In his review of Edward Teller's memoirs ( Physics Today, November 2001, page 55), Hans Bethe says that Teller left Hungary in 1926 to seek an education in Germany. Later in the review, he says that Teller was forced to leave Hungary (in 1926), then Germany (in 1933). This information creates the unfortunate impression that Teller left Hungary for the same reasons he left Germany when the Nazis came to power. He was not forced to leave Hungary; there was no anti-Semitism in Hungary at that time. Jewish Hungarians were doing quite well and were represented in outstanding numbers among top financiers and industrialists, professionals and artists. Nothing proves this point better than the synagogue in Budapest; built in the second half of the 19th century, it is the largest and most beautiful synagogue in all of Europe.
Bethe replies: Maria Ronay is correct. Edward Teller did not have to leave Hungary in 1926. He left voluntarily to get a science education in Germany. Jewish business was flourishing in Hungary at that time, and for many years thereafter. But a science career could only be had outside Hungary. In this sense, Teller felt (as he mentioned in his memoirs) that he was exiled from Hungary in 1926, and then, for quite different reasons, from Germany in 1933.
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