Jun 28, 2026 · 56 min · 12 segments
Wouldn't it be nice if the stories we're told were all true, were all heroic and inspiring? But that's not always the case. Because more often than not, family histories – all our family histories…
Joe DunthorneGuest
Oswin BakerHost
Carla O'ShaughnessyHostTheir radioactive streetlights, the Auerlicht, burn cleaner and longer than other lamps because they're soaked in thorium.
So famous, in fact, that in 1928 his boss, one Karl Quasebart, asked Siegfried to head up a new laboratory, a secret one funded by the German military, tasked with developing and producing chemical weapons.
Now this is before Hitler and the Nazis come to power, but in losing the First World War, Germany's military was severely constrained.
No air force, no submarines, no tanks, and specifically no chemical weapons.
While the 1925 Geneva Protocol banned the use of chemical weapons, It said nothing about their manufacture.
According to his own memoir, he takes the job for the reasons that it paid a lot more.
He got extra what he called danger money because he was going to work with chemical weapons.
It was also, you know, within his career, it was a promotion, like a significant promotion.
But he was saying, you know, in the world that I was working in, I was going to be the director of my own laboratory.
He was going to get to design all the laboratory equipment and have people working under him.
My two young children were the same age that Siegfried's two young children were when he made the decision.
He was talking about, you know, having to look after his family, feeling like he needed the security of this job.
And also he talks about the fact that it's peacetime and it's 1928 and it's, you know, the Weimar Republic's doing quite well and there's a sense that maybe it's a stable world and...
Their radioactive streetlights, the Auerlicht, burn cleaner and longer than other lamps because they're soaked in thorium.
So famous, in fact, that in 1928 his boss, one Karl Quasebart, asked Siegfried to head up a new laboratory, a secret one funded by the German military, tasked with developing and producing chemical weapons.
Now this is before Hitler and the Nazis come to power, but in losing the First World War, Germany's military was severely constrained.
No air force, no submarines, no tanks, and specifically no chemical weapons.
While the 1925 Geneva Protocol banned the use of chemical weapons, It said nothing about their manufacture.
According to his own memoir, he takes the job for the reasons that it paid a lot more.
He got extra what he called danger money because he was going to work with chemical weapons.
It was also, you know, within his career, it was a promotion, like a significant promotion.
But he was saying, you know, in the world that I was working in, I was going to be the director of my own laboratory.
He was going to get to design all the laboratory equipment and have people working under him.
My two young children were the same age that Siegfried's two young children were when he made the decision.
He was talking about, you know, having to look after his family, feeling like he needed the security of this job.
And also he talks about the fact that it's peacetime and it's 1928 and it's, you know, the Weimar Republic's doing quite well and there's a sense that maybe it's a stable world and...
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