Quantum_ Einstein, Bohr and the Great Debate About the Nature of Reality - Manjit Kumar [153]
In Copenhagen, Bohr's institute became a staging post for many physicists. In December 1931, the Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters had chosen Bohr as the next occupant of the Aeresbolig, 'The House of Honour', a mansion built by the founder of the Carlsberg breweries. His new status as Denmark's leading citizen meant he enjoyed even more influence at home and abroad, which he exercised to help others. In 1933 he and his brother Harald helped set up 'The Danish Committee for Support of Intellectual Workers in Exile'. Through colleagues and former students, Bohr was able to get new posts established or have vacancies filled by refugees. It was Bohr who got James Franck to Copenhagen on a three-year visiting professorship in April 1934. After a year or so, Franck moved on to a tenured position in the United States, which, along with Sweden, was the final destination of many who arrived in Denmark. One man who did not have to worry about a job was Einstein.
In early September, as fears for his safety in Belgium grew, Einstein left for England. For the next month he kept a low profile, staying in a cottage on the Norfolk coast. Soon the tranquillity by the seaside was shattered when he learnt that Paul Ehrenfest, in a fit of despair while estranged from his wife, had committed suicide. It happened during a visit to an Amsterdam hospital to see his sixteen-year-old son Vassily, who suffered from Down's syndrome. Einstein was shocked at the news that Ehrenfest had also shot Vassily. Remarkably, the boy survived but was blinded in one eye.
Although deeply upset at Ehrenfest's suicide, Einstein's thoughts soon turned to the speech he had agreed to give at a fundraising rally highlighting the plight of refugees. The meeting, chaired by Rutherford, took place on 3 October at the Royal Albert Hall. A public eager to get a glimpse of the great man meant that there was not even standing room on the night. Einstein succeeded in addressing the audience of 10,000 in his heavily accented English without once mentioning Germany by name, at the request of the organisers. For the Refugee Assistance Council believed that 'the issue raised at the moment is not a Jewish one alone; many who have suffered or are threatened had no Jewish connection'.45 Four days later, on the evening 7 October, Einstein left for America. Due to spend the next five months at the Institute for Advanced Study, he never returned to Europe.
As he was being driven from New York to Princeton, Einstein was handed a letter from Abraham Flexner. The institute's director was asking him not to attend any public events and to exercise discretion for own his safety. The reason Flexner gave was the danger posed to Einstein by the 'bands of irresponsible Nazis' to be found in America.46 Yet his real concern was the damage that Einstein's public statements might inflict on the reputation of his fledgling institute, and therefore on the donations it relied on. Within a matter of weeks, Einstein found Flexner's restrictions and increasing interference suffocating. Once he even gave his new address as 'Concentration camp, Princeton'.47
Einstein wrote to the trustees of the institute to complain of Flexner's behaviour, and asked them to guarantee him 'security for undisturbed and dignified work, in such a way that there is no interference at every step of a kind that no self-respecting person can tolerate'.48 If they could not, then he would have to 'discuss with you ways and means of severing my relations with your Institute in a dignified manner'.49 Einstein gained the right to do as he pleased, but at a price. He would never have any