Google Doodle celebrates Marga Faulstich’s 103rd Birthday

Her fiancé died during World War II, and from that moment she focused solely on her career.

Marga Faulstich was born in Weimar in 1915. In 1922, the family moved to Jena, where Faulstich attended high school. After graduating from high school in 1935, she began her training as a graduate assistant at Schott AG, a leading manufacturer of optical lenses and special techniques in Europe. Google Doodle is celebrating her 103rd birth anniversary.

In her first years there, she worked in the development of thin films. The results of the fundamental research carried out at that time are still used in the manufacture of sunglasses, anti-reflective glasses, and glass facades. Faulstich, a talented young woman, has progressed rapidly in her career, from graduate assistant to technician, to scientific assistant and finally to scientist.

Her fiancé died during World War II, and from that moment she focused solely on her career. In 1942, she studied chemistry while continuing to work at Schott. She could not finish her studies because the situation changed after the Second World War.

Jena belonged to the Soviet occupation zone; however, the world's most advanced glass facility was in Jena and the Western Allies wanted to acquire and use this knowledge.

As a result, 41 specialists and managers of Schott AG were taken to the western sector, including Marga Faulstich. A new research laboratory was built in Landshut in 1949 for employees of Schott AG to continue their work.

However, after the expropriation of the Jena plant in 1948 and the division of Germany in 1949, it was decided to build a new plant in Mainz for the "41 glass manufacturers" of Schott AG. 

The new factory on the outskirts of Mainz Neustadt ("New Town") opened in 1952. Here Marga Faulstich continued working on the research and development of new optical glasses, with a particular focus on the microscope and binocular lenses.

In addition to her research, Faulstich achieved a melting pot. Marga Faulstich received international recognition for the invention of the light SF 64 lens, for which she was honored in 1973.

In 1979, she retired after working at Schott AG for 44 years. She spent the next few years traveling to distant countries, but still gave lectures and presentations at glass conferences. She died on February 1, 1998, in Mainz at the age of 82.