AN EINSTEIN CHRONOLOGY 525
December. E. completes Liber die Spezielle and die Allgemeine Relativi-
tatstheorie, Gemeinverstandlich, his most widely known book. It is later
translated into many languages.
December. The emperor authorizes the appointment of E. to the board
of governors of the Physikalisch Technische Reichsanstalt. E. holds this
position from 1917 until 1933.
1917 February. E. writes his first paper on cosmology and introduces the cos-
mological term.
E. suffers successively from a liver ailment, a stomach ulcer, jaundice, and
general weakness. His cousin Elsa takes care of him. He does not fully
recover until 1920.
October 1. The Kaiser Wilhelm Institute begins its activities (both exper-
imental and theoretical) under E.'s directorship.
1918 February. E.'s second paper on gravitational waves. It contains the quad-
rupole formula.
November. E. declines a joint offer from the University of Zurich and the
ETH.
1919 January-June. E. spends most of this period in Zurich, where he gives a
series of lectures at the university.
February 14. E. and Mileva are divorced.
May 29. A total solar eclipse affords opportunities for measuring the
bending of light. This is done under Eddington on the island of Principe and
under Crommelin in northern Brazil.
June 2. E. marries his divorced cousin Elsa Einstein Lowenthal* (b.
1874). Her two daughters, Use (b. 1897) and Margot (b. 1899), had earlier
taken the name Einstein by legal decree. The family moves into an apart-
ment on Haberlandstrasse 5.
September 22. E. receives a telegram from Lorentz informing him that
preliminary analysis of the May eclipse data indicates that the bending of
light lies between the 'Newton' value (0",86) and the 'Einstein' value
(1".73).
November 6. At a joint meeting of the Royal Society and the Royal Astro-
nomical Society in London, it is announced that the May observations con-
firm Einstein's predictions.
November 7. Headlines in the London Times; 'Revolution in science/
New theory of the Universe/Newtonian ideas overthrown'.
November 10. Headlines in The New York Times: 'Lights all askew in
the heavens/Einstein theory triumphs.' Press announcements such as these
mark the beginning of the perception by the general public of Einstein as a
world figure.
December. Einstein receives his only German honorary degree: doctor of
medicine at the University of Rostock.
Discussions about Zionism with Kurt Blumenfeld.*Elsa's father was Rudolf E., a cousin of E.'s father, Hermann. Her mother was nee Fanny Koch,
a sister of E.'s mother, Pauline, so that Elsa was a cousin of E. from both his parents' sides.