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Mr. Bohlwinkel is a financier who appears in The Shooting Star and the main antagonist of the story.

History[]

As the owner of a major banking concern and a petroleum firm called Golden Oil, he uses his wealth and resources to attempt to beat Tintin and the researchers in the race to find a recently fallen meteorite by financing the exploratory vessel Peary, he also unsuccessfully attempts to sabotage the competing expedition's ship, the Aurora. The Shooting Star ends with a dismayed Bohlwinkel listening to a radio announcement that reveals that the authorities are investigating his actions, which resulted in him being arrested by the police for the attempts of sabotage and fraud.

Trivia[]

  • It is conspicuous that Bohlwinkel has the exact physiognomy of the stereotypical Jew in Nazi propaganda. In the original edition of The Shooting Star, published during World War II, he was referred to as Blumenstein, and his bank was explicitly stated as being located in New York.
  • In later editions of the book, Hergé attempted to alter the financier's antecedents by relocating him to a fictitious South American country, São Rico, and changing his name to a Brabantian dialect word for a sweet shop, Bollewinkel. He also modified the spelling of the new name. Hergé however subsequently learned that Bohlwinkel is also a Jewish surname.
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