Oppenheimer would explain to his interrogators in 1954, “my interests began to change. . . . I had had a continuing, smoldering fury about the treatment of Jews in Germany. I had relatives there [an aunt and several cousins], and was later to help in extricating them and bringing them to this country. I saw what the Depression was doing to my students. Often they could get no jobs, or jobs which were wholly inadequate. And through them, I began to understand how deeply political and economic events could affect men’s lives. I began to feel the need to participate more fully in the life of the
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