Heinz Haber

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Heinz Haber (May 15, 1913–February 13, 1990) was a German physicist and science writer who primarily became famous for his TV programs and books about physics and environmental subjects. His lucid style of explaining hard science has frequently been imitated by later popular science presenters in Germany like Joachim Bublath but rarely surpassed.

After studying physics in Heidelberg and Berlin and obtaining his doctorate, Haber served in World War II for the German Luftwaffe as a reconnaissance aviator until 1942. He returned to the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut für Physik and after the war lectured at Heidelberg. 1946 he emigrated to the U.S., as many German scientists did after the war, and joined the USAF School of Aviation Medicine at Randolph Air Force Base. Together with fellow German Hubertus Strughold, he and his brother Fritz (April 3, 1912 - August 21, 1998) made pioneering research into space medicine in the late 1940s. The brothers proposed parabolic flights for simulating weightlessness. 1952 he accepted a professorship at the University of California, Los Angeles. In the 1950s, he also worked as a scientific consultant for The Walt Disney Company.

In the 1960s and 1970s, he was Germany's premier capacity in popular science and wrote magazine columns and numerous books and presented his own TV programs like Prof. Haber experimentiert, Das Mathematische Kabinett, Unser blauer Planet, Stirbt unser blauer Planet?, Professor Haber berichtet, and WAS IST WAS mit Professor Haber. He was founding editor of the German science magazine "bild der wissenschaft" from 1964 to 1990. His memorable experiments included one where the onset of a nuclear chain reaction was simulated with hundreds of mouse traps, each one having been loaded with two ping pong balls.

Heinz Haber had an unparalleled capability for presenting hard scientific facts in a manner and language which was understandable and entertaining for the layman without being sloppy. This won him many accolades, such as the Adolf-Grimme-Preis and the Goldene Kamera.

Heinz Haber has two children, Kai (* 1943) and Cathleen (* 1945), from his first marriage, and a third child, Marc (* 1969), from the second. His first wife Anneliese lives in Los Angeles, his second wife Irmgard in Hamburg, Germany.