Fanny Hesse

Fanny Hesse (June 22, 1850 – December 1, 1934), born Angelina Fanny Eilshemius, was an influential figure in the history of microbiology, renowned for her pivotal suggestion in 1881 to use agar—a gelatinous substance derived from red algae—as a solidifying agent for bacterial culture media.^[1]^[2] This innovation addressed the limitations of gelatin, which liquefied at incubation temperatures and was susceptible to microbial digestion, thereby enabling the reliable isolation and study of pure microbial cultures.^[1]^[3] Working alongside her husband, the German physician and bacteriologist Walther Hesse, her contribution facilitated groundbreaking research, including Robert Koch's identification of the tuberculosis bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis in 1882.^[2]^[3] Born in New York City as the eldest of ten children to wealthy Dutch merchant Henry Gottfried Eilshemius and his Swiss-French wife Cécile Elise, Hesse grew up in an affluent family with strong transatlantic ties, dividing time between New York and Kearny, New Jersey.^[1]^[2] Only five of her siblings survived to adulthood, and the family maintained close connections to Europe, including Germany and Switzerland.^[2] At age 15, she attended a finishing school in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, where she studied home economics and French, gaining multilingual skills but receiving no formal scientific training.^[1]^[3] She met Walther Hesse, a recent medical graduate from the University of Leipzig, during his visit to New York in 1872; the couple married two years later in Geneva, Switzerland, and relocated to Saxony, Germany, where they raised three sons.^[1]^[2] Hesse's scientific involvement stemmed from her role as an unpaid assistant to Walther, who joined Robert Koch's laboratory in Berlin in the early 1880s to study bacterial diseases like cholera and tuberculosis.^[1]^[3] Drawing from her culinary knowledge—acquired partly from Dutch-Indonesian neighbors who used agar for jellies—she proposed its adoption during a visit to the lab, noting its heat stability up to 100°C and resistance to bacterial breakdown.^[2]^[3] Although Walther and Koch implemented the technique without initially crediting her publicly, her idea transformed bacteriology by allowing the visualization and separation of individual colonies, foundational to pathogen identification, vaccine development, and later advances like antibiotic discovery and genetic engineering.^[1]^[2] Beyond the agar innovation, Hesse contributed as a skilled scientific illustrator, producing detailed drawings for Walther's publications on topics such as diphtheria and wound infections; eleven such illustrations from 1906 were recently discovered in family archives and slated for preservation at the Robert Koch Institute Museum.^[2] She continued assisting in their home laboratory near Dresden until Walther's death in 1911, and her work was acknowledged in some contemporary microbiology textbooks.^[1] Hesse's legacy endures as a testament to the impact of informal scientific contributions, particularly from women in supportive roles, underscoring agar's ubiquity in modern labs worldwide.^[2]^[3]

Early Life and Education

Family and Childhood

Fanny Angelina Eilshemius, commonly known as Lina within her family, was born on June 22, 1850, in New York City.^[4]^[2] She was the eldest of ten children born to Henry (Hinrich) Gottfried Eilshemius, a prosperous Dutch merchant and importer who had emigrated to the United States in 1842, and Cécile Elise Robert, a French-speaking Swiss woman from Lugano who was a cousin of the renowned painter Louis Léopold Robert.^[4]^[1]^[2] The family was of Dutch paternal and Swiss maternal descent, with five of the children, including Fanny, surviving to adulthood amid the challenges of 19th-century mortality rates.^[4]^[2] Fanny's early years were spent in New York City, where the household reflected a multicultural blend of European heritages through her parents' backgrounds and interactions with immigrant communities.^[1]^[4] In 1860, the family relocated to Laurel Hill Manor, a 70-acre estate in North Arlington, New Jersey, along the Passaic River, providing a more spacious environment for the surviving siblings.^[4] The home was infused with artistic influences from relatives, such as her maternal cousin Louis Léopold Robert and later her brother Louis Michel Eilshemius, who became a noted painter, fostering an appreciation for visual arts in the multicultural setting.^[2]^[4] During her childhood in New York, Fanny gained practical knowledge of household science through everyday culinary practices, notably learning about agar-agar from a Dutch neighbor who had lived in Java and used the seaweed extract to gelatinize fruit preserves in Southeast Asian-inspired cooking.^[1]^[4]^[2] This exposure, guided by her mother's Swiss traditions and servants' diverse recipes, highlighted the intersection of cultural heritage and domestic innovation in shaping her early worldview.^[1]^[4]

Education and Early Influences

At the age of 15, in September 1865, Fanny Angelina Eilshemius (later Hesse) was sent by her parents to a finishing school in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, where she studied home economics, French, and decorum as was typical for daughters of affluent families during that era.^[2]^[1] This education immersed her in European cultural traditions, enhancing her proficiency in languages and providing a refined understanding of social etiquette that reflected the expectations for women of her social class.^[1] Her time abroad also exposed her to diverse intellectual environments, fostering a broader appreciation for continental customs and ideas.^[2] Hesse's artistic talents emerged early, influenced by her family's creative heritage, which included connections to notable painters such as her mother's cousin, the Swiss artist Louis Léopold Robert, and her younger brother Louis Michel Eilshemius, who later gained recognition as a New York-based painter.^[4]^[2] This familial environment encouraged her development of skills in painting and illustration techniques, allowing her to cultivate a keen eye for detail and composition from a young age.^[4] Her multicultural upbringing, with a Swiss mother and Dutch father in a prosperous New York household, further nurtured these creative pursuits alongside practical domestic arts.^[1] During her adolescence, Hesse undertook travels between the United States and Europe, including family visits to Switzerland and extended trips with her sister to Germany, such as to Dresden in 1872.^[4]^[2] These journeys expanded her worldview, introducing her to varied landscapes, societies, and intellectual currents that complemented her educational experiences and artistic inclinations.^[2]

Personal Life

Marriage to Walther Hesse

Fanny Angelina Eilshemius met Walther Hesse, a German physician and aspiring bacteriologist, in New York City through an introduction by his brother Richard to her family, during Walther's visit as a ship's surgeon on a transatlantic voyage.^[4] The two reconnected in 1872 in Dresden when the Eilshemius family traveled to Germany for an extended stay, fostering their budding relationship through shared social and familial circles.^[4] This European encounter led to their engagement the following summer of 1873.^[4] On May 16, 1874, at the age of 24, Fanny married Walther Hesse in Geneva, Switzerland, in a ceremony that reflected their international ties and her Swiss educational background.^[4] The marriage symbolized a union of American and German influences, with Walther, who had completed his medical doctorate at the University of Leipzig in 1870, poised to advance his career in public health.^[4] After the wedding, the couple embarked on their early married life by relocating to Zittau in Saxony, Germany, around 1875, initiating a period of adjustment and partnership.^[4] There, Walther established himself as a district physician, managing health services across multiple towns and focusing on preventive medicine such as smallpox vaccinations.^[1] Fanny, transitioning from her New York roots, adapted to German society while preserving elements of her American identity, including her distinct accent, as they built their life in the Saxon region.^[4]

Family and Residences

Following their marriage in 1874, Fanny and Walther Hesse welcomed three sons into their family. Their eldest son, Friedrich Henry Hesse—who later became a surgeon in Dresden—was born in 1875 in Zittau, Saxony, where Walther was practicing medicine at the time.^[4]^[5] The family initially resided in the Erzgebirge region of Saxony, relocating to Schwarzenberg in 1877 when Walther was appointed district physician (Bezirksarzt).^[4] In the early 1890s, they moved to the Strehlen suburb of Dresden, purchasing a house there that served as their long-term residence until Walther's death in 1911; this relocation aligned with Walther's advancing career in public health and microbiology.^[4]^[1] Throughout their years in Saxony, Fanny managed the household dynamics, overseeing the education of their sons while accommodating Walther's professional demands, including periods when he traveled for work related to his roles in hygiene and bacteriology.^[4]

Contributions to Microbiology

Role in Walther Hesse's Laboratory

Fanny Hesse joined her husband Walther Hesse in his microbiological laboratory work in the late 1870s, shortly after their marriage in 1874, providing hands-on assistance with experiments and documentation as he pursued research on airborne microbes while serving as a district physician near Dresden.^[1] As an unpaid assistant functioning much like a modern medical technologist, she supported daily lab operations, including the preparation of materials and observation of bacterial growth, which were essential to Walther's early bacteriological studies.^[4] Her involvement was facilitated by their family life, which allowed her to balance household duties with professional contributions in their home setting.^[6] In the 1880s, Fanny collaborated closely with Walther during his tenure in Robert Koch's laboratory in Berlin, where the couple relocated in the winter of 1880–1881 to aid Koch's pioneering work in bacteriology.^[1] She assisted in preparing samples and maintaining cultures as Walther contributed to investigations of microbial contamination in the air, helping to sustain the rigorous experimental demands of Koch's team during this formative period for the field.^[4] Her support extended to ensuring the smooth operation of lab activities amid the intense research environment, allowing Walther to focus on key observations and data collection.^[1] Following their time in Berlin, Fanny played a vital role in maintaining the home laboratory in Dresden after 1890, where Walther continued his microbiological research until his death in 1911.^[4] She provided ongoing organizational support, including editing drafts and preserving experimental records, which underpinned Walther's publications on topics such as intestinal bacteria.^[6] Through these efforts, Fanny ensured the continuity and documentation of Walther's work, contributing to the broader advancement of bacteriology over three decades.^[4]

Introduction of Agar

In the summer of 1881, after returning from Robert Koch's laboratory in Berlin, the Hesses encountered significant challenges with gelatin-based culture media at their home near Dresden.^[5] Gelatin, the prevailing solidifying agent at the time, melted at temperatures around 37°C—approximating human body heat—and was prone to liquefaction by certain bacteria, rendering it unreliable for incubating pathogens during warm weather.^[7] This instability disrupted the isolation and study of microbial colonies, limiting the precision of bacteriological investigations.^[1] Fanny Angelina Hesse, drawing from her culinary knowledge, proposed agar—a gelling agent derived from red seaweed—as a superior alternative.^[5] She had become familiar with agar through a Dutch neighbor in New York who had lived in Java and used it for preparing firm fruit and vegetable jellies that withstood high temperatures. In summer 1881, Fanny suggested this to Walther, who promptly tested agar at home by preparing nutrient media with it; the trials succeeded, demonstrating its ability to form a stable, solid substrate without melting or degrading under bacterial action.^[7] Walther Hesse adopted agar for his own work and communicated the innovation to Robert Koch later that year, leading to its integration into Koch's tuberculosis research from 1881 to 1882.^[5] Koch utilized agar media to culture and identify the tubercle bacillus, culminating in his landmark 1882 publication on the etiology of tuberculosis, where agar was first documented in scientific literature as a bacteriological tool—though without crediting the Hesses. This adoption marked agar's entry into microbiology, enabling more reliable plating techniques for microbial isolation. Agar's advantages over gelatin were pivotal: it remained solid up to 100°C, resisted enzymatic digestion by microbes, provided a clear medium for observing colony morphology, and solidified reliably at room temperature after sterilization.^[7] These properties revolutionized solid media culturing, facilitating advances in pathogen identification and bacteriological research by allowing discrete colony growth and enumeration.^[5]

Scientific Illustrations and Publications

Fanny Hesse demonstrated her proficiency in scientific artistry through the creation of 11 detailed watercolor illustrations in the summer of 1906, which documented dilutions of fecal samples showing colonies of intestinal bacteria, including those associated with typhoid fever, on agar plates.^[2]^[8] These works were prepared to support her husband Walther Hesse's final publication on bacteriology, released in 1908, where they provided accurate, colored depictions of bacterial growth phases at magnified scales, enhancing the visual precision of his research on microbial structures.^[4]^[2] Her artistic talent, influenced by her family's creative heritage—including her grandfather, the Swiss painter Louis Léopold Robert, and her brother, the New York artist Louis Eilshemius—enabled these illustrations to capture the nuances of bacterial colonies with scientific fidelity, bridging her early exposure to art and her later microbiological endeavors.^[2]^[4] Beyond these 1906 watercolors, Hesse contributed illustrations to Walther's earlier articles, such as those on airborne microbes in the 1880s, further showcasing her role in visually documenting bacteriological findings.^[2]^[1] Family archives indicate possible co-authorship or substantial contributions by Hesse to Walther's bacteriology papers, though her name typically appeared only in supportive capacities rather than as a formal author.^[2] These archives, including letters and reprints preserved by descendants, highlight her integral involvement in the scholarly output of the Hesse laboratory.^[4] The 1906 illustrations and related materials have been preserved in family papers held by descendants in Germany, with portions analyzed in an unpublished biography compiled by her grandson Wolfgang Hesse, offering insights into her overlooked scholarly role.^[2]^[8] These artifacts, some of which survived the destruction of family records in Dresden in 1945, have been deposited at the Robert Koch Institute Museum, ensuring continued access for historical study.^[4]^[2] In 2025, descendants published a graphic novel celebrating her life and contributions, incorporating "agar art" techniques inspired by her innovations.^[9]

Later Years and Legacy

Life After Walther's Death

Walther Hesse died on July 19, 1911, from an internal disease, leaving his wife Fanny widowed at the age of 61.^[2]^[4] Following his death, Fanny continued to reside in the family home in Strehlen, a suburb of Dresden, supported by a widow's pension and occasional remittances from her inheritance in New Jersey, which had been sequestered as enemy property during World War I.^[4] She managed the household amid wartime shortages and disruptions, including providing milk from the Pfund dairy to her grandchildren as a tribute to Walther's earlier work on pasteurization, which helped alleviate starvation conditions in Dresden.^[4] In 1917, she sold the Strehlen house and relocated to central Dresden to live closer to her three sons.^[4] Throughout her widowhood, Fanny maintained close interactions with her sons and grandchildren, often delighting the latter with homemade puddings during Christmas celebrations.^[2] She preserved family papers, letters, and artifacts related to her and Walther's lives, passing them down to descendants; however, many were lost when her Dresden home was destroyed in the Allied bombing raids of February 1945.^[4]^[2] Fanny Hesse died on December 1, 1934, in Dresden at the age of 84, having outlived her husband by 23 years.^[1]^[2]

Recognition and Historical Impact

Fanny Hesse's introduction of agar as a solid culture medium in 1881 profoundly advanced microbiology by providing a stable, transparent, and heat-resistant alternative to gelatin, which facilitated the isolation of pure bacterial cultures essential for verifying Koch's postulates and developing modern diagnostic and research techniques.^[2]^[1] During her lifetime, Hesse received no formal recognition or financial compensation for her contribution, with the innovation largely attributed to her husband Walther Hesse and Robert Koch, as the couple never published on the topic and her role was overshadowed in historical accounts.^[5]^[2] Posthumous rediscovery of her significance began in the late 20th century through family archives, including a 1939 journal article on the history of agar and a 1992 article by her grandson Wolfgang Hesse, which detailed her scientific involvement, and more recent 2024 analyses of surviving papers and illustrations that reveal her broader contributions as a researcher and illustrator in Walther's laboratory.^[5]^[2]^[4] In recent years, Hesse has been increasingly honored as a pioneering yet unsung female figure in science, with 2024 articles in Smithsonian Magazine and 2025 profiles by the Science History Institute emphasizing her foundational impact on microbiology, alongside her inclusion in exhibits at the Robert Koch Institute Museum in Berlin and inspirations for projects like a forthcoming graphic novel. As of November 2025, ongoing projects include the graphic novel set for publication in 2026 and a September 2025 event at International Microorganism Day celebrating her legacy with live illustrations and biography readings.^[2]^[1]^[9]^[10]