[Mind and craft: the surgeon Heinrich Klose]

Heinrich Klose (1879-1968) studied medicine in Göttingen and Strasbourg. He was trained as a surgeon in Frankfurt am Main by Ludwig Rehn and developed a special interest in thyroid and thymus surgery. In 1924, he became the first professor of surgery at the city hospital in Gdansk. In 1929, in northeastern Germany, he presided over the 38th Conference of the Association of Northwest German Surgeons. As medical director, he organized the expansion of the State Academy for Practical Medicine (1935) and the Medical Academy of Gdansk (1940). From 1945 to 1960 he was a medical director and politician in East Berlin.