The Koberwitzers: Those Who Attended Rudolf Steiner’s Agriculture Course at Koberwitz in 1924, World’s Foundational Organic Agriculture Course

Summary

Rudolf Steiner’s Agriculture Course at Koberwitz (now Kobierzyce), in the summer of 1924, was the gateway event that led to the development of biodynamic agriculture and, subsequently, organic agriculture. The present paper identifies for the first time the 111 attendees of that course. The list reveals that ‘Koberwitzers’, as they called themselves, were a well credentialed and capable group of individuals, some of whom went on to champion and develop Rudolf Steiner’s ideas about agriculture and other fields. The present paper revises a prior analysis of the Koberwitzers. For each Koberwitzer, the list reveals, the name, hometown, occupation, and accommodation during the course. Thirty one percent of Koberwitzers were women. Thirty eight percent were associated directly with agriculture (including farmer, estate manager, and estate owner), 6% of attendees were creatives (including writer, author, artist and editor), and a further 6% were priests. These three occupational categories, viz. Agriculture, Creative and Priest, together account for 50% of Koberwitzer occupations (and 72% of the known occupations). There remains for further scholarship to populate gaps in the listing: the gender of one Koberwitzer remains unidentified; one hometown (and country) remains unidentified; 33 occupations remain unidentified; and 51 accommodations remain unidentified. At the time of the Koberwitz course, Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) was mortally ill. The course was never repeated,. It was up to the Koberwitzers to progress Rudolf Steiner’s call for the development of a differentiated natural agriculture without synthetic chemicals. The Koberwitzers met the call. There are now 251,842 certified biodynamic hectares in 55 countries, included in the 71,514,583 certified organic hectares in 186 countries.