Jon Alfred Mjøen

File:JonAlfredMjøen.jpg

Jon Alfred Mjøen, pictured in the 1930s

Jon Alfred Hansen Mjøen (12 July 1860 – 30 June 1939) was a Norwegian chemist and pharmacist, best known for his studies in racial biology and eugenics.

Biography

Jon Alfred Mjøen was born in Oppdal. He graduated in pharmacy in 1881, after which he became manager in Røros. He continued his studies in France, Great Britain and the United States. In 1892/1894, Mjøen studied from in Leipzig for a doctorate in organic chemistry with a dissertation on the subject Über die Polymethacrylsäure. Back in Kristiania, he became a member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters in 1901. From 1905, he ran his own biological laboratory at Vinderen. He was otherwise head of the Alcohol and Drug Control 1905–1912 and from 1915 owner of Majorstuen's pharmacy in Bogstadveien, where he also owned the entire tenement that was built in 1893.

He died in Vestre Aker, now Oslo.

Thought

With the German eugenicist Alfred Ploetz (1860–1940) whom Mjøen knew from Leipzig, he developed ideas which in 1908 were presented as "Norwegian program for racial hygiene". In 1905, he had founded the Vindern Biological Laboratory where he oversaw the work that was published in several books. Mjøen and Ploetz later participated in the founding of the International Eugenics Federation in 1912, where Mjøen was vice president for many years. Mjøen's ideas about racial hygiene and the preservation of a Nordic race met with much opposition in Norway, among others from professors Kristine Bonnevie (1872–1948) and Otto Lous Mohr (1886–1967).

Labour Party politician Karl Evang (1902–1981) was also critical of Mjøen's eugenic program, while at the government party Venstre's national meeting in 1914 Mjøen received a positive response. Mjøen started the magazine Den Nordiske Race where his wife became editor for many years. He traveled extensively to present his theories, and spent two months in Rome in 1928 where he visited Mussolini. He campaigned for a sterilization law, and one was passed by the Norwegian Parliament in 1934.

Together with his brother Alf Mjøen (1869–1956) and Erling Bjørnson (1868–1959), Jon Alfred proposed Ploetz to the Nobel Peace Prize in 1936. Mjøen died in 1939 and his biological station was closed down after World War II.

Family

He was the son of state agronomist and farm owner Nils Hansen (1824–1904) and Augusta Mjøen (1834–1924), who had been secretly engaged to Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (1832–1910). The couple lived on lower Gjøvik farm where their mother came from. He was the brother of Alf Mjøen (1869–1956) who was mayor, sat in the Storting, and took over Gjøvik farm in 1894. A younger brother was Reidar Mjøen (1871–1953) who was a lawyer and music journalist in the Liberal newspaper Dagbladet. His sister Inga (born 1866) was married to the doctor Hans Volckmar (1862–1915) who from 1907 until his death was editor of Dagbladet.

In 1896, Jon Alfred was married to the German-born translator Claire Grevérus Mjøen (1874–1963) from Magdeburg. Through his wife he also became the uncle of noted dancer Inga Jacobi (1891–1937). Jon and Claire had six children:

• Fridtjof Mjøen (1897–1967), actor
• Sonja Mjøen (1898–1993) actress and Dagbladet contributor, married to Dagbladet journalist Axel Kielland
• Heljar Mjøen (1903–2000), poet
• Tove Mjøen (1904–1971)
• Jon Lennart Mjøen (1912–1997) actor, father of the comedian Lars Mjøen (born 1945). The fact that Claire was waiting in 1912 led Jon Alfred to cancel his voyage with the ship Titanic to the United States in order to give a lecture
• Irmelin Mjøen (1918–1965), mother of author Gerd Brantenberg (born 1941)

Mjøen and his family lived at Vinderen in a villa that also housed the laboratory. In 1912, he moved a Greek-style temple from Italy to Nesodden, where it was renamed Miramare. From 1926 he was the owner of Medø farm on Tjøme which is still owned by the family.

Works

• Über die Polymethacrylsäure (1897)
• Racehygiene (1914)
• Germaner oder Slaven? (1917)
• Det norske program for rasehygiene (1932)
• Vern våre landegrenser, 1933
• Rasehygiene (1938)
• Hormonene. Den biokjemiske personlighet (1939)

References

• Jon Røyne Kyllingstad, Measuring the Master Race: Physical Anthropology in Norway, 1890–1945. Openbookpublishers (2014)
• Jon Røyne Kyllingstad, "Norwegian Physical Anthropology and the Idea of a Nordic Master Race," Current Anthropology, Vol. LIII, No. S5 (2012)