Einstein Flees Nazi Germany: Moves to America
Albert Einstein was visiting England when friends warned him not to return to Germany. The Nazis had raided his cottage in Caputh, confiscated his beloved sailboat, and frozen his bank accounts. His books were among those burned in the May 1933 bonfires. He arrived in New York aboard the SS Westernland on October 17, 1933, and settled in Princeton at the Institute for Advanced Study. He had asked for a salary of $3,000 per year; they paid him $16,000. Einstein became an American citizen in 1940 and spent the remaining 22 years of his life at Princeton, working on a unified field theory he never completed. He signed the famous letter to Roosevelt warning about atomic weapons but was excluded from the Manhattan Project because the FBI considered him a security risk due to his pacifist associations.
October 17, 1933
93 years ago
Key Figures & Places
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