CHAPTER SEVEN

1941

TWO YEARS AFTER THE launch of World War II the German army appeared unstoppable. France, with the largest army in Europe, had been the one real hope to slow the German advance, but it had collapsed in just 35 days. Hitler’s armies had overrun most of the European continent, from Poland in the east, Norway in the north and France to the west. Nightly bombing raids by the German Luftwaffe had pounded England’s cities for eight months straight. Rallying his countrymen on the radio, Prime Minister Churchill warned, “Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization.” 63 Then suddenly the bombing stopped. In a surprise move, Hitler redirected his forces away from Great Britain and against his erstwhile ally Joseph Stalin.

1941-06-22 BBC RADIO

WINSTON CHURCHILL: At 4 o’clock this morning Hitler attacked and invaded Russia. . . . Suddenly, without declaration of war . . . German bombs rained down from the sky upon the Russian cities.

It was the largest land invasion in military history. Adolf Hitler set out not merely to capture territory, but to annihilate what he believed was a conspiracy of Jews and “Bolsheviks” (Communists) that threatened all of Europe.

Enrico and Laura Fermi followed the latest developments from the comfort of their Leonia, New Jersey home. An ocean separated them from the fighting, but they still felt threatened. Ku Klux Klan rallies were increasing. Fascist ideas were becoming more acceptable even among prominent Americans like Charles Lindbergh who praised Adolf Hitler as “undoubtedly a great man.” 64 The number of German Americans joining the German-American Bund, a pro-Nazi organization, was growing. In February 1939, a Bund rally at Madison Square Garden in New York City drew 20,000 supporters. Marching to the beat of snare drums, men in Nazi uniforms carrying American flags and swastikas had paraded into the Garden where they were greeted by rally organizers. In front of a towering portrait of George Washington, a speaker exhorted the crowd to “protect ourselves . . . against the slimy conspirators and the parasite hand of Jewish Communism.” Meanwhile, a newsreel camera chronicled Nazi guards beating a lone man who dared to protest.

WORLD WAR II NEWSREEL

NARRATOR: . . . “and this is Fritz Kuhn, leader of a German-American Bund hiding behind an American flag, but taking his orders from Berlin . . . and copying the methods of Berlin.”

Laura Fermi would later write: “There seemed to be little doubt that Germany would gain a final victory in Europe and that such a victory might mean a Nazi domination of America . . . through increased power of the German Bunds.” 65

Laura and Enrico Fermi worried that Nazism might take root in the United States, so they buried what remained of his Nobel Prize money in their basement for safekeeping. Indulging in gallows humor, they spent evenings with friends plotting their escape from the United States. They figured the Germans would control the Atlantic. So they planned to make their way by sailboat from Florida to an island in the Pacific. “We prepared to become modern Robinson Crusoes in some far away desert island,” wrote Laura Fermi. Enrico’s “delight at the prospect of experimenting with compass and sextant was encouraging.” Laura took charge of their clothing needs, making sure their island “colony would not go naked in years to come.” She debated whether to provision their boat with “cotton seed and spinning wheels or . . . bolts of cloth.” 66

The Fermis thought they had considered every possible contingency. They were mistaken.