Cyrus Vanderburg

Cyrus Vanderburg (Born Dominik Emmanuel Vanderberg) was a soldier, writer, popularizer of science, and pro-Israel activist best known for his friendship with Albert Einstein.

He was born in Warsaw, Poland on July 15, 1887 to a Polish father and a Czech mother. He was the second oldest of six children. His family was Jewish, although they were not observant. Vanderburg became an officer in the Allied Russian Army during World War I. After a reporter for a popular British magazine met with him and published his witty commentary on the war, Vanderburg (with his name changed to Cyrus Sanders) became somewhat of a folk hero to the Allied soldiers. After the end of the war, Cyrus returned to Poland and married a German socialite, and the pair had two children, a son and a daughter. During this time he met with Albert Einstein frequently after being introduced by a mutual friend. The pair discussed politics, art and science together. During the run-up to World War II, a German friend warned Vanderburg of growing government antisemitism under Hitler.
Vanderburg concluded that Poland was no longer safe for his family and they emigrated to New York to live with the family of Vanderburg's sister. It was in New York that Vanderburg's wife Veronika contracted tuberculosis. Veronika fought the disease for the rest of the war. After it ended, her family returned her to her hometown in Germany, where she died after fighting the disease for nearly ten years. His wife's death sent Vanderburg into a depression which lasted until 1946, when he met Eva Martin, a widow who had also lost her spouse to a deadly disease. The pair moved to Palestine in support of the formation of a Jewish state there and the Zionist movement. After the formation of Israel, Vanderburg moved to Haifa, where he wrote columns in local magazines on diverse subjects such as politics, religion and science until his death in 1963.

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