From ANTHONY W. SCHRECKER
I should like to add to Brian McCusker’s article (‘The quarks that fell
to Earth’, 20 July) that in the 1920s or early 1930s Felix Ehrenhaft, an
experimental physicist who was the director of the Institute of Physics
at the University of Vienna, told the students in his brilliant lectures
that he had consistently observed charges that were a fraction of the unit
electron charge by the Millikan technique described in the article. His
findings had been questioned by Millikan and by the establishment, but he
persisted in his claims.
After Austria was annexed by Nazi Germany, Ehrenhaft lost his position,
became a refugee, and lived in New York. He returned to Austria after the
war, but died shortly afterwards. He was a wonderful teacher and should
have received more credit than he did.
Anthony W. Schrecker San Diego California, USA
