* Scientist. Died aged 86.
Cornelius Peter During was a refugee from Hitler's Europe who emigrated in 1940 and went on to become one of New Zealand's eminent agricultural scientists.
He did much to establish the nutrient requirements of difficult New Zealand soils on the West Coast, around Te Anau and
in Northland. Based for many years at the Ruakura Agricultural Research Centre, his textbook Fertilisers and Soils in New Zealand Farming (1967) went into three editions and became a standard source of information. It is still found in farmers' libraries around the country.
But his route to a scientific career was not without a struggle.
Born in Munich, he was educated at Salem, a German boarding school founded by Prince Max von Baden and Kurt Hahn (who later established Gordonstoun and Outward Bound). Hahn's ethic of competitiveness, stoicism and anti-snobbishness offered During key values.
When the Nazis came to power, life became difficult for the left-leaning, half-Jewish student, so During emigrated to England. He worked in a series of labouring jobs until contacts with Walter Nash secured him a New Zealand visa, a country he chose after seeing a picture of a New Zealand workingman's club with American cars outside - for him the very image of affluent classlessness. On reaching New Zealand he worked as a farm labourer, then as a bulldozer driver until he saved enough money to put himself through university at Massey, gaining a degree in agricultural science and topping his year.
He joined the then Department of Agriculture in 1949 and over 32 years wrote more than 80 papers on soil fertility, land development, soil chemistry, hill country productivity and animal production. As a young migrant, During married a medical student, Zoe Smuts Kennedy, later a prominent medical officer. Mrs During and five children survive him.
