ARTicles vol. 6 i.2: Who’s Who in Copenhagen

Niels Bohr (1885–1962)

A professor at the University of Copenhagen, Bohr receives the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922 for his investigation of the structure of atoms and takes Werner Heisenberg as a student. During WWII, Bohr offers refuge and jobs to Jewish physicists. During the German occupation, Bohr escapes Denmark. After the war, Bohr promotes the peaceful uses of atomic energy and denounces the transfer of any secret information from one nation to another, hoping to end international aggression.

Margrethe Norlund Bohr (1890–1984)

Margrethe marries Niels Bohr in 1909. Between 1916 and 1928 she gives birth to six sons, the oldest being Christian Bohr. At 18, Christian falls overboard and drowns. After the German invasion, the Bohrs flee to England, where Niels leaves his wife to go to Los Alamos, New Mexico, for the Manhattan Project. After two years apart, the couple reunites. A year after Niels’ death, Margrethe sees Heisenberg at a conference and calls his 1941 visit to Copenhagen “hostile.”

Werner Heisenberg  (1901–1976)

At 22 Heisenberg earns his PhD at the University of Munich. He works under Bohr in Copenhagen, where he develops his Uncertainty Principle, the primary principle of quantum mechanics, suggesting that the exact position and velocity of an electron cannot be determined at the same time. In 1932 Heisenberg wins the Nobel Prize in Physics. As WWII starts, Heisenberg is conscripted to join the German War Office’s Nuclear Physics Research Group. In 1945, Heisenberg is captured by the United States Army. He is allowed to return to Germany one year later.

Lynde Rosario is a first-year dramaturgy student at the A.R.T./MXAT Institute for Advanced Theatre Training.6_26