Abstract

In December 1956, the building of the former Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institute for Chemistry in Berlin-Dahlem where Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann had discovered nuclear fission in 1938 was named Otto-Hahn-Bau der Freien Universität. Simultaneously a bronze plate commemorating the discovery of fission was unveiled. The idea to honour Hahn at the place of his discovery originated from Max von Laue who had come back to Berlin in 1951 to take up directorship of the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institute for Physical Chemistry (now Fritz-Haber-Institut). By drawing upon the Laue Papers now in the Archives of the Max Planck Society it is shown that the Hahn ceremony was intended as a political demonstration to foster nuclear research in the western sectors of Berlin where — differing from the Federal Republic of Germany — allied research restrictions were kept in force. Laue's plan for the Hahn ceremony was vigourosly supported by a group of Berlin university professors. Eager to participate in funds provided by the Federal Ministry for Atomic Affairs in 1955 they had composed a memorandum calling for financial support of nuclear research in universities and demanding the foundation of a central research institute disposing of a nuclear reactor. A ceremony recollecting that it was Berlin where nuclear research had originated seemed instrumental. The name of Hahn stood for an academic tradition seemingly uncompromised by nationalsocialism. But Laue's intention to gain greatest publicity possible met the opposition of Hahn and Lise Meitner who had been assigned by Laue to hold the commemorative lecture. The ceremony had to be reduced in scale. Protests which arose about not including Lise Meitner into the honour were met by awarding her an honorary degree of the Free University in 1957 and by joining her name to Hahn's in naming the newly founded nuclear research institute Hahn-Meitner-Institut für Kernforschung Berlin in 1959. This case study illustrates the fact already emphasized by Robert K. Merton that scientific honours more than once do not have their ends in themselves but are serving certain needs and purposes of the scientific community.