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March 3 in German History
--------------------------------- March 3, 1033 Death of St. Kunigunde von
Luxembourg (ca. 9801033)
St. Kunigunde was the daughter of Count
Siegfried of Luxembourg. In 999 she married emperor Heinrich
II of the Holy Roman Empire (a.k.a. the German Empire).
They were married in Paderborn, Germany. She was crowned as
empress by Pope Benedict VIII in Rome. In 1017 she founded
the monastery in Kaufungen. After the death of her husband
she herself entered this monastery and led the remainder of
her life as a nun. She ultimately became the superior of the
monastery. She devoted her life to prayer and simplicity in
life. On her deathbed there was the sense that she should be
dressed in her empress clothing, but she refused, wanting to
die in the attire of a simple nun. She is entombed in the
cathedral in Bamberg. She was canonized by Pope Innocence III
in 1200.
March 3, 1709
Birth of the chemist, Andreas Sigismund
Marggraf in Berlin, Germany. Marggraf was the director of the
chemical laboratory of the German Academy of Sciences in
Berlin from 1704-1760. He was able to simplify the method of
extracting phosphorus from urine. He discovered that there is
a sugar in beets which is identical to that in sugar cane.
His discovery of beet sugar was not used in production of
sugar until Ferdinand Runge, a chemist at the university of
Breslau devised a method of extracting sugar. The first beet
sugar refinery started in 1802.
March 3, 1716
Death of Bl. Liberatus (Johannes Laurentius
Weiß) (1675-1716)Johannes Laurentius Weiß was born in
Konnersreuth, Germany (near Bayreuth). He entered the
Franciscan order at age 18, taking the name Liberatus. He was
ordained in 1698. He became a missionary to Ethiopia. He
worked there until 1716 to bring the Ethiopian church back
into accord with the Roman Church. In 1716 he was put to
death by stoning in reaction against his efforts. He was
beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1988.
March 3, 1793
Birth of Charles Sealsfield in Poppitz,
Austria. Sealsfield was a novelist specializing in American
Wild West stories for German youngsters.
March 3, 1805
Birth of Jonas Furrer in Winterthur,
Switzerland. Furrer, a Swiss politician, was elected
Bundespräsident (president) of Switzerland 4 times, in 1848,
1852, 1855 and 1858.
March 3, 1872
Birth of Carl Siemens in Charlottenburg,
Germany.
March 3, 1878
Birth of Leopold Jessner in Königsberg,
Germany (now in Poland). Jessner was a theater director, most
noted for his production of Expressionist plays. He became a
director of the Berlin State Theater. In 1933 he fled Nazi
Germany and immigrated to the United States. He worked in
Hollywood until his death.
March 3, 1898
Birth of Emil Artin in Vienna, Austria.
Artin, a mathematician, made his most significant
contribution to mathematics in the area of class field theory
with his general law of reciprocity. He also solved the
Hilbert problem of definite functions, worked with
hypercomplex numbers and developed a theory of braids. He
taught at the universities of Göttingen and Hamburg, and
then immigrated in 1937 to the United States where he taught
at Notre Dame, Indiana University and Princeton University.
In 1958 he returned to Europe to teach at the University of
Hamburg.
March 3, 1933
Arrest of Ernst Thälmann. Thälmann had
been born in Hamburg, Germany on April 16, 1886. He joined
the communist party in 1920. He ran for president of the
Weimar Republic in 1925 and 1932 against Paul von Hindenburg.
When Hitler came to power in 1933 he began attacks on the
Communist Party at once. Thälmann was arrested on March 3,
1933 and was executed in the camp at Buchenwald in August of
1944.
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