KLUYVER AS PROFESSOR; CHRONICLES OF THE LABORATORY 



the post-war years it was she who saw to it that the ever-changing 

 ranks in the personnel were regularly kept filled. She also played an 

 active part in attempts to solve the housing difficulties of the staff. In 

 fact, she was consulted whenever human problems arose in the labor- 

 atory, and discussions between the professor and his staff about such 

 problems always ended in conferences with the 'unsalaried chief of 

 personnel' of the institute. Thus, when she died in 1952, it was also 

 a severe loss to the laboratory. It hardly needs commentary that the 

 next few years were particularly difficult for Kluyver ; during this time 

 his children proved a great support to him. But the most important 

 consequence, the terrifying spectre of the lonely future that awaited 

 him upon his retirement, was something of which nobody could re- 

 lieve him; and there was irony in the circumstance that, just at that 

 time, the plans for the new laboratory with adjoining living quarters 

 began to assume a definite form. He had long looked forward to this 

 development, and now he would scarcely be in a position to enjoy it 

 any more. 



At the outbreak of the war, 'the institute that had been promised 

 me as early as 1924' had not progressed much beyond the stage of a 

 rough draft. When, after the liberation, funds were made available for 

 newly equipping the Technological University, Kluyver hoped that 

 now his new institute would soon come into being, so that he would 

 still be in a position to use it for at least six or eight years before hand- 

 ing it over, completely equipped and functioning, to his successor. 

 With enthusiasm and thoroughness he had helped in the drafting of 

 the plans; he had consulted architect friends and foreign acquaint- 

 ances ; he had gathered documents and designs of other laboratories 

 and during his travels he had collected every pertinent datum of in- 

 formation. But now it was a problem of financing, then again the 

 city's planning commission, that caused postponement or required 

 modification of the plans. What had once been a joy gradually be- 

 came a lingering burden, and with the passing of the years it finally 

 was only a sense of duty towards the chair for microbiology itself that 

 could still act as a stimulus. In addition, the impending departure 

 from the old and familiar surroundings at the Nieuwelaan seriously 

 troubled Kluyver, so that, when at long last it became evident that 

 even under the most favourable conditions he would profit from the 

 new institute for no more than a couple of years, he sometimes could 



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