I grew up in a Jew­ish home in Detroit. We bor­rowed for me to study met­al­lur­gy at MIT and I obtained a Ph.D. in physics on a West­ing­house work/​study/​fellowship in Pitts­burgh. I write after an excit­ing career in indus­try to share a remark­able view into the strange inner work­ings of nature and describe the amaz­ing mod­ern inven­tions it has inspired.