Odón de Buen, for knowledge and oceanography
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Republican, librepentino, atheist and Darwinist. This is how the Zaragoza citizen Odón de Buen y del Cos was defined. It was no surprise, therefore, that in 1936 he ended up in jail. Humiliation, isolation, disease and dirt. “Everything was full of fleas, chunks and cockroaches, the entire building full of bedbugs, even nursing and kitchen.” But in this situation he continued to give classes on the sea, to fellow prisoners, guards, nuns, nurses…
“Knowledge will make us free,” one of the ideals of De Bueno’s life. And he always worked with the aim of disseminating scientific culture as a scientific journalist, university professor, politician and precursor of oceanography.
Born in Zuera in 1863. Being a brilliant student, thanks to the effort of his family and the support of the City Council of Zuera, he was able to carry out the baccalaureate in Zaragoza and the career of Natural Sciences in Madrid. Both in one and the other, he earned a few pesetas giving classes to younger students. At the University he had as a student and friend Miguel Primo de Rivera.
In addition to the university, he also had the school of the weekly Las Dominicales del Libre Pensamiento. He wrote scientific news from the kilometers of the Russian railways to the studies of Ramón y Cajal.
In 1885, at the age of 22, he was chosen to participate as a naturalist in the expedition that the ancient White frigate of the Spanish Army was going to make around the world. Meanwhile, the naturalist from Zaragoza knew little about the sea.
The three-year, five-month journey traveled through Europe and North Africa. But it was decisive for De Bueno. He would write it almost 50 years later in his memoirs: “On that journey I took the course of my future life. I met the sea and saw it: impressive, despising the null of our wooden boat. I felt an insatiable passion to discover the secrets hidden under the waves and the origin of life in the oceans. I decided to dedicate my activity to oceanography, which was then in its beginnings.”
In 1889 he took the Chair of Zoology and Botany of the University of Barcelona. There he worked a lot to transform education. He believed more in practices than in master classes and began to organize outings to collect geological or marine samples. “Learning natural sciences in museums is like learning literature in dictionaries,” he said.
Many did not see with good eyes this way of teaching. And that was going to bring him more problems by starting to teach and expand Darwin's theories. They banned their books on natural history and denounced that their teaching was heretical. In 1895 the chair was suppressed. On the day he was sent from college, about 300 students accompanied him to his home, shouting “Long live freedom!” “Long live free education!”, “Gora Odón de Buen!” and “Down with the bishop!”, “Down with religion!”
De Bueno did not stop giving classes. He donated them in associations or where he could. The conflicts caused the university to remain closed for two months. And finally they decided to return to the chair De Bueno.
He was also a politician in Barcelona: councilman and senator. This would have acknowledged in his memoirs that he had somewhat delayed his scientific work, but that served him much to organize oceanographic research in Spain. “Being a senator opened great doors to me. I got sympathy among big fish; I distanced myself from Spain; and I had a close relationship with the Prince of Monaco, a great honor for me and an incalculable profit for Spain.”
Then, he abandoned politics and dedicated himself to science and education. In 1906 he founded the Marine Biology Laboratory in Mallorca. And in the coming years it would carry out various oceanographic campaigns.
At that time the Oceanographic Society of Gipuzkoa (1908) was born, with which De Bueno had a close relationship from the beginning. In 1913, invited by the Oceanographic Society of Gipuzkoa, he offered a couple of lectures at the Miramar cinema. Among other things, he spoke of the project to create the Spanish Oceanographic Institute. Among the attendees was Alfonso XIII.
The following year, in 1914, the Spanish Oceanographic Institute IEO was created. The king played an important role, according to De Bueno: “…tribute to the king to my applause. The Head of State has shown great interest in the development of oceanographic research in Spain, both when my Prince of Monaco attended the humble conferences of my city in Madrid, and when he had the opportunity to do so.”
The IEO was a great achievement. From that 1885 trip he saw clear the need to investigate in oceanography and De Bueno managed to give Spain a solid structure and base for it. His view on marine research was also progressive: “The sea is an inexhaustible source of healthy and cheap food that is constantly renewed, but it is necessary to wisely regulate exploitation. Without the base of oceanographic studies a step cannot be advanced and we would be in serious danger of drying the source instead of increasing the flow.”
The 1920s were excellent years for De Bueno. He had great national and international respect. His friendship with Primo de Rivera also came to him well during his dictatorship. His last years were not sweet. In 1936, seeing that in Madrid there was a big stir, he moved to the laboratory of Mallorca thinking that there would be more calm. There he was captured by the nationals. After a year in jail, he was released thanks to requests from Europe in exchange for the sister and daughter of the late Primo de Rivera.
De Bueno fled to France with his wife. There he began to write his memoirs. In 1941, when his wife died, he traveled to Mexico. There he had his children. He wrote to them: “I follow my usual free-pentine ideas. Since very young I have lived out of religion and have been educated in a happy free-pentine house. To bury me civil (…) May my body be, if possible, next to that of your holy mother. He died outside any religion and was scientifically buried. Our religion was justice of conscience, good, family, science, freedom, justice and work. We did everything good we could and did not hurt anyone intentionally.”
Bibliography: Bibliography:
Ansede, M.: “The divulger of science by the Church.” Subject (2013)
Buj, A.: Good, Odón de. My Memoirs (Zuera, 1863-Toulouse, 1939)”. Biblio 3W, Revista Bibliográfica de Geografía y Ciencias Sociales, Universidad de Barcelona, 11(541) (2004)
Calvo Roy, A. “Odón de Buen, ciencia y política entre las dos repúblicas”. Lecture at the Aquarium of San Sebastian 2014
Parrilla-Barrera, G.: “Odón de Buen, Forerunner of spanish oceanography”. Oceanography 18(3) (2005)
