Theodor Escherich

Theodor Escherich
Theodor Escherich, around 1900
Born	(1857-11-29)29 November 1857 Ansbach, Kingdom of Bavaria
Died	15 February 1911(1911-02-15) (aged 53) Vienna, Austria-Hungary
Citizenship	Kingdom of Bavaria Austria-Hungary
Nationality	German, Austrian
Fields	Medicine, pediatrics, bacteriology
Institutions	Julius Hospital, Würzburg St. Anna Children's Hospital, Vienna Children’s Polyclinic of the Reisingerianum, Munich Hauner Children’s Hospital, Munich University of Munich University of Graz
Alma mater	University of Würzburg University of Kiel University of Berlin
Doctoral advisor	Carl Jakob Adolf Christian Gerhardt
Known for	Discovery of Escherichia coli
Notable awards	k. k. Hofrat (1906)
Spouse	Margaretha Pfaundler
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Theodor Escherich (29 November 1857 – 15 February 1911) was a German-Austrian pediatrician and a professor at universities in Graz and Vienna. He discovered the bacterium Escherichia coli, which was named after him in 1919, and determined its properties.

Theodor Escherich was born in Ansbach, as the younger son of Kreismedizinalrat (Medical District Councillor) Ferdinand Escherich (1810−1888), a medical statistician, and his second wife, Maria Sophie Frederike von Stromer, daughter of a Bavarian army colonel. When Theodor Escherich was five, his mother died, and five years later Ferdinand Escherich moved to Würzburg to take up his former position as Kreismedizinalrat and married his third wife. When Theodor was 12, he was sent to a boarding school run by Jesuits in Feldkirch, Austria for three years. Later, he finished secondary education in Würzburg, where he attended a Gymnasium (classical language high school) and took his Abitur examination in 1876.

After a half-year military service in Strasbourg, Escherich took up his studies of medicine at the University of Würzburg in the winter term of 1876. Later, he attended the universities of Kiel and Berlin, and returned to Würzburg before passing his medical examination with excellence in December 1881.

After an 18-month service in a military hospital in München (Munich), Escherich returned to Würzburg in 1882 to become second and later first assistant to the internist Carl Jakob Adolf Christian Gerhardt in the medical clinic of the Julius Hospital, Würzburg. Gerhardt became Escherich's doctoral advisor and suggested the topic of his thesis. On 27 October 1882, Escherich was awarded his medical doctorate. In the following two years, he attended lectures in Vienna (with Hermann von Widerhofer and Alois Monti) and did bacteriological research work at the St Anna Children's Clinic. In August 1884, he continued his research work in München, where pediatrics had been established as a department of the medical faculty. In October 1884, the Bavarian authorities sent Escherich to Naples to do research work in the actual cholera epidemic. He also travelled to Paris, where he heard lectures by Jean-Martin Charcot, the renowned neurologist.