[Nuclear medicine in Germany: a look back at the beginning]

The development of nuclear medicine in Germany from early approaches with 32P and 131I to the first radioiodine therapy of thyroid cancer up to the clarification of basic principles for current thyroid diagnostics and for functional scintigraphic imaging are presented. Selected references are used in portraying scientific stepping stones of our speciality as well as its establishment in clinical practice during the first two decades. Researchers, places, and facts are specified and interpreted in their relation to the state-of-the-art of nuclear medicine.