Friedrich August Finger

Friedrich August Finger was born on 29 April 1885 in Frankfurt/Main. He was one of the greatest personalities who established building materials science as a science and as a required course of study. Through his work at that time, F. A. Finger made it possible that Weimar is still known worldwide as a location for successful building materials research and education.

He is the name giver of the Institute for Building Materials Science, founded in 1995 by  Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Jochen Stark at the Bauhaus University Weimar.

by Prof Jochen Stark, from the FIB Annual Report 1995.

The reference in the name to Friedrich August Finger (1885 - 1961), the nestor of building materials research and teaching in Weimar and founding dean of the former Faculty of Building Materials Science and Building Materials Technology at the HAB Weimar, is intended to express, among other things, that the new institute is committed to the long and successful tradition of research and coursework in the
field of building materials in Weimar and will continue this tradition.

Friedrich August Finger had joined the former Weimar School of Architecture as a lecturer on 1 November 1940 and was responsible for training architects in Building Materials Science, with 2 hours of Building Materials Science per week being scheduled in the 1st and 2nd semesters from 1942. On 1 December 1944, F. A. Finger was appointed associate professor for Building Materials Science and Civil Engineering.

After the end of the Second World War, efforts were soon made to reopen the university and university staff were actively involved in the reconstruction of the state of Thuringia. F. A. Finger played an outstanding role in this. In October 1945, a so-called "Bauhaus planning collective" was founded at the university at the time, in which all full and associate professors of the Hochschule für Baukunst were united "as the top experts in their fields in the state of Thuringia". Initially, Hermann Henselmann was in charge of the research communities and from 1 September 1948, F. A. Finger took over. The Building Materials Development Research Association, headed by F. A. Finger, proved to be one of the most successful. Its main task passed in the development of local building material reserves. Work was carried out on the extraction, production and utilisation of clay, lime tuff (Magdala) and anhydrite (Niedersachswerfen) in particular. The results included an anhydrite binder (plaster for the National Theatre in Weimar) and the resumption of the production of sulphate cement in Thuringia, which became known as Thurolit.

In spring 1946, F. A. Finger succeeded in obtaining the machinery of the laboratory of the German cement industry (Berlin-Karlhorst), which had been relocated to Thuringia (Steudnitz), for use by the university. The direct successors to the former planning association are the building materials research centres that emerged from the AG Baustoffe and are located in Weimar inside and outside the university. Outside the university, it was in particular the Institute for Building Materials Development founded by F. A. Finger on 1 April 1946, from which the Institute for Building Materials (now MFPA), headed by F. A. Finger as director until 1955, emerged on 1 January 1951.

On 24 August 1946, the college was reopened as the "Staatliche Hochschule für Baukunst und Bildende Künste" (State Academy of Architecture and Fine Arts) and began teaching in October 1946. F. A. Finger took over the training of architecture students in Building Materials Science, was appointed full professor in March 1947 and founded the Chair of Building Materials Science, Civil Engineering and Statics. In 1950 and 1951, F. A. Finger was the provisional director of the university.

The first Institute for Building Materials Science at the HAB (1958 - 1970)

In autumn 1953, the GDR Council of Ministers commissioned F. A. Finger to found a new faculty of Building Materials Science and Building Materials Technology at the university in Weimar. F. A. Finger regarded this task as his own business and during his five-year term of office as Dean of this unique faculty, the first of its kind, he created the spatial, technical and personnel requirements for the necessary chairs and institutes, or at least prepared them with foresight. Technological planning for the establishment of an Institute for Building Materials Science at the new faculty began as early as 1956. The first construction phase of the new building for the future institute was completed in November 1957 and the second part of the complex, which was named the "Finger Building" in a ceremony on 10 July 1962, one year after the death of F. A. Finger, was completed in early 1960 and is known as such today not only in Weimar university circles.

The founding of the first Institute of Building Materials Science at the Faculty of Building Materials Science and Building Materials Technology took place on 15 November 1958, and the first head of this institute was the holder of the Chair of Ceramics and Glass, Prof. Franz Schwarz (1902 - 1980).

The institute at that time comprised three chairs, whose coursework and areas of research were divided as follows:

Chair of Building Materials Science I:
Ceramics, glass, enamel, industrial waste materials
Head. Prof Franz Schwarz

Chair of Building Materials Science II:
Binders, concrete, building materials testing, construction metals
Head: Doz. Rudolf Riedeberger (1899 -1961)

Chair of Building Materials Science III:
Building protection, barrier and insulating materials
remained unoccupied

The chairs were each occupied by one head and two assistants. With the completion of the "Finger Building", 105 workstations were available for the students of the faculties of Architecture, Civil Engineering and Building Materials Science for their practical training in building materials and Master's theses. The institute was divided into eight departments according to its tasks:

• Concrete
• Binders
• Ceramics and glass
• Construction metals and workshop
• Chemical laboratory
• Fine structure testing
• Wood and wood preservation
• Building protection

The Institute of Building Materials Science developed into the largest institute at the university, in which Dr Werner Riedel, who worked as head of operations, played a major role. In connection with the so-called 3rd university reform in the GDR, the faculty was dissolved and reorganised as the Building Materials Process Engineering Section in September 1968, whereby the basic ideas of F. A. Finger were completely lost. This was also the end of the first Institute for Building Materials Science at this university.