Kaiser Wilhelm Society Medal

Here is a medal awarded to someone for using their brain. There are a fair number of such medal types out there but this one has a history which is a bit more interesting than most. The Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft was a society for the advancement of the sciences. It was founded in 1911 and lasted with that name through the Third Reich which is amazing in it’s own right. In 1946 the American Occupation Government decided that the organization smacked too much of the old Germany and ended it’s existence on July 11, 1946. Our British allies however, were a little more level headed and had second thoughts. The society was good they thought. Only the name was wrong. So two months later on Sept. 11, 1946 they re-instituted the society under a new name, “The Max Planck Gesellschaft” and it still exists to this very day. Well done I say!!