>As late as 1975, I taught a course of "Chemical German" to students at Imperial College in London. The course was scrapped the in the following year..

You must have taught my chemistry teacher! I was told by my chemistry teacher (in about 1977) that I would have to be prepared to study German if I was to have a hope of becoming a serious chemist. I was told that all the best scientific papers were often only available in German.