225 Years Uranium and Radioactivity Cross-Links Around the Brocken: Klaproth, Elster and Geitel, Nazi Research, Wismut Prospection, and Recent Anomalies

When Martin Heinrich Klaproth, born in Wernigerode, presented the discovery of “uranite”, he could not know which role this new element would play. In 1823, Alexander von Humboldt published the idea of the “Classic Geological Square Mile” later used for parts of the Northern Harz area because of their geodiversity. Between 1880 and 1920, the two physicists Julius Elster and Hans Friedrich Geitel worked in the Harz area—Geitel coined the term “atomic energy” in 1899. A cluster of industry and the Mining Academy Clausthal developed in this area because of the diversity of mineral deposits and mining. In the Nazi era, this cluster conducted military research and partly also worked on the possible use of uranium (U) for weapon production. The German U reserve was placed in Staßfurt. After WW II, Wismut carried out prospection work in the Harz region, but no U deposits were found worth mining. The U source of an anomaly in surface waters within the agricultural landscape Magdeburger Börde is probably to be found in the intensive and long-time use of mineral phosphate fertilisers.