Fritz Gajewski

Friedrich Fritz Gajewski ( born October 13, 1885 in pillau; † 2 December 1965 Hahnwald in Cologne ) was a German manager of the IG Colors and Wehrwirtschaftsführer.

Life and work

Gajewski, son of a teacher grew, with eleven other siblings in East Prussia. After attending school, he completed a pharmacist teaching and studied from 1905 chemistry and pharmacy at the University of Leipzig. In 1906 he became a member of that free connection attempt Vandalia (later Corps Vandalia ). In 1910 he received a doctorate in phil. After a year of military service, he was employed by BASF, where he first worked in the main lab and dyeing. From 1914 to 1917 he took part as a soldier in the First World War. He married in 1917, of the marriage were born two daughters. In 1917 he was in the BASF plant manager in Oppau, received 1922 senior officer, assisted from 1925 Carl Bosch, and was director of IG Colors. From 1928, he served as technical director at Agfa and took over in 1930 at IG Colors the range photo, rayon and pulp products. In addition, he was there liaison and member of the Supervisory Board (1936-1940) at Dynamit Nobel.

He was from 1931 to 1945 on the board of I.G. Colors and there Head of Production Area Photo and synthetics. He was from 1933 a member of the NSDAP, from 1940 a member of the South East Europe Committee and from 1942 Wehrwirtschaftsführer.

After the war he was arrested on 5 October 1945 by the U.S. Army. In the Nuremberg IG Farben trial, he was declared on all counts not guilty. In the process he testified to his relief, that he had freed the Jewish fellow board members Gerhard Ollendorff from Gestapo custody. Under cross-examination, however, it turned out that he had previously betrayed him. His counsel was Ernst Achenbach.

In 1949 he became Managing Director in 1952 and Chairman of the Board of Dynamit Nobel AG. A year later, he received the Grand Cross of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. In 1957 he took leave to retire, his interim successor, Ernst Fischer.

In 1961 he was awarded the Grand Silver Medal for Services to the Republic of Austria