On January 24, 1902, the future economist Oskar Morgenstern was born in Vienna. Morgenstern studied social science at the University of Vienna, was a student of Ludwig Mises and a member of the Vienna Circle. In 1929 he became a lecturer in political economics at the University of Vienna.
After the “Anschluss” to the German Reich, Morgenstern did not return from the USA to Austria. From then he taught at Princeton University. A short time later, the University of Vienna revoked his venia legendi.
In 1944 Oskar Morgenstern, together with John von Neumann, developed the game theory, which mathematically analyzes the strategic behavior between humans and their conflicts. In 1963 he and Paul Felix Lazarsfeld founded the “Institut für Höhere Studien” (Institute for Advanced Studies) in Vienna.
In 1965, the University of Vienna awarded him a honorary doctorate. Since 2013 the Faculty of Economics awards an “Oskar Morgenstern-Medaille”.
The Vienna University Archive recently received two ID cards of Oskar Morgenstern from the 1920s as a donation: his registration book, in which the lectures he attended at the University of Vienna are noted, as well as a Certificate of Registration.
