[Franz Coelestin Ritter von Schneider-Vienna's first medical chemist and teacher of the first Austrian hygienists. The 200th anniversary of his birthday].

Franz Schneider (13.09.1812-29.11.1897) in 1850 was appointed the first lecturer on "Chemistry for physicians" by the Viennese university. Two years later he accepted the professorship in the military medical schools in the "Josephinum" from where he shifted to the philosophical faculty as professor of "Common and medical chemistry". Soon after this start in 1870 he became unable to continue his work because of an explosion during experiments. Thus in 1876 the emperor called Schneider to the Austrian public health administration as director. In the following twelve years he achieved great successes in his duties. As a scientist he had worked on various topics of organic and inorganic chemistry. But beyond that Schneider succeeded in imparting to his assistants the modality of scientific work and the way of hygienic thinking. Thus his scholars Josef Nowak, Florian Kratschmer and Max Gruber were well prepared to become Austria's first university hygienists.