Karl Kolbenheyer

Karl Kolbenheyer (born May 28, 1841 in Bielsko-Cieszyn Silesia, died February 1, 1901) is a Silesian-German, Austrian citizen, a high school teacher, a naturalist, a mountain tourist, a Tatras researcher, the mountains with 10 editions and numerous maps of Tatra. From the founding (in 1893) one of the most active members of the German tourist organization Beskidenverein.

He studied classical philology at the universities of Vienna and Jena. He was a teacher of Latin and Greek, as well as of nature and geography. He worked in Levo on Spis (1863-68), Cieszyn (1868-70) and for 28 years in his native Bielsko. In the latter, he taught at the German Gymnasium (K.K.Staatsgymnasium in Bielitz), which was based in a building belonging to a group of mechanical schools at the present Słowacki Street.

Mountain tourism has been practiced since youth. In the Tatra Mountains (at Morskie Oko) was the first time at the age of 20 years. For another 30 years, he traveled to the Tatra Mountains a lot and in time became one of the best nineteenth-century experts in the mountains. He was the author of one of the most important Tatra guides from that period (Die Hohe Tatra, Teschen 1876, 10th edition, 1898), which played a major role in the popularization of Tatra tourism. This guide was also published in Hungarian (A Magas Tátra, Teschen 1882, co-author Pál Kovács). He was also the author of maps of the Tatra Mountains on various scales (based on the maps of the Austrian military maps), which he attached to the editions of his guide or published separately. The most important are Karte der Hohen Tatra mit den nächsten Voralpen 1: 100 000 (Késmárk 1876 and Breslau 1891) and Die Hohe Tatra mit der nächsten Umgebung 1: 133 333 (Teschen 1884, 1891, 1898). He also published a guide to the Beskid Mountains (Führer durch die Beskiden im Gebiete der Section Bielitz-Biala des Beskiden-Vereines, 1891).

Since the beginning of the 1960s, he has been conducting botanical observations in the Beskidy Mountains and in the Silesian Foothills. At that time, Cieszyn cymbaria (G. , Wien 1862).

At least from 1872, Kolbenheyer also conducted broadly understood natural observations in the Tatras and Podtát. He was involved in barometric and trigonometric measurements of height, meteorological observations, temperature measurements of springs, ponds and caves, botanical and geobotanical observations, etc. height of the highest peak in the Tatras, Gerlach, at 2662.6 m n.p.m. Only accurate measurements of the twentieth century reduced this value to 2655 m. The results of these observations were published in the press (among others published in Leipzig "Zipser Bote" and in Wrocław "Schlesische Zeitung") and other publications, among others. in the yearbook of the Hungarian Carpathian Society. From 1874 he was also a member of the Polish Physiological Commission at the Academy of Arts in Cracow, and published many of his works in the Polish translation in the Physiographic Commission Reports (1874-1882).

Kolbenheyer founded and led the school in which he taught the first meteorological station in Bielsko. The second station was founded in 1897 in the Beskidenverein hut at Szyndzielnia. From 1873 he also tried to organize a network of meteorological stations in the Tatras and at their foot. His memory was celebrated by German and Hungarian tourists, calling Kobyla Stawek in the Kobylle Dolina in the Slovak High Tatra Kolbenheyersee and Kolbenheyer tó respectively. Bibliography

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