EAST PROVIDENCE, R.I. - An 89-year-old Rhode Island man has achieved a goal he spent two decades working toward and nearly a lifetime thinking about — earning his Ph.D.
and becoming a physicist.Manfred Steiner recently defended his dissertation successfully at Brown University in Providence. Steiner cherishes this degree because it's what he always wanted — and because he overcame health problems that could have derailed his studies."But I made it, and this was the most gratifying point in my life, to finish it," he said Wednesday at his home in East Providence.As a teenager in Vienna, Steiner was inspired to become a physicist after reading about Albert Einstein and Max Planck.