Ingeborg Rapoport facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Dr.
Ingeborg Rapoport
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Rapoport in 1985
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| Born |
Ingeborg Syllm
2 September 1912 Kribi, German Cameroon
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| Died | 23 March 2017 (aged 104) |
| Nationality | German (East German 1952–1990) |
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| Occupation | Physician and professor in East Germany |
| Known for | Oldest person to receive a Ph.D. (age of 102) |
| Political party | Socialist Unity Party of Germany |
| Spouse(s) | Samuel Mitja Rapoport |
| Children | 4 |
| Awards | Patriotic Order of Merit, National Prize of East Germany and other East German awards |
Ingeborg Rapoport (2 September 1912 – 23 March 2017) was a German doctor who specialized in treating children. She was a leading figure in medicine in East Germany. At the age of 102, she became the oldest person ever to receive a doctorate degree.
Rapoport studied medicine in Hamburg, Nazi Germany. However, she was not allowed to get her medical degree because her mother had Jewish family. She left Germany in 1938 to escape the Nazis and moved to the United States. There, she finished her medical studies. In the early 1950s, she and her husband were investigated for "un-American activities." Because of this, they left the United States. After living in Vienna for a year, they moved to East Germany. She became the first head of a special field called neonatology in all of Germany. This field focuses on the medical care of newborn babies. She retired in 1973. She was a member of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany, a political party in East Germany.
In East Germany, Rapoport received a special qualification called a Habilitation in 1959. She was given important awards like the National Prize of East Germany. As a pediatrician, she helped greatly reduce the number of babies who died in East Germany. During her time, the infant mortality rate there was even lower than in West Germany.
In 2015, the University of Hamburg's medical school corrected the unfairness of the Nazi era. They finally gave her a medical degree after she passed an oral exam. She was 102 years old, making her the oldest person to ever receive a doctorate.
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Early Life and Challenges
Ingeborg Syllm was born in 1912 in Kribi. This was in a German colony called Kamerun, which is now Cameroon. Her parents, Paul Friedrich Syllm and Maria Syllm, were Protestant Germans.
Soon after she was born, her family moved to Hamburg, Germany. She grew up there with her parents. Both her parents were Protestant Christians. However, her mother had Jewish family members.
Ingeborg was raised as a Protestant. Her father was a businessman with traditional German nationalist views. He came from a well-known Protestant family in Hamburg. Her parents divorced in 1928.
Ingeborg Syllm studied medicine at the University of Hamburg. She passed her state exam to become a doctor in 1937. The next year, she wrote her doctoral paper about a disease called diphtheria. But the Nazis classified her as a "Mischling." This term was used for people with both Jewish and "Aryan" (non-Jewish) family. Because of this, she was not allowed to defend her paper. She was denied her medical degree. Her professor, Rudolf Degkwitz, said he would have accepted her paper if not for the Nazi racial laws.
Life in the United States
Rapoport moved to the United States in 1938. She worked as an intern in medical schools in Brooklyn, New York, Baltimore, and Akron, Ohio. She finished her advanced medical education at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. There, she received her M.D. degree.
Rapoport worked as a children's doctor at the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. She later became the head of the outpatient department there. She met her husband, Samuel Mitja Rapoport, in Cincinnati.
Leaving the United States
Rapoport became interested in politics after seeing the poverty of Black people in the US. However, the House Un-American Activities Committee started an investigation into Rapoport and her husband. They were accused of being involved in communist activities. Because of this, they left the United States in 1950.
They first went to Austria. But it was hard for them to find jobs there because of the influence of the CIA. While in Vienna, they tried to find work in several Western European countries. These included England, France, and Scandinavia. These countries were not eager to accept communist immigrants seeking political protection. They also tried to move to Israel, but this did not work out. The Rapoports were also against the idea of Zionism, which supports a Jewish state.
Life in East Germany
In 1952, Rapoport moved to East Germany. Her husband was offered a job as a professor of Biochemistry at the Humboldt-University of Berlin in East Berlin.
In East Germany, Rapoport helped start the Society of Perinatology of the GDR. She was also a council member of the European Society of Perinatology. She served on a committee to reduce infant deaths. She also led a national research project on perinatology, which studies the time around birth. She earned a special qualification called a Habilitation in 1959. She worked at the Humboldt-University of Berlin and Charité Hospital in Berlin.
She founded the first clinic in Germany dedicated to neonatology. This is the medical care of newborn babies. In 1969, she was made a Professor of neonatology. She retired in 1973. She was a member of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany.
Views on East Germany
After the fall of communism in 1990, Rapoport often defended East Germany in interviews.
Rapoport stated that "East Germany was not a state of injustice." She denied that East Germany was an immoral country. She called the negative way East Germany was shown in German media and studies "slander." She also said that investigations into the crimes of the Stasi (East Germany's secret police) were unfair.
Rapoport believed that East German society was better in some ways. She praised its health system, social support, and education system. She compared it to what she saw in the Weimar Republic (Germany before the Nazis), the United States, and Germany today. She especially liked East Germany's healthcare system. She said it gave everyone the same treatment, no matter their social background or wealth. Rapoport claimed that modern society could learn from East Germany. She said, "I'm nostalgic for certain aspects of the GDR. Even with the mistakes it (East Germany) was an important experiment." She also called East Germany "the best society I have seen." She believed that in the future, people would think differently about East Germany.
Retirement and Doctorate at 102
Ingeborg Rapoport continued to live in what used to be East Berlin after she retired. In 2015, the medical school at Hamburg University corrected the unfairness of Nazi Germany. They had denied Rapoport the chance to defend her doctoral paper many years ago.
First, the dean of the medical faculty suggested giving her an honorary doctorate. But Rapoport insisted on taking a full oral exam. She wanted to be tested on her paper, which she had written 77 years earlier. She also wanted to include new research in the field. The exam was given at her home and focused on her paper about diphtheria. After the exam, Dean Koch-Gromus told the press, "She was absolutely brilliant. Her specific knowledge about the latest developments in medicine were unbelievable." Rapoport received a "magna cum laude," which is the second-best possible result for a doctoral paper. She said she did it not for herself, but for the many people who were also treated unfairly by the Nazis. She also did it for those who suffered even more from the regime's crimes. In June 2015, she became the oldest person to receive a doctorate degree.
Family Life
Ingeborg was married to Samuel Mitja Rapoport. They met in Cincinnati. They had four children together. One of their sons, Tom Rapoport, was a professor at the East German Academy of Sciences. He later moved to the United States. He is now a professor at Harvard Medical School. Another son, Michael Rapoport, is a mathematician at the University of Bonn. Her oldest daughter, Susan Richter, is a retired pediatrician. Her younger daughter, Lisa Lange, was a nurse.
Ingeborg Rapoport wrote a book about her life in 1997. A movie about her and her husband's lives was made in 2003. It was called "Die Rapoports - Unsere drei Leben." She became a widow in 2004 and lived in Berlin. She passed away on 23 March 2017.
