The early development of a Nobel Laureate

Horst L. Störmer at The Nobel Prize official website:

Gymnasium was hard. I was not a particularly good student. I loved mathematics and the sciences, but I barely scraped by in German and English and French. Receiving an “F” in either of these subjects always loomed over my head and kept me many a year at the brink of having to repeat a level. Luckily there was “Ausgleich”, balancing a bad grade in one subject with a good grade in another. Mathematics and later physics got me through school without repeat performance. I also excelled in sports, particularly in track and field, where I won a school championship in the 50 m dash. But sports could not be used for “Ausgleich”.

One of my teachers stood out, Mr. Nick. He taught math and physics. A new teacher, basically straight out of college, young, open, articulate, fun, he represented what teachers could be like. His love and curiosity for the subjects he was teaching was contagious. As 15 or 16 year-olds, we read sections of Feynman‘s Lecture Notes in Physics in a voluntary afternoon course he offered.

More here.