which the special theory of relativity had ruled out (see Criticism of the theory of relativity). The physics Nobel Laureate Philipp Lenard suggested Gehrcke for the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1921. From 1922 to 1925, Gehrcke was also a member of the Kuratorium (board of trustees) of the Potsdam Astrophysical Observatory. On 9 February 1922, Max Planck nominated Gehrcke, Max von Laue, G. Müller, Walther Nernst to sit on the Kuratorium, and they were installed by the Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften (Prussian Academy of Sciences). Gehrcke represented the Physikalisch-Technische Reichsanstalt. During their appointment, they sat four times with Albert Einstein present. This was a surprising collaboration in view of what had happened just 18 months earlier at the gathering under the auspices of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft deutscher Naturforscher and the responses in the press by Einstein, Laue, and Nernst. Memberships Gehrcke was a member of professional organizations, which included: Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft (German Physical Society) Berlin Society of Anthropology, Ethnology and Prehistory Literature by Gehrcke Ernst Gehrcke and Rudolf Seeliger Über das Leuchten der Gase unter dem Einfluss von Kathodenstrahlen, Verh. D. Deutsch. Phys. Ges. (2) 15, 534–539 (1912), cited in Mehra, Volume 1, Part 2, p. 776. Gehrcke, Ernst Die gegen die Relativitätstheorie erhobenen Einwände, Die Naturwissenschaften Volume 1, 62–66 (1913) Gehrcke, Ernst Zur Kritik und Geschichte der neueren Gravitationstheorien, Annalen der Physik Volume 51, Number 4, 119 – 124 (1916) Gehrcke, Ernst Berichtigung zum Dialog über die Relativitätstheorie, Die Naturwissenschaften Volume 7, 147 – 148 (1919) Gehrcke, Ernst Zur Diskussion über den Äther, Zeitschrift der Physik Volume 2, 67 – 68 (1920) Gehrcke, Ernst Wie die Energieverteilung der schwarzen Strahlung in Wirklichkeit gefunden wurde, Physikalische Zeitschrift Volume 37, 439 – 440 (1936) Books by Gehrcke Gehrcke, Ernst (editor) Handbuch der physikalischen Optik. In zwei Bänden (Barth, 1927–1928) Bibliography Beyerchen, Alan D. Scientists Under Hitler: Politics and the Physics Community in the Third Reich (Yale, 1977) Einstein, Albert Meine Antwort. Über die anti-relativitätstheoretische G.M.b.H., Berliner Tageblatt Volume 49, Number 402, Morning Edition A, p. 1 (27 August 1920), translated and published as Document #1, Albert Einstein: My Reply. On the Anti-Relativity Theoretical Co., Ltd. [August 27, 1920] in Klaus Hentschel (editor) and Ann M. Hentschel (editorial assistant and translator) Physics and National Socialism: An Anthology of Primary Sources (Birkhäuser, 1996) pp. 1 – 5. Clark, Ronald W. Einstein: The Life and Times (World, 1971) Goenner, Hubert The Reaction to