Thordar Quelprud

Quelprud rejoined Nasjonal Samling in 1941.^[15] In the fall of 1942, during the German occupation of Norway, the German occupation authorities established an Oslo branch of the Ahnenerbe think tank, which was a research institute of the Schutzstaffel (SS). Its purpose was to raise the racial consciousness of the Germanic people. Ahnenerbe attracted a few marginal people in Norway, but it quickly discovered that the Norwegian academic environment could not be counted on.

The Nasjonal Samling Councillor of State Rolf Jørgen Fuglesang wanted research on the population policy of the future and wanted a genetic biology institute, which could, among other things, provide expert expertise on the Romanisæl Travellers. The Genetic Biology Institute (Arvebiologisk Institutt) was established in 1942. It was to engage in both research and teaching, and Thordar Quelprud was appointed the institute's director with a teaching position.^[5][8][15]

Quelprud gave lectures on genetic biology and racial science at the Nasjonal Samling political school in Jessheim, and he wrote articles for the party's periodical NS Månedshefte. Quelprud was considered politically naive, but he nonetheless enjoyed the status of a kind of racial ideologue. When the university was closed in November 1943, most of the activity at the institute stopped. Quelprud became frustrated with this development, sought leave as a lecturer, and resigned from Nasjonal Samling in the fall of 1944.^[12]

Shortly after Norway's liberation in May 1945, Quelprud was dismissed from his position at the University of Oslo.^[5] Quelprud's colleague Ørbeck had no connection with Nasjonal Samling and, upon a direct request from Ørbeck, Quelprud stated "with honor and conscience" (på ære og samvittighet) that he was not a Nazi. However, Quelprud was sentenced to 10 years of loss of civil rights, according to Ørbeck because he had given a lecture at the University on "Lysenko's attack on acquired inheritance."^[12] After the war, the question was raised of completing and publishing Ørbeck's work on Huntington's disease. Ørbeck sought contact with the Human Genetics Institute, but felt that he was given a cold shoulder because of his cooperation with Quelprud. Olav Hanssen, however, presented the work in a meeting for Matematisk-naturvitenskapelig klasse in 1953.^[12] Ørbeck was invited to the Academy of Sciences and gave a lecture on the subject just before the work was printed in 1954.^[16] However, Quelprud was not invited to the Academy of Sciences and its dinners, but closer relations were established. Ørbeck then made arrangements for Quelprud to at least have access to a film projector and present images of the family genealogies. Shortly thereafter, Quelprud's sentence expired. The question of whether their work should have counted for a medical doctorate was considered. It was a fundamental problem that it was written by two authors, one of whom had lost his civil rights, and that a doctoral dissertation should have been written by one person. After this, Ørbeck sent all the material he had collected to Quelprud with a request that he deposit it in the University of Oslo Library's folklore collection, where, as Ørbeck wrote in 1980, "it is readily available."^[12]