Albert Einstein: A Biography

Leah D'Agostino

Celisa Counterman

College Algebra - Sect 50

10/7/06

Albert Einstein was born on March 14, 1879 at Ulm, in Württemberg, Germany to Herman and Pauline Einstein. He was a unique child even from birth due to the unusual shape of his head. Einstein's abnormally large cranium caused doctors to assume that he was mentally handicapped. Because Einstein was slow to learn how to speak, this idea carried on through the first two years of his life. However, at a young age, Albert Einstein was quick to disprove doctors that he was anything but mentally handicapped.

Taking after his mother with a talent in music, Einstein learned how to play the violin and the piano by the age of five. Herman, Einstein's father, was a highly credible engineer who linked his son to the field of mathematics.

Einstein was a shy child and loathed the classroom environment.

English: receiving from Judge his certificate of A...

English: Albert Einstein, official 1921 Nobel Priz...

Albert Einstein during a lecture in Vienna in 1921

Being the only Jew in a Catholic school, he was often made fun of. However, Einstein still received high grades and excelled with his studies at home. For fun, Einstein's father would quiz his son with mathematical equations. This sparked Einstein's intrigue, and at an early age and he often would read large mathematical text books to gain more knowledge on the subject. Young Einstein's genius and early study of mathematics is what had eventually led him to be the Master of Science that he is now known for.

In 1894, Herman Einstein's business failed and his family was forced to move from Germany to Italy. Albert continued his education at Aarau, Switzerland and in 1896 he entered the Swiss Federal Polytechnic School in Zurich to be trained as a teacher in physics and mathematics. Einstein had successfully obtained his doctor's degree by the year 1905. From there...