Interesting Facts about Albert Einstein

Interesting Facts about Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein once said, "The important thing is to not stop questioning". It was this curiosity and questioning attitude that perhaps earned him the ultimate recognition in the form of a Nobel Prize. Albert Einstein is credited with the development of the theory of relativity and physical theory of gravity among other things.

Facts :

• Albert Einstein was born on 14th March, 1879 in Ulm, Germany. When Albert Einstein was a child his mother actually thought he was deformed because he had rather large head. As a child Einstein spoke very little till the age of nine. Albert Einstein had a younger sister named Maja who he became good friends with in the later years of his life.
• When Einstein was five years old his father gave him a pocket compass. It was this compass that sparked Einstein’s interest in science. The fact that the compass pointed in the same direction no matter how it was turned made him curious about understanding the force behind it.
• In 1895 when Albert Einstein appeared for the University Entrance Exam he could only manage to pass in the math and science sections and failed in the rest of the subjects.
• Albert Einstein published papers on theory of Special Relativity, Brownian motion and Photoelectric Effect in the year 1905. His paper on general relativity was published in the year 1916.
• Albert Einstein could not find work after he graduated from the college and initially had to work as a technical assistant with the Swiss Patent Office. Between the year 1911 and 1912 he taught at a German speaking University in the city of Prague after which he returned to Zurich. In the year 1914 he started working as a professor at the University of Berlin and was also made the director in the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics.
• Albert Einstein won the Nobel Prize for his work in the area of Photoelectric Effect in the year 1921. Einstein was not present to receive his Nobel Prize in December 1922 because he was on a trip to Japan.
• In the year 1933 he started teaching at the Princeton University. In the year 1939 he wrote to President Roosevelt and pointed out the possibility of construction of a powerful bomb using atomic chain reactions in Uranium and he also suggested that Germany might be working on such a creation.
• Einstein was offered the Presidency of Israel in 1952 but declined it. An element named einsteinium was discovered in 1952 and named in his honor.
• Albert Einstein had an illegitimate child with Mileva Maric who was one of his former students. His daughter was named Lieserl and was born in 1902 and not much is known about his daughter. Some accounts indicate that his daughter was mentally challenged and lived with her mother’s family. Einstein eventually married Mileva and he had two sons Hans Albert and Eduard. However his relationship with his wife was largely strained. His relationship with his elder son Hans Albert was also quite rocky. Eventually Einstein divorced Mileva and married his cousin Elsa Lowenthal. He had numerous affairs with many women during his lifetime.
• Albert Einstein was also not particularly concerned about being well dressed. He also stopped wearing socks because he found his big toe would make a hole in the sock. His favorite past time was sailing. Einstein also loved going for walks around the town and that was one of his favorite activities. He also loved music and used to play the violin.
• After Albert Einstein’s death in 1955 his brain was removed without approval from his family and an autopsy was conducted. Thomas Harvey conducted this autopsy and eventually it was discovered that Einstein’s brain had large portion of glial cells in the region that synthesizes information. Other studies also indicated that Einstein’s brain did not have a particular kind of wrinkle and this allowed the neurons to communicate better with each other. At the time of his death, Albert Einstein’s final words died with him as they were in German and his nurse did not understand German.