Word: pontecorvo
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...Rome University Ph.D., a pupil of famed Enrico Fermi, Physicist Pontecorvo fled Italy in the 1930s to escape Mussolini's Hitler-inspired antiSemitism. He spent some time in France and the U.S., finally settled in Canada, where he became a British subject and an important researcher at the Chalk River atomic project. Eventually he made his way to Harwell, where he rose to the post of chief scientific officer. Like many a colleague, he was an associate (in Canada) of Dr. Allan Nunn May, later convicted of passing atomic information to Russian agents; and an associate (in Britain...
...Pontecorvo stayed above suspicion. Last July he resigned from Harwell to take a post at the University of Liverpool, which has one of Britain's finest atomic research departments. He was doing work on tritium, key element for the hydrogen bomb; he was also keenly interested in cosmic ray research. Before going to Liverpool, Pontecorvo planned a holiday...
...That Russia?" With his wife & three children, the physicist went to visit his parents in Milan. A friend who met him there asked if they were going straight back to England. "No," said Pontecorvo. "I'm going to Austria, where petrol is cheaper." But he never showed up in Austria...
Instead, the Pontecorvos bought tickets via Scandinavian Airlines to Stockholm. From Stockholm, without calling Mrs. Pontecorvo's mother, who lives in a suburb of the Swedish capital, they quickly flew on to Helsinki. During the trip, one of their little sons prattled to a fellow passenger, "We're going to Russia." When the youngster saw land below after crossing the Baltic, he asked, "Is that Russia...
...Helsinki's Malmi Airport, Mrs. Pontecorvo looked haggard and distraught. Her husband seemed quite normal. But his passport was not in order; he had no Finnish visa, so the authorities politely told him he must surrender it for correction. He could pick it up in three days at the Ministry of Interior's Bureau for Foreigners...