Walther Bauersfeld

He was employed by the Carl Zeiss Jena, who, on a suggestion by the German astronomer Max Wolf, started work on the first projection planetarium in 1912.

These inter-war planetariums were constructed in Berlin and Düsseldorf in Germany, as well as Rome, Paris, Chicago, Los Angeles and New York.

The Zeiss I planetarium in Jena is also considered the first geodesic dome derived from the icosahedron, 26 years before Buckminster Fuller reinvented and popularized this design.

Bauersfeld remained with the core firm in Jena, East Germany, where after 1953 he developed the ZKP-1 (Zeisskleinplanetarium, the Zeiss Small Planetarium #1).

This was intended for small dome planetariums, and while it had latitude change capabilities, the operator had to turn a hand crank to accomplish this.