Einstein enrolled in the Zurich Polytechnic in October
1896, although he was still six months short of the official minimum
age of 18. He participated in a four-year teachers' training
program that would qualify him as a specialized high school teacher
of mathematics and physics. He lived in student lodgings in the
bourgeois district of Hottingen, first in the apartment of Frau
Henriette Hagi and then at a small pension run by Stephanie Markwalder.
Throughout his four years of study, he lived on the modest income of
100 Swiss francs per month, most of which was provided by his maternal
grandparents, the Kochs.
Einstein's decision to enroll in a teachers' training
program may seem surprising in light of his own unhappiness as
a schoolboy in Munich; the joy he took in learning came from his
informal education at home, not from his experiences in a school
with formally trained instructors. However, his teaching course
may have been an attempt to reach a compromise with his family,
which was in financial trouble at the time. The factory run by
his father and uncle had failed in 1896 and most of the family
funds were lost. Thus, despite Einstein's desire to master the
frontiers of physics, he also recognized the importance of securing
a steady income.
Einstein did not abandon physics, however, indeed studying
it seriously in the laboratory of the head physics professor at
the Polytechnic, Heinrich Friedrich Weber, who was best known for
his contributions to electrical engineering. Yet although Einstein
admired the professor's achievements, he was distressed to learn
that Weber, a staunch believer in classical physics, was hopelessly
old- fashioned, dismissing of all the advancements in electricity
and magnetism since Helmholtz's discoveries of the 1850s. Once
again, as in high school, Einstein relied on independent study:
he read widely the works of Maxwell, Kirchoff, Hertz, Helmholtz,
and contemporary physicists. Einstein also benefited from his
studies with his mathematics lecturer, Hermann Minkowski, who would
later prove instrumental in devising a strict mathematical formalism
to support Einstein's theory of relativity.
Although Einstein did not have a large social circle in
Zurich, he made several close friends who would have a strong impact
on his future. One such friend was Marcel Grossman, a mathematics
student one year his senior. Grossman's father was a factory owner
in Zurich and Marcel was the product of a liberal Swiss environment.
Einstein viewed his friend as a model student and relied heavily
on his lecture notes whenever it came time for final examinations.
Grossman continued to come to Einstein's aid in later years,
first by helping him to secure a position at a patent office in
Bern following his graduation, and then by working on the mathematical
calculations of the general relativity theory.
Another of Einstein's closest friends was Michele Angelo
Besso, a mechanical engineer living in Zurich. Einstein met Besso
through an amateur music group in Zurich, which Einstein often
joined on Saturday afternoons to play his violin. He encouraged
Einstein to read the works of Ernst Mach, a contemporary Austrian
philosopher. Mach's empirical positivism and distrust of metaphysical
speculation would have a strong impact on Einstein's theory of
special relativity.
Finally, Einstein also became very close with Mileva Maric,
a Hungarian student three years his senior at the Zurich Polytechnic.
Mileva was not a brilliant student, but a hard and determined worker.
Although Einstein was popular with many of the women at the Polytechnic,
his relationship with Mileva became particularly intense between
the autumn of 1899 and the summer of 1900. Then, in July 1901,
not long after their graduation, Mileva informed Einstein that
she was pregnant. Einstein intended to marry her, but his parents
were vehemently opposed on the grounds that she was beneath their
social standing. Mileva's parents, in contrast, encouraged the
relationship between Einstein and their daughter, especially when
they learned that she was pregnant. When Mileva gave birth to
an illegitimate child at the end of January, 1902, Mileva's parents
took responsibility for the young Lieserl and, it is believed, soon
put her up for adoption. Although Einstein and Mileva remained
on good terms throughout the pregnancy, it was not until January
1903, when Einstein had a secure and well-paying job at the patent
office in Bern, that the couple finally married.
The relationship between Einstein and Mileva has been
a subject of extensive historical interest, especially following
the publication of their romantic correspondence. Einstein's love
letters to his fiancee contain detailed descriptions of his scientific
work and his reactions to his studies, often interjected amidst
more prosaic personal details such as his decision to shave and
his fondness for sausages. Although the Einstein scholar Dr. Evan
Harris Walker argued in 1990 that Mileva was crucial in the development
of relativity theory, it is unlikely that she made any significant
intellectual contribution to Einstein's research. While Einstein
referred in his letters to "our work" when discussing his latest
ideas, this term was most likely a testament to his desire to involve
her in his work, not to the actual fact of her involvement. It
should be noted that Mileva did help her husband by checking his
calculations, and therefore participated directly in his research
even though she probably did not shape its development. In any
case, historians agree that Mileva was one of the most important
individuals in Einstein's life during his years at the Zurich Polytechnic
and immediately thereafter.
