Bernhard Grzimek

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The Tomb of Michael and Bernhard Grzimek on the top of the Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania
The Tomb of Michael and Bernhard Grzimek on the top of the Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania

Bernhard Klemens Maria Grzimek [ˈgʒɪmɛk] (April 24, 1909 - March 13, 1987) was a renowned zoo director, zoologist, book author, editor, and animal conservationist in postwar West-Germany.

Contents

[edit] Biography

[edit] Early years

Grzimek was born in Neisse (Nysa), Upper Silesia. His father Paul Franz Constantin Grzimek was a lawyer and civil law notary and his mother was Margarete Margot (nee Wanke).

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[edit] Middle years

After studying veterinary medicine in 1928, first at Leipzig and later in Berlin, he received a doctorate in 1933.

He married Hildegard Prüfer May 17, 1930 and had 3 sons: Rochus, Michael, and an adopted son, Thomas.

After World War II he became director of the Frankfurt Zoological Garden, then in ruins, which he made into one of the largest zoological gardens in Germany. At the same time he served as president of the Frankfurt zoological society for over forty years. The society - organized on similar principles as its London and New York counterparts - runs a number of wildlife conservation projects both in Germany and overseas; most well-known is its ongoing work in the Serengeti ecosystem in Tanzania, East Africa.

Grzimek is most famous for the work he undertook for the conservation of the Serengeti. He spent several years studying the wildlife there along with his son Michael, especially on areal observation and counts of large scale annual migrations. In 1959 Michael was killed in an aircrash while flying the Dornier Do 27 due to a collision with a Griffon Vulture. He wrote a best-selling book called Serengeti shall not die, which appealed enormously to the public and was key in driving the creation of the Serengeti National Park.

He prophesied in his book

Large cities continue to proliferate. In the coming decades and centuries, men will not travel to view marvels of engineering, but they will leave the dusty towns in order to behold the last places on earth where God’s creatures are peacefully living. Countries which have preserved such places will be envied by other nations and visited by streams of tourists. There is a difference between wild animals living a natural life and famous buildings. Palaces can be rebuilt if they are destroyed in wartime, but once the wild animals of the Serengeti are exterminated no power on earth can bring them back.

The documentary based on the film won the Academy Award for Documentary Feature in 1959.

He was the editor-in-chief of (and author of a number of articles in) a massive and monumental encyclopedia of animal life. After publication in Germany in 1968, it was translated into English and published in 1975 in 13 volumes (covering lower life forms, insects and other invertebrates, fish, amphibia, reptiles, birds and mammals) plus three additional volumes on Ecology, Ethology and Evolution. The 1975 work was issued in both hardback and less expensive paperback editions and became a standard reference work. After Grzimek's death, the volumes on mammals were revised, and republished in both German and then in English. In 2004, the entire encyclopedia was revised and published in a new and expanded edition. All the versions of the encyclopedia are marked by clear and forceful prose, extensive use of illustrations (both drawings and color plates), and a deep love and concern for animal conservation.

Of national importance were his work as co-editor (together with Austrian Nobel-prize winner Konrad Lorenz[citation needed]) of the then largest popular magazine on animals and wildlife in German language, Das Tier (German language, i.e. "The Animal", or "Animals") and of a very popular television series on wildlife. He also authored a large number of popular books based on his countless experiences with animals which he raised since his student days, managed as zoo director, and encountered in the wild during many research trips.

[edit] Later years

He died in Frankfurt am Main in 1987, falling asleep while watching a circus performance with a group of children.

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[edit] Works

[edit] Films

  • 1956 - Kein Platz für wilde Tiere (German)
  • 1959 - Serengeti shall not die (Original German title: Serengeti darf nicht sterben) (German)
  • 1956 - 1980 - Ein Platz für Tiere (German TV series) (German)

[edit] Books

  • 1941 - Wir Tiere sind ja gar nicht so! Franckh'sche Verlagshandlung (German)
  • 1943 - Wolf Dschingis: Neue Erlebnisse, Erkenntnisse und Versuche mit Tieren, Franckh'sche Verlagshandlung (German)
  • 1951 - Affen im Haus und andere Tierberichte, Franckh'sche Verlagshandlung (German)
  • 1952 - Flug ins Schimpansenland: Reise durch ein Stück Afrika von heute, Franckh'sche Verlagshandlung (German)
  • 1956 - 20 Tiere und ein Mensch (German)
  • 1956 - Thulo aus Frankfurt - Rund um die Giraffe, Franckh'sche Verlagshandlung (German)
  • 1959 - Serengeti darf nicht sterben (über die Arbeit am Film) (German)
  • 1960 - Kein Platz für wilde Tiere (German)
  • 1961 - Unsere Brüder mit den Krallen (German)
  • 1963 - Wir lebten mit den Baule. Flug ins Schimpansenland (German)
  • 1965 - Wildes Tier, weißer Mann (German)
  • 1968 - Grzimeks Tierleben (German)
  • 1969 - Grzimek unter Afrikas Tieren: Erlebnisse, Beobachtungen, Forschungsergebnisse (German)
  • 1974 - Auf den Mensch gekommen: Erfahrungen mit Leuten (German)
  • 1974 - Vom Grizzlybär zur Brillenschlange: Ein Naturschützer berichtet aus vier Erdteilen, Kindler (German)
  • 1974 - Einsatz für Afrika: Neue Erlebnisse mit Wildtieren, Kindler (German)
  • 1974 - Tiere, mein Leben: Erlebnisse und Forschungen aus fünf Jahrzehnten, Harnack (German)
  • 1975 - Grzimek's Animal Life Encyclopedia, 16 vol., Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, New York [translation of 1968 work]
  • 1977 - Und immer wieder Pferde. Kindler (German)
  • 1988 - Grzimeks Enzyklopädie der Säugetiere, Kindler Verlag, München.
  • 1990 - Grzimek's Encyclopedia of Mammals, 5 vol., McGraw-Hill, New York, ISBN 0079095089 [translation of 1988 work]
  • 2004 - Grzimek's Animal Life Encyclopedia, 2nd. Ed., 17 vol., Thomson-Gale, Detroit, ISBN 0787653624 [revision of 1975 work]

[edit] Magazines

[edit] Literature

  • Franziska Torma: Eine Naturschutzkampagne in der Ära Adenauer. Bernhard Grzimeks Afrikafilme in den Medien der 50er Jahre. Martin Meidenbauer Verlag, München 2004, ISBN 3-89975-034-9 (German) (Media studies; on his films on African wildlife)
  • Gerhard Grzimek, Rupprecht Grzimek: Die Familie Grzimek aus Oberglogau in Oberschlesien, in: "Deutsches Familienarchiv", Band X, Verlag Degener & Co., Neustadt (Aisch) 1958. - 4., erweiterte und überarbeitete Ausgabe, Herder-Institut, Reutlingen 2000. (German) (genealogy)

[edit] External links