The birth of CERN

At an intergovernmental meeting of UNESCO in Paris in December 1951, the first resolution concerning the establishment of a European Council for Nuclear Research was adopted. Two months later, 11 countries signed an agreement establishing the provisional council – the acronym CERN was born. This humoristic drawing features some of the main characters who were involved in the establishment of CERN. On the American hen: Isidor Rabi and Robert Oppenheimer, while on the hatching egg we recognize Francis Perrin (France), Niels Bohr (Denmark), Werner Heisenberg (Germany) and Sir George Paget Thomson (United Kingdom).