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Photo Edition

Privatdozent Photo Edition #11

Einstein with Edwin Hubble in California (1931)

Jørgen Veisdal

Apr 2, 2022

Colourized 1931 photograph of Einstein with Humason, Hubble, St. John, Michelson, Campbell and Adams (Photo: Getty Images)

Einstein stayed in Pasadena, California as a visiting professor at Caltech for three winter terms, in 1931, ‘32 and ‘33. According to the Caltech Archive, he lived in a bungalow at 707 South Oakland Avenue in 1931 and in the “Einstein suite” of Caltech’s faculty club ‘The Athenaeum’ during the winters of 1932 and ‘33. Read more about Einstein’s visits to America here:

Privatdozent

Einstein's Emigration to America (1932)

In May of 1932, a viciously anti-Semetic illustrated brochure entitled Juden Sehen Dich An (“Jews are Watching You”) featured Einstein in its prologue alongside some sixty other prominant (alleged and actual) Jewish intellectuals (Robinson, 2019a p. 225). Written by a close collaborator of Josef Goebbels, the author of the brochure included a photograph of Einstein featuring the caption…

2 years ago · 7 likes · Jørgen Veisdal

He first arrived via boat in San Diego on New Years Eve, 1930. His first appearance at an official Caltech event was a dinner on the 15th of January 1931. In attendence were over 200 members of the California Institute Associates, including cosmologist Richard Tolman (1881-1948), physicist Paul Epstein (1883-1966), “Martian” Theodore von Kármán (1881-1963) (read: The Martians of Budapest) and Nobel Laureate Albert A. Michelson (1852-1931), who would pass away only a few months later. Also there, pictured above, were his acquaintances Edwin P. Hubble (1889-1953) and Charles E. St. John (1857-1935). Hubble had just a few years prior confirmed the existence of cosmic expansion, a famous implication of Einstein’s field equations.

In the photograph above, Einstein can be seen with Milton L. Humason (1891-1972), Hubble, St. John, Michelson, William W. Campbell (1862-1938) and Walter S. Adams (1876-1956).

Related Privatdozent newsletters:

When Einstein met Churchill (1933), November 5th 2021
The Einstein-Szilárd Letter (1939), June 7th 2021
When Heisenberg met Einstein, June 11th, 2021
Gödel’s Solutions to Einstein’s Field Equations, May 4th 2021
Einstein and Hilbert’s Relativity Race, July 3rd 2021
Einstein’s 1905 Paper on the Photoelectric Effect, July 16th 2021

This is Photo Edition — a shorter, more frequent newsletter for subscribers of Privatdozent. If you don’t want to receive these emails, go to your Substack profile and uncheck the box titled ‘Photo Edition’.

The photograph has been colourized for effect. Send inquiries about unwanted use/copyright claims to privatdozent @ protonmail.com.