You’re aware the boy failed my grade school math class, I take it? And not that many years later he’s teaching college. Now I ask you: Is that the sorriest indictment of the American educational system you ever heard? [pauses to light cigarette.] No aptitude at all for long division, but never mind. It’s him they ask to split the atom. How he talked his way into the Nobel prize is beyond me. But then, I suppose it’s like the man says, “It’s not what you know…”
–Karl Arbeiter: former teacher of Albert Einstein
This is an obviously bogus quote, found at various places on the web: Science jokes page, Ozonline page, Heartmath page, Girls Achievement page, and dozens of other quote sites. Sometimes the reference to American schools is left out, sometimes the cigarette lighting is left out. Einstein did not get bad grades, he wasn’t a product of the American school system, he didn’t help split the atom. But who is Karl Arbeiter? Is he some fictional character?