Noble Nobels

Noble Nobel

During WWII, two German Nobel Prize laureates (in physics) escaped to Denmark. When it too was taken over, their medals were chemically dissolved by Danish physicist Neils Bohr and Hungarian chemist George de Hevesy to keep them safe from the Nazis (and to keep the physicists safe as well, as taking gold out of Nazi Germany was a crime). The solution must have just looked like any other bottle of chemicals, because after the war was over, Hevesy precipitated the gold out of the solution, sent it back to the Swedish institution that grants the Nobels, and they generously recast the medals and reawarded them to the two physicists.