Eugen Fischer - Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics

Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics

Eugen Fischer was recommended for the directorship of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics (KWI-A) by Erwin Baur circa 20 May 1926.

"The KWG senate founded KWI-A at Ihnestrasse 22/24 in Berlin-Dahlem, with Eugene Fischer director, in 1927 (during the "5th International Congress for Genetic Science", led by Erwin Baur, meeting in Berlin, in Sept. 1927. Congratulations were also extended to Charles Davenport at this time. The new institute inherited the skull collection of Rudolf Virchow and Felix von Luschan. The custodian of the skull collection was Hans Weinert, also responsible for paleoanthropology and blood group research.

When Fischer was appointed the Director of the Institute, Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer was simultaneously appointed as director of Department of Human Genetics. A few years later (1933), Adolf Hitler appointed Fischer rector of the Frederick William University of Berlin, now Humboldt University.

"The new institute, as Eugen Fischer had announced proudly, would no longer occupy itself with mere skull measuring. In the sense of opening up anthropology toward human genetics, which Fischer outlined with the catchword of anthropobiology, the conventional, static, taxonomically organized concept of race that proceeded from morphological features was to be abandoned in favor of a dynamic concept of race conceived in terms of evolutionary biology and grounded in genetics. It could be applied to a multitude of topics, practically all anatomical, morphological, physiological, pathological, and psychological features and characteristics -- "from the dimensions of the skull measurements, structure of spine, red hair, the shape of the ear, the pattern of fingerprints, hemogram, or disposition to tuberculosis, all the way to conceptions of morals, criminality, performance in school or talent for playing chess."

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