The Man Who Stalked Einstein Read Online Free

postpone his relinquishing of his citizenship by invoking a rarely applied
     tax law requiring Einstein to pay a fine for fleeing the country. Einstein simply
     ignored the decree, recognizing it as a thinly veiled ruse to bring him back into
     Germany and arrest him.
    The Academy’s charge that Einstein had participated in anti-German activities had
     some basis in fact. Einstein had made a number of statements to U.S. pacifist groups
     over the previous few months, condemning Nazi antagonism toward Germany’s Jews.
    Nonetheless, he denied the charges in an indignant letter to the Academy dated April
     5, 1933. Although Einstein acknowledged that he had described the German citizenry
     as suffering from a “psychiatric disease” and that he had urged a “threatened civilization
     to do their utmost to prevent the further spread of this mass psychosis, which is
     expressing itself in Germany in such a terrible way,” he denied that he had ever been
     a part of any “loathsome campaign.” He stood behind every word he had ever published
     and asked that, in fairness, his defense of his actions be disseminated to the members
     of the Academy and the public at large.
    The Academy’s wrongful accusations had slandered him. He had resigned his Academy
     membership and his Prussian citizenship because “I do not wish to live in a state
     in which individuals are not granted equal rights before the law, as well as freedom
     of speech and instruction.”
    Having concluded his dispute with the Prussian Academy, Einstein deposited his passport
     at the German consulate in Brussels and returned his attention to deciding where he
     would work in the future. Paul Ehrenfest, a Dutch friend, tried to prevail on Einstein
     to join him in Leiden. Similarly, scientists at Christ Church College in England,
     where he had spent a number of happy times, argued that Oxford would provide the best
     environment for continuing his work on what increasingly had been attracting his professional
     attention: a general field theory that would incorporate all known building blocks
     of the universe into a coherent whole. While Einstein surely considered these options,
     he was most taken with the possibility of moving to the United States. During his
     three trips to the United States, Einstein had been favorably impressed by the freedoms
     that Americans enjoyed. He also appreciated the absence of a formal class system that
     in Europe denied advancement to those born into lesser circumstances.
    Physicist Robert Milliken had seen the possibility of recruiting Einstein to Pasadena
     early in their relationship, so the door was open to him at Cal Tech. Einstein might
     well have chosen this option except for the mistake Milliken made in introducing Einstein
     to the renowned American educational reformer and secretary of the Rockefeller Foundation,
     Abraham Flexner. Flexner, who was Jewish, had incited a revolution in American medical
     education. He had closed down sham medical schools and helped to develop a more rigorous
     medical curriculum. In the spring of 1932, while visiting Los Angeles, he asked Milliken’s
     permission to meet the vaunted German physicist then serving his second professorship
     in residence. The two hit it off. They were seen walking together, in deep conversation,
     late into the evening, well beyond the time Elsa had set aside for her husband and
     Flexner to meet.
    Flexner spoke to Einstein about his plan to start a small, very exclusive research
     university or think tank. Having secured a $5 million pledge from department store
     magnate Louis Bamberger, Flexner envisioned a highly vetted, prestigious faculty.
     It would have visiting scholars but would not present degrees. Although Flexner had
     decided his institute would be located in Princeton, New Jersey, it would have no
     formal affiliation with Princeton University.
    Einstein had lectured at Princeton University several times and enjoyed the experience.