The Real Story Behind “A Beautiful Mind”

MIT and Eleanor Stier

John was offered a place on the faculty at MIT in 1951, a position he gladly took. His college days had been plagued by isolation – his strange behavior and tendency to throw childish tantrums caused him to be frequently teased by his peers. He met nurse Eleanor Steir not long after, who was seven years his senior. The pair quickly struck up a romantic relationship, and Steir soon discovered she was pregnant. John was unwilling to marry her as he thought her social status was beneath him, and left her to have the child, a son, alone. This part of John’s life was controversially left out of the movie.