In March 1953, the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences informed Fritz London that it had awarded him the prestigious Lorentz Medal. The only other recipients were Max Planck, Peter Debye, Arnold Sommerfeld and Hendrick Kramers. In July of that year, London attended a ceremony at Leiden to receive the Medal. At the end of his short speech, Fritz London talked for the first and last time about himself publicly. ‘During most of my life I have been so fortunate that I could do the things which my own nature drove me to do. It is embarassing to earn so much respect for just doing this. Yet, it is a great satisfaction for me to receive this particular sign of recognition, because it tells me that the work which was done, apparently by an internal necessity, has been found to be of some objective value’.

Some?

Surely it was a show of humility demanded under the circumstances, I thought when I first read that speech a few years ago. But, after reading and rereading his papers and books, going through his notebooks, doing most of the calculations to understand the missing steps, examining more than 3000 letters in his own and his correspondents' archives, talking to his family, friends and colleagues, I came to realize that Fritz London was not being humble that day at Leiden. He truly meant some. As I slowly realized that, the man whose work so deeply intrigued me, shrank into much smaller dimensions. And happily he become a very real person to me.

I have decided to write a scientific biography of Fritz London for many reasons.