Einstein was born in Ulm, Germany on Mar. 14, 1879. Einstein's parents, who
             were non observant Jews, moved from Ulm to Munich when Einstein was an infant. The
             family business was the manufacture of electrical parts. When the business failed, in 1894,
             the family moved to Milan, Italy. At this time Einstein decided officially to relinquish his
             German citizenship. Within a year, still without having completed secondary school,
             Einstein failed an examination that would have allowed him to take a course of study
             leading to a diploma as an electrical engineer at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology.
             He spent the next year in nearby Aarau at the continual secondary school, where he
             enjoyed excellent teachers. Einstein returned in 1896 to the Swiss Federal Institute of
             Technology, where he graduated, in 1900 as a secondary school teacher of mathematics
             After two years he obtained a post at the Swiss patent office in Bern. The
             patent-office work required Einstein's careful attention, but while employed there he
             completed an astonishing range of publications in theoretical physics. For the most part
             these texts were written in his spare time and without the benefit of close contact with
             either the scientific literature or theoretician colleagues. Einstein took one of his scientific
             papers to the University of Zurich to obtain a Ph.D. degree in 1905. In 1908 he sent a
             second paper to the University of Bern and became a lecturer there. The next year Einstein
             received a regular appointment as associate professor of physics at the University of
             By 1909, Einstein was recognized throughout German-speaking Europe as a
             leading scientific thinker. In quick succession he held professorships at the German
             University of Prague and at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. In 1914 he
             advanced to the best-paying post that a theoretical physicist could hold in central Europe,
             professor at the Kaiser-Wilhe...