Richard Feynman was elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Society in 1965. The Royal Society’s election records date his election to 8 April 1965, recognizing an American physicist whose work had transformed quantum theory.
That same year brought Feynman another major distinction: he shared the Nobel Prize in Physics with Julian Schwinger and Sin-Itiro Tomonaga for fundamental work in quantum electrodynamics. His Nobel-winning contributions included a powerful reformulation of the theory and the diagrammatic methods now known as Feynman diagrams.
The Royal Society honor is sometimes confused with other dates in Feynman’s career. He received the Albert Einstein Award in 1954, the Ernest Orlando Lawrence Award in 1962, and the Oersted Medal in 1972. “Foreign Member” was the Royal Society’s category for an eminent scientist who was not a British national; it was not a separate scientific prize.