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2026-10-06 German Wikipedia - Hilgenberg-OC

Page: [web] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ott_Christoph_Hilgenberg (read in German). Wikipedia is a tertiary source; its statements are leads to check, not primary evidence.

Found (new relative to the folder document)

  • Born 18 Jan 1896 Grebenstein near Kassel; died 21 Sep 1976 West Berlin (heart failure). Described as "promovierter deutscher Ingenieur, Geowissenschaftler und Begründer der Expansionstheorie der Erde".
  • WWI front soldier 1914-1918 (knee wound, burst eardrum; Iron Cross II). Studied electrical machine engineering at TH Berlin 1919-1922 (Dipl.-Ing.), assistant to 1924.
  • USA 4 years: survey-party leader with geophysical instruments in oil exploration in Texas and New Mexico, interpreting seismic signals. The page says this was the main reason for his later rock-physics research at TH Berlin, and that several TH professors supported him with equipment and lab rooms.
  • Vom wachsenden Erdball begun in the late 1920s during Wegener's lifetime, dedicated to Wegener after his 1930 death. "Mit vier Modellgloben zeigte Hilgenberg - als Erster -, wie alle Festländer ... nahtlos ... aneinander passen, wenn der Erddurchmesser etwa halb so groß ist wie heute."
  • 1934-1938 assistant and lecturer, Chair of Getriebelehre (gear/mechanism theory), TH Berlin. "Eine akademische Karriere scheiterte an seiner Weigerung, NSDAP-Mitglied zu werden."
  • "Seine erste Doktorarbeit Über Strömungsversuche mit Senken und Quellen, die das Wesen der Schwerkraft grundlegend erklären wurde 1938 von der Fakultät für Maschinenwesen zurückgewiesen, hauptsächlich weil seine Auffassung von Äther und Schwerkraft nicht mit Albert Einsteins Relativitätstheorie im Einklang stand." (A second source for the rejection, naming the faculty and year; no archival citation given on the page.)
  • WWII: worked at the TH Berlin library; Volkssturm, wounded in the left arm. After 1945 recovered evacuated TH books from the Soviet zone; declined a Bundesverdienstkreuz nomination.
  • 1947-1950 Oberbibliothekar at the Staatsbibliothek Unter den Linden (East Berlin); Dr.-Ing. TU Berlin 1948 (Die Bruchstruktur der Erdrinde); dismissed from GDR library service 1950 as a West Berliner.
  • Thereafter independent researcher with a workroom at the TU Berlin Institut für Geologie und Paläontologie; supported by geology professors including Heinrich Quiring and Werner Zeil ("einem langjährigen Anhänger der Erdexpansion").
  • Original globes lost; Scalera's replicas of the four globes are at the Museo di geofisica di Rocca di Papa near Rome.
  • Partner Hanni Drewer (from 1929); daughter Helge born 1932.
  • Literature/links: Scalera & Jacob (eds.) 2003, 465 pp., proceedings of the 3rd Lautenthaler Montanistisches Colloquium, Lautenthal, 26 May 2001; documentary "Und sie bewegt sich doch!" (ZDF/arte, dir. Franz Fitzke, 45 min, first broadcast 31 Jan 2007); TU Berlin short biography by K.-H. Jacob, May 2001 (archived); J. Marvin Herndon "21st Century Earth Dynamics Part 1" (2009). Authority data: GND 1217674209, LCCN n2003013047, VIAF 37009064.
  • Link "online" for Vom wachsenden Erdball -> http://www.nuclearplanet.com/Hilgenberg.html ; table of contents of the 1974 work -> http://www.schweizerbart.de/pubs/isbn/es/geotektfor-3510500113-desc.html (not visited); ISBN 978-3-510-50011-6.

Bearing on the claims

  • Claim 6 and the rejection story: a second published account (besides Scalera-Braun) of the thesis rejection, with faculty (Maschinenwesen), year (1938) and stated reason (ether/gravity view incompatible with relativity). Thielmann (De Gruyter) and zillmer.com give 1937 as the submission year. Neither cites the faculty file; the TU Berlin university archive is the record that would decide.
  • Claim 3: "Erddurchmesser etwa halb so groß" restates the 1933 book's intro wording; the book's own calculation gives 0.62-0.65 (see archive-org note).