Adnan Waly: A Life and Career in Physics
From high-voltage mistakes to a visit with the Gestapo, physicist Adnan Waly talks about a life and career in science.
Published May 1, 2000
By Merle Spiegel
Academy Contributor

The New York Academy of Sciences’ (the Academy’s) most valuable asset is the knowledge and experience of its members. Ninety-year-old Adnan Waly — an Academy member for 49 years, and an active member of its Lyceum Society — has watched and been a part of the unfolding of the “century of physics.”
During his long career, he had personal contact with almost all the eminent scientists working in or passing through Germany in the 1930s and 1940s. Waly shared his memories in an extensive series of interviews with Professor Martin Pope. Evelyn Samuel transcribed the entire series, which is available at the Niels Bohr Library of the American Institute of Physics.
Following are some selected highlights:
High-Voltage Mistakes
“We had a one-million-volt pulse generator, but if you activated this, all the instruments in the institute would break down. So the whole room was coated in aluminum in order to protect the other instruments, and I was standing beautifully on aluminum and adjusting the spark gaps. In order to make photographic exposures of some discharges, the control table was separated by a dark curtain so the one on the controls could not see the generator.
“Brasch [Arno] was at the controls, and when I had just adjusted the last spark he misunderstood something I said and switched the thing on. The current entered my arm. I had an insulating rod in my hand, and it broke into a million pieces. The current went through my body and out through my feet. I got an incredible cramp in my lungs, and my lungs collapsed totally.
“No air. I collapsed. The soles of my feet had big blisters where the current went out, and my arm was paralyzed for three days. Brasch came running over and dragged me to a nice comfortable chair. Then he did something else – he lost his head. He went into his bag – I’ll never forget this – and took out a piece of cake, which he knew I liked. Then he stuffed this in my mouth. I almost suffocated. I’ll never forget that. He almost killed me a second time.”
A Visit with the Gestapo
“When Hitler came to power, Max von Laue tried to recommend Jewish scientists to universities in the States, but he could not send letters as the mail was opened. I could travel because I had an Egyptian passport. My wife — at that time, my girlfriend — was Jewish. I went to the Egyptian embassy and said, ‘I’m an Egyptian.’ I didn’t know anything about Egypt — my father [who was from Egypt] had died when I was two years old. I pestered them until I got an Egyptian passport for myself and my wife.
“So I had an Egyptian passport and could travel. I traveled once to Egypt and twice to Holland to deliver the letters of von Laue. The Gestapo then asked me to come to their headquarters. It is very unpleasant to be summoned to Gestapo headquarters. A barred iron door closed behind me, and I was quizzed by two investigators for quite a while about why I traveled so much.
“At that time I had a very good imagination and an excellent memory. I concocted all sorts of stories, which they tried to pierce and defuse. After a few hours they bought my story. I had posted a friend in a car and told him to go to the Egyptian Consulate and tell them what happened if I didn’t return in five hours. But I was released.”
Art Meets Science at the Academy
“I was at The New York Academy of Sciences attending a lecture of the Nuclear Section. I found a seat in an empty row because not too many people were interested in nuclear physics at the time. The door opened, and in came a gentleman flanked by two gorgeous women. It was Salvadore Dali with his moustache and his cane. He sat in my row with the ladies, and he put his cane up, two hands on the cane and his chin resting on it, as was his habit. He looked at the pictures that were presented.
“One of the pictures was of a cloud chamber — a photograph of particles moving apart from a center. Some time afterwards I saw a television program where Dali was interviewed, and his latest painting was exactly what he had seen at the Academy, with tracks coming out from the center. ‘You don’t know what this is?’ Dali said to the interviewer. ‘These are pimmesons.’ The lecture had been on the π meson.”
Also read: The Academy’s Lyceum Society: A “Think Tank”