The greatest mind of the twentieth
century Albert Einstein who won the Nobel prize but didn’t get it as he had to
offer his prize money to his wife as a divorce settlement.
Nobel prizes often attract controversy, but usually after they have been awarded. Albert Einstein's physics prize was the subject of argument for years before it was even a reality
After his marriage to Mileva Maric hit the rocks in the early 1910s, Einstein left his family, moved to Berlin and started a new relationship with his cousin, Elsa.
Einstein had divorced his wide Mileva in 1919, several years after she had returned to Switzerland with the boys, Hans-Albert and Eduard. He and Maric finally divorced several years later in 1919. As part of the divorce settlement, Einstein pledged any eventual Nobel prize money to her for their upkeep.
As part of their separation agreement, Einstein promised her an annual stipend plus whatever money he might receive from the Nobel Prize which he was supremely confident he would eventually win.
Maric agreed, and Einstein later handed over a small fortune upon receiving the award in 1922 for his work on the photoelectric effect.
In divorce papers signed in 1919, which finally dissolved Einstein's troubled marriage to his first wife, Mileva Maric, the theoretical physicist left all his Nobel money to Maric and their two sons.
There has been a lot of speculation around that decision. Some have suggested that Einstein felt indebted to Maric it has been rumored that she, herself a budding young scientist, helped author some of Einstein's most famous work.
Perhaps more intriguing is Einstein's bold prescience: He left the money to Maric in 1919, yet was not awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics until 1921. He was sure that he would definitely win the Nobel prize.