Alfred Wegener: Difference between revisions
→Summer Semester 1901
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Kurt and Alfred registered for "General Botany" (lecture) and "Exercises in Identification of Flowering Plants, with Special Attention to Medicinal Plants" (lab), both taught by Emil Heinricher, an authority on wild iris and primroses growing at altitude. His lecture and laboratory were preludes to his course "Botanical Excursions", in which students learned field identification and collecting of alpine wildflowers. They also registered for "Geological Tour of the Tirolean Alps" with Josef Blaas, who had spent his life hiking, exploring and mapping the Alps. He had just sent to press his seven-volume "Geological Guide to the Tirolean and Vorarlberg Alps". The microscale of geology was handled by Alois Cathrein, a specialist in crystal symmetry, who taught an introduction to mineralogy, followed by a mineralogical field course : "Mineralogical and Petrographic Excursions."
=== Military service ===
At some point in summer, Alfred made the decision to complete his year of compulsory military service immediately on his return to Berlin. In September 1901, Alfred reported for duty to the headquarters of the Queen Elisabeth Grenadier Guards, in Westend. One registered for service where one lived, because in future wars victory would depend on rapid mass mobilization, which in turn depended on having the ready reserves assemble close to their residences. Alfred lived in Berlin, therefore, he would belong to a Berlin regiment. Alfred was enrolled in Company No. 4 of Queen Elisabeth Grenadier Guards Regiment No. 3, with the expectation that he would, upon completion of his training, become a reserve lieutenant of infantry in the Xth Guard Reserve Corps.
Alfred's particular regiment was mostly an elite unit, as was its brother regiment, the Kaiser Alexander Grenadier Guards, stationed at Potsdam. Both regiments had members of the royal family as honorary officers, even though the regiment's mission no longer entailed protecting the perons of the royal family -- the original rationale for designation as "guards".
Alfred was exercising his right, as a member of the educated upper middle class to avoid conscription into army for a period of two years, by volunteering instead for one year. They began their training under the command of noncommissioned drill instructors and learned the lessons of barracks life. They went through physical training and learned "spit and polish", marching, field exercises, infantry tactics, weapons traing, military etiquette, military topography, map reading, logistics and mobilization drill.
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