Synopsis "Walther Bauersfeld"
High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Walther Bauersfeld (23 January 1879 in Berlin - 28 October 1959 in Heidenheim an der Brenz) was a German engineer, employed by the Zeiss Corporation, who, on a suggestion by the German astronomer Max Wolf, started work on the first projection planetarium in 1912. This work was stopped by military needs during World War I, but resumed after the war. Bauersfeld completed the first planetarium, known as the Zeiss I model in 1923, and it was initially placed on the roof of a Zeiss building in the corporate headquarters town of Jena. This model projected 4,900 stars, and was limited to showing the sky only from Jena's latitude. Subsequently, Bauersfeld developed the Model 2 with 8,956 stars, and full latitude capability. Over a dozen were installed before World War II again suspended planetarium work. These inter-war planetariums were built in Berlin and Düsseldorf in Germany, as well as Rome, Paris, Chicago, Los Angeles and New York. The Düsseldorf planetarium did not survive the war, but its destruction was not by military action: it was removed by the Nazi government because it had been a donation of a Jewish businessman.
