Wolfram Schöllkopf, Privatdozent für Glaziologie und deutsche Literatur an der Eidgenössischen Technischen Universität, flieht aus der Sitzung der Freifächerfakultät, der Abteilung 13 für Geistes- und Militärwissenschaften.
A century of sunspots on 28,000 sheets
Sunspots are patches on the sun’s surface which, at around 4,000°C, are considerably colder than their surroundings. They are formed by disturbances in the sun’s magnetic field.
World Trade Center New York (1970-2001)
Forty years ago, on April 4th 1973, Minoru Yamasaki’s World Trade Center in Manhattan opened officially. The following photographs were taken in 1971 by Heinz Baumann from the agency Comet.
In search of black gold – Swiss petroleum geologists and the nationalisation of crude oil in Iran
After the Second World War, in the early days of the Cold War, Iran gradually began to break away from the geopolitical power games and economic greed of the major powers, which had especially set their sights on Iranian crude oil. At the end of 1949, the Iranian government founded Iran Oil Co. (Sherkat Sahami Naft Iran), an autonomous state-owned company.
Charles F. Blunt: The beauty of the heavens: a pictorial display of the astronomical phenomena of the universe: one hundred and four coloured scenes illustrating a familiar lecture on astronomy (London, 1842)
To illustrate the science of astronomy, Charles F. Blunt has created 104 coloured panels entitled The beauty of the heavens. Together with the explanatory text, they are intended as instruction for the whole family:
School maps in the 19th century
At the beginning of the 19th century, the liberal Canton of Aargau assumed a leading role across all school levels in Switzerland’s education system. For example, it opened the first Gymnasium (grammar school) in the country where the teachers were not members
Albert Robida: Le Vingtième Siècle (Paris 1883)
Albert Robida (1848-1926) was a French writer, draughtsman, painter, caricaturist and journalist. He began his career as an illustrator for popular Parisian magazines such as Chronique illustrée and Le Pollichinelle. He became famous for his illustrations of luxury editions of literary works by François Rabelais, Charles Perrault, Honoré de Balzac and others. From 1879 onwards, Robida published a
In the land of pyramids and mosques. The Swiss civil engineer Charles Andreae in Egypt
After the Kingdom of Egypt had formally achieved independence in 1922, the Egyptian government tried to suppress British influence in the country. In 1928, as part of these efforts, in 1928 the government requested the Swiss Federal Council to send an ETH professor
Milestones of Swiss cartography
The history of Swiss cartography begins with a chart of the country, still classed as a mediaeval “mappa mundi”, with Rigi as the centre point. It was published in 1479 in Albrecht von Bonstetten’s first geographic description of Switzerland, Superioris Germaniae confederationis descriptio.
How much Switzerland is there in San Francisco? – structural engineer O. H. Ammann and the Golden Gate Bridge
It is a well known story that Swiss-born Johann August Sutter founded a colony by the name of New Helvetia in California in the mid-19th century. It is less well known that another Swiss citizen was essential to the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco’s famous landmark that celebrated its 75th birthday in 2012.