Union included a significant number of physicians. Between January and August 1936, twenty-nine physicians who belonged to the KPD had arrived in the Soviet Union.60 However, until 1936, Agrojoint had little contact with the Communist Physicians' Collective. Agrojoint had located a job in Saratov for the physician Ernst Ascher, a KPD member who had arrived in Moscow under the aegis of the Red Help. Domke and Boss, the two physicians who arrived in Moscow in May 1934 under the Agrojoint agreement, were also KPD members and joined the local physicians' group when they remained in Moscow. Apart from these isolated instances, the activities of Agrojoint and the collective seldom overlapped. In April 1936, when Agrojoint approached the German party leadership for assistance with the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, they were welcomed with enthusiasm. Wolf, whom Pieck had asked to prepare a report on the issue, described Agrojoint's work: 'As I already mentioned, the settlement and integration of this large number of physicians as a KPD cadre is a matter of great political (and not just health policy) importance. These physicians will someday be highly qualified and very useful workers in Germany.'61 Wolf did caution that the group would require constant political monitoring, although given their experiences in Germany, it could be assumed that most were sympathetic to the KPD, Wolf suggested that a party functionary be installed as commandant in the Malakhovka house to ensure political reliability. It would be the commandant's duty 'in daily communications and observations ... to acquaint himself of undesirable persons in a discreet and timely fashion and to avert harm.'62 The Agrojoint physicians who lived in the provinces were to be monitored by mail. Besides offering assistance with grievances, Wolf envisioned the provision of political and health policy materials.63 Agrojoint agreed to this direct party control. Wolf then responded to the list of physician candidates that Groer had forwarded to Schaxel on 12 May 1936, Nine of the names on the list were recommended for immediate entry by members of the Communist Physicians' Collective.64

482 Carola Tischler

This effort at collaboration did not yield results. Of the five physicians who entered the Soviet Union via Agrojoint after May 1935, none was on the list approved by the Party. The political monitoring likely also failed to materialize. Had the new procedure succeeded, it would have had a significant impact on the social and political composition of the Agrojoint physicians, most of whom had no party affiliation. Party-affiliated physicians fared no better. As the number of physicians arrested increased, not only the Communist Physicians' Collective, but also the Agrojoint group, began to disintegrate. Agrojoint and Stalin's Terror In 1935 the job of organizing the settlement of jews in Ukraine, Belorussia, and the Crimea, which had previously been managed by Komzet, was transferred to the local republican administrations. Komzet was now restricted to work on the Birobidzhan settlement and to cooperation with foreign Jewish aid organizations. Socialism had won and the Jewish question had been solved, Sergei Egorovich Tsutskaev, the representative to Mongolia, wrote in a memorandum to Stalin, Molotov, and Kalinin. All remaining activities could be handled by other organizations, and Komzet could be dissolved.65 This plan masked a conflict with the settlement department (pereselencheskii otdel) of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (Narodnyi kommisariat vnutrennykh del, NKVD), headed by I.I. Pliner. Originally, Pliner's department had been responsible only for transporting settlers to Birobidzhan, but gradually it assumed control of more and more of Komzet's sphere of activity. In July 1938, Komzet was finally disbanded. Ozet had suspended its activities two months earlier, in May 1938, Ozef s director, Semen Dimanstein, and some of its presidium and staff, had been arrested even before then, in February and March 1938.66 The official suspension of Agrojoint's work was formalized in an agreement with the government on 4 September 1938. Rosen had already abandoned his permanent residence in the Soviet Union. In summer 1938 he paid a brief visit to Moscow for the final negotiations. He signed the liquidation agreement in the Soviet Consulate in New York. Negotiations on loan repayment and the distribution of assets administered by Agrojoint in the Soviet Union continued for most of the year. Given that it was no longer possible to work on behalf of Soviet Jews and that the immigration of foreign Jews was no longer a realistic option, the Joint Distribution Committee had elected to suspend Agrojoint's work.

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 483

This would not have come as a total surprise to Komzet. In February 1938, Rosen had written to Komzet to say that the conditions for Agrojoint's work had deteriorated markedly of late.67 This was a thinly veiled allusion to the wave of arrests that had overtaken Agrojoint's staff. Grigorii Naumovich Kaminskii had been arrested after a Central Committee plenary in 1937. Towards the end of the year, three staff in the Moscow office, including Groer, had been arrested. Rosen linked this to Kaminskii's arrest: 'A plot is being developed to accuse Kaminskii, in cooperation with the Agro-Joint or perhaps with myself personally as his foreign relative, of bringing German spies into Russia under the cover of helping the doctors.'68 Bronner, the head of the All-Union Bureau of the Foreign Sanitary Information in the People's Commissariat of Public Health, was arrested in 1937. Most of the Soviet Agrojoint staff and the agronomists supervised by Agrojoint vanished into prisons and camps.69 The first Agrojoint physician to be arrested was the pediatrician Ernst Ascher. Born in 1899 in Berlin, Ascher joined the KPD several years before Hitler took power and worked in Berlin as a physician to the poor. Following the Reichstag fire of 27 February 1933, he was arrested and tortured. He fled to Switzerland; from there he was able to enter the Soviet Union in 1935 with the assistance of the Red Help. The Moscow Agrojoint bureau managed to arrange a position for Ascher in Saratov. His wife, Elsa Ascher, joined him in the spring of 1936 along with their three-year-old child. Ascher was arrested in June 1936. Lothar Wolf, who sent Wilhelm Pieck a detailed report about Ascher's arrest, claimed that the cause was an interview with Ascher that a German journalist had published in a Frankfurt newspaper. The madness of this interview and the harm it caused is beyond debate,' Wolf commented: But it is doubtful whether Ascher's immediate arrest by the NKVD was the correct response. In my opinion it was a mistake. When I heard of Ascher's arrest several days ago, I suggested to the NKVD that an examination be conducted by a German-speaking neurologist or psychiatrist [Irrenarzt]. I am convinced that Ascher is suffering from a serious nervous disorder. I believe the proper political course of action would have been as follows: Ascher should have been persuaded to send a calmly and objectively worded correction to the editors of the 'Frankfurter Zeitung.' About the misunderstandings that had taken place, about the true conditions, etc. Had the 'Frankfurter Zeitung' then suppressed the correction or launched a renewed attack, the Soviet press could have condemned the

484 Carola Tischler Nazi mode of journalism. Ascher could also have been permitted to speak and protest on the Deutsche Stunde [German Hour] on the radio. This would have transformed Ascher's manipulation into a counterattack. And party proceedings and the NKVD investigation could still have taken place. But the stubborn clumsiness of the 'immediate attack' ruined everything. Of course the Gestapo and Hitler's press corps found out about Ascher's immediate arrest. In the Third Reich, they must be crowing, 'Aha, the dopey Dr. Ascher must have told the truth. That's why he's in the clink. Didn't our reporter do a wonderful job weaseling the truth out of him!' Ascher's arrest must appear to corroborate his interview.70

The head of the Mutual Assistance Organization of German Scientists Abroad, Fritz Demuth, heard rumours from various sources that a number of German physicians had been shot in Russia as spies. On 4 August 1936 he asked Bernhard Kahn for a report on the issue and for the names of those rumoured to have been shot.71 At this point - the first show trials had yet to take place - Agrojoint concluded that there was no reason for concern: There is no truth in the tales that are being told about the German doctors in Russia. In one case, unfortunately a German doctor made himself suspicious, especially by traveling back to Germany and again coming to Russia. These are the facts: This man is in Untersuchungshaft [investigative custody] - that is all. We hope that he will soon be able to explain his behaviour and that he will be released, if he is innocent. All the other doctors are very happy in Russia.' Kahn sent copies of the letters to Hyman, the secretary of the JDC in New York, and 'for curiosity's sake' to Rosen in Moscow.72 Ascher's arrest was not to be the last. However, the fate of the fiftyeight physicians on the 1937 list can be only partially reconstructed. Once the arrests became the rule rather than the exception, they no longer were accorded as much attention in the files. The dissolution of Komzet and Ozet and the closing of the Agrojoint Moscow bureau also coincided with the end of the archival record. The fate of a very few individuals can be reconstructed from names mentioned in other publications, as well as from memoirs, scholarly accounts, and the testimony of relatives.73 The two Agrojoint physicians who worked at the same clinic as Ascher, Theodor and Edith Auerbach, were also arrested in 1937. Both were released in April 1939. In May 1956 the Auerbachs returned to East Berlin, became members of the SED, and worked as physicians in the Berlin-Buch Clinic and in the Government Hospital. Margot Benjamin and Alfred Stern also returned to the GDR in 1956 after being detained in a camp in the Soviet Union. Stern, who arrived

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 485

in the Soviet Union in February 1936 and worked in Krivoi Rog, is known to have been arrested in August 1937. He died two years after his return in the GDR. After her arrival in the Soviet Union in December 1934, Margot Benjamin worked first in Balzer in the Volga Republic, and later in an orphanage in Kharkov. In February 1940, Benjamin was sentenced to an eight-year term, which she served in the camps in the Komi autonomous region. After her release in 1946, Benjamin lived in exile in Komi until 1954. Adolf Boss, who was arrested in Moscow in March 1938, was also sentenced to eight years in the camps and sent to the Komi region. A second trial in early 1942 resulted in a death sentence, and Boss was shot in May 1942. Walter Domke was arrested in Moscow in February 1938 and executed later that year. Nothing is known about the fate of Ernst Sussmanovich, who worked in the Crimea and was arrested in January 1938. The Fate of the Physicians In the main, the fate of the physician emigres parallels that of other German exiles in the Soviet Union. Not all of the emigres were arrested. Some were expelled after their passports expired; others left the Soviet Union of their own accord; still others spent the rest of their lives in the Soviet Union without ever encountering the police apparatus of the NKVD. The emigres who were arrested either were sentenced to time in the camps or were expelled. Some died in the camps. Others survived, and a few returned to Germany. The treatment of Jewish emigres to Soviet Russia had a special feature that deserves mention, however. If the physician had listed his or her nationality as 'Jewish' rather than 'German' on the application for Soviet citizenship, he or she might have been spared the arrest and deportation that awaited the majority of German exiles in the Soviet Union after the invasion. The extent to which this ever occurred must remain a matter of speculation. For the Jewish physicians to identify as Jews was not a simple matter. Most were assimilated Jews who had turned to Jewish aid organizations because it was their only hope of resuming work in their profession. It is possible that their experiences in Germany and their forced exile led some to reactivate their ties to Judaism. On the other hand, the latent anti-Semitism of the Soviet Union in the 1930s may have deterred the emigres from mentioning their Jewish heritage on their passport. It is impossible to know whether claiming Jewish rather than German nationality would have been a help or a hindrance.

486 Carola Tischler

In any case, the Jewish settlements in Ukraine and the Crimea were completely liquidated by the Germans during the war. Of the fiftyeight physicians, twenty were on the Gestapo's special arrest list. Five of the physicians were even classified as extremely dangerous.74 But even those not on the arrest list would have been unlikely to escape the Germans unscathed. Exile to Siberia or Central Asia would have provided a greater chance of survival. The fate of the emigres who left the Soviet Union is also largely unknown. The first two physicians to leave Moscow were Fritz Falkenburger, who had arrived in June 1935, and Georg Dienemann, who had arrived in September that same year. Both left the Soviet Union in December 1935. Their departure and the departure of Egon Wissing in February 1936 may have been prompted by the closing of the Torgsin company.75 Alfred Korach, who had worked as an organizer for industrial hygiene and social welfare institutions in Moscow since his arrival in July 1935, left in December 1936. In all likelihood his departure was motivated by the political situation at the time. Korach's wife had worked as a governess for the Molotovs and had lost her job after the first show trial. Susanne Leonhard, a close friend of the Korachses, had been arrested in October 1936.76 Gerhardt Hess left the country in February 1937, Alexander Griinbaum in May 1937. Helmut Simons departed in June 1937, and Otto Rubens, Hans Feilchenfeld, and Lasar Davidsohn left in July. Presumably they had all been given the choice of adopting Soviet citizenship or leaving the country. Whether the departing emigres returned to Germany or continued on to a third country would have depended on individual circumstances in each case. Walter Steinberg, who was still working in a Zaporozh'e hospital in July 1937, is known to have returned to Germany. Steinberg's account is included in the collection of reports of Russia returnees published by Krupinski.77 Sigbert Proskauer left the country with his German passport in June 1937 and entered Prague via Poland. In Prague, a French company offered Proskauer a temporary position in the Netherlands.78 Hugo Natannsen, who had been detained, possibly in Odessa, for three-and-a-half months prior to his expulsion in January 1938, was also able to flee to Prague.79 Walter Friedlander and his wife were also detained prior to expulsion.80 The Paris office first received word of the expulsions in December 1937. Because Agrojoint's work was now being conducted from Paris rather than Moscow, Rosen was in Paris at the time. The Paris bureau files contain no correspondence from Moscow from the year 1937, let

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933

487

alone from the year 1938. Moscow's advice now arrived at Agrojoint via other channels. In January 1938 the Warsaw branch of the Joint Distribution Committee notified Kahn of the expulsions. The Warsaw JDC had been informed of the arrival of the Germans by a refugee committee active in the city. In the Soviet Union the Germans had been furnished with a passport, a visa for Germany, and a transit visa for Poland valid for two to three days. The JDC was unable to arrange for an extension of their residency permit for Poland, and they could provide little by way of assistance to the refugees' departure from the USSR, which in many ways resembled their original flight from Germany.81 The German physicians who fled to the Soviet Union after 1933 have received little attention in the research on German-Soviet medical relations. Just as scholars know very little about the German emigre physicians in Russia, this account suggests how little the physicians understood about the conditions that would await them. Notwithstanding years of professional acquaintance and interaction, it turned out that information about the Soviet experiment in medicine was 'transmitted selectively' both by Soviet agencies seeking to win admirers abroad and by German friends of the Soviet experiment. It remains to be investigated whether Jewish aid organizations such as Agrojoint may also have been involved in the selective dissemination of information about Soviet reality. It turns out that for all their efforts, except for the group of Jewish physicians whose fate is described here, Jewish aid organizations were unable to organize in socialist Russia a refuge for Jewish emigres from Germany. In light of the fate that awaited the refugees in the USSR under Stalin's Terror, this failure must in retrospect be regarded as a stroke of good fortune. For those who study Soviet-German relations, there is an irony in the story told here. Prior to the mid-1920s, when relations between the two countries were officially sanctioned and structured, informal networks of German and Russian physicians were among the most important vehicles for bilateral relations. Indeed, as many of the chapters in this volume attest, those who crafted foreign policy in both Germany and Soviet Russia drew upon the expertise and the good offices of physicians. In light of the density and richness of those relations, German Jewish physicians might have been forgiven for expecting better treatment in Soviet Russia.

Appendix List of the German physicians who emigrated to the Soviet Union with the assistance of Agrojoint and the approval of the Health Commissariat of the USSR Surname, First Name 1. Domke, Walter b. 1901 Berlin + 2. Boss, Alfred {corr. Adolf) b. 1903 Offenburg +, venereal disease specialist 3. Natanssen, Hugo b. 1897 Hamburg* 4. Sussmanowitsch, Ernst b. 1 908 Zeiskam (); general practitioner 5. Benjamin, Margot b. 1893 Berlin'Q 6. Finke, Walter 7. Epstein, Hermann b. 1898 Lauenburg" 8. Wolf, Reinhard b. 1'906; general practitioner 9. Auerbach, Theodor b. 1899 Berlin*(); gynecologist/internist 10. Auerbach, Edith b. 1903Beriin*(); internist 11. Conn, Heinz b. ca. 1899; internist

Arrival date

Place of Employment

Citizenship

5.14.1934

Moscow, Inst. CIEM

Soviet

5.27.1934

Moscow, Sokol'niki, Vener. Inst.

Soviet

12.12.1934

Odessa, Kuial'nik Leman San. im. Efimova

German

12.27.1934

Kurman-Kemertsi, Crimea

Soviet

12.23.1934 1.9.1935

Worked in Balzer, Volga Republic Novo-Zlatopol', USSR

unknown unknown

1.9.1935

Worked on the Karanut Station, Crimea, Naiman Village

unknown

1.23.1935

Kular-Kiptsak, Crimea

unknown

4.18.1935

Saratov, Med. Institut

Soviet

4.18.1935

Saratov, Med. Institut

applied for Soviet citizenship

4.25.1935

Karanut Station, Crimea, Naiman Village

applied for Soviet citizenship

Appendix (continued) Surname, First Name 12. Scheuer, Paul b. ca. 1901; surgeon 13. Hermann, Max b. ca. 1890; general practitioner/internist 14. Auerbach, Ludwig b. ca. 1900; general practitioner 15. Falkenburger, Fritz b. ca. 1890; general practitioner/social hygienist 16. Haas, Erwin b. ca. 1903; psychiatrist 17. Mainzer, Wilhelm b. 1909 Heppenheim*; general practitioner 18. Heymann, Paul b. ca. 1892; internist/pulmonologist 19. Lanzkron, John b. ca. 1 905; general practitioner 20. Korach, Alfred b. ca. 1893; social hygienist 21 . Sternberg, Erich b. 1902 Posen*; neuropathologist 22. Wissing, Egon b. ca. 1899; radiologist 23. Ball, Sigmund b. ca. 1895; internist/pediatrician

Arrival date

Place of Employment

Citizenship

5.26.1935

Sem' Kolodezei, Crimea

unknown

6.9.1935

Kerch, ul. K. Marksa No. 36

Soviet

6.15.1935

Kolkh. Molotovo, Saki, Crimea

applied for Soviet citizenship

6.21.1935

Left the Soviet Union in Dec. 1935

6.24.1935

Ivanovo, Obi. Psikhobol'nitsa

Soviet

6.23.1935

Zelenopol', Dnepr, obi. USSR

applied for Soviet citizenship according to letter

7.4.1935

Yalta, San. Sel'biliar, Autskaia 33

applied for Soviet citizenship according to letter

7.6.1935

Kirovo, Odess. Obi. Zentrale Poliklinik

German

7.7.1935

Left the Soviet Union in Dec. 1936

7.15.1935

Moscow, Nevro-Psikh.. Inst. im. Gannuskina, Sokol'niki

7.17.1935

Left the Soviet Union in Feb. 1936

7.19.1935

Krivoi Rog, ul. Lenina No. 43/24

applied for Soviet citizenship

Soviet

Appendix (continued) Surname, First Name 24. Lichtigfeld, Heinrich b. 1907 Dusseldorf* 25. Hess, Gerhardt b. 1899; internist/radiologist 26. Dienemann, Georg b. ca. 1898; general practitioner 27. Katzenstein, John b. 1890 Kassel*; neuropathologist/ psychiatrist 28. Rosenberg, Gerhardt 29. Rubens, Otto b. ca. 1900; general practitioner/internist 30. Hautemann, Max b. 1903 Nuremberg*; internist/ radiologist 31. Gilde, Sigfried b. ca. 1905Q; internist 32. Lowenstedt, Hans b. ca. 1895; pathologist 33. Krombach, Julius b. ca. 1900; general practitioner 34. Kann, Julius 35. Stern, Alfred b. 1901 Simmern*();general practitioner 36. Proskauer, Siegbert b. 1884 Leipzig*; pulmonologist

Arrival date

Place of Employment

Citizenship

7.19.1935

Krivoi Rog, ul. Lenina No. 43/24

Soviet

8.30.1935

Left the Soviet Union in Feb. 1937

9.10.1935

Left the Soviet Union in Dec. 1935

11.16.1935

Kostroma, Psikho-bol'nitsa

applied for Soviet citizenship

11.16.1935

laropolets, Det. Sanatorii im. Pavlika Morozova

applied for Soviet citizenship

12.8.1935

Left the Soviet Union in July 1937

12.20.1935

Khimki, Nikol'skaia Bol'nitsa

Soviet

1.20.1936

Moscow, Inst. Pitaniia, Nikolo-Vorobinskii per.

applied for Soviet citizenship

1.29.1936

Cheliabinsk, ul. Vasenko 37

unknown

1.31.1936 2.1.1936

Novo-Zlatopol' USSR Kasli, Ural, San. Tsungul'

German unknown

2.8.1936

Krivoi Rog, Oblzdrav

unknown

2.9.1936

Stalindorf Dnepropetr. Region

German

Appendix (continued) Surname, First Name

Arrival date

Place of Employment

Citizenship

37. Lewin, John

2.14.1936

Moscow, Inst. Nervn. Profilaktiki pi. Vostanii

Soviet

38. Friedlich, Ernst b. ca. 1910; dentist

2.15.1936

Left the Soviet Union

2.20.1936

Leningrad, Inst. Bekhtereva

unknown

2.20.1936

Leningrad, Inst. Bekhtereva

unknown

2.25.1936

Left the Soviet Union on 7.13.1937

3.1.1936

Left the Soviet Union on 7.14.1937

3.3.1936

Krivoi Rog, Krivo-Buda, 1-aia ploshchadka, kottedz No. 3

unknown

44. Cohen-Philipps, Jenny b. 1905 Wollbeck*; dentist

3.6.1936

Moscow, Zubolechebnitsa Kr.Kresta ul. Metrostroia No. 8

applied for Soviet citizenship

45. Kassel, Viktor b. ca. 1902; dentist

3.11.1936

St. Vechernii Kut, rudnik Dubovoi Balki, Poliklinika

unknown

3.25.1936

Magnitogorsk, ul. Berezki No. 42

unknown

4.1.1936

Left the Soviet Union in May 1937

4.4.1936

St. Krim, poliklinika

39. Szekely, Lajos 40. Szekely-Sussmanowitsch, Edith b. ca. 1 909; general practitioner 41 . Feilchenfeld, Hans b. ca. 1900; dentist 42. Davidsohn, Lazar b. ca. 1905; radiologist 43. Steinhardt, Walter b. ca. 1896; dermatologist

46. Friedlander, Walter b. 1900 Hamburg*; internist/pediatrician 47. Griinbaum, Alexander b. ca. 1907; dentist 48. Dreyfuss, Fritz b. ca. 1905; venereal disease specialist/dermatologist

applied for Soviet citizenship

Appendix (concluded) Arrival date

Place of Employment

Citizenship

4.7.1936

Skadovsk, USSR, kol. Lenindorf

unknown

4.16.1936

Feodossiia, Dnepr. Detskii Sanatorii

unknown

4.16.1936

Zaporozh'e, 5-aia Sovetskaia bol'nitsa unknown

5.3.1936

Kuibyshev, Nevr. Klinika Kooperativnaia ul. No. 102

Soviet

53. Gunther, Use b. 1901 Hannover'

5.3.1936

Kuibyshev, Nevr. Klinika Kooperativnaia ul. No. 102

Soviet

54. Sendelbeck, Lisel b. ca. 1895; gynecologist/surgeon

7.31.1936

unknown

55. Blumenthal, Adolf

1.7.1937

56. Simons, Helmut 57. Wolf, Eduard

3.5.1937 3.10.1937

58. Sacks, Erich

4.25.1937

Krivoi Rog, Krivo-Buda, 1-aia ploshchadka kotted2 15 Dnepropetrovsk, Klinika Ukha, nosa i gorla Left the Soviet Union on 26.6.1937 Moscow, Leningradskoe shosse, Poliklinika im. Lesgafta Did not have a position yet, lived at Malachovka, Turgenevskaia ul. No. 83, Agrojoint's residence

Surname, First Name 49. Rosenfeld, Ernst b. 1902 Schwerenz' 50. Zeichner, Otto b. ca. 1900; orthopedist 51. Steinberg, Walter b. 1889 Duisburg(); general practitioner 52. Giinther, Max b. 1901 Wesel-Rees*

* On the Gestapo's special arrest list + Arrested during the Terror and shot () Arrested and released before or after the war Source: GARF, 7746/1/501, fol. 1-2

applied for Soviet citizenship

German German

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 493 NOTES 1 See Wolfram Fischer et al., eds., Exodus von Wissenschaften aus Berlin: Fragestellungen, Ergebnisse, Desiderate. Entwicklungen vor und nach 1933 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1994); Giuliana Gemelli, The "Unacceptables": American Foundations and Refugee Scholars between the Two Wars and After (New York: Peter Lang, 2000). 2 Gerhard Baader, Tolitisch motivierte Emigration deutscher Arzte/ Berichte zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte 7 (1984): 67-84; Michael Hubenstorf, 'Osterreichische Arzteemigration 1934-1945/ ibid.: 85-107; Hans-Peter Kroner, 'Die Emigration deutschsprachiger Mediziner, 1933-1945: Versuch einer Befunderhebung/ Exilforschung 6 (1988): 83-98; H.-P. Kroner, 'Die Emigration deutschsprachiger Mediziner im Nationalsozialismus/ Berichte zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte 12 (1989), SH: 1-44. 3 For specialized studies, see also Uwe Henrik Peters, Psychiatrie im Exil. Die Emigration der dynamischen Psychiatrie aus Deutschland 1933-1939 (Diisseldorf: Kupka, 1992); Michael Kohn, Zahnarzte 1933-1945. Berufsverbot - Emigration - Verfolgung (Berlin: Hentrich, 1994); Eduard Seidler, Kinderarzte, 1933-1945: entrechtet, geflohen, ermordet - Pediatricians: victims of persecution, 1933-1945 (Bonn: Bouvier, 2000). 4 Appendix in Fischer et al., eds., Exodus. 5 See, for example, David Pike, Deutsche Schriftsteller im sowjetischen Exil 19331945 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1981); Kunst und Literatur im antifaschistischen Exil, vols. I/I and II: Exil in der UdSSR (Leipzig: Reclam, 1989); Hermann Weber, 'Weifle Flecken' in der Geschichte. Die KPD-Opfer der Stalinschen Sauberungen und ihre Rehabilitierung (Frankfurt am Main: isp-Verlag, 1990); and, most recently, Oleg Dehl et al., Verratene Ideale. Zur Geschichte deutscher Emigranten in der Sowjetunion in den 30erjahren (Berlin: Trafo, 2000). 6 Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi archiv sotsial'no-politicheskoi istorii, Moscow [henceforth RGASPI] /. 495, op. 74, d. 1220 (on emigration): Meeting of the KPD Politburo. Report by General Degen [alias of Hermann Nuding] on some KPD Questions, 5.9.1936. According to this report, immigration to Western Europe was estimated at 1,800 to 2,000 party members, distributed as follows: Czechoslovakia (900), Switzerland (100), France (400), Belgium and the Netherlands (300-400), and Scandinavia (100-150). 7 Werner Roder and Herbert A. Strauss, eds., Biographisches Handbuch der deutschsprachigen Emigration nach 1933, vol. 1 (Munich: Saur, 1980), xxxviii. 8 This article draws on my book on German immigration to the Soviet Union. See Carola Tischler, Flucht in die Verfolgung. Deutsche Emigranten im sowjetischen Exil 1933 bis 1945 (Miinster: Lit-Verlag, 1996).

494 Carola Tischler 9 See, especially, Wilhelm Mensing, Von der Ruhr in den GULag. Opfer des Stalinschen Massenterrors aus dem Ruhrgebiet (Essen: Klartext, 2001); Gerhard Kaiser, Rufilandfahrer. Aus dem Wald in die Welt. Facharbeiter aus dem Thiiringer Wald in der UdSSR 1930-1965 (Tessin: Wage, 2000); Sergei Zhuravlev, Malen'kie liudi i bol'shaia istoriia. Inostrantsy moskovskogo Elektrozavoda v sovetskom obshchestve 1920kh-1930kh gg. (Moscow: Rosspen, 2000). 10 For examples of the travel reports that formed German public opinion, see Martha Ruben-Wolf and Lothar Wolf, Moskauer Skizzen zweier Arzte (Berlin: Vereinigung Internal. Verlagsanstalten, 1926); Russische Skizzen zweier Arzte (Berlin: Vereinigung Internat. Verlagsanstalten, 1927); Deutsche Arzte im Kaukasus. Dritte Ruftlandreise 1927 (Berlin: International Arbeiter-Verlag, 1928). 11 For Oskar Vogt, see Jochen Richter, 'Das Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut fur Hirnforschung und die Topographic der GroGhirnhemisharen. Bin Beitrag zur Institutsgeschichte der Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft und zur Geschichte der architektonischen Hirnforschung/ in Bernhard vom Brocke and Hubert Laitko, eds., Die Kaiser-Wilhelm - Max-Planck-Gesellschaft und ihre Institute. Studien zu ihrer Geschichte: Das Harnack-Prinzip (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1996), 349-408; for Karl Wilmanns, see Jochen Richter, ed., Karl Wilmanns: Lues, Lamas, Leninisten. Tagebuch einer Reise durch Rufiland in die Burjatische Republik im Sommer 1926 (Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus, 1995). For Ludwig Aschoff, see Susan Gross Solomon and Jochen Richter, eds., Ludwig Aschoff: Vergleichende Volkerpathologie oder Rassenpathologie. Tagebuch einer Reise durch Ruftland und Transkaukasien (Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus, 1998); for Heinz Zeiss, see chapter 5 by Wolfgang Eckart. 12 Steve Zipperstein, Imagining Russian Jewry: Memory, History, Identity (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1999); Zvi Y. Gitelman, A Century of Ambivalence: The Jews of Russia and the Soviet Union, 1881 to the Present (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001). 13 On immigration to Germany, see Trude Maurer, Ostjuden in Deutschland 1918-1933 (Hamburg: Christians, 1986); on anti-Semitism after 1917 more generally, see Matthias Vetter, Antisemiten und Bolschewiki. Zum Verhaltnis von Sowjetsystem und Judenfeindschaft 1917-1939 (Berlin: Metropol, 1995). 14 Golfo Alexopoulos, Stalin's Outcasts: Aliens, Citizens, and the Soviet State, 1926-1936 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003). 15 See Edmund Silberner, Kommunisten zur Judenfrage: Zur Geschichte von Theorie und Praxis des Kommunismus (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1983), 139. 16 See Otto Heller, Der Untergang des Judentums (Vienna and Berlin: Verlag fur Literatur und Politik, 1931), 180. Heller does not elaborate on the situation of Jews in industry. On this, see Louis Fischer, 'Die Juden und der Fiinfjahrplan/ Das Tagebuch (Berlin), no. 26 (25.5.1932): 986-93.

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 495 17 For a history of this project, see Antje Kuchenbecker, 'Ein "Rotes Palastina" im Fernen Osten der Sowjetunion - die Verbannung einer Idee. Die Auseinandersetzung um ein autonomes jiidisches Siedlungsgebiet in der friiheren UdSSR/ Archiv fur Sozialgeschichte 37 (1997): 255-82; Antje Kuchenbecker, Zionismus ohne Zion. Birobidzhan: Idee und Geschichte eines jiidischen Staates in Sowjet-Fernost (Berlin: Metropol, 2000). The latter also includes a summary of the relevant literature. 18 There is still very little information on Geserd. See Tischler, Flucht, 56-60. 19 An overview of the activities of the three societies can be found in a report by Tsutskaev, the head of Komzet, to the Commission for Party Control, dated 29 August 1936. See Gosudarstvennyi archiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii, Moscow (henceforth: GARF),/. 7541, op. 1, d. 867, /. 1-10. 20 On ORT in the Soviet Union, see Leonard Schapiro, The History of ORT (New York: Schocken Books, 1980), 131-60. 21 See Archiv vneshnei politiki Rossiiskoi Federatsii, Moscow (henceforth AVPRF), 082/74/16/23, /. 27-28, ORT letter to Komzet, 19 October 1933. 22 See AVPRF 082/74/16/23, /. 30, letter from Stern to Trotskii, 11 November 1933. 23 See A. Giants, 'Pochemu imenno Birobidzhan,' Der Tor (New York), 14 December 1933. As a member of the presidency of the Central Executive Committee, Petr Germogenovich Smidovich (1874-1935) was also one of Kalinin's deputies. See also B. Amanzolova: 'Prichu, zhivu i vchuvstvuiu/ Petr Germogenovich Smidovich, Opyt istoricheskogo portreta (Moscow: 1998). After Smidovich's death, Sergei Egorovich Tsutskaev (1876-1944), the Soviet representative to Mongolia, became the head of Komzet. 24 M.Z., 'Birobidjan - autonomes jiidisches Gebiet. Jiidische Einwanderung in die Sowjetunion,' Rundschau tiber Politik, Wirtschaft und Arbeiterbewegung 31 (1934): 1225-6. 25 RGASPI, /. 17, op. 120, d. 239, /. 1, letter from Tsutskaev to Andreev, 9 April 1936. 26 Raskes, the Ozet representative whose job it was to select among the candidates, had been intending to travel to Poland and Lithuania. 27 On Agrojoint's work in the USSR, see Evelyn Morrissey, Jewish Workers and Farmers in the Crimea and Ukraine (New York: n.p., 1937), 120-47; Yehuda Bauer, My Brother's Keeper: A History of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee 1929-1939 (Philadelphia: Jewish Publishing Society Of America, 1974), 57-104; Yehuda Bauer, The Relations between the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee and the Soviet Government, 1924-1938,' in Bela Vago and George L. Mosse, eds., Jews and Non-Jews in Eastern Europe, 1918-1945 (New York and Toronto: Wiley, 1974), 271-82; Allan L. Kagedan,

496 Carola Tischler

28

29 30

31

32 33

34

35 36

'American Jews and the Soviet Experiment: The Agro-Joint Project, 19241937,' Jewish Social Studies 2 (1981): 153-64. For a discussion of Rosen, see Derek J. Penslar, '"Steppes to Freedom": Programme fur jiidische Agrarsiedlungen in RuSIand und der Sowjetunion,' in Stefi Jersch-Wenzel, ed., Juden und Armut in Mittel- und Osteuropa (Cologne: Bohlau, 2000), 333-56. On the declassed, see Alexopoulos, Stalin's Outcasts. Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi voennyi arkhiv, Moscow, holdings of the former Special Archive (henceforth RGVA/TsKhlDK) [Tsentr khraneniia istoriko-dokumentalnykh kollektsii] /. 722, op. \, d. 37, /. 299. Ten Years' Work of the Agro-Joint in the U.S.S.R./ 6 April 1934. (Original in English.) Grigorii Naumovich Kaminskii (1895-1938) had been a Party member from 1913 and studied medicine in Moscow in 1915. After 1917 he assumed a variety of Party functions, including Party Secretary of the Central Committee of the Azerbaijani CP after 1920. From 1922-1928 he was head of the union 'Vserabotzemlets.' Kaminskii was head of the Moscow Party Committee after 1930, and from 1934 to 1937 was People's Commissar for the RSFSR Health Services (and after July 1936 also of the USSR). He was arrested in June 1937, then sentenced to death and shot in February 1938. See Gosudarstvennaia vlast' SSSR. Vysshie organy vlasti i upravleniia i ikh rukovoditeli 1923-1991 (Moscow: Rosspen, 1999), 336-7. RGVA/TsKhlDK], /. 722, op. 1, d. 270a, /. 145-6, 'Memo for Dr. B. Kahn/ 24 April 1934. OZE (Obshchestvo zdravookhraneniia evreev, or the Society for Jewish Health Care, not to be confused with Ozet), was founded in Tsarist Russia in 1912, the same year as ORT. From 1922 on, the world federation of OZE was located in Berlin; between 1933 and 1940, it moved to Paris. Vol'f Moiseevic Bronner (1876-1938) studied medicine in Tomsk. He was expelled in connection with the student unrest in 1899 and finished his studies in Berlin. Bronner took part in the 1905 revolutionary uprising in Russia. He spent the years 1906 to 1913 in Paris conducting research, then returned to Russia and was arrested in 1915. He was active in Narkomzdrav from 1918, then arrested in 1937. See Rossiiskaia evrdskaia entsiklopediia, Moscow: Rossiiskaja Akadem. Estestv. Nauk 1994, part 1,176. On Bronner and the clinic for skin and venereal diseases that he headed, see also Richter, Karl Wilmanns. See RGVA/TsKhlDK, /. 722, op. 1, d. 270a, /. 243-4, letter from Agrojoint Moscow to AJDC Paris, 22 July 1934, and GARF, /. 7746, op. 1, d. 436, /. 47, letter from Groer to the Jewish Community in Harbin, 7 July 1934. For Torgsin, see E.A. Osokina, Our Daily Bread: Socialist Distribution and the

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 497

37 38

39

40

41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52

Art of Survival in Stalin's Russia, 1927-1941 (Boulder, CO: M.E. Sharpe, 2001); Julie Hessler, A Social History of Soviet Trade: Trade Policy, Retail Practices, and Consumption, 1917-1953 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2004). See Zhuravlev, Malen'kie liudi, 195-202. See RGVA/TsKhlDK,/. 722, op. 1, d. 270a, /. 204-205. The 11 December 1934 instructions from Agrojoint to the Paris office, which were supposed to be passed on to OZE, describe the envisioned plan for immigration and employment. GARF,/. 7746, op. 1, d. 501, /. 1-2, 'Spisok nemetskikh vrachei, priezzhavshchikh v SSSR po soglasovaniiu s Narkomzdravom SSSR, cherez posredstvo Agrodzointa/ n.d. A list of the German physicians who immigrated to the USSR with the assistance of Agrojoint and the approval of the Soviet Health Commission can be found in GARF,/. 7746, op. 1, d. 501, /. 1-2. See Appendix. Copies of the letters are located in the holdings of the Archives of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, New York (henceforth Joint), file 510; GARF,/. 7746, op. 1, d. 470, and RGASPI,/. 495, op. 11, d. 14. Joint, file 510, letter from Finke to Agrojoint, 1 March 1935, unpaginated. GARF,/. 7746, op. 1, d. 470, /. 10, letter from Mainzer to Groer, 1 August 1935. On Magnitogorsk, see Stephen Kotkin, Magnetic Mountain: Stalinism as a Civilization (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995). GARF,/. 7746, op. 1, d. 470, /. 4, letter from Friedlander to Groer, 26 May 1936,1. GARF,/. 7746, op. 1, d. 470, /. 58, letter from Giinther to Groer, 15 November 1936. See GARF,/. 7541, op. 1, d. 915, /. 11-15, replies from Cheliabinsk, Stalindorf, Dnepropetrovsk, Krivoi Rog, and the Crimea. GARF,/. 7541, op. 1, d. 915, /. 13, To voprosu o rabote nemetskikh vrachei v Krimu/7Junel936. Ibid.,/. 12. See Elinor Lipper, Elfjahre in sowjetischen Gefangnissen und Lagern (Zurich: Europa, 1950), 218. See GARF,/. 7541, op. 1, d. 915, /. 1-7, 'Protokol soveshchaniia vrachei-emigrantov iz Germanii,' 11 June 1936. See for example, the reports sent home by Heinz Zeiss as described by Eckart in his chapter. See, for example, Ruben-Wolf and Wolf, Moskauer Skizzen zweier Arzte; Russische Skizzen zweier Arzte; and Deutsche Arzte im Kaukasus.

498 Carola Tischler 53 See GARF,/. 7746, op. I, d. 463, /. 118, letter from OZE to Agrojoint, 24 December 1935. 54 RGASPI,/. 495, op. 11, d. 14, /. 3, letter from OZE to Agrojoint/Paris, 18 May 1936. 55 See GARF,/. 7746, op. 1, d. 503, /. 81, letter from OZE to Agrojoint/Paris, 15 June 1936. 56 See GARF,/. 7541, op. 1, d. 915, /. 8-10, letter from Rosen to Kaminskii, 11 June 1936. 57 GARF,/. 7746, op. 1, d. 502, /. 10, letter from Groer to Schaxel, 27 April 1936. 58 Julius Schaxel (1887-1943) studied biology and medicine. He was a member of the SPD from 1906 to 1914, and in 1915 was named Professor of General Biology and Zoology in Jena. In 1918 he was appointed director of the Institute for Experimental Biology in Jena. He was an opponent of National Socialist racial theory. After the autumn of 1933, he was Professor at the Academy of Sciences in Leningrad; after 1935, in Moscow. See RGASPI, /. 495, op. 73, d. 156, /. 36-38, 'Autobiographic,' 13 June 1942. 59 See Moskauer Skizzen zweier Arzte; Russische Skizzen zweier Arzte; Deutsche Arzte im Kaukasus. Dritte Rufilandreise 1927; Martha Ruben-Wolf and Lothar Wolf, Imfreien Asien. Reiseskizzen zweier Arzte (Berlin: Internationaler Arbeiter-Verlag, 1931). On the Ruben-Wolf family, see also Anja Schindler, 'Mit der Internationale durch das Brandenburger Tor/ Martha Ruben-Wolf (1887-1939), in Ulla Plener, Leben mit Hoffnung in Pein. Frauenschicksale unter Stalin (Frankfurt an der Oder: Frankfurter Oder Editionen, 1997), 35-53. 60 See RGASPI,/. 495, op. 11, d. 14, /. 64, report from Wolf to Pieck, 11 August 1936. 61 RGASPI, /. 495, op. 11, d. 14, /. 41, report from Wolf to Pieck, 27 July 1936. 62 Ibid.,/. 40. 63 See Stiftung Archiv der Parteien und Massenorganisationen der DDR im Bundesarchiv, Berlin-Lichterfelde (hereafter SAPMO BArch), 12/3/373,/. 2, 'Arbeitsprogramm der KPD-Arzte/ 2 June 1936, 8. 64 See GARF,/. 7746, op. 1, d. 499, /. 29, letter from Wolf to Groer, 12 May 1936. 65 See GARF,/. 3316, op. 2, d. 1760, /. 1-3, Tsutskaev to Stalin, 10 July 1936. 66 See GARF,/. 9498, op. 1, d. 97, /. 3,38, 70, 72, protocols from the meetings of Ozet dated 3 March 1938,23 March 1938, 7 April 1938, and 15 May 1938. 67 Archives of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York (henceforth YIVO), Rosen, file 97, fol. 57. See letter from Rosen to Komzet, 22 February 1938. 68 Letter from Rosen to Rosenberg and Baerwald, 11 December 1937. Cited in Bauer, My Brother's Keeper, 98-9. 69 Ibid., 98, cites a figure in the hundreds. Elsewhere it is reported without

Emigration of German-Jewish Physicians after 1933 499

70 71 72

73

74

75

76 77 78 79

source attribution that only one hundred of a total of three thousand staff escaped arrest. See Louis Rapaport, Hammer, Sichel, Davidstern. Judenverfolgung in der Sowjetunion (Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 1992), 88. RGASPI,/. 495, op. 11, d. 14, /. 64, report from Wolf to Pieck, 11 August 1938. RGVA/TsKhlDK,/. 722, op. 1, d. 270a, /. 3, letter from Demuth to Kahn, 4 August 1936,6. RGVA/TsKhlDK,/. 722, op. 1, d. 270a, /. 34, letter from Kahn to Demuth, 7 August 1936 (original in English). Ascher's name is not mentioned directly in this letter. However, since no other Agrojoint physician was known to have been under arrest at this point, it can be assumed that the letter refers to Ascher. The reported reason for the arrest (leaving the country and returning) does not contradict this assumption in any fashion. At this point, reasons were still being sought for arrests. Arthur Koestler provides another variation on the reason for the arrest in his memoirs: 'As I later found out, he was accused of being a saboteur who injected his patients with syphilis bacteria and demoralized the people with his claims that venereal diseases were incurable; also, he was supposedly an agent of a foreign power/ See Ein Gott, der keiner war (Munich: dtv, 1962), 66. See the reference works by Werner Roder and Herbert A. Strauss, eds., Biographisches Handbuch der deutschsprachigen Emigration nach 1933,3 vols. (Munich: Saur, 1980-3); Weber, 'Weifte Flecken' in der Geschichte; In den Fangen des NKWD. Deutsche Opfer des stalinistischen Terrors in der UdSSR (Berlin: Dietz, 1991). See Werner Roder, ed., Sonderfahndungsliste UdSSR. Faksimile der 'Sonderfahndungsliste UdSSR' des Chefs der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD, das Fahndungsbuch der deutschen Einsatzgruppen im Rufilandfeldzug 1941 (Erlangen: Verlag D+C, 1977). This, in any case, is what Wolf claimed in his 27 July 1936 report to Pieck (RGASPI,/. 495, op. 11, d. 14, /. 41): 'Of more than 50 physicians, only three returned to Western Europe. And they didn't leave because they were having any particular difficulties, but because they had left valuables in hard currency abroad, etc., so when the Isnab and Torgsin closed, they thought it better to leave the Sojuz again.' See Susanne Leonhard, Gestohlenes Leben. Als Sozialistin inStalins Gulag (Frankfurt am Main: Athenaum, 1988), 40. See Kurt Krupinski, Ruckkehrer berichten iiber die Sowjetunion (Berlin: Seydel, 1942), 102n321. See RGVA/TsKhlDK,/. 722, op. 1, d. 270a, /. 7, 'Verzeichnis deutscher Staatsburger aus Sowjet-Rufiland/ n.d. Ibid., /. 8. See also Hans Schafranek, Zwischen NKWD und Gestapo. Die Aus-

500 Carola Tischler lieferung deutscher und osterreichischer Antifaschisten aus der Sowjetunion an Nazideutschland 1937-1941 (Frankfurt am Main: isp-Verlag, 1990), 151. 80 See RGVA/TsKhlDK,/. 722, op. \, d. 270a, /. 5, letter from Laski to Kahn, 19 April 1938. 81 See RGVA/TsKhlDK, /. 722, op. 1, d. 270a, /. 12-13, letter from Giterman to Kahn, 28 January 1938.

Index

Note: Page numbers in bold indicated an illustration. Abrikosov, A.I., 10,15,265-6, 335 Academy of Medical Sciences (Russia), 327,344 Academy of Military Medicine (Russia), 416 Academy of Military Physicians (Germany), 203^ Adams, Mark, 276 Adenauer, Konrad, 118,225-6 Agol, Isaak, 369 Agricultural University (Saratov), 207 Agrodzhoint. See Agrojoint Agrojoint: German emigre physicians, 21,432,464-5,469-73,472-3; German emigre physicians, list of (Appendix), 488-92; Jewish-American organization, 21; and the KPD, 478-82; letters from emigre physicians to, 474-8; Medical Aid Societies, 470; Mutual Aid Societies, 470; Paris bureau, 486-7; regional branch in Kherson, 469; regional branch in Krivoi Rog, 485; regional

branch in Simferopol', 469; and Stalin's Terror, 482-5; support of by private foundations, 470 Alexander Hospital (Petrograd), 47 All-Academy Anniversary Commission, 66 All-Russian Institute of Experimental Medicine (Moscow), 434 All-Russian Microbiological Collection, 51,161,170, 249 All-Union Academy of Agricultural Science, 73 All-Union Bureau of Foreign Sanitary Information, 471,474,483 All-Union Congress of Neurologists and Psychiatrists, 378 Ail-Union Institute of Experimental Medicine (Moscow), 434-5 All-Union Neurologists' Conference, 437-8 All-Union Neuropathology Conference (Leningrad and Moscow), 410,425 All-Union Society for Cultural Ties Abroad (VOKS). See VOKS (AllUnion Society for Cultural Ties Abroad)

502 Index Ail-Union Society of Opponents of Alcohol 428 Amanshulov (veterinarian), 218 Amateurs of Natural Science, Anthropology, and Ethnology (Moscow), 249 American Anthropological Society and Nazi racial policies, 396 American Association for the Advancement of Science, 381 American Genetics Society, 381,389, 396 American Relief Administration (ARA), famine (1921), 469 American Society for Jewish Farm Settlement in Russia (AMSOJEFS), 470 American Society of Naturalists, 387 American Type Culture Collection (US), 171 Amerikanskaia evreiskaia ob'edinennaia agronomicheskaia korporatsiia 'Agrodzoint'. See Agrojoint Amoss, Harold, 253,263-4 Anatomical Institute (Germany), 419-20 Andreev, Andrei, 371 Anti-Bolshevik League, 143 Antonovskii, Dr, 272 Antrick (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Arbeiter: Herrschaft und Gestalt, Der (The Worker: Mastery and Form), 139 Arbeitsgemeinschaft fur Geopolitik (Association for Geo-Politics), 305 Arbeitsgemeinschaft fur Volksgesundung (Association for Health of the Nation), 307 Arbeitsgemeinschaft zum Studium

der Sowjetrussichen Planwirtschaft. See Arplan Arbusov (veterinarian), 218 Archives de Medecine Navale, 243 Archiv fiir Bevolkerungswissenschaft und Bevolkerungspolitik, 309 Arco, Georg, Graf von, 15,124,129 Arplan (German Society for the Study of the Soviet Planned Economy), 13; far-right and fascist members, 130; Five Year Plan, 130, 133,138; and Gesellschaft, zum Studium Osteuropas, 142-3; members on the left, 140; National Bolshevism and conflicts over, 13045; and Society of Friends, 142-3; von Harnack, secretary of, 133 Ascher, Elsa, 483 Ascher, Ernst, 473,481,483-4,4989n72 Aschoff, Ludwig, 14,207,257,340, 439; and German-Russian Laboratory for Comparative People's Pathology, 408-10; Moscow Brain Institute, 344; reports of on Soviet medicine, 464 Askanazy, Max, 257,265 Asmis, Dr, 210 Asnes (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Association for the Fight against Alcoholism, 428 Association for Health of the Nation (Germany), 307 Association of German Universities, 430 Association of Proletarian-Revolutionary Writers, 421 Atoxyl, 47,165 Auerbach, Theodor and Edith, 473, 484

Index 503 Auslandsdeutsche, 293, 297,299,308, 313; Zeiss and, 291,295-8 Auslandsdeutsche, Der (DAI newsletter), 297 Auslandsdeutsche Movement, 2958,307,312 Babukhin, Aleksandr Ivanovich, 415, 445n41 Bacteria tularense, Zeiss's work with, 183-4 Bacteriological Institute of the Second Moscow University, 222 bacteriology: and epidemiology, 253-4; institutionalization of in Russia, 261-4 Baron, Erich, 110,123-6,130,140, 142-3 Bartol'd, V.V., 71 Barykin, Vladimir, 250,264,268 Bauman, Karl, 370-1,374, 383-4, 396; On Preparations for the VII International Genetics Congress, 373 Bavarian Workers', Peasants' and Soldiers' Soviet, 137 Bayer Company, 47,162-3,168, 210. See also Atoxyl; Germanin; Naganol; suramin Bayer 205,161-7,174; experiments, 171; Soviet Asia, 210 Becker, Karl, 78 Behning (professor), 211 Bekhterev, Vladimir Mikhailovich, 340-1,360n31,363n58,415-19,423, 426,444n39 Belarus. See Belorussia Belich, A., 78 Belorussia: credit cooperatives in, 467; Jewish national territory, 465-

6; Jewish settlers in, 465,482; refugees in, 44 Belorussian University (Minsk), 417 Belyi, Andrei, 366n85 Benjamin, Margot, 473,484-5 Berger, Hans, 343 Berghaus, Heinrich, 244,252,260 Bergmann, Ernst von, 417,448n61 Berlin, 81,109,113, 334,467; in the 1930s, 388; medical studies in, 201; Soviet embassy personnel, 118-19 Berlin, Treaty of (1926), 51,407 Berlin and Moscow brain research institutes, comparisons, 325,327, 341-7 Berlin Hygiene Institute, 52, 203, 204 Berlin Institute for Brain Research. See KWI for Brain Research (Berlin) Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases, 412-13,420,424, 437, 443n29, 454nl23; Vogt member of, 409; withdrawal of Jacobsohn-Lask from, 427 Berlin University, 229,411-12; Polyclinic Institute, 413,443n30 Besredka, Alexander M., 170; view of Mechnikov, 177-8 Bessonov, S.A., 133 Beyer (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Bieling, Richard, 52,179 bilateralism, post-Rapallo, 17-20; relation of the partners with other countries, 11-12 Billroth Foundation for German Medicine Overseas, 37,40,48,50, 210 Bing, Paul Robert, 417,447n57

504 Index Binger (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 biological weapons, tularemia, 2023, 221-2 Biology Station (Sevastopol), 459nl78 Birger, O.G., 263 Birobidzhan, 482; Jewish national territory, 468-9 blood types: race-anthropological research, 220; race-pathological research, 220 Boas, Franz, 374,396 Boehm, Max Hildebert, 295 Bogdanov, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich, 349 Bohlen Halbach, Krupp von, 357nlO, 370 Bohr, N., 80 Bol'shaia meditsinskaia entsiklopediia, 264; medical geography in, 241-2 Bolshevik Revolution, 262; tenth anniversary, 226 Bolshevism, 135-8,225,377 Bonhoeffer, Karl, 427 border crossing: scientific cooperation and, 13-17,328; Zeiss and, 276 Bordier, Arthur, 243, 259 • Borisiak (Berlin, 1927), 15,18-19 Boss, Adolf, 471,473,481; execution of, 485 Boss, Josephine, 477 Boudin, Jean-Christian-Marc, 243, 259 boundary objects, 13,16,159-61, 184-5 brain research: collaboration under strain, 350-2; comparison of Berlin and Moscow, 6, 325, 341-7; elite brains, 341,349-50; elite collection,

366n85; inter-institute collaboration, 347-50; methodological innovations, 329-30. See also KWI for Brain Research (Berlin); Lenin Institute for Brain Research (Moscow); Moscow Brain Research Institute Brauer, Ludolf, 38,175 Brest-Litovsk, Treaty of, 36,83 Britain, 73,85,388; experimental epidemiology, 253,263-4; genetics in, 381, 393-4; medical geography, 241,243; politics of genetics, 395; response of to Moscow congress, 77,375; Seventh International Genetics Congress, 385,391 British Eugenics Society, and genetics congress, 391 Brockdorff-Rantzau, Ulrich Graf von, 115,123,231nl, 292,326; Soviet-German research agreements negotiator, 7-8; and Vogt's mandate, 337-8 Brodmann, Korbinian, 329-30,413 Brok, Olaf, 80,98nl02 Bronner, Vol'f Moiseevich, 431-3, 457nl55, 471,496n34; arrest of, 483 Brugsch (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Brussilovskii, L.Ia., 4,10 Bubnov, A.S., 74 Bukharin, 377 Bumke, Oswald, 418,449n70 Bumm, Geheimrat R., 4 Bunak, V.V., 336 Bund der Freunde der Sowjetunion (League of Friends of the Soviet Union), 128 Bund fur Mutterschutz (League for the Protection of Motherhood), 124

Index 505 Bund Geistige Berufe (Union of Intellectual Professions), 140,142 Bunina, E.D., 174-5,180,184,191n45, 195n85,197-8nll2; replacement of Zeiss by, 224 Burdenko, Nikolai Nilovich, 10,423 Burgdorfer, Friedrich, 305; co-editor of Archiv fur Bevolkerungswissenschaft, 309

Burleigh, Michael, 116 Butyrka Prison, Central Military Hospital, 204 Bykova, Nina, 85 camel disease. See trypanosomiasis camel expeditions, 200,210-18. See also trypanosomiasis Canada, response of to Moscow congress, 375 Carnegie Institute, 79 Cassirer, Richard, 418,448n64 Catholic Christian missions (Russia), 225 Catholic Zentrum, 225-6 Central Bacteriological Laboratory (Moscow), 50-1,161, 205; and mobile field laboratories, 46 Central Bacteriological Museum of Live Cultures, Control Institute, 171 Central Biological Laboratory (Moscow), 248 Central Commission for Brain Research (Brain Commission), aims of, 328 Central Committee Agriculture Department, 382 Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party/Bolsheviks. See TsK VKP(b)

Central Committee of Famine Relief (Pomgol), 108 Central Executive Committee (TsIK). See TsIK Charcot, Jean Martin, 415-16,445n43 Chemical-Pharmaceutical Scientific Institute (Russia), 160,163,202 Chemisch-BakteriologischeLaboratorium (Chemical-Bacteriological Laboratory) [Saratov], 207 Chernomordzev (veterinarian), 218 Chernov, Mikhail, 370 Chernyshev, Aleksei S., 345,434,436, 438-9,459nl74; Lenin's brain research, 339 Chicherin, Georgi V., 9,39,70,73,78, 84,102nl35,111-12,115 Children's Hospital (Uralsk), 213 China, response of to Moscow congress, 85,230,375 Chizhevskii, Aleksandr, 259,269 cholera, 46; increases in, 44 Clinic for Skin and Venereal Diseases, 471 Cohen-Philipps, Jenny, 473 Collection of Live Cultures (Moscow), 253; Zeiss's terminology, 192n53 Comintern. See Communist International (Comintern) Commissar of Public Health, 248, 277, 294; and tularemia cultures, 221 Commissariat for the Observation of Public Order, (Germany), 129 Commissariat of Agriculture (Narkomzem), 370-1 Commissariat of Enlightenment (Narkompros), 9,371 Commissariat of Foreign Affairs

506 Index (NKID). See NKID (Commissariat of Foreign Affairs) Commissariat of Public Health. See Narkomzdrav (Commissariat of Public Health) Commission for Preserving the Memory of V.I. Lenin, 423 Commission on the History of Science of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, 180 Committee for the Commemoration of Lenin, 333 Committee on the Consequences of Famine (Poslegol), 108 Communist Academy, 75-6,181, 344,351,366n90 Communist International (Comintern), 105,108-10,120,354,463; Agitprop department, 126,128; left turn of, 128-9; occupation of the Ruhr, 135-6 Communist Party, 344-6,353,481; Levit's expulsion from, 378; and Romer, 139; Schaxel joins, 395-6. See also German Communist Party (KPD) Communist Physicians' Collective, 480,481 Congress of Bacteriologists (1925), 172,173 Congress of Friends of the Soviet Union, 128 Congress of German Pathologists, 257 Control Institute, 160,168,169,1702,175,176; live microbial cultures collection, 160-1; and Zeiss's dismissal from, 184. See also Institute for Serum and Vaccine Control; Institute of Experimental

Therapy and Serum Vaccine Control Cook, Robert, 387 Council of the People's Commissars (Sovnarkom), 9, 73, 76, 81,87,335, 340, 352,373,382,386; grants, 81; RAS anniversary celebration, 68, 69,74-5 Crew, Francis A., 386-7,391-2 Crimea, Department of Health, 4789; Jewish settlement region, 465-6, 470,473,482,486 cultural diplomacy: defined, 103-4; Soviet cultural diplomacy, 104-8, 112-3,144-5; and Zeiss in Moscow, 291-5. See also dualism. Curie, Marie, 64 Czerny (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Dahlberg, Gunnar, 386,391 DAI (Deutsches Auslands-Institut [German Foreign Institute]), 240, 273,278n6,297,311; Volga Germans and, 300 Darkshevich, Liverii Osipovich, 416, 446n51 Darlington, Cyril, 392 Darwin, Charles, 199-200,334 Darwinism, 343 Davenport, Charles, 388-9 Davidenkov, Sergei, 374 Davidsohn, Lasar, 486 Davis, Watson, 392 Demerec, Milislav, 381,390 Demographic Research Group (Germany), working agenda for 19347,309 demography, and population, 302, 305

Index 507 Demuth, Fritz, 484 Deutsche Auslands Institut (German Foreign Institute). See DAI Deutsche Bank, 116 Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Blutgruppenforschung (German Association for Research on Blood Groups), Volga Germans and, 300-1 Deutsche Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas, 106-7,129,131,142-3, 145,408; and Arplan, 142-3; dealing with VOKS, 113-14; and Hoetzsch, 120-2; and Shtange, 126-7; and Soviet cultural diplomacy, 113-19; Volga Committee, 206-7. See also German Society for the Study of Eastern Europe Deutsche Rundschau, 86 Deu tsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift, co-editors, 6 Deutsch-Russische Medizinische Zeitschrift / Russko-Nemetskii meditsinskii zhurnal, 3,5,407,423 Deutsche Schulverein, 307 Deutsches Archiv fur Geschichte der Medicin und Medicinische Geographie, 243, 247 Deutschnationale Volkspartei (DNVP), 117 Deutschtum, 298 Diatroptov, Petr N., 179-80,202; and Zeiss's position at Control Institute, 184 Dienemann, Georg, 486 Dimanstein, Semen, 482 Dinges, Georg, 211 Dirksen, Herbert von, 226,278n6; on German-Soviet scientific interactions, 8

diseases: among national minorities, 270-2; geographical distribution of, 46; Hirsch's social patterns, 245; iron curtain discourse on, 37-8; monitoring epidemics, 248; world patterns of, 244. See also specific diseases DNVP (German National People's Party), 203 Dobreitser, LA., 271 Dobzhansky, Theodosius, 390 Domke, Walter, 471,473,481,485 Doxiades (founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 dualism, Soviet cultural diplomacy in Germany, 103,145-6 Dunker (KDP official), 140 Dunn, Leslie Clarence, 361 n35,388-9 Dupeux, Louis, 138 Dutch Genetics Society, 394 East Germany (GDR), 484-5; archives of, 7; and Vogt, 327 Eastern Europe, 292,296; geomedical research and war, 311-13; restructuring, 308 Eastern Front, 201 Economics Institute (Konigsberg), 116 Economo, Constantin von, 329, 360n31 Edinburgh, Seventh International Genetics Congress (1939), 370,386, 391-2 Ehrlich, Paul, 162,253 Eighth All-Russian Congress of Bacteriologists, Epidemiologists, and Sanitary Physicians (Leningrad), 171,248 Einstein, Albert, 15,63,122,129

508 Index EKO (Eweiiskoe kolonizatsionnoe obshchestvo), 467 Elberfeld Farbwerke, 162 elite brains. See brain research institutes Emelin,V.S., 165-7,210 Emergency Association for German Science, 64 emigre physicians. See Agrojoint Enukidze, Avel' Safronovich, 352 epidemic control: East Prussia-Silesia, 42; international goals, 43-5; mass migration and, 44 epidemiology: institutionalization of in Russia, 261-4; and microbiology, 250; military uses, 250-1,312; research in, 275 Eppendorf Hospital (Hamburg), 175 Erb, Wilhelm, 418,448n67 Eschmann, Ernst Wilhelm, 139 eugenics, 201,334; racism, 376-82 European International Health Conference, Russian typhus, 44 Evdokimov, G.E., 74, 75 Evolutionary Physiology meeting, International Congress of Physiologists (Moscow and Leningrad, 1935), 430 Evreiiskoe kolonizatsion noe obshchestvo. See EKO Ewald, Walter, 268 experimental epidemiology, 253^1, 260 Ezhov, Nikolai, 371 Falkenburger, Fritz, 486 famine (1921), 205 Fascism, and genetics, 370 Feilchenfeld, Hans, 486 Ferguson, Niall, 12

Fernald, Guy, 419 Fersman, A.E., 15,18-19, 66, 68, 72, 82 Fifteenth International Congress of Physiologists (Moscow and Leningrad, 1935): conference languages, 429-30; Jacobsohn-Lask registered at, 429-31 Filimonov, Ivan Nikolaevich, 344-6, 348-50,352; Lenin's brain research, 339; salary of, 346 Finke, Leonhard Ludwig, 241, 243, 252,259 Finke, Walter, letter to Agrojoint, 474-5 First All-Russian Congress for Psychoneurology, 332-3 First All-Union Neuropathology Conference (Leningrad, 1927), 424 First International Conference of the Neurosciences (Amsterdam), 417 First Moscow State University, 426 First Neurological World Conference (Bern), 428 First World War, 203, 407; German scientific travels after, 199-201; scientific casualties of, 3,418; and the Treaty of Versailles, 295; Zeiss's reports after, 207 Fischer, Alfons, 268 Fischer, Hugo, 139 Fischer, Otto, 50,299 Flatau, Edward, 412,414,417-18, 426,441n20 Flechsig, Paul, 357n4 Flexner (British epidemiologist), 264 Foerster, Otfried, 10,333,358-9n21, 423, 429 Folia medica (bilingual German-Russian journal), 48

Index 509 Forel, August, 331,342 Tourneau 309,' 168 France, 73, 85-6,179,259; medical geography, 241,243,245-6,246; RAS anniversary celebration, 69, 77; response of to Moscow congress, 375; rivalry between Germany and, 16; Seventh International Genetics Congress (1937),385;Zeissin,174 Francis, Edward, 183 Franco, Francisco, 381 Frankfurt University, 475 Freiburg University, 45,475; medical studies in, 201 Freie Schule (Berlin), 419 French-Soviet scientific relations, in medicine, 168,170; in microbiology, 176 Frenkel', Z.G., 268 Frey, Gottfried, 40 Fricke, Rudolf, 37 Friedlander, Leo, 480 Friedlander, Walter, 486; letter to Agrojoint, 475-6 Friedrich-Wilhelm University (Berlin), 295,326; Neurobiological Laboratory, 328; Zeiss awarded Chair of Hygiene, 36 Friedrichstadt Hospital (Dresden), 201 Fubini, G., 82 Fuchs, Caspar Friedrich, 244,246, 252,259 Fuchs, Eduard, 129 Galison, Peter, 248 Gastrea theory, of Haeckel, 179 Gay, Peter, 240 Generalplan Ost, 230,308-9

Genetics, and eugenics, 376-82; and Germany, 372; links to fascism, 385; and race, 386-93; and Soviet Russia, 376-80. See also Seventh International Genetics Congress 'Geneticists' Manifesto' (Muller), 392 geomedicine, 245,273,291; of the East, 36; field of, 17, 203; founders of, 201; and geopolitik, 301-7; in Russia, 200,219-20; and social hygiene, 302; Zeiss's contributions to, 218-21,230 geopathology, and racial pathology, 264-6 geopolitics: and geomedicine, 301-7; and the political right, 203 Geopolitik (journal), 305 German Army, Medical Inspection Agency, 204 German Commission of the Association of Soviet Writers, 429 German Communist Party (KPD), 110,122,351,419,432,483; and Berta Lask, 421,428,437; letters from emigre physicians to, 474; occupation of the Ruhr, 135-6; physician members of, 481; Scheringer line, 136; social work of, 419-20; and the Society of Friends, 128; Soviet Union as sanctuary for, 463; von Harnack as secret member of, 133 German Embassy (Moscow), 219, 226,278n6,294; Zeiss as emissary for, 200; Zeiss on Institute for Social Hygiene, 270 German emigre physicians. See Agrojoint German ethnic associations, 296 German Foreign Office, 205,206,210,

510 Index 219,240,249,464; brain research institutes collaboration, 326; cultural division, 8,45,116; financial support for Moscow Brain Institute, 346-7; and German-Russian Laboratory for Comparative People's Pathology, 409; medical expeditions, 407; and Vogt's mandate, 337; and Volga German refugees, 42; Zeiss on payroll of, 199200 German Genetics Society, 394 German Hospital, 40 German-Jewish emigre physicians, 462-3; arrests of, 482; classified as economic refugees by Soviets, 463; emigration of to the Soviet Union, 432-3,462-87; immigration process, 471-3; immigration status of, 469; and Rosen, 470; treatment of, 485 German-Jewish middle class, Soviet Union as destination for, 463 German Military Mission, Turkey, 201 German military mission (St Petersburg), medical assistance to German POWs, 37 German National People's Party. See DNVP German Pathological Society (Vienna), 265 German Red Cross, 163,168,172, 292,299; Central Bacteriological Laboratory (Moscow), 202; closing of bacteriological laboratory, 161; conflict over, 47-50,48; humanitarian relief expedition, 39-41; Zeiss installed as director of, 269

German Red Cross Mission, 36, 205; Zeiss and, 45,200 German relief team, sanitary train to aid Volga German refugees, 40-1 German Research Society (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft), 226. See Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft German-Russian bilateral relations, 240,407; (1920s), 421-7 German-Russian Laboratory for Comparative People's Pathology, 266,408. See also German-Russian Laboratory for Racial Pathology; German-Russian Laboratory for Racial Research German-Russian Laboratory for Racial Pathology (Moscow), 14, 274,340,347,350; joint venture in Moscow, 6; support for medical expeditions, 407 German-Russian Laboratory for Racial Research, 274 German-Russian medical communities, 437-9 German-Russian medical relations, 408; cultivation of, 49,52; Treaty of Rapallo, 8-11 German-Russian scientific ties: and colleagues in other countries, 1113; and Russian public health researchers, 5-6 German Society for the History of Medicine and Science, 180-1 German Society for the Study of Eastern Europe, 423; and RAS anniversary celebrations, 64 See also Deutsche Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas German-Soviet cooperation, 7-12,

Index 511 35-6,160; in brain research programs, 341-7; in culture, 8-9; interpretations of, 7-8; medical, 3-22, 487; in neuroscience, 417-18; scientific, 45. See also KWI for Brain Research (Berlin); Moscow Brain Research Institute German-Soviet Treaty of Neutrality and Friendship (Berlin Treaty), 51, 407 German University (Saratov), and the Volga Germans, 208 German Volga Republic (Pokrovsk), 206, 209. See also Volga German Republic German War Ministry, Special Group R, 49 Germanin, 47,163,210 Germany, 84, 86,201-3,230, 258, 334-5,381; and diplomatic relations with Soviet Union, 182; eugenics in, 394; left in, 103; medical geography, 241,245-7,276; nationalism in, 103; and RAS anniversary celebrations, 64,77; response of to Moscow congress, 375; rightward drift of, 131; rivalry between France and, 16; Seventh International Genetics Congress (1937), 385; Soviet Union exchanges, 171; Zeiss in, 174; Zeiss's sudden return to, 226-7 Germany, Nazi (Third Reich), 137, 332,411,424; Citizens' Law, 4556nl40; Colonial Office (Reichskolonialamt), 206; Committee for Public Health, 307; Foreign Ministry, 375; government, 299; Health Office, epidemic prevention wall, 42; Ministry of Education, 375,430;

Ministry of Propaganda, 375; Ministry of Science, 375; Research Council, 203; Soviet Union and, 381 Germany, Weimar Republic, 135, 296,303,308,312,421; brain research institutes founded, 325; cultural policy in Soviet Russia, 291; Gesellschaft links to, 121-2; Nazi seizure of power, 135; new nationalism, 136; Soviet cultural diplomacy, 103,104,107,140,1434; VOKS showcase, 113 Gesellschaft der Freunde des Neuen Russland, 106-7,109,110,112, 120-30,408,421; and Arplan, 1423; comparison with VOKS, 117-18; cultural front organization, 124; membership, 125-6; pro-Soviet nature of, 123; VOKS's contributions to, 124-5 Gesellschaft fur Rassenpathologie und Geographische Verbreitung der Krankheiten (Society for Racial Pathology and the Geographic Spread of Diseases), 219 Gesellschaft (Landesgruppe Rheinland) (German Society for the Study of Eastern Europe, Rhineland regional committee), 225-6 Geserd (Gesellschaft zur Forderung des Judischen Siedlungswerkes in der UdSSR [German Society for the Advancement of Jewish Settlement Work in the USSR]), 466-7 Gestapo, 375,411,432; special arrest list, 486 Ghigi, Alessandro, politics of genetics, 394 Gilde, Siegfried, 473

512 Index GINZ (State Institute of Public Health), 162,169,170,264 Girshfel'd, Aleksandr, 131-4,136, 139,140-3,145 global imperialism (Weltimperialismus), 220,236n62; and tropical medicine, 236 Glotova, E.V., 191n45,197-8nll2 Glum, Friedrich, 337-8 Goebbels, Joseph, 42 Goldenberg (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Colder, F., 86 Goldscheider, Alfred, 417,441n20, 443n30,447n59 Goldschmidt, Richard, 385,388 Gol'dshmidt, V.M., 79 Gol'dshtein (VOKS representative, 1924), 125 Gorbachev, Mikhail, 327 Gorbunov, N.P., 47, 64, 73-5, 77, 79, 81,86-7,160,335,372, 382,384-6, 408; commission, 76; death of, 182; Soviet-German research agreements representative, 7; Stalinist purges, 351 Gorky, Maxim, 38-9,366n85 Gosplan. See Soviet State Planning Agency (Gosplan) Gottstein, Albert, 268 Gould-Davies, Nigel, 147n7 Grabowsky, Adolf, 143 Gran, M.M., 266 Great Depression, 463 Great Terror, 381, 388; KamenevZinoviev bloc, 377 Grenz- und Auslandsdeutschtum, 297 Griesemer, James, 159 Groer, LA., 469,480-1,483

Gross, Walter, co-editor of Archiv fur Bevolkerungswissenschaft, 309 grofideutsches Reich (Greater German Reich), 296,304 Grotjahn, Alfred, 268 Griinbaum, Alexander, 486 Griinberg, Karl, 122,129 Giinther, Max, 476-7 Giinther, Ruth, 476-7 Giinther, Ruth (daughter), 476 Giitt, Arthur, co-editor of Archiv fur Bevolkerungswissenschaft, 309 Haeckel, Ernst, 178-9 Haenish, E., 84 Hagedoorn, A.L., 394 Hahn, Martin, 37 Haigh, W.E., 43-4 Haldane, J.B.S., 392 Hallervorden, Julius, 355 Hamburg Institute of Tropical Medicine, 38,47,201,202 Hamburg University, 228; Medical Faculty, 175 Harmsen, Hans, 308; co-editor of Archiv fur Bevolkerungswissenschaft, 309; and geomedical agenda, after Zeiss, 53 Hass, Elli, 477 Hauptmann, Gerhart, 38-9 Haushofer, Karl, 203,260,302,304, 308 Hautemann, Max, 473 Heckert, Fritz, 480 Hedin, Sven, 294 Hellpach, Willy, 259 Herder Institute (Riga), 209 Hermann, Dr, 207 Hess, Gerhardt, 486 Heymann, Klara, 477

Index 513 Heyse, Ernst, 344,347 Hilger, Gustav, 39,49, 51 Hirsch, August, 244-6, 247, 252, 259, 269 His, Wilhelm, Jr, 37 Hitler, Adolf, 138,353-4,387; Germany of, 388; Rassenhygiene (eugenics), 394 Hochschule fur Politik (Berlin), 143 Hoetzsch, Otto, 84,140,143; and the Gesellschaft zum Studium Osteuropas, 115-17,120-2,408; on Rapallo treaty, 133; VOKS connections of, 118 Hogben, Lancelot, 374,392 Holl, Karl, 84 Hoover, Herbert, 39 Hueppe, F., 173 human genetics: eugenics and racism, 376-82; links to fascism, 385; and race, 386-93 humanitarian relief, Russian famine, 38-41,43-5 Humboldtians, 244,246,252,259,277 Huxley, Julian, 373-4,379-80, 382, 392 Hygienisch-Bakteriologischelnstitut der deutschen Republik in Pokrovsk (Hygienic-Bacteriological Institute of the German Republic in Pokrovsk), 207 Hyman (secretary of the JDC, NY), 484 lagoda, G.G., 74, 79 IAH. See Internationale Arbeiter Hilfe (IAH) lakimov, Vasili L., 166,167 lakovenko, E.I., 268 lakovlev, lakov, 382-3,385-6

Ikor (Idishe kolonizatsye organizatsye [Organization for Jewish Colonization in the Soviet Union]), in the US, 466 Ilovaiskii, Sergei Aleksandrovich, 164-7 Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD), 335 India, response of to Moscow congress, 375 Industrial Party trial, 182 Inner Mission, in Germany, 308 Institute for Biophysics (Russia), 255 Institute for Experimental Medicine (Russia), 261, 262 Institute for Experimental Veterinary Medicine (Russia), 254; Department of Helminthology, 269 Institute for Higher Nervous Activity (Russia), 351 Institute for Hygiene, University of Giessen, 201 Institute for Racial Research. See German-Russian Laboratory for Comparative People's Pathology Institute for Serum and Vaccine Control. See Control Institute Institute for Social and Community Medicine (Russia), 266 Institute for Social Hygiene (Moscow), 181,255-6,269-70 Institute of Experimental Therapy and Serum-Vaccine Control, 169 Institute of Genetics (Russia), 383 Institute of Medical Genetics (Russia), 376,378 Institute of Nutritional Physiology (Russia), 171 Institute V.I. Lenin, 336

514 Index Institut fur Grenz- und Auslandsstudien, 296 Institut fur Schiffs-und-Tropenkrankheiten (Institute for Naval and Tropical Diseases) [Hamburg], 240 International Association of the Academies, Brain Commission, 328, 329 International Committee of the Red Cross, 39 International Conference of Internal Medicine (Moscow), JacobsohnLask and Minor at, 414 International Medical Conference (Moscow), 417 International Physiologists' Conference (Leningrad, 1935), 424, 434 International Red Aid, 458nl68, 463 International Red Cross, 17 International Research Council, 83; Charter of, 101nl28 International Society for Geo-Pathology, 257,265 International Society for Microbiology, 182 Internationale Arbeiter Hilfe (IAH), 109-10; World Congress for Economic Aid and Reconstruction of the New Russia, 110 internationalism, post-Rapallo, 1213,17-20; 393-6 Intourist visas, 480; physicians to Moscow via, 471 Ipatiev (Berlin, 1927), 15 Ipsen, Gunther, 320n88 IRH (International Red Help [Rote Hilfe]), 433,473,481,483

iron curtain: epidemiological, 42; of war, 45 Isaakov, H.R., 213 Italy, 81-2,85-6,259; politics of genetics, 394; and RAS anniversary celebrations, 77 Jacob, P., 417 Jacobsohn-Lask, Louis, 409^10, 453nll8; consultant to Kremlin, 421; death of, 436; German-Russian medical communities, 437-9; and his name, 441 nl 4; immigration of to Soviet Russia, 21,411; joins Berlin Medical Society, 411; juvenile offenders, 419; marginalization of, 420-1; as politically detached, 423; publication of photographic atlas, 429; research agenda of, 409-10; students, 412; Vergleichende and Vogt rivalry, 424-5,438 Jahresbericht, 414-16; Jacobsohn-Lask, editor of, 418 Jahresbericht contributors from: Austria-Hungary, 415; Berlin, 415; Italy, 415; Poland, 415; Sweden, 415; Switzerland, 415 Jahresbericht uber die Leistungen und Fortschritte aufdem Gebiete der Neurologie und Psychiatric. See Jahresbericht Janus, Archives internationals pour I'Histoire de la Medecine et pour la Geographic medicale, 243,247 Japan, response of to Moscow congress, 375; tularemia, 222, 223 JDC. See Joint Distribution Committee

Index 515 Jena school of comparative neuroanatomy, 430,431 Jennings, Herbert, 373-4,389-91; politics of genetics, 394 Jessner, Max, 274 Jewish Communist organizations, resettlement project, 466-7 Jewish national territory, 466 Jewish settlement regions, 473 Jewish workers, under National Socialism, 354 Jews: anti-Jewish legislation, 387; anti-Semitism and Zeiss, 230; deprivation of civil rights of, 4556nl40; emigration of Jewish refugees to Western Europe after the October Revolution, 465; forced migration of scientists, 20-1,412; impact of the October Revolution on, 465; of Samarkand, 85. See also German-Jewish emigre physicians Joint Distribution Committee (JDC): founder of Agrojoint, 469; Warsaw branch, 487 Jolly, Friedrich, 416,442n25,446n49 Jonas, Hans, 84,118,129 Journal fur Psychologic und Neurologic (JPsN), 329, 331, 347 Journal of Heredity, 387 JPsN. See Journal fur Psychologic und Neurologic (JPsN) Jiinger, Ernst, 138-9,303 Jungkonservative Bewegungen (young conservative movement), 296 Juniklub, 296,316n28 Junkers aircraft factory, 49,50 Kahn, Bernhard, 470,480,484 Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft. See KWG

Kaiser Wilhelm Institute (KWI) for Brain Research (Berlin). See KWI for Brain Research (Berlin) Kalinin, Mikhail I., 63,64,352-3, 366n85,482 Kamenev, Lev Borisovich, 39,63, 105, 377 Kameneva, Ol'ga Davydovna, 84, 108-13,115,122-9,141,144-5; OBI and VOKS, 105; and Ost-Europa, 118-20 Kamenev-Zinoviev bloc, 377 Kaminskii, Grigorii N., 377,378,433, 470,480,483,496n31 Kappers, Ariens, 410 Karpechenko, Georgii, 372 Karpinskii, Aleksandr P., 63,75, 366n85 Karutz, Richard, 216 Kazan Republic, 41,85; famine of 1921,205 Kazan University, 416 Keller, Boris, 372 Kerzhentsev, P.M., 81, 82 Khalturin, D.N., 75 Kharkov, 262, 272, 301, 485 Khimki clinic (Moscow), 473 Kiev Institute of Microbiology, 183 Kireev, Mikhail Petrovich, 161 Kirghiz, compared with Aboriginal peoples of North America, 216; Zeiss's cultural report (1927), 21617 Kirov, Sergei M., 366n85 Kjellen, Rudolf, 203,260 Koch, Robert, 38,47,123,178,229, 253; Pettenkofer debate, 261; Robert Koch Institute for Infectious Diseases (Berlin), 253 Koestler, Arthur, 498-9n72

516 Index Kohlberg, Lawrence, 419 Kohler, Robert, 277 Kollontai, A.M., 79 Kol'man, Ernst G., 351,377-8 Kol'tsov, Nikolai, 265-6,334,371, 373,379-80, 384; Institute of Experimental Biology, 171; Institute of Nutritional Physiology, 171 Komarov, Vladimir, 371, 382,384-6 Komarov-Gorbunov memorandum, 382, 384-6 Komitet po zemel' nomu ustroistvu trudiashchikhsia evreev (Committee on the Settlement of Jewish Toilers on the Land). See Komzet Kommission fur Blutgruppenforschung (Commission for Research on Blood Groups), 301 Komzet (Committee on the Settlement of Jewish Toilers on the Land), 465,467-8,469,482-3,484 Koopman, Karl, 210-11,214 Korach, Alfred, 473,486 Korach, Kathe, 477 Korsakov, Sergei Sergeevich, 426 Korshun (head, Metchnikov Institute), 222 Korzhinskaia, A.F., 174,195n85 Kovalevskii, Alexander O., 180 Kozhevnikov, Aleksei lakovlevich, 415,426,445n42 KPD. See German Communist Party (KPD) Krachkovskii, Liu., 75, 79,81 Krai collection (Prague), 171 Kramer, V.V., 336 Krasin, Leonid Borisovich, 63,70, 73, 78,82,95n61 Kraus, R, 4, 6,10 Kreitz, Werner, 139

Krestinskii, Dr (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Krestinskii, Nikolai Nikolaevich, 4, 15,18-19, 79,125,128 Krichevskii, I.L., 222 Kristi, M.P., 69 Krol', Mikhail, 416,417,426,434, 446n54,455nl33; First Neurologi^ cal World Conference (Bern), 428 Krupinski publishing, 486 Krupp, Friedrich Alfred, 326,328. See also Bohlen Halbach, Krupp von Krupp family, 424 Krupskaia, Nadezhda, 366n85 Krylov, A.N., 66 Krzhizhanovskii, G.M., 74 Kuhlenbeck, Hartwig, 410,440nll Kuibyshev, Valerian V 112,476 Kiinstlerhilfe (Artists Assistance), and Soviet culture, 109 Kurkin, P.I., 268 KWG (Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft), 331; founding of, 328-9, 332; support for Berlin Institute, 346; and Vogt's contract, 337-8 KWI for Brain Research (Berlin), 326, 328, 329-32,338-9,341-3,346-7, 354,355-6,423^; budget 1925, 359n25; budget 1933,359n27; and cooperation with Moscow, 19; deposits for the benefit of Vogt's research, 362n42; genetics laboratory, 331; investment costs, 359n26; under National Socialism, 353-6; political spectrum of personnel, 353 Laboratory for Racial Pathology, 274-5. See also German-Russian Laboratory for Racial Pathology

Index 517 Laboratory for Veterinary Bacteriology (Urals), 207 Laboratory of Evolutionary Mechanics (Russia), 430 Lagorio, A.E., 79 Lakhtin, Mikhail I., 181,255; death of, 182 Landauer, Walter, 372-3,383^, 38890; political views of, 395-6 Lask, Berta (Mrs Louis JacobsohnLask), 410,418,432-3,440nlO, 450n80,450n85,451n89, 453nll8; arrest of, 428; influence of, 437; revolutionary-proletarian woman writer, 420-2 Lask, Dora (daughter-in-law of LJL), 429 Lask, Emil (brother of Berta Lask), 451n89 Lask, Ernst (son of LJL), 421,460nl89 Lask, Hermann (son of LJL), 421,424, 457nl55,461nl92 Lask, Ludwig (son of LJL), 421,429, 431-2,457nl55,461nl92 Lask, Marianne (granddaughter of LJL), 429 Latour, Bruno, interessements theory, 159 Laue, M. von, 79 Laveran, Alphonse, 167 Lavrent'ev, Boris Innokent'evich, 434-5,439 Law for the Protection of the German People and German Honour, 455-6nl40 Lazarev, Petr Petrovich, 15, 66, 71-2, 255,335 League of Nations, 39,191n47,350; famine areas in Ukraine and Caucasus, 43

League of Nations Health Organization (LNHO), 17; Serological Commission, 169,171 League of Nations Health Section, Epidemiological Intelligence Reports, 267-8 League of Nations Hygiene Section, 260 Lebedeva (Russian bacteriologist), 250 Lebensraum ideology, 35-6,40,49, 301,304-5,310,312; Zeiss's interest in, 45-6 Leibbrandt, Georg, 297, 316n35 Lenin, V.I., 9,345, 377,424; brain of, 19,325,327, 331,333-4,339,342, 347-8,350,423-1; brain of, final report (1936), 352-3; bust of, 85; cytoarchitectonic study of the brain of, 409; death of, 333-4; endorsement of Zeiss, 47; Miinzenberg and international relief action, 109; principles on treatment of minorities, 208,214. See also brain research institutes Leningrad, 74, 78, 85,171,429,430; and RAS anniversary celebrations, 64 Leningrad Brain Institute, 363n58; transfer of elite brains to Moscow from, 341 Leningrad Physiologists' Conference (1935), 435 Lenin Institute for Brain Research, 266, 336-8 'Leninism in medicine' society, 377 Lenz, Friedrich, 130,138-9,142-3; ultranationalism of, 132-3 Leonhard, Susanne, 486 Lerner, E.G., 142

518 Index Leuckart, Rudolf, 178 Levi, S., 82,86 Levin, John, 473 Levit, Solomon, 369,371,373-4,37680,385,389 Levit-Livent, 121 Lewandowsky, Max, 417-18,448n65 Lewy, Fritz Heinrich, 412,425, 442n26 Leyden, Ernst von, 441 n20 Liepmann, Hugo, 412,418,442n27 lishentsy: legal category of, 465; and medical aid societies, 470 Lister Institute, 171,184 Litvinov, M.M., 9,39, 74, 78-9,120, 335 Liubarskii S.E., 180,469 Liuders, G., 84 LNHO. See League of Nations Health Organization (LNHO) Locarno, Treaty of, 84 Loesch, Carl Christian von, 296 Lomonosov, M.V., 85 London Epidemiological Society, 245 Lonsinger, A., 209 loose concepts, 13 Lorenz, F.A., 209 Lowy, liana, 13, 277 Lubarsch (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Ludendorff, Erich, 35,49 Liiders, Heinrich, 64 Lukacs, Georg, 140 Lunacharskii, Anatolii Vasilievich, 15,63, 64, 71, 74-5, 78,118,123, 349; Stalinist purges, 351-2 Lurquin, C, 86 Luther, Arthur, 118 Lynch, Clara, 253

Lysenko, Trofim, 372,376,379-80, 382,389 McCo, L.U., 222 McCoy, George, 183 Madsen, Thorvald, 191n48 Maiakovskii, Vladimir Vladimirovich, 349,353 Mainzer, Wilhelm, letter to Agrojoint, 475 Maiskii, Ivan, 146nl Makar, A.M., 80 Makarova, lu.N., 174,191n45 Malakhovka house, 478,481; and the emigre physicians, 472 Malone, Edward Fall, 417 Mann, Heinrich, 122 Mann, Thomas, 122 Martsinovskii (director, Tropical Diseases Institute), 222 Marx-Engels Institute, 111 Max Delbruck Centre for Molecular Medicine, 356 Mayer, Georg, 134,173 Mayer, Martin, 201 Mechnikov, Il'ia I., 168,171-2,180; biography, 16; Franco-Russian view of, 177-8,197nl09; and the French, 178; on the Kirghiz people, 214; papers, 195n84; and Russian scientists, 180 Mechnikova, Olga N., 170,179; and Mechnikov's biography, 175-80 Mechnikov Institute for Infectious Diseases, 222 Mechnikov Museum, 171-2,175-7, 181; dissolution of, 185; live microbial cultures collection, 160-1 medical geography, 243,251-6,2734; contrasted with geographic

Index 519 medicine, 275; decline of, 245-7; direction of, 260; in Germany, 2427; roots of, 241; in Russia, 241,24760,277. See also geomedicine medical topography, 242,259,273, 302,310-11 Mehnert, Klaus, 143 Meifiner (professor), 320n88 Meister, Georgii, 372 Mendel, Emanuel, 411-18,429, 441nl5,441n20 Mendelian genetics, 376 Mensheviks, 377,378 Mesnil, Felix, 167 Metchnikow Institute for Infectious Diseases. See Mechnikov Institute for Infectious Diseases Meyer, Eduard, 64, 86 Meyer, Emil, 209 Meyerhold, Vsevolod, 65 Mezhlauk, Valerii, 384, 385 Mick, Christopher, 118,129 Microbiological Museum of Living Cultures, 227; closing of, 224; Zeiss head of, 202 microbiology, and epidemiology, 250 migration, of Jewish scientists from Germany to Russia, 20,462-3 Miletich, L., 78 Military Medical Academy (Berlin), 204 Military Medical Academy (St Petersburg), 262 Military Prison Hospital (Vladimir), 204 Miliutin, Vladimir Pavlovich, 75,76, 86-7,96-7n75,129 Minor, Lazar Solomonovich, 334-6, 412,414-21, 423,425-8,433,437,

453nll8; Science Worker of the USSR medal, 427 Minor, Salomon, 444-5n40 Minor, Victor, 436 minorities, Russian, 270-2 Minsk, 44,46,48,417; famine of 1921, 205 Modzalevskii, B.L., 85 Moeli, Karl, 417,447-8n60 Moeller van den Bruck, Arthur, 137, 296,315-16n26 Mohler, Armin, 315-16n26 Mohr, Otto, 369-70,371,374,376, 388,391,394; political right on issues of race, 387 Molas, B.N., 75 Molotov, V.M., 352,373-4,377,3826,482,486 Monakow, Constantin von, 357n4 Monsi, A. de, 82 Moscow, 50, 74,175,177,249,391, 467,471; Jacobsohn-Lask relocates to, 431; overcrowding, 171; PIOC withdrawal of from genetics congress, 386; Russian Brain Research Institute, 356; Zeiss's institutional base in, 247 Moscow Bacteriological Society, tularemia, 222 Moscow Brain Research Institute, 6, 19,325-7,344,349,351-3,423,4345,438-9; EEC research, 352; founding of, 340; personnel at, 345-6; state financing of, 346-7; Vogt director of, 409 Moscow City Party Committee, 377 Moscow Institute for Experimental Biology, 331, 334 Moscow Institute of Hygiene, 471

520 Index Moscow Society of Neuropathologists and Psychiatrists, 415,428 Moscow State University, 181,267 Moscow Tropical Diseases Institute, 222, 274; Department of Helminthology, 269 Moscow University: Clinic, 415; Department of Helminthology, 269 Mosse, Max, 268 Muhlens, Peter, 39-40,44,46,47-8, 165,202 Miihry, Adolph, 244,246,252,259 Muller, H.J., 371,379-80,382,391-2 Munchener Medizinische Wochenschrift, 249,251,275; Zeiss as Russian correspondent for, 294 Miinzenberg, Willi, 109-10,129; and the Society of Friends, 128,131 Muralov, Aleksandr, 371,372,374, 382 Murko, M., 86 Museum of Living Cultures. See Microbiological Museum of Living Cultures Mutual Assistance Organization of German Scientists Abroad, 484 Muzio (Italian physician), 259 Naganin, 168 Naganol, 16,47,163,167,234-5n35; clinical trials of in Soviet Union, 165-6 Nansen, Fridtjof, 39,80 Narimanov (comrade), 112 Narkomindel (People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs), 76,464,468, 479-80 Narkomzdrav (Commissariat of Public Health), 9,21,164,191n47, 202, 271,334,340,351,411,431,

464,479-80, 483; Control Institute, 168-9; and the emigre physicians, 471-3; GINZ, 169; letters from emigre physicians to, 474; Microbiological Institute, 264; and SerumVaccine Commission, 171-2; support for Aschoff, 408; support for medical expeditions, 407; Trotskyist conspiracy, 377-9 Natannsen, Hugo, 486 National Bolshevism, 142-3,145; conflicts over Arplan, 130-45; journal, 139; Soviet Union, 135 National Socialism, 36,138,139,203, 221, 302,307,354; demographic science, 313; Lebensraum ideology and, 301; race theory, 372 National Socialist Physician's Organization, 295 National Socialists, 303-4; 311; and power, 327, 353-4,428,429; Race Purity, 379-80; racial theories, 370, 372 nationalism: epidemic control and, 43-5; Germany, 103,106-7 Natural Science Association of the Communist Academy, 351-2 Navashin, Mikhail, 371 Nazi Germany, 411; emigration of scientists from, 20-1; racial theories, 381 Nazi Party (NSDAP), 136,295; and Eschmann, 139; and ethnic Germans, 311; and KWI for Brain Research, 353; Office for Racial Policy, 307,309; racist theories, 201; Zeiss joins, 52, 203 Near East: geomedical research and war, 312; Zeiss as emissary for German Embassy, 199, 200

Index 521 Needham, Joseph, 392 Needla, Z., 80 Neiding, Marcel Natanovich, 417, 446n53 Nelidov, A.I., 71 Nernst, V., 79 Netherlands, response of to Moscow congress, 375 Neue Russland, Das, 119,122,125,130, 408,421 Neufeld, Fred, 4,253-4, 264; De Lamar lectures, 253 Neumann, Franz, 304 Neumann, Heinz, 136 Neumann, Rudolf Otto, 201 Neurobiological Laboratory (Germany), 329 Neurological Institute of the University of Berlin, 336 Neurologische Zentralstation (Neurological Institute), 327; founding of, 326 Neurologisches Zentmlblatt, 412 Neuropathologiia, psikhiatria i psihogigiena, 434 Neuropathologiia i psikhiatria, obituary of Jacobsohn-Lask in, 436 New Economic Policy (1921-8), 350 New York Joint Distribution Committee, letters from emigre physicians to, 474 New York Times, 369,376-7,381; Nazi racial theories, 381-2; report on Vavilov's arrest, 388-9 Nicolson, Malcolm, 244 Niedermayer, Oskar von, 49 Niekisch, Ernst, 137,138 Nielsen, E.A., 432-3,436,457-8nl62 Nikanorov, S.M., 164,183-4,269 Nikiforov (Berlin, 1927), 15

Ninth All-Union Congress of Bacteriologists, Epidemiologists and Sanitary Doctors (Moscow), 264 NKID (Commissariat of Foreign Affairs), 13,104, 111, 120,124,134, 471,481; brain research institutes collaboration, 326; Kameneva and, 109; and RAS anniversary celebrations, 78-9; and VOKS, 109,140-2 NKPros (People's Commissariat of Education): Academy of Sciences, 62; Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), 66-7, 75; and visit of Slavists, 78 NKVD (People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs), 142,185,482, 485 Nobel oil company, 37 Nocht, Bernhard, 48 Nonne, Max, 211 Norway, 79; tularemia in, 223-4 Notgemeinschaf t der deutschen Wissenschaft (Emergency Association for German Science), 120,210,224, 240,258,266,335; financial support for Moscow Brain Institute, 346-7; financial support of Zeiss, 166, 200; and international academic relations, 51-2; and RAS anniversary celebrations, 64; Schmidt-Ott, 116,407; support for Aschoff, 408; Volga Germans and, 300; working conditions of Soviet physicians, 464; Zeiss on German science, 292 Novasanol, 46 Novosel'skii, S.A., 268 NSDAP. See Nazi Party (NSDAP) Nuremburg Laws, 201,429 Nye, Joseph, 8

522 Index Oberland paramilitary group, 139 Obermeier, Otto, 177 Obersteiner, Heinrich, 357n4 Obert, Dr (commissar of Public Health), 207 OBI. See United Information Bureau of the Commission on Foreign Aid (OBI) Obrastsova (Russian bacteriologist), 250 Obshchestvo zdravookhranenie evreev. See OZE (Society for Jewish Health) October Revolution, 128,326,420; Soviet Jews after the, 465-9 Odessa, 262,417 OGPU: and Kameneva, 122; surveillance of Zeiss, 182,223 Ol'denburg, S.F., 63-6, 68-9, 71-2, 74-7,81-4,113; results of RAS anniversary celebrations, 86; Soviet-German research agreements representative, 7; Stalinist purges, 351 Omelianskii, V.L., 173 Operation Barbarossa, 35-6,52-3 Oppenheim, Hermann, 412,416, 417-18,441n20,442n25 Oppenheimer, Franz, 122 OPR ('socially useful labour'), 346 Organizational Bureau (Orgburo), 370,371 ORT, German Jewish refugees, 467-8 Osborn, Max, 124 Osborne, Michael, 252 Oserskaia, Fanny, 433,435 Osoviakhim (Society for National Defence), 346 Ost-Europa (Gesellschaft periodical), 118,143,423; pressures on, 120-1;

and publication of Soviet authors in, 119 Ostforschung, East European ethnocentrism, 114-16 Ostpolitik, 36,38,296; and the Treaty of Versailles, 41 Otto, Berthold, 419,449n74 Otto, Richard, 40 Outline of Political Economy (Lenz), 132 Out of the Night (Muller), 379 OZE (Society for Jewish Health Care), 464,471,479-80,496n33; and the emigre physicians, 472 Ozet, 465-9,482; dissolution of, 484 'Pantheon of Brains,' 341 Paratyphoid B, 174 Paris: global centre, 70; Zeiss in, 182 Paris Peace Conference, 3 Pasteur, Louis, 170,173 Pasteur Institute, 51,166,168,170, 171,176,178,273 Pasteur stations, 261 Patrick, Hugh Talbot, 412, 441n21 Pavlov, Ivan Petrovich, 349; institute, 426; International Congress of Physiologists (Moscow and Leningrad, 1935), 430 Peking, global centre, 70 Pellio, P., 82 Pelz, Herbert, 480 People's Commissariat of Education. See NKPros (People's Commissariat of Education) People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs. See Narkomindel (People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs) People's Commissariat of Foreign Trade, 81,467

Index 523 People's Commissariat of Public Health. See Narkomzdrav Permanent International Organizing Committee for Genetics Congresses. See PIOC Peter the Great, 62,66, 89n3 Petrograd, 40,46,262; brain research institute, 340; famine of 1921, 205 Petrograd Academy of Sciences, election of international members to, 71 Petrov, Fedor, 133,135,144 Pettenkofer, Max von, 213,229,253, 263; Koch debate, 261 Piaget, Jean, 419 Pieck, Wilhelm, 481,483 Pinkevich (Soviet pedagogue), 118 PIOC (Permanent International Organizing Committee for Genetics Congresses), 369,371,386-7; withdrawal of congress from Moscow, 391 Pirogov Congress, 261 Planck, Max, 64, 84 Platonov, S.F., 71, 84, 88 Pletnev, D.D., 10, 273 Pliner, I.I., 482 Poddubnyi, M., 180 Podiapolsky,P.P.,211 Pokrovsk, 207,209 Pokrovskii, Mikhail N., 71,75, 76, 97n81,135,366n85 Poland: German physicians, 487; invasion preparations, 308; public health in, 44; and RAS, 71; response of to Moscow congress, 375; stigmatization of, 37; Volga Germans stranded in, 42 Polish-Soviet Treaty of Riga, 42

Polish workers, under National Socialism, 354 Politburo, 351,370; Lenin's brain research, 339; on the RAS anniversary celebrations, 72-4, 75, 87; Seventh international genetics congress, 375-6,385,396; Vogt and Lenin's brain, 333; and Vogt's mandate, 335-6 Political Bureau. See Politburo Pollack, Bernard, 417 Popov, Nikolai Semionovich, 341, 345,348,349; Lenin's brain research, 339 Popov, P.P., 269; Moscow Tropical Diseases Instititute, 274 Popova, Idaliia Stankevich, 345,348, 349; Lenin's brain research, 339 Pozern, B.M., 69 Pritchett (British epidemiologist), 264 Prochorowitsch (Magnitogorsk official), 476 Prokhorov, Mikhail, 383 Prokor (Argentinskoye obshchestvo sodeistviia evreiskoi kolonizatsii v Birobidzhane) [Argentina], 466 Propper (Deputy Commissar of Health), 435 Proskauer, Sigbert, 486 Prussian Institute for Infectious Diseases, 40 Prussian Ministry for Science, Art and Education, and Vogt's mandate, 337 Psychoneurological Institute (Russia), 352 Queisser pharmaceutical company, 38

524 Index race: and blood types, 220; term, for Kol'tsov, 266 Race Purity, 379 racial anthropology, 203 racial hygiene, 201 racial ideology, and German culture, 301,306 racial pathology, 256-7,260,274; and geopathology, 264-6; and medical geography, 276 racism and eugenics, 376-82 Radek, Karl, 135,139 Radslob, Dr, 123 Rajchman, Ludwik, 43-4 Rakovskii, Khristian Georgievich, 73, 377,433,458nl66 Rapallo, Treaty of (1922), 14,39, 83, 103,130,133,240,326, 338,356, 407; era of, 3,5; German-Russian medical connection, 8-11 Rassenhygiene (eugenics), 380,393, 394,396 Ratner, M.J., 469 Red Army, 49,51,355,462 Red Crescent, Zeiss's service under the, 200 Red Help. See IRH (International Red Help [Rote Hilfe]) Reisner (Soviet sociologist), 118 Reiter (professor), 320n88 Reventlow, Graf Ernst zu, 134,139 Riazanov, David, 111 Riga, Treaty of, 42 Robert Koch Institute for Infectious Diseases (Berlin), 253. See also Koch, Robert Rockefeller Foundation, 17,72,332, 368nll6,424 Rodenwaldt, Ernst, 45,201,203,206, 221, 230,312

Romer, Joseph 'Beppo/ 139 Rosen, Baron, 83 Rosen, Joseph A., 470-1,480,482^1, 486; director of Agrojoint, 469 Rosenberg, James N., 470 Rosenthal, Fritz, 471 Rosenwald, Julius, 470 Rossolimo, Grigorii Ivanovich, 10, 349,416,423,446n50; clinic of, 426 Rost (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Rostov, 206,227; Skriabin's expedition to, 269 Rothig, Paul, 413,443n28 Rozvadovskii, M., 78 RSFSR. See Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) Rubens, Otto, 486 Ruben-Wolf, Martha, 481 Rubinin, E., 80 Ruhr, occupation of, 135,137 Rupke, Nicolaas, 243,244-5 Rusheinikov, J.S., 216 Russia, 202,258,262,313; archives of, 7, 247; credit cooperatives in, 467; epidemic control in, 43^4; medical geography, 242,276; new Russia, 421; peoples and tribes, 273^1; politics of genetics, 394; public health training in, 48; scientific fault lines, 260-72; secret police, 131; and tularemia, 222; Zeiss in, 199-200,227, 230 Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), 9,13,61-5,67-9,72-7, 78-9,83,85, 87,120,335, 371-2,374,382,386, 407,436; archives of, 185; Asia Museum, 75; Biology Station, 434; Communist Academy and, 76; election of international members to, 71; founding date, 89n3; Gen-

Index 525 eral Assembly, 74; German emphasis, 64-5; international component of, 63-4, 69-73; international results of, 86-7; invitations to, 77-85; and NKID, 78-9; Schaxel, chair in biology, 430; and the Seventh International Genetics Congress (1937), 370; Soviet politics, 65; AS USSR, 87 Russian Archaeological Institute, 71 Russian Brain Research Institute, 356 Russian Civil War (1921), 67; famine (1921), 469 Russian Deutschtum, 298 Russian Eugenics Journal, 373 Russian Eugenics Society, 373 Russian Natural Science Researchers' Week (Berlin), 211,408,423 Russian Society for the History of Medicine, 274 Russian Society for Racial Pathology and the Geographical Distribution of Disease (Moscow), 257-8,264-6, 337 Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), 66-7, 75; Academy of Sciences, 62 Russian workers, under National Socialism, 354 Rutherford, Ernest, 63-4 Ruttke, Falk, co-editor of Archiv fur Bevolkerungswissenschaft, 309 Rykov, A.I., 69, 72, 73, 74 Sakharov, Andrei, 366n85 Sakharov, V.V., 250 Salvarsan, 46,165; and neurosyphilis, 408 Sapir, Isai Davidovich, 345,348, 349; Lenin's brain research, 339

Saratov, 206-7,227,481,483; German-Russian cultural facilities in, 209; shortages in, 211; university in, 299 Saratov College of Education, Germanic Department, 208 Saratov Institute, 51,160,163-5,166, 183,250; and tularemia cultures, 222 Saratov province, 46; trypanosomiasis epidemic, 164,167; Zeiss's field work in, 16 Saratov Regional Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology. See Saratov Institute Sarchi, Dr, 222 Sarkisov, Semion Aleksandrovich, 344, 348,349,352-3,436,439; brain research, 339, 342; salary of, 346 Scandinavia: genetics in, 381, 393-4; Seventh International Genetics Congress (1937), 385 Schaxel, Julius, 372-3,383-4,388, 456nl46,480-1,498n58; and flight to Leningrad, 430-2; joins Communist Party, 395-6; Scheringer line, 136 Schiemann, Theodor, 115 Schilling, Viktor, 40, 202 Schindler (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Schlageter, Albert Leo (Nazi martyr), 135-6 Schlageter line, 135,139; communists and fascists, negotiations, 136 Schmalhuasen (Berlin, 1927), 15 Schmidt-Ott, Friedrich, 15,18-19,51, 64,82,84-6,116,120,224,266,335; RAS anniversary celebrations,

526 Index 407-8; Soviet-German research agreements negotiator 7 Schmurlo, E.F., 66 Schnurrer, Friedrich, 244, 246,252 Schreiber, Georg, 225,293; letter from Zeiss, 228-9 Schulz, Dr, 123 Schuster, Paul, 412,429,441-2n22, 456nl42 Schutzbund fur das Grenz- und Auslandsdeutschtum (Alliance to Protect Germans Living on the Borderlands and Abroad), 307; East Conference (1927), 296 scientific interaction. See bilateralism; border crossing; cultural diplomacy; German-Russian scientific ties; German-Soviet cooperation; trading zones scientific internationalism: exclusion of Russia and Germany, 5; German version of, 91-2nl8; literature on, 17 Scientific Senate for Military Medicine, 203 Sechenov, Mikhail I., 180 Sechenov Institute of Physical Therapy (Sevastopol), 432,436,438,439 Second Moscow State University, 415,421,426 Second World War, 204,327,345; research on brain injuries, 355; tularemia as biological weapon, 222 Secret State Police (Third Reich). See Gestapo Seeckt, Hans von, 49 Seifert, Carly, 47 Semashko, Nikolai, 4, 6,10,15,1819,112,123,160,169,172,181,202,

226,249,255,265,341,423; Commissar of Public Health, 248; death of, 182; and eugenics, 334; Lenin's brain research, 335, 339; on social hygiene, 266-7,270; Soviet-German research cooperation, 7; Stalinist purges, 351; support of Zeiss, 47-50; Vogt and, 350 Serebrovskii, Aleksandr, 371,373, 379-80,384-5 Serological Commission, 191n48 Sero-Therapeutic Institute (Vienna), 171 Serum-Vaccine Commission, 171 Sevastopol, Jacobsohn-Lask to, 433 Seventh All-Russian Congress of Bacteriologists, Epidemiologists, and Sanitary Physicians, 161 Seventh International Genetics Congress (1937), 369-96; Moscow, round two, 382-6; relocation of to Edinburgh (1939), 19-20, 369; Stalin's attitude to 381-2 Severi, F., 82 Severstov Institute of Evolutionary Morphology, Laboratory of Evolutionary Mechanics, 430 Shakhty trial, 182,228 Shcherbatskoi, F.I., 71 Shtange, A., 83 Shtange, Nikolai Nikolaevich, 131, 141,145; and the Society of Friends, 119,126-7 Shtutzer, Mikhail, 183,250 Shuman (VOKS), 134 Shuralev (veterinarian), 218 Siegfried-Karger Verlag (Berlin), 414, 416,418 Siemans-Werke, 116 Sigerist, Henry, 52,181

Index 527 Simons, Helmut, 486 Skriabin, K.I., 269 Skriabin Commission, 254,269 Skvortsov-Stepanov, Ivan Ivanovich, 349,353 Smidovich, Petr Germogenovich, 468 Snesarev, Pavel Evgenevich, 360n31 SNK. See Council of People's Commissars social Darwinism, 203 Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), 136; Jacobsohn-Lask as member of, 422 social hygiene, 246, 251,266-70; and geomedicine, 302; political overtones of, 277 Society for Jewish Health. See OZE (Society for Jewish Health) Society for the Study of Eastern Europe (German), 84 Society for the Study of the Soviet Planned Economy, 130 Society of Cultural Ties with the West, 111. See VOKS Society of Friends of the New Russia, See Gesellschaft der Freunde des Neuen Russland Society of German Neurologists and Psychiatrists, 418,426,427. See Society of Friends Society of Lovers of Natural History, Anthropology, and Ethnography, 173 Society of Psychologist-Marxists, 181 soft power, Nye's concept of, 8 Soiuz obshchestv remeslennogo, zemledel' cheskogo i industrial' nogo truda sredi evreev. See ORT Sokolovskii, G.N., 75 Solov'iev, D.P., 47,48

Sotsial'naia gigiena, 267 Soviet Buriatiia, syphilis expedition to, 408 Soviet cultural diplomacy: boomerangs, 144-5; dualism, 103,145-6; Gesellschaft, 113-19,145-6; Weimar Republic, 103,104,107, 140 Soviet Embassy (Berlin), 142; and Gesellschaft's potential, 119 Soviet-French scientific and medical relations, 191-2n50 Soviet-German relations, 381,487 Soviet-German research expeditions, 7 Soviet-German scientific collaboration, strains in, 275, 355 Soviet-German scientific exchanges, 211,350 Soviet Institutes of Neuroscience, 434 Soviet State Planning Agency (Gosplan), 133-4,140-1 Soviet Union, 202^; 291,334; Berlin embassy, 131; and diplomatic relations with Germany, 182; ethnic groups and racial brain research, 342; eugenics in, 394; genetics in, 393-5; geopolitics, 304; German exchanges, 171; Germany as antiWestern partner, 137-8; Great Terror, 388-9; industrialization of, 466; Jacobsohn-Lask and, 438-9; Jewish emigres, 485; as a land of asylum, 462-3; medical system, 463-5; National Bolshevism, 135; recognition of, 326; Seventh International Genetics Congress, 370; xenophobia of, 52 Sovnarkom. See Council of People's Commissars

528 Index Spatz, Hugo, 355 Special Temporary Committee of Science (OVKN), 68, 69 Spendiarov, Aleksandr Afanasievich, 349 Spengler, Oswald, 137,260,303 Stalin, Joseph, 84,136,366n85, 371, 373-4,385,388,462,464,482; Great Break, 129,144; Great Terror, 4825; Kreitz on, 139; Niekisch on, 138; and RAS anniversary celebrations, 65,87; rise of, 424; and Seventh International Genetics Congress, 379-83 Stalinism, 52, 87,130,144,327,465; purges, 345,351 Stanislavskii, Konstantin, 366n85 Star, Susan Leigh, 159 State Institute for Foreign Languages, 209 State Institute for Social Hygiene, 267,270,272; research on variation in disease, 271; Soviet social hygienists, 268 State Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology of South East Russia (Saratov), 269 State Institute of Public Health. See GINZ Steinacher, Hans, 308 Steinberg, Walter, 486 Steklov, V.A., 63,66,68-9, 72, 74-5, 79, 81-2, 86-7 Steppun, lulia Lvovna, 174 Steppun, O.A., 163,181 Stern, Alfred, 484 Stern, David, 468 Stern, Kurt, 4,385 Sternberg, Erich, 473 Sticker, George, 252

Stiftung fur deuthsche Volks- und Kulturbodenforchung (Leipzig), 116 Stocker, Elena, 124,129 St Petersburg Medical Institute for Women, 416 Strauss (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Stresemann, Gustav, 117 Stumpf, Carl, 417 Stutzer (German scientist), 293 su-auru. See trypanosomiasis Sudhoff, Karl, 252 Supreme Council of the National Economy (VSNKh), 9,163 suramin, 185 Sussmanovich, Ernst, 477,485 Sussmanovich, Irina, 477 Sweden, response of to Moscow congress, 375 Switzerland, response of to Moscow congress, 375 syphilis, 14,24,163; Buriat Mongolia, 24nl4 Szekely, Lajos, 473 Szekely-Sussmanovich, Edith, 473 Tarasevich, Lev A., 10,168,169,264, 273; death of, 182; on epidemiology, 268; German wooing of, 175; on the Kirghiz people, 214; Mechnikov Museum, 175-6 Tarasevich Institute, 36,169,170, 181, 202,227,250,253,264,275, 294; All-Russian Microbiol Collection, 248-50,250,254; Zeiss and, 170-2,182,205-7,224,227, 276; Zeiss and boundary objects, 16 Tarasevich Institute for Experimental Therapy and Serum Control.

Index 529 See Tarasevich Institute; Control Institute Tarasevich State Institute of Standardization and Control of Medical Biological Preparations, 185 Tenth All-Russian Congress of Bacteriologists, Epidemiologists and Sanitary Physicians (Kiev), 270 Tenth Congress of Bacteriologists and Epidemiologists (Odessa), 175 Thomas (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Thuringian Ministry of Education, 430 Timofeev-Resovskii, Nikolai Vladimirovich, 331,355 Todes, Daniel, 277 Tonnies, Jan Friedrich, 352 Tonnis, Wilhelm, 355 Topley, W.C., 253,263-4 Torgsin company, 486 Torgsin shops, and the emigre physicians, 472 Tovstukha, Ivan Pavlich, 336,361 n39 trading zones, 14,248; Zeiss's failure to create, 276 Triton (hospital ship), 40 Troianovskii, Aleksandr, 387 tropical medicine, global imperialism and, 236 Trotskii, B.I., 468 Trotsky, Lev, 39, 84,105, 377 Trotskyist conspiracy, 377 trypanosomiasis, 24,163,166,167, 190n38; camels, 164,165-6,167, 174,190n38,200,206,210,218,228; horses, 164; sheep, 165; suramin, 185 Tsegel' nitskii, la.S., 467-8 Tseiss, A.L. See Zeiss, Heinz

TsIK (Central Executive Committee), 62, 73, 76,105,108,110-11, 216, 351,370; financing of Berlin Institute, 346 Tsilinskaia, Praskovaia Vasilevna, 171 Tsiolkovskii, Konstantin, 366n85 TsK VKP(b) (Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party / Bolsheviks), 469 Tsutskaev, Sergei Egorovich, 482 Tugendreich, Gustav, 268 tularemia: as biological weapon, 221-2; cultures in Saratov Institute, 223; disease of rodents, 183-5; in North America, 223; in Norway, 223-4; in Russia, 222; in South Africa, 223 Turkey, 45,85; German Military Mission, 201 Turkish Army, Zeiss and, 200-2 Turkish Headquarters for Medical Services, 201 typhoid fever, 46 typhus, 37,40,43-4,46 Ukraine, credit cooperatives in, 467; Deutsche Gesellschaft and, 121; Jewish settlers in, 465,470,473, 482, 486; refugees in, 44 Union of Friends of the New Russia, 110 Union of German Writers, 421 Union Republics of the Soviet Union (USSR), first Constitution of, 75-6 United Information Bureau of the Commission on Foreign Aid (OBI), 105,124; influx of foreigners into Soviet Union and, 108-11 United States, 85,86,372,388; after

530 Index the October Revolution, 465; American Type Culture Collection, 171; emigration of Jewish refugees to experimental epidemiology, 253^4,263^1; genetics in, 381, 393-4,395; German settlers in, 300; International Congress of Physiologists (Moscow and Leningrad, 1935), 430; investment in science in, 72; Jacobsohn-Lask works cited in, 410; Jewish press in, 468; Landauer's political views, 396; Moscow genetics congress, 375, 383; and RAS anniversary celebrations, 77; Rockefeller Foundation, 368nll6; Seventh International Genetics Congress, 376,385; tularemia as biological weapon, 222 University of Hamburg, 202; Zeiss in, 276 University of Munster, 202 Ural province 206, 211, 215; camel trypanosomiasis, 24nl4; 164-5, 167,174; health service, 213; journey to, 211-12; plague laboratory, 207; Zeiss's fieldwork in, 16; Zeiss's report on, 207, 212-13 Ural Provincial Veterinary Administration, 165 Ural River, 220 Uspenskii, F.I., 71 Varnitso (All-Union Association of Scientists and Technicians for the Realization of Socialist Development in the USSR), 346 VASKhNIL, 372; issues in eugenics, 377; issues in genetics, 379-80,383, 385

Vaterlandspartei, 35 Vavilov, Nikolai, 369-71,376,381-3, 388,392; election of as president of Edinburgh congress, 386 VDA (Volksbund fur das Deutschtum im Ausland), 307,308, 319n76 VDM (Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle), 308 Veller, Roman, 125-6 Vernadskii, V.I., 83 Versailles, Treaty of, 35,83,103,2956 Veselovskii, K., 83 Vestnik mikrobioligii i epidemiologii (Saratov Institute), 250-1 Veterinary-Animal Research Institute (Leningrad), 166 veterinary medicine, Russian work in, 218, 228 V.I. Lenin Institute for Brain Research. See Lenin Institute for Brain Research (Moscow) Vinogradskii, Sergei N., 264 Virchow, Rudolf, 213 Vladimirskii (Commissar of Public Health), 183-4,223,224 Vogt, Heinrich W., 417, 447n56 Vogt, Oskar, 14,15, 266,328-31, 350, 358-9n21,416,418,423-5,436, 452nl03; brain research institutes, 19, 274,325, 326,333^, 344,356, 413; editor of }PsN, 347; First AilRussian Congress for Psychoneurology, 332-3; First Report on the Work of the Moscow Institute for Brain Research, 347-8; and German-Russian Laboratory for Comparative People's Pathology, 409; and Jacobsohn-Lask rivalry,

Index 531 424-5,438; Lenin's brain research, 334—41; methodological innovations, 330; re-evaluation of work of, 327; reports of on Soviet medicine, 464 Vogt-Mugnier, Cecile, 329,330,333, 338,358-9n21, 413, 418,423; First Ail-Russian Congress for Psychoneurology, 332-3 VOKS (Ail-Union Society for Cultural Ties Abroad), 9,13,80,81, 83-4,86,114-15,123-9,184; and Arplan, 140-2; comparison with Society of Friends, 117-18,131; dualistic German strategy, 130-2; founding of, 105-6,112-13; as front organization, 108-14; funding, 110-11; German and Soviet perspectives, 135^1; left-wing and right-wing combination in, 134; Moscow office, 141; radical right and, 107-8; and Stalin's Great Break, 144 Volga German Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic, 17, 206, 225, 298-301, 485; and the emigre physicians, 473; famine of 1921, 205; German as official language of, 298-9; Heimatmuseum (People's Museum), 209; and malarial infection in European Russia, 301. See German Volga Republic Volga Germans, 52,122,206,258, 272,313; cultural observations of Zeiss, 16; geomedical case study, 298-301; and Red Cross support, 49-50; refugees, 40-2; and the Reich Germans, 209; in Russia, 306 Volga German Workers' Commune, 298

Volga Relief Society, 209 Volga River, German settlements on, 291 Volkogonov, Dmitrii, 335 Volksbrucke, 311; term, 321nl03 Volksbund fur das Deutschtum im Ausland. See VDA Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle. See VDM volksdeutsche movement, 295 Volksdeutschtum, 297 Volkstum, 304, 307,310; and concept of Lebensraum, 304-5 Volkswissenschaftlicher Arbeitskreis (Political Studies Research Group), 308 von Behring, Emil, 38,179,253; Nobel Prize, 52 von Drygalski (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 von Harnack, Arvid von, 142-3, 338 von Humboldt, Alexander, 8,199,244 von Schoen, Wilhelm Eduard, 42 Vorkampfer, 132-3,139 Vorovskii, V.V., 98n95 Vorwiirts (SPD newspaper), 422 Vsesoiuznoe obshchestvo zemel'nogo ustroistva trudiashchikhsia evreev. See Ozet VSNKh. See Supreme Council of the National Economy (VSNKh) Wagner, Gerhard, 202 Waldeyer, Wilhelm von, 328, 411, 414,441nl6 Webster, Leslie T., 253,263-4 Week of Russian Natural Science (Berlin), 266 Wehrmacht, Zeiss's travels with the, 200 Weltpost, Die (Nebraska), 209

532 Index Westphal, Carl, 415,442n25,445n44 White, Norman, 48 White Russia (Belarus), refugees in, 44 Widerstand (Resistance) Circle, 137 Wieland, Gerhard. See Lask, Berta (Mrs Louis Jacobsohn-Lask) Wilmanns, Karl, 14,207,253,408, 410,439; reports of on Soviet medicine, 464 Wirsing, Giselhert, 139 Wissing, Egon, 486 Wittfogel, Karl, 140 Woelcke, Margarete, 338,339 Wolf, Eduard, 473 Wolf, Lothar, 480-1; comment on Ascher's arrest, 483-4 Wolter, Friedrich, 253, 263, 272-3 Women's Medical Courses, 171; Vaccine Control Station, 169 Yalta, 477 Yatren, 164-5 Zabolotnyi, D.K., 262-3,268; German literature sources of, 273 Zehrer, Hans, 139 Zeiss, Heinz, 12,168,179-80, 221, 242, 256; academic career, 203-5; Ail-Russian Microbiological Collection, 170-1, 249; anti-Semitism and, 230; Armenian massacre, 40; Arplan member, 140; biographical overview 1913-1949,45-53; blood and soil notion, 312; border crossing, 276; boundary objects and, 16, 184-5; camel expeditions, 210-18; co-editor of Archiv fur Bevolkerungswissenschaft, 308-11; Control Institute, 171-3; cultural report, second

camel expedition (1927), 216-17; death of, 204-5; deportation of to Soviet Union, 53; director of Hygiene Institute, 204; ejection of from Soviet Union, 184-5; employment terminated with the Russian state, 294; exclusion of from Berlin Medical Faculty (1945), 53; German and Russian communications, 247-8; on his activities in Russia, 224—9; and history of medicine, 255-6; joins Nazi Party, 201; Mechnikov Museum, 177; and Mechnikov's biography, 175-82; medical geography in Russia, 24760; microbial collection, 249; Moscow clinic, 49; network of, 14,16; notice of termination from Tarasevich Institute, 224; outsider/insider status of, 240, 242; Parkinson's disease, 204; patronage, 276; Physician General, 204; political evolution of, 36; and the question of the minorities, 270-2, 306-7; racism of, 46; reading of Mechnikov, 197nl09; relationship with Soviet microbiologists, 160-1; reports of on Soviet medicine, 464; revisionist account of Mechnikov, 176; salary, 231nl; as self-promoter, 182; social hygiene and geomedicine, 270, 302; Tarasevich Institute and, 170-2; trypanosomiasis drug effectiveness studies, 164-8; and Vladimirskii meeting, 183-4,197-8nll2; 'What We Understand by Medical Geography,' 258; world view, 303-7 Zeitschrift fur Hypnotismus (Journal for Hypnotism), 331

Index 533 Zetkin, Clara, 335,349 Zinoviev, G.E., 70, 74,377 Zinoviev, LA., 71 Zinsser, Hans, 48 Zionism, 466 Ziurupa, Aleksandr Dmitrievich, 349

Zlatarskii, V.N., 78 Zlatogorov, S.I., 273 Zondek (at founding of DRMZ, 1925), 4 Zyklon gas, 46

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GERMAN AND EUROPEAN STUDIES General Editor: James Retallack 1 Emanuel Adler, Beverly Crawford, Federica Bicchi, and Rafaella Del Sarto, edsv The Convergence of Civilizations: Constructing a Mediterranean Region 2 James Retallack, The German Right, 1860-1920: Political Limits of the Authoritarian Imagination 3 Silvija Jestrovic, Theatre of Estrangement: Theory, Practice, Ideology 4 Susan Gross Solomon, ed., Doing Medicine Together: Germany and Russia between the Wars 5 Laurence McFalls, ed., Max Weber's 'Objectivity' Revisited