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Abstract
From 1963 to 1971 about 2.8 million East German school children participated in nine nationwide mathematical competitions. The 1329 most successful participants were selected for further study. In 1970/71 and in two follow ups in 1983 and 1993, data on 23,000 relatives of these children were gathered. The data indicated the existence of a strong relationship between mathematical‐technical giftedness in school and achievement in life. There was evidence from the distribution of high professional achievement among the relatives that such achievement needs not only nurture but also an appropriate genetic background, which seems to be transmitted as a simple Mendelian trait, now open to investigation by molecular genetics.