Enrico Fermi

Enrico Fermi, a man whose scientific genius was so profound that his colleagues nicknamed him "the Pope," managed to not only develop the first nuclear reactor but also escape fascist Italy with his family, half of whom were Jewish. Talk about split-second timing and impeccable planning; he picked up his Nobel Prize in Stockholm in December 1938 and then promptly sailed to America, thus neatly avoiding Mussolini's racial laws which would have targeted his Jewish wife, Laura.

While Fermi himself wasn't Jewish, his family's predicament under Mussolini's antisemitic decrees certainly added a dramatic backdrop to his already monumental scientific achievements. One might say his K-score isn't just about splitting atoms, but also about splitting for freedom.

He might not have been a Jew, but he certainly lived through a pivotal moment where being Jewish (or married to one) shaped destiny, right before he shaped the destiny of the world with the Manhattan Project. Some people just have an uncanny knack for being at the center of... well, everything important.