LIGHT AIR OZONE MARTIN LÄUBLI Johannes Staehelin Pierre Viatte
LIGHT AIR OZONE MARTIN LÄUBLI Based on research by Johannes Staehelin and Pierre Viatte
Haupt Publishers
AROSA AROUND 1930 Guesthouses and hotels in Arosa Juggahalde during the health resort’s golden age.
AROSA 2018 With the former Sanatorium Florentinum (bottom left), today the Mountain Lodge Hotel.
FOREWORD I congratulate the Swiss government for the unparalleled success of the Arosa observatory. Its measurements and scientific research have been groundbreaking for the atmospheric science community. Ability to carry out high-quality measurements is the backbone of monitoring the state of our atmosphere. Human impact on the atmosphere can be best studied by using long-term records, like those of Arosa.
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In addition to ozone measurements, Switzerland has played a pioneering role in atmospheric radiation measurements including the UV-end of the atmospheric spectrum. This has also allowed studies on long-term changes and variations of atmospheric radiative balance, which are essential to understanding our climate and weather patterns. Radiative balance and the impact of changes in greenhouse gases are central to future climate scenarios. They are also essential for modelling weather forecasts and various processes such as cloud formation and rain. Humankind has made several important steps to protect planet Earth from harmful changes caused by human activities. Acidification caused forest damage and acidification of lakes in Europe a few decades ago. The emissions of sulfur and nitric compounds have been successfully limited by international agreements. Another success story has been the signature of the Montreal protocol in 1987 to reduce the emission of ozone depleting gases. Slow recovery of the ozone layer is already underway. In 2015 UN Member countries signed the Paris Agreement with the goal to limit global warming to between 1.5°and 2.0°C. Both the economic and technical means to reach those targets exist. Climate change causes snow, ice and glaciers to melt and it affects rainfall patterns, tropical storms and the wellbeing of human beings and nature. We should build upon the success of the Montreal Protocol to ensure a bright future for the coming generations.
Prof. Petteri Taalas, Secretary-General World Meteorological Organization
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PETTERI TAALAS Secretary-General of WMO
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OZONE MEASUREMENTS IN AROSA The intensity of UV light is measured with a Dobson spectrophotometer and used to calculate the atmospheric ozone amount.
FOREWORD From the 1990s until our retirement, we were responsible for carrying out the important ozone measurements in Arosa for the Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology MeteoSwiss and we worked as ozone researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH Zurich). We worked together a great deal during those years. About three years ago the opportunity arose to delve into the history of the Light Climatic Observatory (LCO) founded in 1921.
They take us back to the days when there were no antibiotics to cure tuberculosis, so patients went to recover in the many sanatoriums in the mountain resorts of Davos and Arosa. Medical curiosity therefore played its role in the founding of the Observatory. The focus was on examining the climate and the radiation in Arosa. Paul Götz, considered it essential to include observation of the stratospheric ozone layer. In recent years, we have collected and interpreted countless documents about the exciting history of the world‘s longest series of ozone measurement records. It is thanks to the unflagging commitment of some forceful personalities that measurements have continued in Arosa to this day. The author of this book, Martin Läubli, has described our scientific research in a lively and accessible style, while Rachel von Dach’s original design invites the non-specialist to read on. The book reveals the importance of reliable long-term measurements in describing man-made ozone depletion and in verifying the success of the “treatment” initiated by the Montreal Protocol.
Johannes Staehelin and Pierre Viatte
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In so doing we came across innumerable documents chronicling the long history of Swiss ozone measurements in Arosa, which had until that time been neither studied nor appraised. A good example is the extensive correspondence of the founder of the LCO F.W. Paul Götz (1891-1954). Thirty-five binders detailed his contacts with all important ozone researchers working at the time. Other documents were found in the annual reports of the Arosa Resort and Tourism Association and the Kulturarchiv (town archive) Arosa Schanfigg.
CONTENTS TRAVELLING INTO CLEAN AIR FROM FARMING VILLAGE TO HEALTH RESORT
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DAVOS’ OFFSPRING ......................................................................................................................................................................................................12
MAGIC MOUNTAINS IN AROSA
21
ROBERT KOCH, DISCOVERER OF THE TUBERCULOSIS PATHOGEN .....................................................................................................22 CONTEMPORARY WITNESS CÉCILE STAEHELIN ......................................................................................................................................... 26
THE DECISION
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HOW THE ATMOSPHERE GOBBLES UP SOLAR RADIATION....................................................................................................................38 LOCATIONS OF THE LIGHT CLIMATIC OBSERVATORY .............................................................................................................................40
KNOWLEDGE TO 1921
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PAUL GÖTZ, THE PIONEER DRIVEN BY SCIENCE
45
SCIENTIST OF INTERNATIONAL RENOWN
57
THE OZONE COMMISSION ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 62
CARL DORNO, DAVOS VERSUS AROSA
65
FABRY AND BUISSON, THE MASTERS ............................................................................................................................................................. 70
FRIENDSHIP WITH DOBSON
73
HOW THE DOBSON SPECTROPHOTOMETER WORKS .............................................................................................................................. 76 UMKEHR EFFECT ...................................................................................................................................................................................................... 78
1926 – A MILESTONE
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OZONE, HEAT AND WEATHER ............................................................................................................................................................................ 82
EXPEDITION TO SPITSBERGEN
85
CHRONIC SHORTAGE OF MONEY
93
DIFFICULT SUCCESSION
99
KNOWLEDGE TO 1957
102
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HANS ULRICH DÜTSCH, THE SAVIOUR STRONG MAN IN THE BACKGROUND
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THE INTERNATIONAL GEOPHYSICAL YEAR .................................................................................................................................................106 THE CHAPMAN OZONE CYCLE ...........................................................................................................................................................................108 BREWER DOBSON CIRCULATION ....................................................................................................................................................................... 110
BOULDER AND A NEW CRISIS
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DÜTSCH TAKES OVER
121
MODERN OZONE CHEMISTRY AND HAZARDOUS TRACE GASES ......................................................................................................122
SOLUTION FOR THE FUTURE
129
THE DISCOVERY OF THE OZONE HOLE ..........................................................................................................................................................130 MONTREAL PROTOCOL ............................................................................................................................................................................................134
KNOWLEDGE TO 2000
138
THE PARTNERSHIP 141
THE MONTREAL PROTOCOL THE SUCCESS STORY..................................................................................................................................142 THE CREATION OF THE GLOBAL NETWORK............................................................................................................................................... 144 CONTROVERSIAL SUBSTITUTES .........................................................................................................................................................................146
MODERNIZATION
151
HOW RELIABLE ARE OZONE MEASUREMENTS?.......................................................................................................................................152
“HARMFUL” GAS
157
THE GOTHENBURG PROTOCOL ............................................................................................................................................................................158
AROSA REMAINS IMPORTANT
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NEW DISCOVERIES CREATE NEW QUESTIONS ...........................................................................................................................................162 OZONE AND CLIMATE CHANGE ...........................................................................................................................................................................164
EPILOGUE DAVOS’ BIG BREAK
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FROM OBSERVATORY TO WORLD RADIATION CENTRE...........................................................................................................................168 THE WORLD’S LONGEST OZONE MEASUREMENT SERIES...................................................................................................................174
REFERENCES
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS & COPYRIGHT NOTICE
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IN MONTREAL’S WAKE
TRAVELLING INTO CLEAN AIR
LANGWIES RAIL VIADUCT Engineering feat on the line between Chur and Arosa, opened in 1914.
FROM FARMING VILLAGE TO HEALTH RESORT A sudden whistle just a er departure. It puts us in mind of a scene from old films, a long blast as the train slowly draws out of the station, picking up speed while the travellers wave goodbye to those on the platform. It is not quite that evocative on this Saturday in May. The time is 1.08 pm and the train compartments have few occupants.
But what was it like, hundreds of years ago when the river meandered through a primeval forest, washing rugged rocks? What on earth caused people to move into this inhospitable terrain? Was it the search for new land to raise livestock and plant vegetables? Or was it just a sense of adventure? We’re running into yet another tunnel. Is it really wide enough for the train? From a distance it looks so tiny, set in the cliff face that soars to the sky. There is also an idyllic waterfall. Mother Nature offers the traveller the perfect spectacle en route to Arosa. The train moves quickly with a so rattle. Sloping ridges, oddly shaped rocks. There is still snow on the mountain peaks. At Lüen-Castiel, the train stops in front of an overgrown herb garden. Another half an hour and the valley opens. The first Alps appear. St. Peter, Molinis, Peist. The villages at the halts are far above or nestled far below near the river.
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The Rhaetian Railway‘s red train leaves Chur station right on time. The journey begins with a short drive through the town. Elderly gentlemen greet the engine driver. People know each other. But just one stop later, the train moves into the lush green landscape of early summer, the narrow Schanfigg valley. It follows River Plessur, swollen with meltwater. The slopes are steep and covered in dense forest. A er ten minutes the train reaches the first tunnel and then the first galleries cut into the rock. The riverbed is already well below, cut deep into the valley. Slate rocks rise, and then it is pitch-black again. The railway line follows the contours of the valley, sometimes it takes a direct route through the cliffs. To the le are protective rockfall nets, to the right high fir trees block the view into the depths below.
DAVOS’ OFFSPRING
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CHUR
CASTIEL
LÜEN
The Schanfigg is first mentioned in records as “Scanavico” in 765. This refers to the outer part of the valley from today’s town boundary of Chur to Frauentobel, between the modern villages of Peist and Langwies. Places such as Lüen, Castiel or Calfreisen on the right of the valley – the “sunny side” – appear in documents as early as the 11th and 12th centuries. Today, the whole valley up to the sources of River Plessur in Arosa is classified as Schanfigg. It was the Walser people who in the 12th and 13th centuries pushed deep into the inner valley during the Alpine migration period. They came from the Walser colony in Davos and travelled over the 2,300-metre-high Strela Pass. Around 1300 they moved into the Fondei and Sapün side valleys. They settled in Medergen, Langwies, and finally in the 14th century they occupied the valley ending in Arosa. They were mountain farmers and shepherds who bred livestock. We do not know for certain why these people, originally from the Valais, set out in all directions. Was it due to overpopulation? Natural disasters, the plague or simply a sense of adventure? Whatever the reason, the mild climate at that time meant they could grow crops even at high altitudes. In addition, the feudal lords in the Alps granted various rights and freedoms to their subjects who were willing to withstand hardships to populate inhospitable land. In this way they consolidated their claims to power, promoted the growth of the population and brought new areas under cultivation, thus achieving control of the Alpine passes. The Chur cathedral chapter and the St. Luzi Monastery discovered an additional source of income in the valley: free tenants bred cattle throughout the year on behalf of the Church and subsequently sold them in the markets of the South.
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Plessur Road Railway line Pass ST. PETER
PEIST
STRELAPASS MOLINIS
LANGWIES
For centuries, the Strela and Duranna passes leading to Davos and Prättigau gave access to this deserted valley. The roadway over the Strela Pass was also the shortest route between Chur and the country around Davos. The first census in 1850 showed this was still the case. The population of Langwies was 358, of Peist 237 and only 56 people lived in Arosa. At that time, Arosa was politically part of the municipality of Davos.
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LITZIRÜTI
WEISSHORN
AROSA
Early guesthouses These were once all farming villages, some until the middle of the 19th century. The mountain village of Arosa gradually became a health resort towards the end of the century, but it took a long time. On 1 April 1851, Arosa separated from Davos, becoming a municipality in its own right. But the expected development as an independent community did not happen straight away. In 1880 the population was at the level it had been before separation from Davos. Fi y-four inhabitants. It was thanks amongst others to Luzius Hold and his family that despite the difficulties of reaching Arosa, it did not lose contact with the “outside world”. The director of the grammar school in Chur – the Kantonsschule – gave the community advice in the middle of the 19th century, when it was weighing political separation from Davos. The Hold family had owned a holiday home in Arosa since 1847. In the summer this was a place where prominent Swiss and Germans from the worlds of politics and science came together.
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Word gradually spread that the mountain village was suitable as a health resort – in particular for patients with lung disease and consumption. As a result, more guesthouses opened in the 1880s. They had names like Brunhold, Kurhaus Arosa, Waldhaus Arosa, Seehof and Rothorn. In 1884, the owners founded the Arosa Resort Association. Marie Herwig built the first sanatorium, Berghilf, in 1888, which was open the whole year round to take in the sick and convalescent. Three years later, the road from Chur to Arosa was completed. Now the Federal stagecoach reached Arosa. In 1891, the Swiss Meteorological Institute (nowadays MeteoSwiss) began measuring temperature, pressure, humidity, hours of sunshine and other metrics at Villa Frisia. According to the 1888 census, 88 people lived in Arosa; by the end of the century the population had already risen to 1,071.
“The mountains flanking the valley are crenelated, so they form ridges that provide a backdrop and at every moment the scenery changes. On the sharp bends you often worry the horses will bump their heads, you ready yourself to leap from the coach, but the coachman, a Thurgau man who wears the typical shepherd’s silver earring, a man who rose to the rank of corporal in the army, calms all our fears with his composure and assured manner.” Friedrich Ernst, a traveller from Dresden, reporting around 1900, from Ueli Haldimann: Arosa
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AROSA’S MOUNTAIN CLIMATE “Sunshine and fresh air have outstanding healing qualities”.
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A strenuous journey Even a er the Schanfigg Road had been built, the trip to from Chur to Arosa could take up to six hours. The journey remained an adventure. Carts, carriages and sleds transported food, mail and guests to Arosa, as well as building materials for the fast-growing health resort.
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The train stops in Langwies. Here it changes to the other side of the valley and drives over a major engineering feat dating back to the pioneering construction of the railway to the south. The line crosses the deep Langwies Ravine over a 284-metre viaduct mounted on 42-metre pillars. Since no suitable building blocks were available locally, engineers decided to build a concrete bridge using the plentiful gravel and sand. At the beginning of the 20th century it was the world’s largest reinforced concrete bridge. The railway line running 26 kilometres from Chur to Arosa is an astounding feat of engineering and construction. Although the height difference was 1,154 metres, the railway engineers laid the track in the landscape in such a way that they did not need a rack-and-pinion locomotive. Construction work began in the summer of 1912, and the Chur-Arosa line was officially opened on 11 December 1914. The idea of a train had first been raised in 1902, because travelling to Arosa – despite work to upgrade the road – was still very difficult and cars in the canton of Grisons were not allowed to drive on the roads. In fact, up until 1927 several different routes were proposed, and there was even talk of building a cable car from Chur to Arosa. This major project started to take shape when the Chur-Arosa Railway Company was established in 1911. The new railway line saved tourism in Arosa. Resort and holiday guests were now able to travel in comfort to the sports and health resort throughout the year, even for a short visit lasting a few days. Travelling time from Chur was just over an hour. The resort had by now become a destination for winter holidays. Resort Director Felix Moeschlin believed the future lay in sports tourism. Rather than a health resort for those with consumption, it should try to attract summer tourists and those keen on winter sports. He was in office from 1915 to 1920 and promoted various sporting facilities in line with his ideas. For example, the bobsleigh run to Litzirüti was extended. German war internees built the first ski jump in Arosa. The expansion paid off. The number of overnight stays rose from 247,000 in 1920/21 to 536,000 in 1930/31. Then times became more turbulent. There was a growing threat of war and the economy slumped. Arosa’s golden age was over.
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Private sanatoriums were converted into hotels, but they struggled to survive until there was an improvement in the economy. Between 1930 and 1941 the population dipped below the level of 1920, shrinking from 3,466 to 1,980 inhabitants. Yet to this day, the high mountain resort lives from the holiday and sports business. Today, Arosa notches up almost a million overnight stays per year.
1888 1900 1930 1980 1990 2000 2016
POPULATION 88 1,071 3,466 3,508 3,241 3,551 3,219
Imposing valley basin The train crosses the viaduct. As the traveller catches a first glimpse of the deep valley cut by the River Plessur, it is hard to imagine that engineers and construction workers built this railway over a hundred years ago. The train enters a dark forest. As the great German poet Christian Morgenstern, author of “Songs from the Gallows”, once wrote in a letter in 1901 about his first stay in Arosa, “The landscape is just magnificent, forests as if of stone, imposing mountain peaks, magnificent basins, crystal clear air.” Morgenstern visited Arosa several times because he suffered from lung disease.
“Fragrance flows from the meadows. Darkness spills from the wood. From deep within secret gullies Babbles the sparkling brook.” Christian Morgenstern on Schanfigg, second stanza of the poem “Welch ein Schweigen” (“Such silence”), reprinted in the Aroser Fremdenblatt, February 1912 On this day in May the streams are gorged with the meltwater that spills down the slopes. The train goes past the hamlet of Litzirüti, pushing on in great loops up the mountain. It is now in the valley basin, very close to the River Plessur that meanders
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YEAR
AROSA LANDSCAPE The sports and health resort in the early 1970s.
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wildly in a broad riverbed. The journey is nearly over, just a final tunnel and the train enters the station. It is at the same level as the upper lake. Most of the other parts of Arosa village were built on slopes, framed by an imposing ring of mountains, dominated by the Rothorn that rises to just under 3,000 metres. The basin is open to the sky, so it receives a lot of sunlight in spite of the high peaks. The sun, as the physicist Paul Götz had already pointed out in his 1926 book “Das Strahlungsklima von Arosa” (“The Radiation Climate of Arosa”), played a prominent role in a high mountain resort like Arosa. He enthused about the “clarity and the deep blue of the sky”, about the “abundance of light that bathes the landscape”.
CLIMATE IN AROSA 3.9 1,337 1,679 42 1
Considering that Arosa is a high mountain resort in a valley basin, the sun shines for a relatively long time. The averaged annual sunshine duration in Zurich is 1,828 hours. The air is clear and cleaner because there is no transit traffic. The valley basin provides shelter from high winds. On this May day the visitor feels none of these climatic features. Arosa seems dead. The place is recovering from the hustle and bustle of the winter months. “A village without a soul”, says the hotelier, in one of the few houses that are still open. But soon the summer season will begin. And it will be loud and busy again. At the beginning of the 20th century peace and quiet were an important selling point for a mountain resort. But the time of the sanatoriums was long gone, and Arosa had become a holiday and sports resort.
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Temperature Annual average in °C 1987-2017 Precipitation Annual average in mm 1987-2017 Sunshine duration Average annual sum in hours 1987-2017 Wind Number of days over 45 km/h Wind Number of days over 100 km/h (20-year average)
REST CURE At the beginning of the 20th century tuberculosis patients in sanatoriums spent several hours in the fresh air every day.
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MAGIC MOUNTAINS IN AROSA If you walk along the idyllic forest path from the village centre to Innerarosa, you suddenly find yourself in front of the imposing entrance of the Tschuggen Grand Hotel. The location is unique, and the hotel has a broad view of the valley floor and its impressive crown of mountains. It was reopened in the winter season of 1970 a er it had completely burned down in 1966. The Swiss architects Mario Botta and Carlo Rampazzi created a wellness zone, the “Mountain Oasis”, in the mountain behind the hotel. Church-like windows jut out of the slope like ethereal trees and bring the light into the underground spaces. This is the health offering of the Tschuggen Grand Hotel in the 21st century.
Marie’s brother Otto Herwig suffered from pulmonary tuberculosis. He came to Davos in 1880 and spent one and a half years taking a cure. He had been very impressed by a trip to the high valley of Arosa, a place that was little known at that time. In 1882 he moved to the mountain village, where he went on to work as a doctor. A year later, he built a small house, which he later transformed into a health resort. Herwig had an innovative mind. As early as the 1880s he travelled around the village on skis from Scandinavia, at a time when the narrow wooden slats were still unknown in Switzerland. Otto Herwig put Arosa on the map as a health resort. The Berghilf Sanatorium is located on the southern slope of the Tschuggen, near the forest. “Completely dust-free, sheltered from north and east winds”, is how the owners describe the benefits of the Arosa valley basin. What is more, in comparison to other mountain resorts, the air is “purer and more tranquil”. According to the sanatorium’s own description, the sun shines for much longer. This is very beneficial for winter cures – similar to “nearby Davos, which is 1,000 feet below”. Berghilf is 6,160 feet (or 1,850 metres) above sea level. Marie Herwig manages the sanatorium until her death in 1922.
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Guests have come here looking for rest from as early as the end of the 19th century. In 1888 Marie Herwig builds a four-storey house with balconies on the south side of the top two floors – the Berghilf Sanatorium. It is the first resort house in Arosa for pulmonary patients who “still have some fight le in them”, as the sanatorium claimed at the time.
ROBERT KOCH, DISCOVERER OF THE TUBERCULOSIS PATHOGEN Dr Robert Koch reports in a speech he gives in Berlin on 24 March 1882 that he has discovered the pathogen for tuberculosis (TB), mycobacterium tuberculosis. In so doing he aroused great hopes of a cure for the disease, which was widespread in Europe and America. According to estimates, one in seven Germans died of TB in those days.
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In 1890, Koch scores his next coup at an international medical conference when he presents the remedy for tuberculosis: tuberculin. The news spreads like wildfire. Demand rises sharply. But the remedy initially makes people sick. Some recover, but others die. Later, Koch's teacher Rudolf Virchow proves that this “miracle cure” by no means kills the tuberculosis bacteria. Under pressure, Koch reveals his formula. Tuberculin contains an extract of tuberculosis bacilli in glycerol. He got the idea for it after infecting guinea pigs with the formula and finding that they survived longer than expected. Koch escapes to Egypt until the scandal dies down. He had already been to the country in the 1880s. At that time, he had tried to identify the cholera pathogen. In India, he had finally discovered that cholera was caused by contaminated drinking water. He was later able to use this knowledge, and in 1892 successfully fought a devastating cholera epidemic in Germany. Koch's reputation had suffered to some extent because of the tuberculin failure. Nevertheless, in 1891 he was able to open his own Institute for Infectious Diseases in Berlin, today known as the Robert Koch Institute. There he works on combating the spread of typhus and cholera. Koch is now considered the founder of epidemiology. In 1905, he received the Nobel Prize for Medicine for his “investigations and discoveries in relation to tuberculosis”.
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Belief that climate heals Unlike Arosa, Davos was already a well-known health resort at the end of the 1880s. As early as the middle of the 16th century, the village was considered to have a beneficial effect. Ulrich Campell, pastor, historian and geographer, believed in “very healing air”. At the beginning of the 17th century, Sir Johannes Guler von Wyneck recommended stays in Davos for those suffering from lung complaints because of the health benefits of sun and fresh air.
It was in fact another doctor who put Davos on the map as a health resort. Alexander Spengler, a political refugee from Germany, was appointed as doctor in Davos in 1853. In a book about consumption, he wrote in 1869: “It is worth noting that while among the 1,600 inhabitants of the area not a single case of chronic tuberculosis of the lungs has come to my attention in 14 years, very o en the vigorous offspring of healthy parents, with magnificent, well-proportioned physique, bulging thorax, strong heart muscle, the very picture of rude health, move away to the lowlands and return a er just a few years with consumption.” The mountain village of Davos now became a major destination as a health and holiday resort. One reason was that around 1856 the first reports appeared describing tuberculosis as curable in the early stages if patients took good care of themselves, abided by the prescribed therapy, and recovered in a place where tuberculosis was rare – such as Davos. In the 19th century tuberculosis become a worldwide epidemic. The Zurich doctor Otto Naegeli demonstrates around 1900 that nearly all people are infected
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The belief in the healing power of climate remains strong in the community almost two centuries later. In 1806 Canton President Jakob Valär says this is due to the many mild days, and the absence of damp fog. It was another 35 years before the first sanatorium was built in Davos. The founder was a doctor named Luzius Rüedi, who in 1841 set up a private institution for scrofulous and cretinous children. Scrofula is unknown today; it was a childhood disease that caused chronic inflammation of the skin and mucous membranes. Cretinism was a developmental disorder. The disease was then mistakenly attributed to iodine deficiency in certain geographical areas. Even today researchers do not agree on whether it is a parasitic infestation with bacterial infection, or an allergy. However, Luzius Rüedi was convinced that it was the altitude and high mountain climate that prevented occurrence of the two diseases in Davos.
with tubercle bacteria during their lifetime. The cause of the disease remains a mystery until the German microbiologist Robert Koch discovers the tuberculosis pathogen “Mycobacterium tuberculosis” in 1882. Scientists also make their way to the high mountain resort. One of them is the German natural scientist Carl Dorno. His daughter suffers from tuberculosis and the climate of Davos will supposedly improve her condition. Dorno wants to know more about the Davos climate and its effects – in 1907 he founds the Physical Meteorological Observatory, which he will run using his own resources until 1922. Dorno is considered the founder of radiation climatology and bioclimatology. In his book "Klimatologie im Dienste der Medizin" ("Climatology in the Service of Medicine") he considers in detail the effect of sunbathing – say in an adapted lounge – on the human body. When in 1926 Dorno can no longer support the observatory financially, it is transferred to the Research Institute of Altitude Physiology and Tuberculosis, and later named Swiss Research Institute for High Altitude Climate and Medicine at the suggestion of the Davos doctor Karl Turban.
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Turban is a German general practitioner from Weinheim who arrived in Davos with an established reputation as a doctor. He undertook further training in the new field of bacteriology in Berlin as an assistant to Robert Koch, the discoverer of the tuberculosis bacillus. Turban subsequently contracted himself, so he went to the Riviera to recuperate. There he met the Zurich clinician Gustav Huguenin, who later recommended him for the post of medical director at a newly planned sanatorium in Davos. Before starting work in Davos, he agrees to learn the treatment methods used by Peter Dettweiler at the Falkenstein Sanatorium in the German Taunus Mountains. This experience subsequently influences the therapies he offers in Davos.
Disorderly sanatoriums Once in Davos, Turban is initially appalled by the methods used in the alpine resort. In 1889 he writes: “Patients with a fever and those coughing up blood are sent on mountain walks. At the regular concerts in the Kurhaus, patients with laryngitis sing drinking songs at the top of their voices. At celebrations in the hotel, seriously ill men and women get drunk and then do all the modern dances - and the doctors simply watch.” Turban emphasises the importance of strict hygiene and systematic recuperation. His patients spend many hours of the day on sun loungers in the open air.
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Turban joins them in the a ernoon to overcome their initial scepticism about this treatment. He obviously succeeds with his combination of strict sanatorium regime and alpine treatment. Patients from all over the world make their way to Davos. On 8 August 1889, at the age of 33, he opens the Turban Sanatorium in Davos; it is Switzerland's first pulmonary hospital and has 70 beds. In his memoirs he writes: “Although I expected no miracles from the weather and climate, I could surmise on the balance of probability that if a) treatment in an institute and b) the alpine climate were each proven beneficial, then a+b would produce even better results...” Thanks to Turban’s therapeutic successes the village enjoys a second building boom. New private sanatoriums are established. Davos becomes a Mecca for lung patients, 30,000 of whom seek salvation in the alpine resort in 1912, more than a third from Germany and almost 7,400 from Switzerland. They also come from Russia, England, the USA and South America.
At the time there is already a certain amount of rivalry between Davos and the much smaller ex-farming village Arosa. According to the 1895 “Leitfaden für Aerzte und Laien” (“Guide for doctors and laymen”) to winter resorts, Arosa “has rapidly become a mountain resort of the first order”. This document contains a detailed comparison of the climates of Arosa and Davos. For example, at 65 per cent the relative humidity is 10 to 20 per cent lower than in Davos, and the sun shines half an hour to a full hour longer in winter. However, it rains or snows more o en in Arosa. The document went on to say: “As a rival to Davos, Arosa points to its lower levels of smoke pollution because it is a small village, and to the quieter life, that is, the lack of opportunity for any kind of extravagance”. On the other hand, Davos did however offer pleasant walks, whilst Arosa lacked flat terrain. Only the sick who could manage a Excerpt from “Guide for doctors and laymen”, 1895 climb benefited from an outdoor cure. The standards of care stipulated by the Davos doctor Karl Turban lent themselves to publicity extolling the health benefits of Arosa. Some doctors in sanatoriums
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Competition for Davos
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Without the painstaking research and detailed specialist knowledge of Johannes Staehelin and Pierre Viatte this book would not have been written. Rachel von Dach’s attractive layout makes the book accessible and lively. Thank you. I would like to thank Hans Ulrich Dütsch’s children for sharing their memories of their father. Particular thanks to Matthias Meili, a science journalist in Zurich, for proofreading the draft. Finally, I would like to thank the specialists who checked the corresponding chapters: Ursula Dütsch (doctor), Julian Gröbner (PMOD/WRC), Alexander Haefele (MeteoSwiss), Renzo Semadeni (Arosa Local History Museum), Thomas Peter (ETH Zurich).
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My thanks also go to the team at Haupt Publishers, who have accompanied me in the writing of this book in a refreshingly straightforward manner. Publication received financial support from the Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology MeteoSwiss, ETH Zurich, Municipality of Arosa, Swiss Academy of Sciences, Platform Geosciences, Swiss Commission for Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (ACP) and the World Meteorological Organization for the English translation.
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COPYRIGHT NOTICE First edition: 2020 Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek list this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie. More information can be found at http://dnb.dnb.de Haupt Publishers is supported by the Federal Office of Culture with a financial contribution for the years 2016 - 2020. ISBN 978-3-258-08210-3 All rights reserved. Copyright © 2020 Haupt Bern Any form of reproduction without the consent of the publisher is prohibited. Graphic design, concept and type setting: Rachel von Dach, Biel/Bienne Printed in Germany www.haupt.ch
Also available as eBook: ISBN 978-3-258-48210-1
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Pioneers, troublemakers, discoveries. The resort of Arosa became a world-renowned research centre. This book tells the story of the world’s longest series of ozone measurements and the Earth’s vital protective envelope.
ISBN 978-3-258-08210-3