This was - as far as I had found - first published by Erber:
Erber, J. (1864): Die Amphibien der österr. Monarchie Mit Anführung der Beobachtungen, die an den in der Gefangenschaft gehaltenen Arten gemacht wurden.
42. Hypochthon Laurentii Fitz. Grotten-Olm.
Vorliegendes Exemplar ist aus der Adelsberger (Magdalenengrotte) aus Krain, in etwas mehr als halber Grösse. Dieses Thier ist in der Gefangenschaft leicht fortzubringen, da es, wenn es von Zeit zu Zeit frisches Wasser bekommt, keiner weiteren Nahrung bedarf. Doch verschmäht er kleine Regenwürmer nicht, auch kleine Mehlwürmer, Flohkrebse etc. sind ihm angenehm. Scheinbar augenlos, nimmt es wirklich Wunder, wie er sogleich auf das in's Wasser geworfene Futter lossteuert, und nie dasselbe verfehlt. Nach und nach den Einwirkungen des Lichtes ausgesetzt, verändert er vollkommen die Farbe, und wird fast rothbraun. Ich hatte schon ein Exemplar drei Jahre, welches auf diese Weise die Farbe gänzlich verändert hatte. Offen ist jedoch noch immer die Frage: Ob das Thier lebendig gebärend oder eierlegend sei?
in english: "My specimen is out of the "Magdalenen-Grotte" near Postojna, about half grown. It is easily kept, if it gets fresh water from time to time. It doesnt need food, but takes small earthworms, mealworms and Gammarus. Although without eyes, it is woundering, how quick it starts in direction of the prey, and never miss it. Kept under light, it changes its color completely, and turns to red brown. I had one specimen for 3 years, having changed its color completely. We still dont know, if the Olm is eggs laying or giving birth to living young."
Peter P. Berz (2009): The eyes of the olms.- Hist Philos Life Sci 31(2):215-239.
The experiments of the Austrian biologist Paul Kammerer to breed eyes in blind olms is probably one of the most notable manifesations of Lamarckian thinking and research at the beginning of the 20th century. If living in the environment of the dark caves in the Slovenian Kraijna for thousands of years has reduced the eyes of the olms until they nearly disappeared, then is it possible to influence the development in the other direction and speed it up? Will a transformed milieux or media (in a Lamarckian sense) conduct olms to vision, to the mysteries of light? Kammerer's legendary skill in taking care of animals (especially amphibians), the highly modern research environment of an institution unique in whole Europe and America at that time (the Biologische Versuchsanstalt Wien), years of experimental crossings, and, finally, the convergence of biological media and technical media (for example media of development in photography), provided the opportunity for Kammerer to succeed. The olm experiments are part of an elaborate research program of the Viennese Versuchsanstalt and its facilities that assume the environment of animals to be the critical point in developmental, hereditary, and evolutionary research. Theoretically Kammerer's olms ask questions about vision in general and its organ, the eye.
Kammerer, in 1907 and 1912 reports on livebearing olms and, when new born larvae kept under light, the eyes dont become rudimentary. Both has never been confirmed.
In the database Kammerer 1907 you find with Kammerer, from his 1912 paper I only have an extended summary (F.M. (anonymus) 1912).
Mario
