Maximilian Herzberger

Maximilian Herzberger was the son of Leopold Herzberger (born 7 Mar 1870, Krefeld — died in Rochester (NY)) and Sonja/Sofia Behrendt/Berendt/Berends (22 Mar 1876, Petersburg (Germany) — 28 Jan 1945, Florence); he had a sister Olga (24 Sep 1897, Berlin — 2 Aug 1922, Berlin). The family was Jewish.[3] He studied mathematics and physics at the Berlin University, where Albert Einstein was one of his professors, and later became a friend and advisor.[4]^: 57r In 1923, Herzberger finished his Ph.D. thesis Ueber Systeme hyperkomplexer Grössen under Ludwig Bieberbach and Issai Schur at the philosophical faculty.[5] In 1925, he married Edith Kaufmann (10 Oct 1901, Stuttgart — 16 Feb 2001, Carlsbad (California) or New Orleans); they had three children, born in Jena, viz. Ruth (born 1928), Ursula Bellugi (1931), and Hans (6 Aug 1932, spouse of Radhika Herzberger).[1][2] No later than Sep 1930, he was assistant of Hans Boegehold,^(de) the chief of calculation office at Carl Zeiss Jena.[6]

In 1934, the Nazis deprived him from his professorship at Jena University and his contract with Zeiss. He emigrated with his family to Rochester (NY),[6] where he became head of Eastman Kodak's optical research laboratories, arranged by Einstein.[4]^: 57r In 1940, he and his family became U.S. citizens.[4]^: 58l In 1945, he got the Cressy Morrison Award of the New York Academy of Sciences.[4]^: 57l

In 1954 he finished the development of the superachromat as the ultimately well-corrected lens for Kodak.[4]^: 58m[7] In 1962, he was awarded the Frederic Ives Medal of the Optical Society of America.[8][9] In 1965, he retired from his position at Kodak, and helped building a graduate institute for optics in Switzerland,[4]^: 58r until in 1968 he followed invitation of the University of New Orleans to teach at their Physics Department.[4]^{: 57m, 58r}[6]

He held patents for an "apochromatic telescope objective having three air spaced components",[10] and a "superachromatic objective".[11]

• Ueber Systeme hyperkomplexer Grössen, Max Herzberger, Berlin, 1923, Ebering.
• Untersuchungen über die Eigenschaften erster Ordnung von reellen Strahlensystemen, Jan 1928, De Gruyter, ISBN 9783111279886
• Untersuchungen über die Eigenschaften erster Ordnung von reellen Strahlensystemen, in: Journal für die reine und angewandte Mathematik, Vol.159, p. 36-49, 1928
• Über die geometrische Bedeutung des Rotationswinkels in der Strahlengeometrie, Jan 1928, De Gruyter, ISBN 9783111095615
• Über die geometrische Bedeutung des Rotationswinkels in der Strahlengeometrie, in: Journal für die reine und angewandte Mathematik, Vol.160, p. 33-37, 1929
• Gullstrand, Allvar, Complete Dictionary of Scientific Biography, 2008
• M. Herzberger, Allvar Gullstrand, in Optica Acta, Vol.3 (1960), p. 237–241

• Homage to an immortal KUBRICK AND THE LEGENDARY PLANAR 50mm f / 0.7, about a camera objective based on a 1937 draft by Herzberger, and used by Stanley Kubrick for his film "Barry Lyndon"