Fascist Pigs: Technoscientific Organisms and the History of Fascism

The interest in analyzing the origin and development processes of curly hair was attributable to the possibility of establishing a “true” biological classification of the sheep, by contrast with classifications put in place by fur merchants based solely on the phenotype (that is, the final appearance of the sheep fur). Traditionally many different types of curls had been identified by furriers, in a great mess of names, which revealed no true difference, for they were just different developmental stages of the same curl type. Hornitschek’s research was expected to have significant results not only for the specific classification of Karakul but also for that of many other animals that had “similar” processes of “curl formation… such as in dogs, pigs, horses, chickens, goose, as well as in humans.”[43] The developmental history of hair recounted the history of differentiation of breeds and races for all these mammals and birds. In other words, Karakul was used as a model organism to illuminate processes of curl formation in other organisms, allowing for biological classification of animals and replacing unreliable crude phenotypic methods. As Frölich stated, Karakul had the double status of experimental and research object (Versuchs- und Forschungsobjekt).[44] Science revealed new things about Karakul (sheep as research object), but Karakul also enabled the production of new scientific knowledge (sheep as experimental object). It was not only a question of displacing traditional knowledge of fur merchants by replicable laboratory knowledge based on systematic observation with microscopes and other histologic instruments—of transforming Karakul furs from commercial objects into research objects. Karakul were also experimental objects, good to tinker with for revealing biological phenomena common to other organisms. They were model organisms useful in unveiling the developmental genetics of other animals.

Frölich bluntly asserted that research conducted at Halle should be of general significance and should be aimed at promoting fundamental knowledge (grundlegenden Erkentnissen): “For a scientific institute that has always to be its main objective.”[45] The practical consequences for breeders he insisted “come always in second line.” In reality, as Hornitschek’s work suggests, such an ordering of priorities was never that clear at Halle. But Frölich was certainly right to point out the importance of Karakul as an experimental object. He would, no doubt, have agreed with the emphasis Robert Kohler and Hans-Jörg Rheinberger put on the usefulness of model organisms for understanding the historical dynamics of the life sciences. Not only did communities of researchers cohere around a single model organism; in addition, “manipulating it can generate insights into the constitution, functioning, development, or evolution of an entire class of organisms.”[46]

A 1928 special issue of the Halle journal Kühn-Archiv dedicated exclusively to Karakul was to make clear its status as research and experimental object in developmental genetics. Frölich and eight of his Halle disciples explored the developmental history of second dentition, blood analysis, hair growth, skin quality, tail formation, skeleton measures, and wool formation in pureblood and crossbred Karakul.[47] No doubt that the battery of techniques in question made Karakul an object of experimental analysis distant from the crude observation techniques of furriers. The unexpected fact here is that Karakul have obvious differences with the animals we usually identify as model organisms in the history of genetics, such as Drosophila, Ephestia, and guinea pigs. Because the sheep are expensive to obtain, slow to reproduce, and difficult to manipulate, they seem poor candidates as model organisms. There were, one may argue, certain characteristics that recommended their use in developmental genetics, including the pigmentation of the hair follicles and their many easily identifiable inheritable anatomical traits (tail form, fleece color, fur brightness, and so on). But a more reasonable explanation for the insistence in using Karakul as a model organism lies in their economic value in the luxury fur market. The point is that the success of Frölich’s institute was based on the ability of Karakul to conflate science and technology through their dual nature as laboratory model organisms and industrialized organisms.