Boron Chemistry–3. Selected Lectures Presented At The Third International Meeting On Boron Chemistry, Munich & Ettal, Frg, 5–9 July 1976

Organizing Committee Chairman: H. Nöth Members: V.l. Bregadze N . N . Greenwood M . F . Hawthorne S. Hermanek R. Köster W.N. Lipscomb R.W. Parry R. Schaeffer M . G . H . Wallbridge International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (Inorganic Chemistry Division) in conjunction with German Chemical Society Boron Chemistry — 3 Selected lectures presented at the Third International Meeting on Boron Chemistry, Munich & Ettal, FRG, 5 - 9 July 1976 Symposium Editor: H. Nöth University of Munich To commemorate the 100th birthday of Alfred Stock PERGAMON PRESS OXFORD · NEW YORK · TORONTO · SYDNEY · PARIS · FRANKFURT U.K. Pergamon Press Ltd., Headington Hill Hall, Oxford O X 3 OBW, England U.S.A. Pergamon Press Inc., Maxwell House, Lairview Park, Elmsford, New York 10523, U.S.A. CANADA Pergamon of C a n a d a Ltd., 75 The East Mall, Toronto, Ontario, Canada AUSTRALIA Pergamon Press (Aust.) Pty. Ltd., 19a Boundary Street, Rushcutters Bay, N . S . W . 2011, Australia FRANCE P e r g a m o n Press S A R L , 24 rue des Ecoles, 75240 Paris, Cedex 05, France WEST GERMANY Pergamon Press G m b H , 6242 Kronberg-Taunus, Pferdstrasse 1, West Germany C o p y r i g h t @ 1977 International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry AII Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means: electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without permission in writing from the copyright holders T h e contents of this book appear in P u r e and Applied Chemistry, Vol. 49, N o . 6 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data International Meeting o n B o r o n Chemistry, 3rd, Munich and Ettal, 1976 Boron chemistry 3. 1. Boron - Congresses 1. Title IL N ö t h , H III. International U n i o n of P u r e and Applied Chemistry. Inorganic Chemistry Division IV. Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker 546\67Γ2 QD181.B1 77-30258 ISBN 0-08-021206-9 Printed in Great Britain by Α. Wheaton & Co., Ltd., Exeter Pure & Appt. Chern., Vol. 49, pp. 69 1 - 700. Pergamon P r e s s , 1977. ALFRED STOCK AND THE RENAISSANCE OF INORGANIC Egon Printed in Great Britain. CHEMISTRY Wiberg Translation from the German by H. Nöth and R.H. Walter Institut für Anorganische Chemie der Universität Meiserstraße 1, 8000 München 2, West Germany München, When, a hundred years ago on the 16th July 1876, a 'Sunday child', baptised Alfred, was born to the Danzig insurance official Hugo Stock and his wife Hildegard, a heart began to beat which was destined, in the course of its 1 70 y e a r s existence, to live through all the heights and depths of its earthly fate. A human being entered life, whose extraordinary research and organisational ability swiftly raised him to scientific fame and international recognition. His physical strength was increasingly consumed in the service of chemistry until he closed his eyes for the last time on the 12th August 1 9 4 6 in a small town on the river Elbe, at the end of a life full of successes and honours, extensively paralysed after indescribable suffering from the hardships of refuge during the aftermath of the last war and the loss of his very last possessions, in the simplest of surroundings, quiet and unrecognised in the confusion of the postwar period. Let us follow the changing fate on his long road from the unhindered start to the bitter end, a life which bridged the wide span of four periods of German 1 history from the 'Kaiserreich through the 'Weimarer Republik',