Paul Golden: Bayer deal reminds us of the awful history of corporation

Re “Germany’s Bayer increases offer for seed company Monsanto” (Page 10A, July 15): You have been reading about the attempted take over of Monsanto in St. Louis by Bayer in Germany. Some history of Bayer is warranted, and can be corroborated in “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” by William Shirer and in “Nuremberg” by Airey Neave.

Bayer was founded in 1863 as a chemical company and is well known for discovering aspirin, phenobarbital, a cough suppressant (heroin) and other drugs by 1910. In 1925 Bayer became part of IG Farben, another large chemical company. During WWII, IG Farben enslaved people from occupied Poland, Czechoslovakia and other countries to work in factories near the Auschwitz concentration camp. A subsidiary of IG Farben provided the poison Zycon B for Germany’s gas chambers. After the war, Bayer and IG Farben were separated by the Allies. Fritz ter Meer of IG Farben was convicted of war crimes and imprisoned until 1953. In 1956 he returned to Bayer.

Monsanto is not squeaky clean, either, having produced DDT and Agent Orange. Bayer is mostly interested in Monsanto for its genetically engineered crop program. Unlike Bayer/IG Farben, Monsanto did not have to apologize to Elie Wiesel for its involvement in the Holocaust.

This story was originally published July 21, 2016 at 3:24 PM with the headline "Paul Golden: Bayer deal reminds us of the awful history of corporation."