After joining the family firm, Karl was sent to the
Deutsche Bank in Berlin to train as a
bank teller, and it was there that he made the acquaintance of
Oskar Boettger and
Wilhelm Kobelt, whose friendship and influence would allow him some time to spend studying
mollusks. Indeed, it was during a trip to the
Alps during this time that Karl decided to write and publish his first scientific paper, on
Tandonia nigra. In 1894, he was to spend a year in
Frankfurt as a volunteer banking teller, where he himself admitted he spent more time studying mollusks than on his banking studies, largely due to the influence of his friends Boettger and Kobelt. This short interlude was to end in another tragedy, when was struck by a serious illness in January of 1895, forcing him to cut his time in Frankfurt short and return to Kassel for treatment and recovery. By the end of that year, Karl was sent to study
Classical economics in
Berlin and
Paris, and this, paired with his recent and lingering illness, quashed what little energy he had to pursue his scientific interests. Karl eventually completed an
apprenticeship with the
Disconto-Gesellschaft, after which he traveled and worked in various banks in America, London and Paris. By 1899, he was fully-accredited co-owner of Bankhaus L. Pfeiffer. He embraced his role in civil society, undertaking board memberships at various organizations and wading into the world of art. Beginning in 1907, Karl was the founding
chairman of the Art Association () of Kassel, and under his leadership, the
Avant-garde movement was first introduced to that city. His fellow board members included
Johannes Boehlau, Otto Ehrenberg, and Franz Thorbecke. After the death of his uncle Louis Pfeiffer (not the malacologist) in 1912, Karl became the director and sole proprietor of Bankhaus L. Pfeiffer. In this position, he guided the bank through some turbulent times in Germany's history. Under Karl's leadership, the bank managed to survive the
First World War and the subsequent
Weimar Hyperinflation, but with the coming of the
Great Depression, the small bank simply lacked the capital to survive as an independent entity. It was one of the last holdouts in Kassel, but by 1930, the firm had been acquired by
Deutsche Bank, of whose Cassel bureau Karl Pfeiffer would be president of until 1934. Karl was appointed to the Kassel
Chamber of Commerce in 1913, and following the death of Otto Vogt in 1921, he was elected chairman of the Chamber - a post that his grandfather and uncle had held before him. He served in this position for twelve years. During his tenure, the chamber district grew rapidly through a series of
geopolitical mergers. In 1924, the
Free State of Waldeck, and in 1932,
Mühlhausen,
Thuringia, were added to the Kassel Chamber of Commerce's purview. From 1924, the organization's name had been changed to Chamber of Industry and Commerce. When the
Nazis seized power in 1933, Pfeiffer was removed from the chairmanship. The government took advantage of a vacation trip to Madeira to promote Nazi functionary Rudolf Braun to the chairmanship in Pfeiffer's absence. After Karl's protests against this were unsuccessful, he bowed to the facts and resigned. During the period of National Socialism, Pfeiffer kept away from all public offices. In 1935, to add insult to injury, Pfeiffer was removed from his position at the head of the and classified by the
Nazi government as an "undesirable () person."> After World War II, he was reappointed as chamber president by the occupying power in April 1945. Due to his age, however, he resigned again as early as July 1945 and Gustav Römer became his successor. ==Return to malacology==