Paul Marinus Hansen, 1901-1976

Abstract

Dr. Paul Marinus Hansen, distinguished marine biologist, Fellow of the Arctic Institute of North America, and for many years Director of the Greenland Fisheries Research Organization, died in January, 1976. ... Paul Hansen was born in November 1901, in Hellerup, a suburb of Copenhagen. At the University of Copenhagen one of his professors was Dr. Adolf Jensen, the acknowledged founder of Greenland fisheries research, ... who continued as Director and Advisor on Greenland marine research until Paul Hansen took over in the years before the Second World War. In 1946, the research was officially reorganized in the formation of the Institute of Greenland Fisheries Research, with Hansen as leader .... Hansen's work stands as a model for the development of a fishery, based on abundant empirical evidence and sound theory. His monumental "Studies on the biology of the cod in Greenland waters" earned him the doctorate degree at the University of Copenhagen, and summarized the work of decades, of systematic and painstaking research. Later he discovered the wealth of shrimp in West Greenland waters and started another lucrative fishery .... He was in due course invested as Knight of the First Grade of the Order of the Dannebrog. ... He was a master raconteur, and held his audiences spellbound and laughing with his memories of Greenland life. Stored up in his capacious memory was such wealth of Greenland lore and recent history as would have made most excellent reading had it ever been printed .... Much of the economic development of Greenland during the present century is based on the work of Adolf Jensen and Paul Hansen - quiet, persistent, unspectacular scientific work (like most scientific work) that made possible the rational development of the cod, halibut, char and shrimp resources during the climatic warming that caused a shift from seal-hunting to a fishery economy. And indeed, Paul Hansen dealt with the sea mammals as well, and the control of the seal hunting. ... His bright and ebullient personality will be remembered by all his friends and colleagues for many years, in Canada as in his own Denmark and Greenland.