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Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated on June 28, 1914. Long before that Dr. Hammann, head of the Nachrichtendienst of the German Foreign Office, had organised a plan for the successful influencing of the Press of the world. In May, 1914, the work of a special bureau under his direction and presided over by a woman of international reputation was in full operation.

Hammann, for ten years chief of the Berlin Foreign Office propaganda department, was selected as president of the Overseas News Agency. The Krupp interests, which had been subscribing 400,000 marks annually to this agency, subscribed the same amount to the reorganised company. Then, believing that another agency could be organised, subscribed 400,000 marks more to the Transocean News Agency.

Under Bülow’s régime the humble pressman rose to influence and affluence and basked in Ministerial favour. With the assistance of Mr. Hammann, Prince von Bülow made the Berlin Press Bureau a sinister power in Europe as well as in Germany; for the Chancellor was as anxious to conciliate the foreign journalist as the German. M. Huret sang his praises in the Figaro.

O. Hammann abandons Darwinism for an internal principle of development. W. Haacke openly disavows Darwinism; and even at the convention of naturalists in 1897, L. Wilser was allowed to assert without contradiction that, "anyone who has committed himself to Darwinism can no longer be ranked as a naturalist."