MICHAELIS, Paul.

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25 Jahre Betriebsarzt ("Twenty-Five Years a Company Physician"). An otherwise untraced memoir by a doctor employed between 1918 and 1943 at the Griesheim-Elektron factory at Bitterfeld, which produced alloys and chemicals. In 1925, the factory was merged by Hermann Schmitz into the notorious IG Farben conglomerate, a core of the Nazi military-industrial complex and a perpetrator of crimes against humanity.Michaelis was recruited by Griesheim-Elektron in 1918. His responsibilities included the day-to-day provision of medical care and institutional hygiene and welfare practices, although he notes that, after the creation of IG Farben, he had fewer opportunities to consult with the factory's management on the health of the workforce. Overall, his department treated around 2.5 million people during his tenure. Written around 1943, the memoir avoids references to any of the horrors unfolding under the Nazi regime and IG Farben's complicity, although he states that the workforce was in part composed of labour from occupied countries. During the Second World War, the factory produced inputs for the manufacture of explosives and aircraft, and treating phosphorus necrosis was one of Michaelis's main concerns.The account is illustrated by 18 original, professionally composed photographs showing the factory's medical facilities and treatment of patients.

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