Marine Sciences in Germany: The Restart in Kiel After World War II

The first German paper on oceanography was published in Kiel in 1697 (Kortum, 1994) at the beginning of the country’s long history in ocean science. Following successful development during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, culminating in the Atlantic Ocean Expedition of the first research vessel Meteor from 1925 to 1927 (Spiess, 1928), marine sciences almost disappeared from the defeated nation at the end of World War II. Because the country was mostly landlocked, it was not obvious to occupation authorities and German politicians that the country should again develop a strong marine science capacity. Nevertheless, the restart began, mostly at Kiel University and at the newly founded German Hydrographic Office in Hamburg