Biography
Maria Goeppert was born on June 28, 1906, in Kattowitz, Germany (now Poland).
She was the only child of her parents, Friedrich Goeppert and Maria Wolff.
In 1910, she and her family moved to Goettingen, Germany where she remained
until her marriage. Maria grew up surrounded by many science and
math greats; their presence had had a profound impact on her. Her
father wanted her to carry on the family tradition of becoming a professor,
since she was their only child. She accomplished this goal and became
the seventh generation of professors in her family. Her father also told
her that he did not want her to become a woman, implying a housewife.
She informed her father that she “wasn’t going to be just a woman.”
She entered Goeppert University in 1924 as a mathematics student.
After attending a Max Born seminar, she soon changed from a math student
to a physics student. She once said “Mathematics began to seem too much
like puzzle solving. Physics is puzzle solving, too, but of puzzles created
by nature, not by the mind of man.”(J. Dash, Maria Goeppert-Mayer, A
Life of One's Own.) She received an excellent background in quantum
mechanics. In 1930 she completed her thesis on the theoretical treatment
of double photon processes and received her doctorate in physics. While
attending Goettingen, Maria met Joseph Mayer, and American who had come
to the University to study. The two were married and Maria followed
her husband back to the United States where he was appointed a professor
at Johns Hopkins. Even with a doctorate, degree in physics Maria
only managed to find a position as an assistant. Her husband encouraged
her to continue her research and she taught him all about the field of
quantum mechanics. Together they co-authored the book Statistical Mechanics.
While at Johns Hopkins, Maria continued her research and began giving lectures
and teaching a few graduate courses.
In 1939 Maria’s husband Joe, was appointed an associate professor
of Chemistry at Columbia University. Maria was given an office, but
no appointment. Two years later she was finally given her first real
job. She was hired as a part time teacher of science at Sarah Lawrence
College. She was given another part time job in 1942 by Harold
Urey. Urey was responsible for putting together a research group
devoted to separating U 2325 from natural unramium. Maria joined
this group and offered her knowledge of chemical physics to the development
of the atomic bomb. This group became known as SAM, Columbia University’s
Substitute Alloy Materials. Maria secretly hoped that the development
of the atomic bomb would never succeed, and she wept when the first bomb
was dropped on Hiroshima.
In 1946, the Mayers moved to Chicago. Joe was appointed
as a professor in the Chemistry department and Maria became a voluntary
associate professor of Physics. While at the University, Maria continued
her work with Edward Teller on the Opacity Project. This Project
dealt with the properties of matter and radiation at very high temperatures.
Through her work with the project, she was appointed a senior physicist
in the Theoretical Physics Department of the Argonne National Laboratory.
Maria continued to teach at the University of Chicago while working at
the Argonne Laboratory. During this time, Maria developed the shell
model for the nucleus of an atom. Her husband encouraged her to write
an article of her discovery. At the same time on her discovery another
scientists, J. Hans Jensen, working independently realized the importance
of the shell structure. Maria and Jenson first met in 1950 and then
a year later they co-authored Elementary Theory of Nuclear Shell Structure.
In 1963, the two shared the Nobel Prize for Physics for their joint contribution
to nuclear shell structure.
In 1954 both Maria and her husband transferred to the University
of California at San Diego, where they were both given appointments as
professors. Maria had a stroke in 1955, but she continued to teach and
conduct research. She remained in San Diego until her death in 1972.