The Richter-Case Cover Image

A Richter-ügy
The Richter-Case

A Scholar’s Way up to Moral Fall

Author(s): György Gaal
Subject(s): Local History / Microhistory, Social history, 19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919)
Published by: Erdélyi Múzeum-Egyesület
Keywords: Aladár Richter; university; Botanical Institute; Botanical Garden; Kolozsvár/Cluj; Transylvanian Museum Society; science; fraud

Summary/Abstract: Following his university studies in botany at Budapest, Aladár Richter (1868–1927) had the opportunity to visit all the important botanical institutes and gardens from Europe. In 1899 he was promoted professor of botany at the Kolozsvár/Cluj Franz Joseph University. He reorganized the Botanical Institute and the old Botanical Garden of the town. He created a Botanical Museum and a rich Herbarium. But he was extremely severe with his students and assistants. In 1910, he managed to have a new territory bought by the state at a very suitable place for a new University Botanical Garden. He was elected member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and several botanical associations. He was the head of the Botanical Section of the Transylvanian Museum Society. Though he had many merits his financial accounts were not quite correct, he expropriated pieces from the Herbarium of the Museum Society, he obliged his assistants to serve his own personal purposes. One of his assistants, Endre Szabó made public these things in newspapers. The control commission of the university declared him not guilty, but he did not dare to prove it by means of a legal action. He rather got retired at the age of 45. Later he tried to get some jobs in his field in Pozsony/Bratislava, then in Budapest, but he was refused everywhere. The scientific community considered him guilty.

  • Issue Year: LXXXII/2020
  • Issue No: 1
  • Page Range: 111-133
  • Page Count: 23
  • Language: Hungarian