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Book/Printed Material Letter from Albert Einstein to the Secretary-General of the League of Nations in Geneva.

About this Item

Title

  • Letter from Albert Einstein to the Secretary-General of the League of Nations in Geneva.

Summary

  • The document shown here is a short, handwritten letter, dated June 25, 1924, from Albert Einstein to Sir Eric Drummond, secretary-general of the League of Nations, written on the occasion of Einstein's reelection to the Committee on Intellectual Cooperation. The text reads: "I hereby thankfully accept the renewed election to the Committee on Intellectual Cooperation. In light of my past behavior, the election means an act of special generosity of spirit, and filled me with joy as a result. I shall always try to give my best in the service of this good cause. With best high regards, A. Einstein." The committee was established in 1922 by the League of Nations for the purpose of building international relations among teachers, artists, scientists, and members of other intellectual professions. Einstein, a citizen of Germany, had resigned from the committee in 1923 to protest the re-occupation of the Ruhr by the French army, hence the reference his "past behavior." A committed pacifist who enjoyed enormous international prestige for his scientific discoveries, Einstein was an appealing figure to represent the League of Nations and its ideals. The letter is preserved in the archives of the League, which were transferred to the United Nations in 1946 and are housed at the UN office in Geneva. They were inscribed on the UNESCO Memory of the World register in 2010.

Names

  • Einstein, Albert, 1879-1955 Author.

Created / Published

  • [place of publication not identified] : [publisher not identified], 1924-06-25.

Headings

  • -  Germany
  • -  1924-06-25
  • -  Correspondence
  • -  League of Nations
  • -  League of Nations. Committee on Intellectual Co-operation
  • -  Letters
  • -  Memory of the World
  • -  Physicists
  • -  Scientists

Notes

  • -  Title devised, in English, by Library staff.
  • -  Original resource extent: 1 page : handwritten in ink.
  • -  Reference extracted from World Digital Library: League of Nations Secretariat, Intellectual Cooperation and International Bureaux Section, 1919--1946, http://biblio-archive.unog.ch/detail.aspx?ID=408. External
  • -  Original resource at: United Nations Office at Geneva Library.
  • -  Content in German.
  • -  Description based on data extracted from World Digital Library, which may be extracted from partner institutions.

Medium

  • 1 online resource.

Source Collection

  • League of Nations Archives

Digital Id

Library of Congress Control Number

  • 2021667901

Online Format

  • compressed data
  • image

Additional Metadata Formats

IIIF Presentation Manifest

Rights & Access

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Credit Line: [Original Source citation], World Digital Library

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Cite This Item

Citations are generated automatically from bibliographic data as a convenience, and may not be complete or accurate.

Chicago citation style:

Einstein, Albert, Author. Letter from Albert Einstein to the Secretary-General of the League of Nations in Geneva. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified, -06-25, 1924] Image. https://www.loc.gov/item/2021667901/.

APA citation style:

Einstein, A. (1924) Letter from Albert Einstein to the Secretary-General of the League of Nations in Geneva. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified, -06-25] [Image] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021667901/.

MLA citation style:

Einstein, Albert, Author. Letter from Albert Einstein to the Secretary-General of the League of Nations in Geneva. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified, -06-25, 1924] Image. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/2021667901/>.