Otto Reche
Otto Carl Reche (24 May 1879 – 23 March 1966) was a German anthropologist and professor from Glatz (Kłodzko), Prussian Silesia. He was active in researching whether there was a correlation between blood types and race. Once a member of the Nazi Party, he remained active in anthropological issues following the downfall of Nazi Germany.
Contents
Education and career[edit]
Reche was educated at the University of Breslau (now the University of Wrocław), the University of Jena and the University of Berlin.[1]
In his career, Reche served as the director of the Departments of Anthropology at the University of Vienna and then the University of Leipzig,[1] and also taught at the University of Hamburg. Among the organizations he was involved in were the Nazi Party and the German Society for Blood Group Research (which he founded along with Paul Steffan). In 1928, Reche and Steffan founded Zeitschrift für Rassenphysiologie, a magazine on the subject.[2]
Blood type research and conclusions[edit]
Reche's work with blood types, involving studies in northwestern Germany, was an attempt to prove a correlation between which blood type a person had and whether they were of German ancestry. He claimed that the three blood types, A, B, and O, were each originally attached to European, Asian, and Native American races, but that interracial marriage had diluted this over the centuries.[2]
Life after the war[edit]
On April 16, 1945, Reche was arrested by American forces for membership in the Nazi Party but was released after sixteen months of detainment.[1]
In 1959, Reche was chosen by a German court investigating the claims of Anna Anderson that she was Anastasia Nikolaevna, a Russian royal thought to have been murdered along with the rest of the royal family. He concluded that Anna Anderson was either the Grand Duchess herself or an identical twin.[3] After Anderson's death, however, it was concluded based on DNA evidence that she was not Anastasia.
Reche died near Hamburg in 1966.[1]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^ a b c d Geisenhainer, Katja (2002). "Rasse ist Schicksal" Otto Reche (1879–1966) – ein Leben als Anthropologe und Völkerkundler (in German). Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. ISBN 3-374-02015-1.
- ^ a b Proctor, Robert N. (1988). Racial Hygiene: Medicine under the Nazis. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-74578-7.
- ^ Lovell, James Blair (1998). Anastasia: The Lost Princess. Robson. ISBN 0-86051-807-8.
Further reading[edit]
- Arthur L. Caplan, ed. (1992). When Medicine Went Mad: Bioethics and the Holocaust. Humana Press. p. 359. ISBN 0-89603-235-3.
- Neugebauer, Wolfgang. "Racial Hygiene in Vienna 1938". Dokumentationsarchiv des österreichischen Widerstandes. Retrieved 2007-07-13.
- 1879 births
- 1966 deaths
- People from Kłodzko
- People from the Province of Silesia
- German anthropologists
- German military personnel of World War I
- Nazism
- University of Breslau alumni
- University of Jena alumni
- Humboldt University of Berlin alumni
- University of Hamburg faculty
- University of Vienna faculty
- Leipzig University faculty
