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by Kristi Skebo
When
you think of refugees, scholarly professors and learned academics
rarely leap to mind. Yet many German researchers, like Albert Einstein,
fled the intellectual repression and religious persecution of Nazi
Germany in the early 1930s. When Einstein left Germany in 1932,
he had no trouble obtaining a new position. But what happened to
thousands of lesser-known academics who were forced to flee? While
researching the development of radar in Britain, UVic military historian
Dr. David Zimmerman noticed that many of the scientists involved
were also part of another British organization, the Society for
the Protection of Science and Learning (SPSL), dedicated to finding
permanent research positions abroad for displaced academics.
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Zimmerman |
What united this seemingly disparate group of
physiologists, chemists, physicists and engineers is most fascinating
to Zimmerman. "Science and their respect for freedom of thought
and research was what rallied them. Some of England's most prominent
academics were inspired to help rescue those ousted from their positions,"
he says.
Funded by a grant from the Social Sciences and
Humanities Research Council, Zimmerman is researching the history
of the SPSL and its remarkable success.
The SPSL was founded in 1933, and the timing could
not have been worse. "It was the height of the Depression. Lack
of support from British colleges and universities forced the SPSL
to look for public support - not an easy task prior to WWII as anti-Semitism
was rampant," Zimmerman explains.
They met the challenge, however, and from 193345,
the SPSL raised a total of £100,000 - equivalent to millions of
dollars today. Over a 12-year period, they rescued upwards of 10,000
people - academics representing a broad cross-section of disciplines
and their families, primarily from Germany, but also from Italy,
Spain, Portugal, Austria and Czechoslovkia. The SPSL found them
permanent or temporary research positions and provided a portion
of their funding.
"The largest number of placements was in the U.S.
and Britain. At the time, the entire British academic community
consisted of only 6,000 scholars. The SPSL helped to place over
2,500 - a huge feat for such a small community," says Zimmerman.
A number of researchers also found positions at Hebrew University
in present-day Israel and in Turkey at the University of Istanbul.
"The Turkish government had just opened the new university and saw
this as an opportunity to attract world-class academics."
Over the same period, Canada accepted just six
academics, five permanently. Anti-Semitic immigration policies and
little support from Canadian universities ensured those who did
come received no support from Canadian sources, says Zimmerman.
The most famous of these was Gerhard Herzberg,
winner of the 1971 Nobel Prize in chemistry, whose work was initially
supported by the SPSL and the Carnegie Corporation of New York.
Forced to flee Germany because his wife was Jewish, Herzberg joined
the faculty at the University of Saskatchewan in August, 1935. Six
other refugees helped by the SPSL also became Nobel laureates.
"Even though an equivalent Canadian organization
was formed in 1939, Canada was unsuccessful in helping more academic
refugees find freedom," says Zimmerman. "How the immigration policies
and social stigma at that time hindered further efforts to support
scholars is not only intriguing, but is still relevant to how we
treat academic refugees today."
Only six academics helped by the SPSL made Canada
their home on a temporary or permanent basis: Gerhard Hertzberg,
University of Saskatchewan, physics/chemistry Peter Brieger, University
of Toronto, art history Lother Richter, University of Toronto, economics
Bernard Haurwitz, University of Toronto, physics Richard Brauer,
University of Toronto, mathematics Gerhard Schmidt, Queens University,
biochemistry
- The successor organization to the SPSL still
exists today; it is known as the Council for Assisting Refugee Academics
(www.academic-refugees.org/).
- Researching the history of the organisation is more straight-forward
than you might think. "The SPSL kept very full and comprehensive
records of who donated money, who was helped and where these academics
ended up. One woman, Dame Esther Simpson, who retired from the organisation
in the 1960s, was primarily responsible for their meticulous record-keeping." Most of Zimmerman's research is done at the Bodleian Library at
the University of Oxford were the SPSL's records are kept.
 Kristi
Skebo wrote this as a participant in the SPARK program (Students
Promoting Awareness of Research Knowledge), funded by UVic, the
Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, and the Social
Sciences and Humanities Research Council.
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