Brallier - Who Was Albert Einstein?

Who Was
Albert
Einstein?

Who Was
Albert
Einstein?

by Jess M. Brallier
illustrated by Robert Andrew Parker

Grosset & Dunlap New York

Text copyright 2002 by Jess M. Brailler. Illustrations copyright 2002 by Robert Andrew Parker. Cover illustration 2002 by Nancy Harrison. All rights reserved. Published by Grosset & Dunlap, a division of Penguin Young Readers Group, 345 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014. GROSSET & DUNLAP is trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. Published simultaneously in Canada. Printed in the U.S.A.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2002280613

ISBN: 978-1-101-64007-4 40 39 38 37 36 35 34 33 32 31

For an idea that does not at first seem insane, there is no hope.

Albert Einstein

Did you know that Albert Einstein was a very poor student who got kicked out of school? Well, he was. Yet he was one of the most brilliant people that the world has ever known.

Did you know that Albert was a peace-loving person who hated war? Well, he was. Yet his work led to the creation of the most destructive bomb ever.

Did you know that Albert was shy and hated publicity and attention? Yet he was a media superstar. Even now, fifty years after his death, Hollywood still makes movies about himand T-shirts, coffee mugs, and posters are decorated with pictures of his famous face.

Who was Albert Einstein? You are about to find out.

There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.

Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein made his entrance into the world on March 14, 1879, in Ulm, Germany. He certainly didnt seem like an extraordinary child. He was chubby and pale with thick, black hair. He was so quiet and shy that his parents worried that there was something wrong with him. They took Albert to doctors. He doesnt talk, his parents explained. The doctors found nothing wrong.

The story goes that Albert didnt speak a word until he was three or four years old. Then suddenly, over supper one night, he said, The soup is too hot. Greatly relieved, his parents asked why he had never said anything before. Because, little Albert replied, up to now, everything has been fine. Is this story true? Theres no proof.

Most boys his age played soldier and other rough-and-tumble games. Not Albert. When Albert saw real soldiers marching with their blank faces, they frightened him. Albert preferred to stay by himself and daydream. He enjoyed playing with blocks and building houses out of playing cardssome of them were fourteen stories high.

His parents continued to worry about their lonely and quiet son. They took him to more doctors. Could there be something wrong with his brain? his parents asked. Once again, doctors found nothing wrong with the boy. It was just his nature. He was quiet. He was a thinker.

Alberts father and uncle had a business that sold batteries, generators, and wire. Electricity fascinated Albert. It was invisible, powerful, and dangerous. Electricity was like some mysterious secret. Albert pestered his father and uncle with lots of questions. How fast is electricity? Is there a way to see it? Whats it made of? If theres electricity, could there be other strange and mysterious forces in the universe?

Albert enjoyed thinking about a world beyond the one that could be seen or explained. As he later said, Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.

Albert was also fascinated by the compass that his father had given him. No matter what he did with the compass, its needle always pointed in the same direction: North. Albert turned the compass upside down and sideways. He used it in the dark. No matter what, that needle always pointed in the same direction. Albert wondered why. His dad explained that the earth is like a big magnet thats always pulling on the compasss magnetic needle. Albert was amazed that some strange and powerful force was all around him. He could not see it or feel it. Yet it was there, making the compass needle move.

Albert had more to think about. School wasnt teaching him about the things that mattered to him. So at about age 10, Albert started to teach himself. He was going to read as much about science as he could.

Albert also enjoyed playing the violin. Music calmed his active mind. He especially liked playing duets with his mother. She would accompany him on the piano. One day, while they were playing, Albert suddenly realized that music chords were like patterns of numbers. Musical rhythms were like counting by threes, fours, or eights. Musics just like numbers, he exclaimed to his mother. (Albert was thinking even when relaxing.) Later, when Albert was famous and traveled all around the world, he carried only two things with himhis suitcase and his violin.

When Albert was a year old, his family moved to the city of Munich in Germany. There, his sister, Maja, was born. Albert expected a little sister to be like a toy. But Maja had no wheels like his other toys. Where are its wheels? he asked his parents, clearly disappointed with the new baby.

The wheel-less little girl, however, quickly became Alberts best friend. As they grew older, Albert and Maja loved to take long walks and hikes. Often their cousins came with them. The higher the hill, the better Albert could think. On these thinking hikes, he used his compass and thought more about how mysterious the world was. He would lie on his back in the grass, look at the sky, and think about space. Is anything farther away than space? How fast would somebody have to go to get there? How does light get all the way from those stars to your eyes? How far does space go on? Could you ride on a beam of light? Is anything bigger than the universe?