Oak Kidge Story
OAK RIDGE WILL HAVE A UNIQUE PLACE IN HIS-
TORY. IT WILL BE A LANDMARK IN THE FIELD OF
ATOMIC DEVELOPMENT/'
GEN. L. R. GROVES, U. S. A. (Ret.)
Commanding General
Manhattan Project, 1942-47
Illlllllllllllllllllllllllllllllliillllllllllllllilllllllll Illlllllllllllllllllllll Illllllllllllllli Illilllll I I
THE
OAK RIDGE STORY
'Che Saga of a People Who Share in Mistory
By
GEORGE O. ROBINSON, JR.
Illustrated
SOUTHERN PUBLISHERS, INC.
KINGSPORT, TENNESSEE
iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Copyright, 1950, by
GEORGE O. ROBINSON, JR.
PRINTED AND BOUND IN THE U. S. A. BY
KINGSPORT PRESS, INC., KINGSPORT, TENN.
Dedicated
... to the thousands upon thousands of scientists, engineers,
construction men, operations managers, military personnel,
workers in the plants, laborers and administrative personnel,
whose skill, knowledge, dogged determination, teamwork and si-
lent perseverance made possible the unprecedented and dramatic
accomplishment which brought a new era to the world . . .
... to the thousands who continue their labors to maintain the
leadership of the United States in the new field of atomic energy;
and to
BILLIE
WITHOUT WHOSE ENCOURAGEMENT THIS BOOK
WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN WRITTEN.
Introduction
IN World War II, when the Japanese were in control of
Southern Luzon, they conducted a roundup of persons
suspected of unfriendly attitudes. One of these was an elderly
American who had resided in the Philippines for many, many
years. A Japanese officer questioned him about his nation-
ality. The American replied that he was from Tennessee. A
perplexed look crossed the officer's face. Then he decreed:
"You may depart. You are of a non-belligerent nation. Japan
has no war with Tennessee."
On August 6 and August 9, 1945, the Japanese realized in
a most dramatic manner that they did indeed have a war with
Tennessee, as well as the rest of the United States. On those
dates, two atomic bombs shattered the cities of Hiroshima
and Nagasaki. One was supplied with a new kind of explosive
material produced in unprecedented facilities at Oak Ridge,
Tennessee; the other with a new kind of explosive material
produced at Hanford, Washington. The Atomic Age had
broken over an astounded world.
For sheer, stark drama, no single venture in the Twentieth
Century approaches the development of atomic energy — first
as a weapon for use in World War II and, in subsequent
years, as a tool to benefit mankind. Americans should not
only take deep and grateful pride in the accomplishment but
[7]
INTRODUCTION
should acquaint themselves with the general history of the
development and its promises of a brighter future. The good
to be derived by humanity from atomic energy will, in time,
completely eclipse the destructive character of one of the
greatest advances made in all the long history of man's search
for knowledge.
During World War II, three great main installations were
established by the United States Government to bring about
in the shortest possible time the development of a new
weapon to be known as an atomic bomb. These were at Oak
Ridge, in Tennessee, Los Alamos, in New Mexico, and Han-
ford, in the State of Washington. Smaller development areas
were established elsewhere. The Nation's great industrial or-
ganizations and universities, aided by thousands of other
organizations and groups of varied description, led the way
in breaking through many barriers to reach the new con-
tinent of atomic energy. The successful accomplishment of
the atomic energy mission is attributed to what is probably
the most comprehensive cooperative effort in history on the
part of Government, science, business and labor, and indi-
viduals in all walks of life working in a common cause on a
single project.
Of the three major installations, Oak Ridge, Los Alamos
and Hanford, which were built from scratch, including large
communities to house atomic energy workers, Oak Ridge has
a particularly fascinating and unique place in the modern-
day story of the atom; the Oak Ridge Area, which rose from
what was once a sparsely-settled section in the foothills of the
Cumberland Mountains in East Tennessee, has in truth come
to be known as the Symbol of the Atomic Age.
Interestingly enough, atomic energy is not as rare or as
strange as generally thought. It is not a thing of "black
magic."
[8]
INTRODUCTION
Atomic energy is the basis of life itself. It is with us every
minute, every hour. Consider the sun, in which a nuclear, or
atomic, reaction has been going on for millions of years,
where hydrogen atoms convert (fuse) into helium under high
temperatures (at least 1,000,000 degrees Fahrenheit) with si-
multaneous release of enormous amounts of energy. Energy
from the sun nurtures and sustains man and all other life on
the earth. The sun is the greatest of atomic energy "factories."
But we leave to others the technical explanations of atomic
energy. "The Oak Ridge Story" gives attention to the his-
torical phase of Oak Ridge itself. It is the story of the birth
pains of a city and a project, of a people who share in history,
the human side of the startling atomic adventure, an account-
ing of Americans at their best when the chips were down. It
is the story of the pioneers of another era giving up their
lands and homes so that a new type of pioneer coming from
every corner of America could bring about a New Age and
how those who participated in the ushering in of this New
Age lived and worked as great plants and a city arose almost
miraculously from once pine- and oak-dotted terrain.
And it is the story of how these new pioneers, under the
general supervision of the United States Atomic Energy Com-
mission, are now striving to bring to rapid fruition the great
peacetime potentialities of atomic energy. Oak Ridge, some-
times called the "Cradle of the Atomic Age," is at once the
Crossroads of a New World.
In bringing into one complete work the story of Oak Ridge
and its people, the author wishes to make grateful acknowl-
edgment to Mr. Clifford Seeber, of Knoxville, Tennessee, a
native of the Oak Ridge Area, for the use of certain historical
facts contained in a paper entitled "From Acorns to Atoms."
The author also has utilized background information con-
tained in articles appearing in the semi-official project news-
[9]
INTRODUCTION
paper, the Oak Ridge Journal, which served the community
from 1943 until the Spring of 1948.
Releasable facts on Oak Ridge plants have been carried in
official releases of the War Department's Manhattan Project,
the United States Atomic Energy Commission and various
contractors of the Manhattan Project and the Atomic Energy
Commission, and in various other public accounts. In addi-
tion, the author has been privileged to occupy a ringside seat
for the unfolding of "The Oak Ridge Story," becoming
associated with the atomic project in June 1943, when it
began to burgeon forth in all its splendor, and has drawn
from his own knowledge and observations of the develop-
ment.
GEORGE O. ROBINSON, JR.
Oak Ridge, Tennessee
September 27, 1950
Any opinions or assertions contained in "The Oak Ridge Story" are the
private ones of the author and are not to be construed as reflecting the views
of the United States Atomic Energy Commission or any other Government
agency.
[10]
Contents
I. THE PROPHET: An Old Man of the Hills, Many
Years Ago, Predicted the Oak Ridge of Today 17
II. STRANGERS IN THE VALLEY: The Why and How
of Oak Ridge; in Tennessee, History Walks with
a Heavy Foot 2 1
III. OF THOSE WHO LEFT: The Sons of Pioneers Re-
linquish Their Land for New Pioneers 32
IV. OF THOSE WHO CAME: A Cross-Section of Amer-
ica Turns a Rural Section Into the Symbol of a
New Age 42
V. THEY COULDN'T SAY A WORD: How the Secrecy
Was Maintained on the Most Secret of Projects 66
VI. THE WONDERS OF A NEW WORLD: The Intri-
guing Facts in the Building of Intricate Plants 77
VII. ATOMIC CITY HOUSEKEEPER: A Construction
Company Meets a Unique Challenge 93
VIII. A STORY Is BORN: The Story Behind the Story of
the First Official Releases on the Atomic Bomb 100
IX. INTO CIVILIAN HANDS: The United States Atomic
Energy Commission and Its Blueprint of Progress no
X. OAK RIDGE AND THE FUTURE: A City Begins to
Grow Up 127
APPENDICES 134
[Hi
Illustrations
CHAPTER I
The home and grave of John Hendrix, the "Prophet"
CHAPTER II
Norris Dam and the Great Smoky Mountains
CHAPTER III
Scenes familiar to "Those Who Left," including the
old Wheat church, a home and school
CHAPTER IV
The Oak Ridge of the past and the present
CHAPTER VI
The great plants in the Oak Ridge Area
CHAPTER VIII
The atomic blasts and Oak Ridge in the headlines
CHAPTER IX
President Truman signs the Atomic Energy Act of 1946 and
a vast project is transferred from the military to civilians;
radioactive elements from Oak Ridge help humanity
CHAPTER x
A city is "opened" to the public in a unique ceremony;
Oak Ridge and a new era
[13]
the Oak Kidgc Story
CHAPTER I
The Prophet
NEAR the city limits of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, not far
from a high wire fence running forbiddingly along one
of the main traffic arteries leading into the community, a lone
grave rests on a grassy, overgrown knoll. It is marked by an
inconsequential little stone — scratched and scarred.
Resting beneath this forlorn marker in the shadow of a
city of 30,000 where live the personnel who grapple daily
with the new force of atomic energy are the remains of one
John Hendrix. Many years ago, John Hendrix, an ascetic,
roamed the fields and woods of a sparsely-settled, isolated sec-
tion of East Tennessee. John Hendrix had visions. He re-
cited these visions frequently. Those who paused to listen
often laughed.
John Hendrix assumed the role of a prophet around the
turn of the Twentieth Century, when about 50 years of age.
His visions manifested themselves more acutely as he would
return from a communion in the deep woods which stretched
along the ridges near his stark, weather-beaten home. One
Spring day, shortly after returning from a meditative walk,
he startled his wife with the prediction that in a few years a
railroad would be built from Knoxville, 20 miles to the east,
through the central part of Anderson County, their home.
The buxom woman looked at him speculatively and went
[17]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
about her business of housekeeping. Her indifference did not
upset him. On the contrary, he became more bold and open
with his prognostications. Well, he might, for the Louisville
and Nashville Railroad within a few years began construc-
tion of a new line along the approximate route spelled out
by Hendrix.
Hendrix began to enlarge his horizons. He found his most
ready audiences at the crossroads' store near his home and to
them he solemnly voiced his prophecies. There was no his-
torian to put his stories to paper but fragments of informa-
tion remain which give accountings of John's speculations of
the future.
Of two small farming communities near his home, Scar-
boro and Robertsville, Hendrix foresaw unusual things. On
one occasion, he emerged from his beloved woods with a
strange and wondrous story.
"In the woods," he said, "as I lay on the ground and looked
up into the sky, there came to me a voice as loud and as sharp
as thunder. The voice told me to sleep with my head on the
ground for forty nights and I would be shown visions of what
the future holds for this land."
Hendrix did what the "voice" told him to do. He wan-
dered through the thickets and the briers until he came to a
clump of trees which satisfied him as a spot for his tryst. He
put his head on the ground and slept a fitful sleep for forty
nights. The rains came but he was unflinching. On the forty-
first day, he came forth to tell of the vistas which had been
opened up to him. Part of the time, he said, had been spent
in Paradise.
". . . and I tell you," Hendrix said to his neighbors gath-
ered at the crossroads' store, "Bear Creek Valley some day
will be filled with great buildings and factories and they will
help toward winning the greatest war that ever will be.
[18]
J. E. Westcott
This was once the home of John Hendrix, the "Prophet"
J. E. Westcott
The slab over Hendrix' simple grave near the town of Oak Ridge
THE PROPHET
"And there will be a city on Black Oak Ridge. The center
of authority will be on a spot which is middleway between
Sevier Tadlock's farm and Joe Pyatt's place.
"A rajlroad spur will branch off the main L & N line and
run down toward Robertsville and then it will branch off and
turn toward Scarboro. It will serve the great city I saw in my
vision.
"Big engines will dig big ditches and thousands of people
will be running to and fro. They will be building things and
there will be great noise and confusion and the earth will
shake. . . ."
"I've seen it, it's coming," he would mutter and then stalk
away to the summit of Pine Ridge, where he would gaze
across the valley toward Robertsville and meditate and pray
again.
John Hendrix died in 1903, when Theodore Roosevelt
was President and the Wright Brothers made history with
the first successful mechanical airplane flight from Kill Devil
Hill on North Carolina's seacoast, four miles south of Kitty
Hawk. They buried the prophet in a clearing near his home.
Forty years later, there arose a short distance away the city he
predicted would some day rest along one of the ridges —
Black Oak — over which he roamed and dreamed.
In the county of Anderson in the state of Tennessee, seven
miles from the Anderson county-seat town of Clinton, a bus-
tling community of 30,000 goes about its business today along
Black Oak Ridge. In every corner of the world, Oak Ridge is
the symbol of a new era, the Atomic Age.
The old communities of Scarboro and Robertsville,
through which John Hendrix walked his weary way, and a
third farming settlement, Wheat, several miles to the south-
west, have been enveloped. A railroad spur runs into the city
from the main line of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad.
t'9]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
A huge Administration Building, the center of authority for
the new city, stands where Hendrix said it would.
In Bear Creek Valley, there is a great and imposing plant
known as the electromagnetic facility, built to produce ura-
nium-235. Here was produced for the first time in history in
a significant amount the material which went into the world's
first atomic bomb utilized in warfare, the devastating weapon
which cascaded over Hiroshima, Japan, at 8:15 A.M. on Au-
gust 6, 1945, taking 80,000 lives. Three days later, another
atomic missile fell on Nagasaki, Japan, taking 73,000 lives.
The Japanese had had enough. Surrender followed.
John Hendrix would not recognize his land today if he
were to return. He sleeps on. But his spirit must have stirred
uneasily early on the morning of July 16, 1945, when in the
desert stretches of Alamogordo, New Mexico, a huge blast
shook the earth and the sky became lit up as if by the noon-
day sun. The test of the world's first atomic bomb had been
successful, an event described by Brig. Gen. Thomas F. Far-
rell, an observer, as follows:
"The whole country was lighted by a searing light . . .
golden, purple, violet, gray and blue. It lighted every peak,
crevasse, and ridge of the nearby mountain range with a clar-
ity and a beauty that must be seen ... to be imagined. It
was that beauty the great poets dream about but describe
most poorly and inadequately. Thirty seconds after, the ex-
plosion came first, the air blast pressing hard against the peo-
ple and things, to be followed almost immediately by a sus-
tained, awesome roar which warned of Doomsday and made
us feel that we puny things were blasphemous to dare tamper
with the forces heretofore reserved to the Almighty."
It was a solemn moment in world history. The roar re-
verberated in time back along Bear Creek Valley in the hills
of East Tennessee. . . .
[20]
CHAPTER II
Strangers in the Valley
A PARTIALLY cloudy sky greeted East Tennessee on Sep-
1\. tember 19, 1942. As the day wore on, a gentle southeast
wind helped to alleviate the 91 -degree temperature. In Eu-
rope, the Russians were striking vigorously at the Nazis on
the Volga in their defense of Stalingrad, and the late Wendell
Willkie was a visitor in Russia as a guest of the Soviet Gov-
ernment. In the Pacific, General MacArthur's heavy bombers
and fighter planes were harassing key Japanese bases on New
Britain Island and in Northern New Guinea. Announcement
was to be made soon that Admiral William F. Halsey had
been placed in charge of the Navy's Task Forces in the South
Pacific.
An entire nation bit its collective lower lip in grimness.
Throughout the United States, the loins of war were being
girded at a faster pace. The know-how that is uniquely Amer-
ican was beginning to assert itself in many places throughout
the land. Scrap drives began to get underway. The pinch of ra-
tioning was being felt more widely. The tramp of thousands
of feet began to be heard with more regularity in training
camps from the Atlantic to the Pacific and Army maneu-
vers were getting underway in Middle Tennessee. Simulta-
neously, Lt. Gen. Brehon Somervell of the War Department's
General Staff was telling Americans that "we are not going to
[21]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
win until everybody puts everything he has into the war."
Life in the farm homes, the schools, the churches and the
rural stores along the ridges and in the valleys which make up
Anderson County and the adjoining County of Roane went
on about as usual. Only the departure of men to volunteer,
to answer the call of their draft boards or to leave for employ-
ment at the great sprawling plant of the Aluminum Company
of America at Alcoa, 34 miles away, and at other industrial
plants in East Tennessee, disturbed the normal life of the
section.
None knew — actually only a chosen few in Government
circles in Washington did know — of the establishment 37
days before, on August 13, by order of the Commander-in-
Chief, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, of a mysterious segment
of the War Department's Corps of Engineers designated sim-
ply "The Manhattan District."
Since August, however, residents of Anderson and Roane
counties had noticed a few strangers roaming the valleys, the
ridges and the gaps which made up their homeland. The new-
comers were sighting through instruments, surveying and
measuring. They were engineers, dressed in rough khaki,
wearing high boots, taciturn and noncommittal. Asked what
they were running lines for, they would answer: 'Tor seventy-
five cents an hour." The natives wondered and talked about
it among themselves. They made wry attempts to shrug it off.
"Only more Tennessee Valley Authority people," they would
say.
But just as noonday came on September 19, five men, two
of them high ranking officers in the United States Army, with
the Corps of Engineers' insignia on their blouses, stood at a
vantage point at the railroad whistle stop of Elza in Ander-
son County. . . .
The spot from which they looked out over a long valley
'
STRANGERS IN THE VALLEY
had seen the tides of an empire swirl about it. It had echoed
to the rumblings of the covered wagons from the East and the
staccato sound of rifle fire as the Indians retreated before the
white men. Long before, a race whose identity is buried in
antiquity's archives had built mound cities in the blue grass
basins to the south and southwest.
The State to which the five had come to make a momen-
tous decision was the seed-bed of the civilization of the Old
Southwest; of the development of that West, a historian has
said: "Its center rested in Tennessee, the region from which
so large a portion of the Mississippi Valley was settled by de-
scendants of the men of the Upper South."
In Tennessee, history walks with a heavy foot.
To the northeast of the point where the five visitors stood
on September 19, 1942, is Greeneville, resting place of the
country's iyth president, Andrew Johnson, the tailor, who
succeeded to the office upon Lincoln's death; to the south-
west is Columbia, home of James K. Polk, the nth president;
to the west near Nashville is The Hermitage, where Andrew
Jackson, "Old Hickory," the 7th president, died in 1845; to
the south is Chattanooga, near where the famous Civil War
battles of Chickamauga, Lookout Mountain and Missionary
Ridge were fought in 1863; to the southeast is Sevierville,
named for John Sevier, Tennessee's first governor; far to the
southwest is Memphis, where the Spaniard, DeSoto, is said by
some historians to have first seen the Mississippi River in
1541; to the northwest is Jamestown, home of Sergeant Alvin
York, World War I hero, and close by, a short distance from
Byrdstown, is the birthplace of Cordell Hull, former United
States Secretary of State, who served longer in that position
(March 3, 1933 — November 21, 1944) than any other man in
the nation's history.
Illustrious names shine in the history of Tennessee, the six-
[23]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
teenth state admitted to the Union (June i, 1796) and first
settled by a white man in 1769, when William Bean built a
log cabin near the junction of Watauga River and Boone's
Creek in East Tennessee. These names include Sam Houston,
"The Raven," one-time governor of Tennessee who later be-
came the Liberator of Texas; David Crockett, pioneer back-
woodsman and later a Congressman; David Glasgow Farra-
gut, the first Admiral of the American Navy, who was born 1 1
miles southwest of Knoxville; Nathan Bedford Forrest, the
Confederate general whose battle strategy was "Git there fust-
est with the mostest men"; William C. Claiborne, whose vote
made Thomas Jefferson president over Aaron Burr, and E. E.
Barnard, world-famous astronomer.
Nature, too, had erected monuments of its own in Tennes-
see. To the east and southeast of the spot where the men stood
are the Great Smokies, the country's greatest mountain mass
east of the Black Hills of South Dakota and one of the oldest
mountain ranges in the world, where mountain men still
scrape their fiddles in lively old ballads handed down from
generation to generation, and pioneer crafts of spinning,
weaving and basket making still survive; to the west is Reel-
foot Lake, created in 1811 in the spasms and convulsions of
an earthquake when the bottom of the Mississippi River
seemed to fall through as it flowed backward into a terrible
abyss of thousands of acres; and to the south is Lookout
Mountain, a rock-faced promontory carved by the currents
of the Tennessee River and overlooking Moccasin Bend at
Chattanooga. . . .
. . . Their conference over, the five visitors to the valley
entered their automobile. Their destination was Knoxville,
20 miles to the east, where a metal slab on a building at the
corner of Gay and Church Streets carries this legend: "SITE
OF THE BIRTHPLACE OF TENNESSEE HERE THE FIRST CONSTITU-
[24]
bo
Tennessee Conservation Department
The Great Smoky Mountains (Gatlinburg in the foreground) are near Oak Ridge
STRANGERS IN THE VALLEY
TIONAL CONVENTION WAS HELD IN THE OFFICE OF COL. DAVID
HENLEY, AGENT OF THE WAR DEPARTMENT, KNOXVILLE JANU-
ARY i I-FEBRUARY 6, 1796." Upon reaching the city, they went
directly to their hotel. One of the officers lifted a telephone
in his room, asked for long distance. When he reached his
party in the War Department in Washington, he said:
"The location tentatively selected in July and which has
been under survey is ideal for our purposes. We should pro-
ceed with land acquisition."
The other colonel and the three companions — they were
officials of the Stone and Webster Engineering Corporation
of Boston, under contract with the War Department to carry
out in high secrecy the development engineering, design en-
gineering and construction of certain plants for producing
uranium-235 — nodded in agreement. Their faces were grim,
their demeanor serious; another step had been taken into a
dark, foreboding and uncharted path.
The site they had chosen for the building of fantastically
big facilities which had no pilot plants to serve as models, and
which at that time existed only in laboratory conceptions and
in blueprints being drawn under the supervision of America's
most distinguished scientists — the proposed plants had no
counterparts anywhere in the world — was a tract of 92 square
miles, 58,800 acres on the Clinch River in Anderson and
Roane counties 18 miles west and northwest of Knoxville.
(The Oak Ridge Area presently constitutes 58,762 acres of
which 30,315 are in Anderson and 28,447 in Roane. The area
is approximately 1 7 miles long, averages 7 miles in width and
runs from northeast to southwest. While additional acreage
was purchased after 1942, other land has been sold or relin-
quished. Of Anderson County's 342 square miles, the Oak
Ridge Area occupies about one-sixth.)
In 1933, another revolutionary step in the American way
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
of life had taken place, the authorization by the Congress of
the Tennessee Valley Authority. The first of its great dams,
N orris, and the city of Norris, which were built in the middle
1930'$, stood 16 miles northeast of the new War Department
site. One of the contributing factors to the decision made
September 19 was the TVA, for great amounts of power were
needed for what the Manhattan District proposed to do.
In addition to sufficient electric power, Clinton Engineer
Works, as it became known, had to be safe from air attack,
not too close to large centers of population, large enough to
accommodate four separate plants with flat building areas
separated by natural barriers, accessible to rail and motor
transport, and on land of reasonable value adjacent to a de-
pendable water source. Specifications also called for space for
a town, a local labor supply and topography which would fa-
cilitate security control.
For the second time within a decade, the wheel of Fortune
spun toward Anderson County, Tennessee. Anderson Coun-
ty's first big drama was the TVA; the second, the Clinton
Engineer Works, was so vast in scope that it included part of
Anderson's neighboring county of Roane, where the first coal
was mined in Tennessee in 1814.
Shortly after the dramatic telephone call to Washington,
the deluge fell upon the 1,000 families in the area selected.
They were to lose their homes and their farms. Their land,
they were told, was needed immediately for the war effort.
They were further informed that efforts would be made to
relocate them satisfactorily, that "adequate compensation"
would be made for their land, property and crops and that
"every consideration would be given the people by their Gov-
ernment." Among such considerations was the taking over of
the care of 65 cemeteries on the project site. The plots are
STRANGERS IN THE VALLEY
still looked after by the Government. By November i, 1942,
all property owners had received notices of condemnation,
ordering them to vacate the project site not later than Janu-
ary J> 1943-
The race into the unknown was pressing on, men were
walking an untrod path along the brink of disaster; time
could not stand still. In Washington, the question of what
direction Germany might be moving in scientific fields fur-
rowed the brows of key officials.
Concurrently with the initial trickle of official personnel
onto the project site in October, Knoxville newspapers and
the weekly newspapers at Clinton, in Anderson County, and
Harriman, in Roane County, began to ask for details of the
project, its purposes and objectives. After much probing and
questioning locally and in Washington, local headlines an-
nounced:
"Army surveys for project in area. Telegram from Con-
gressman Albert Gore announces that about 56,000 acres of
land in Anderson and Roane counties will be used as site for
a demolition range." A demolition range, it was explained,
is an area in which targets are set up to be destroyed by artil-
lery fire or airplane bombings. Indeed, for several weeks,
Clinton Engineer Works was known as the "Kingston Demo-
lition Range" — a prophetic designation.
Kingston, county seat of Roane County, was the western
outpost of the United States Army shortly before the Ameri-
can Revolution and famous as the site of a huge breastwork
built by the Indians in prehistoric times. It had a brief fling
in the nation's history on September 21, 1807, when Ten-
nessee's General Assembly named it as the State's capital for
one day, only to move the capital back to Knoxville the next.
Again in 1843, Kingston was named by the Tennessee Senate
[27]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
as the State's permanent capital but the House of Represent-
atives chose Murfreesboro. This necessitated a compromise
— Nashville, the present seat of state government.
The site having been chosen for the Clinton Engineer
Works, the once tranquil, isolated valleys of Anderson and
Roane counties changed overnight. While Stone 8c Webster
engineers directed the cutting of ditches, the driving of stakes
in barnlots and the opening of roads across cornfields, and as
huge trucks, the first of thousands to come, bumped across
open terrain, the first official headquarters office for Clinton
Engineer Works was opened in a room in the Andrew John-
son Hotel in Knoxville at 8 A.M. on October 26, 1942.
First Government man on the job for keeps was Robert J.
Dunbar of Osceola, Iowa, an engineer with the Corps of En-
gineers, who arrived at the temporary offices 15 minutes be-
fore Lt. Col. Warren George, who served as first construction
engineer for the project. Major Thomas J. Rentenbach of
Hancock, Michigan, was the second Army representative to
report. First Stone & Webster official to report was Talley W.
Piper, personnel manager, October 26, 1942; five days later
he was joined by a brother, J. P. Piper, procurement officer.
In a few days, the first shovel of dirt in project construction
was turned by the firm of Walters and Prater, of Morristown,
Tennessee, in the building of a railroad siding at Elza.
Responsibility was placed on the Ohio River Division of
the Army's Corps of Engineers for acquiring the land, which
eventually cost the Government approximately $2,500,000.
Dissatisfied with the first appraisals, most of the landowners
carried appeals to the Federal Court in Knoxville, where ju-
ries generally increased the Government's offers. In the final
settlements, average cost of an acre of land for the Oak Ridge
Area was approximately $45.
Preparation for construction and actual construction work
STRANGERS IN THE VALLEY
could not, however, await determination of the land suits,
some of which were not settled until 1944. On November 2,
1942, the first carload of materials arrived. From then on
until the Summer of 1945, wondrous things happened.
The manner in which the Government acquired the land
for its venture had reverberations in Washington. In the Sum-
mer of 1943, a House Military Affairs Sub-committee headed
by Representative Clifford Davis of Memphis investigated
complaints and reported that "fairer prices should be paid
those forced from the area by the Government." Former Rep-
resentative John Jennings, Jr., of Knoxville, who requested
the probe, told his constituency that "the Secretary of War
has assumed the guise of an invader," a charge which he un-
doubtedly would have softened if Henry L. Stimson had been
officially privileged to discuss the matter with him.
But there was at least one person among the 1,000 families
— 3,000 persons — forced to depart from the area who felt that
Mr. Jennings knew what he was talking about when he men-
tioned "invader." He was a part time manufacturer and dis-
penser of the potent white beverage known as "moonshine."
For some years, it seemed, the Government had been singling
him out for especial attention.
Born and reared in the Great Smokies, where he was living
happily on Roaring Branch and plying his trade with great
finesse, he found himself evicted in 1928 when the United
States Park Service condemned and bought up a huge section
of land, including his 15 acres, for a National Park. Casting
about for a good location for business, he selected Union
County. But he hadn't calculated on the Tennessee Valley
Authority, which condemned and acquired his land in the
middle 1930*5 to help hold back the waters of Norris Dam.
His next stop was Anderson County. But he landed in the
wrong place again. The Government needed his land for the
[29]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Clinton Engineer Works. It is not recorded if he found a new
business site. But he did remark philosophically as the third
condemnation notice in a period of 14 years arrived:
"If I knew a place where there warn't no Government men
but only revenoors to dodge, I'd shore go there."
For others, a leather-faced oldtimer put the problem of
eviction into more understandable language. "The only dif-
ference," he said petulantly, "is when the Yankees came be-
fore, we could shoot at them."
— and That's Not All
In addition to being the site of the giant production facili-
ties which produced the first U-235 in world history for use
in an atomic weapon, Tennessee has recorded other notable
"firsts."
In 1801, Tennessee passed the first state law against duel-
ing. The death penalty was provided.
In 1819, the first periodical against slavery appeared at
Jonesboro, being succeeded by the Emancipator in April,
1820.
In 1831, the first publication in the United States devoted
principally to railroading, "The Rail-Road Advocate," ap-
peared at Rogersville.
The first town in the United States to be named in honor
of the maiden name of George Washington V wife, Martha
Dandridge, is Dandridge, in Jefferson County.
In 1866, the Ku Klux Klan was first organized at Pulaski.
In 1925, Dayton was the scene of the famed "Monkey
Trial" when William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow
played a great drama while the world took sides on the theory
of evolution and debated whether John T. Scopes, a high
[30]
STRANGERS IN THE VALLEY
school instructor, was in the right when he violated the Ten-
nessee law prohibiting the teaching of the theory. Scopes was
fined $100; the law's constitutionality was upheld by the Ten-
nessee Supreme Court on appeal and remains on the statute
books.
CHAPTER III
Of Those Who Left
WHAT is now the Oak Ridge Area was settled in the late
i7oo's and the early iSoo's by hardy and rugged indi-
viduals who helped push back the frontiers of America.
The majority were members of that vast English, Scotch
and Irish clan which first followed the Quakers into Pennsyl-
vania, then pushed down into Virginia and North Carolina.
Later, they followed the mountain gaps — Cumberland Gap
on the Tennessee-Virginia line was one of the first passage-
ways— into the new, promising, free land in the West. With
them came the Dutch and the Swedes, a melting pot made
up of resourceful, peace-loving people, pioneers in frontier
democracy.
Land grants given by the Government also attracted some
Revolutionary soldiers, among them some who had fought in
the famous battle at King's Mountain, on the North Caro-
lina-South Carolina border against the British. One Revo-
lutionary soldier who settled in the Oak Ridge area was Cap-
tain John Harrell, who had accompanied Washington when
he crossed the Delaware. His descendants today are scattered
over a broad East Tennessee section.
In addition, a scattering of German immigrants appeared
in the area around the turn of the igth Century. Probably
[32]
OF THOSE WHO LEFT
the most famous of these was Frederick Sadler, a wagon
maker, who arrived in Pennsylvania in the late 1700'$, reared
a large family of girls and then decided to move westward. In
covered wagons, he made the trek with his wife, eight daugh-
ters and eight sons-in-law and settled in a little valley near the
Oak Ridge section. The family names of seven of his sons-in-
law (the name of the eighth was not preserved) — Leinart,
Spessard, Leib, Shinlever, Claxton, Clodfelter, and Bumgart-
ner — mingle with the more common names of Smith, Jones,
Brown, Watson, Gallaher, Jett, Standifer, Cross, Wilson,
Browder, Morton, Stooksbury, Haun, Brennan, Price, Har-
mon, Dunlap, McKinnon and Reed in Tennessee today.
When the War Department put its finger on the now fa-
mous acreage in Anderson and Roane counties, the contrast
in the way of living was as sharp as that found in any section
where there are green valleys and rocky ridges. In the valleys
were substantial homes on farms ranging from 200 to 600
acres, rolling fields, hard roads, electric power and modern
equipment. On the ridges, the foothills of the Cumberland
Mountains which rise to the West, were eroded hills, tenant
houses, sedge grass pastures, scrub stock, hound dogs and cab-
ins perched on rock formations. But in the entire 58,800 acres
there were only two one-teacher schools, serving about 30
children each. In the communities of Scarboro, Robertsville
and Wheat, however, there were consolidated schools accom-
modating around 1,100 pupils.
Along the perimeter of the area selected stood other settle-
ments known as Elza — named for another German family
which pioneered in East Tennessee — Solway, Blair and Edge-
moor.
Elza, Edgemoor, Blair, Solway and Oliver Springs, named
for a community six miles west of the area, were to become
especially familiar designations in the Atomic Age. Through
[33]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
the barriers which were established at these points, and at
two others — Gallaher and White Wing Entrances — to con-
trol visitors into the town and the vast plant areas, world-
renowned scientists and the great men in American military,
business, industrial and Government circles passed during
the hectic days of construction and first plant operations. And
for month upon month during World War II, many Ameri-
can manufacturers, suppliers and jobbers scratched their
heads in bewilderment, for orders for materials from the War
Department simply specified shipments to various engineer-
ing and construction companies at Elza, Tennessee and Blair,
Tennessee. The bewilderment was understandable; the
Postal Guide in 1942 listed neither settlement.
William Tunnell and his family were the first settlers in
what is now Oak Ridge, arriving from Virginia around 1792.
They occupied land where Robertsville later stood. The
Tunnell family and that of Anne Howard, an English pio-
neer, was joined by Isaac Freels, an Irishman of Presbyterian
faith, who entered 1000 acres of land adjoining the two. Then
came the Peaks, the Lees and the Garners. A member of the
Garner clan was former Vice-President John Nance Garner's
father, who migrated to Texas after the Civil War.
Two other illustrious men in American life had their roots
in the immediate vicinity of Oak Ridge. Sam Rayburn,
speaker of the National House of Representatives, lived as a
young boy across from Clinch River west of Wheat in Roane
County before his family moved to Texas. Just before the
late William Gibbs McAdoo, U. S. Secretary of the Treasury
(1913-19), was born in Georgia during the Civil War, his fa-
ther had lived in Clinton. After the war, the McAdoos re-
turned, and Clinton technically claims him today as its native
son.
In the 1840% the Gallahers came in from the East to buy
[34]
OF THOSE WHO LEFT
up 1500 acres of river bottom and gently rolling hill land
along Clinch River in the west portion of the Oak Ridge
area. The Gallahers became one of the outstanding families
in East Tennessee and through the years have supplied bish-
ops, judges, ministers, politicians and business men through-
out the United States. The Gallahers can trace their family
tree back to the moors of North Ireland and the House of
O'Gallcobair and then back into the Seventh Century when
old King Callack ruled Ireland.
The name of Gallaher is synonymous with the community
of Wheat, near where there arose during World War II one
of the largest industrial buildings in the world — the gaseous
diffusion plant for the production of uranium-235. This
building covers 44 acres and is nearly half a mile long.
On February 9, 1947, the late William Gallaher, one of the
early residents whose land was taken but who remained with
others to work on the "project," told a nation-wide radio au-
dience on the "We, the People" show emanating from Oak
Ridge:
"I was born in the house my grandfather built back in 1846
(when the United States and Mexico began war). This is
mighty pretty country around here — the Great Smoky Moun-
tains to the east and the Cumberland Mountains to the west.
Don't blame my grandfather a bit for settling here.
"All the folks in these parts were farmers. They worked the
ground and minded their own business, peaceful folks living
a simple life. Of course, when the Civil War came along, we
sent a few of our boys out to fight. And then in World War I
we did our share. But other than that, we didn't pay much
attention to the outside world and they didn't bother with us.
That was up to 1942, anyway, when one day a man came to
our house and said he was from the Government. 'We're
going to buy up your land,' he said to me. 'All of it?' I asked.
[35]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
'Yes, sir,' he said, 'we're going to buy all the land in this sec-
tion. Everyone has to go.'
"I went outside the house with the visitor and looked
around me ... up at the green hills my grandfather had
come across 100 years earlier, and I looked at the farm I'd
worked for half a century. I asked the visitor what the Govern-
ment was going to do and he said he didn't rightfully know,
but it was for winning the war. I had three sons in the Service
— two overseas — and I figured if giving up my home and my
land would help bring them home sooner, I'd be happy to
do it. . . ."
The hamlet of Wheat, named for its first postmaster, Frank
Wheat, was originally known as Bald Hill. It has furnished
illustrious leaders in many walks of life in Tennessee and else-
where. The names of Cross, Cox, Brittain, Jones, Christen-
berry, Rigsby, Arnold, Waller, Green, Hembree, Driskell,
McKinney, Young and Davidson and many others figure
prominently in the life and times of Tennessee.
A subscription, or "loud" school, so-called because of the
custom of reciting lessons aloud and in unison, was established
in the Wheat Community in 1876 by the Rev. John P. Dickey,
a Methodist minister. The school was held in an old log build-
ing and marked the beginning of a movement to provide
educational facilities for the section.
Two years after the founding of the "loud" school, Poplar
Creek Seminary was founded and headed by the Rev. W. H.
Crawford, Cumberland Presbyterian minister. Some time
later, Dr. C. W. Butler, Presbyterian pastor, who also was a
skilled physician and a Princeton graduate, was associated
with Mr. Crawford as a teacher in the Seminary. Courses were
similar to those offered by state high schools in later years.
In 1879, George Jones, a man of generous spirit, presented
the Seminary 200 acres of land encircling a four-acre plot
[36]
OF THOSE WHO LEFT
owned by the local Baptist Church. The deed contained the
unique stipulation that the Seminary Board of Trustees allow
all persons in whose homes a student or students stayed to
build on and enjoy full use of one-acre lots. If students no
longer lived in the home or if the householder committed an
act detrimental to the school, the resident was obliged to sell
his house to a qualified person. Many persons were attracted
to the Seminary through this building policy.
In 1 886, Poplar Creek Seminary was chartered by the State
of Tennessee as Roane College. Students were attracted from
over Tennessee and neighboring states to the four-year liberal
arts college which offered both Bachelor's and Master's de-
grees. Roane College virtually ended, however, in 1908 when
Wheat High School was established, but the Board of Trus-
tees continued in control of the property until 1916 when it
was transferred to the Roane County Board of Education.
After 34 years, the old Wheat High School, which replaced
Roane College, was demolished in 1950.
What was once Wheat and the site of a college is today in
the restricted portion of the Oak Ridge Area. Visitors gen-
erally are not allowed within these confines. There is, how-
ever, one exception. In the shadow of the massive gaseous
diffusion plant, a reunion is held each year at the George
Jones Memorial Church, which adjoins a cemetery in which
are buried some of the early settlers. The annual Homecom-
ing of former Wheat residents is probably the most unusual
gathering held in the United States. Those attending are
admitted through the barriers to the restricted area of the
atomic energy plants only through passes approved by the
United States Government. And near the scene of the festivi-
ties, armed guards patrol the roads and an eerie calm hangs
in the atmosphere.
Clinton, county seat of Anderson County, from which
[37]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Clinton Engineer Works derived its name, became a com-
munity in 1801. Shortly after the State's General Assembly
approved an act taking enough territory from Knox County
to form two new counties, Anderson, named for Joseph An-
derson, then a U. S. Senator from Tennessee, and Roane, a
commission composed of William Lea, Kinza Johnson, Wil-
liam Standifer, William Robertson, Joseph Greyson, Solomon
Massengale and Hugh Montgomery was appointed to select
a county seat for Anderson. The site chosen, it was named
Burrville, in honor of Aaron Burr. When Burr fell into dis-
repute, the General Assembly of 1809 changed the name to
Clinton in honor of DeWitt Clinton of New York.
In 1942, Anderson County had a population of 27,000;
today it is 60,000. Clinton, with a population of 2765 in 1942,
rose to 7,000 during the war years and now has a population
of 3800. Census Bureau figures reveal that the dollar volume
of retail sales in Anderson County increased 851 per cent
from 1939 to 1948, a total of $29,700,000 in 1948 compared
to $3,100,000 in 1939 — a direct result of the building of Oak
Ridge.
Scarboro, one of the three small communities in the Oak
Ridge area in 1942, was founded in the late 1700'$ by three
brothers from Virginia — Jonathan, David and James Scar-
boro. They were joined later by the Peters, Keith and Eng-
land families and Scarboro flourished as a farming community
until the fateful Fall of 1942.
Even the legend of gold pervades the Oak Ridge area. The
story persists that $20,000 in gold coin remains hidden to this
day in the vicinity of what is now Grove Center, one of the
principal business sections of the new Oak Ridge.
Shortly before the Civil War, Collins Roberts drifted down
from Connecticut, received a land grant of between 3,000 and
4,000 acres from the Government and began the development
[38]
OF THOSE WHO LEFT
of a community which came to be known as Robertsville.
There he built his home with the help of slaves. Just before
the War Between the States broke out, Roberts decided to
sell his slaves. In the transaction, he demanded gold, which
he received in pieces of ten and twenty dollars.
He had hoped to keep the transaction quiet but the news
spread that he had the money. He became so disturbed over
the possibility of theft that he hid it. He disclosed the hiding
place to no one. A short time later he died, carrying the secret
of the gold to his grave.
The gold has never been found, although many years ago
people came from all over the South, some with strange di-
vining rods, camping out on a wide expanse of land, to search
for the treasure. Where modern apartments now stand in
Oak Ridge, mercenary persons once burned barns and other
buildings searching for the treasure.
The treasure found at Oak Ridge was of another type.
U. S. Boom Town of the 1890*5
Harriman, largest town in Roane County with a popula-
tion of 7,000, once was America's Number One "boom town."
In the fabulous iSgo's, a group of prohibition advocates
led by General Clinton B. Fisk, who received half a million
votes for President in 1888 on a Prohibition Ticket, deter-
mined to create an industrial city free of liquor traffic, a city
in which a moral principle was to be successfully combined
with a profitable commercial venture. Between 1890 and
1893, great hordes of people from the United States were
attracted to the new city.
General Fisk and other Northern capitalists who formed
the East Tennessee Land Company in 1889 with a capital of
$3,000,000 envisioned an industrial city of half a million.
[39]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
The group bought 275,000 acres of coal lands, 250,000 acres
of farm and timber lands and leased or purchased all the
known iron ore beds in East Tennessee; they foresaw growth
of industry because of "rich iron beds" around the site, con-
tending that enough coal to supply what they thought would
be the largest steel center in the south was available in the
nearby mountains.
Harriman also was to be a textile center, they claimed,
chemical tests having proven that water from Emory River
was the softest and purest in the United States. And virgin
forests sufficient for operation of giant woodworking plants
were nearby.
The Land Company, in addition to General Fisk, had
among other officials W. C. Harriman, of Warner, N. H., son
of Gen. W. C. Harriman, former governor of New Hamp-
shire, for whom the town was named; I. K. Funk and A. W.
Wagnalls, of the publishing firm of Funk and Wagnalls;
Ferdinand Schumacher of Akron, Ohio; W. H. Russell, one-
time owner of the Boston Braves baseball team; John Hope-
well, Jr., and J. R. Leeson of Boston; A. A. Hopkins of Roch-
ester, N. Y.; James B. Hobbs, Chicago; Francis W. Breed,
Lynn, Mass.; William Silver-wood, Baltimore; E. M. Goodall,
Sanford, Maine, and Frederick Gates, New York.
Harriman was chartered in February 1 890. First land sales
began February 26, 1890, more than 5,000 men from 15 states
attending. Before turning the city over to corporate authori-
ties— the first city government was elected in June 1891, on a
prohibition platform — the East Tennessee Land Company
spent $50,000 building streets, an electric plant and water-
works, a school building and a meeting hall. By the end of
1891, there were 15 industries in Harriman. On January i,
1892, the population was 3,672 and there were 27 corporations
with a total capitalization of $7,335,000.
[40]
OF THOSE WHO LEFT
In 1893, the American University of Harriman was
founded, chartered on the principles of temperance and pro-
hibition. The co-educational college attracted students from
25 states. It soon passed into oblivion.
The Panic of 1893 ended the grandiose schemes for Harri-
man, envisioned as a Pittsburgh-on-the-Emory. The promot-
ers did not return. The large coal deposits have never been
worked out; the iron contains too much phosphorus for ex-
tensive use. One blast furnace still operates, however, in Rock-
wood, in Roane County. And a large hosiery mill, using the
pure water of Emory River, is still operating in Harriman
after 37 years.
[41]
CHAPTER IV
Of Those Who Came
WITH the establishment of the Manhattan District Au-
gust 13, 1942, a time limit of three years was set for the
development and use of atomic energy as a weapon of war.
This objective was off schedule by only two weeks, an in-
credible achievement. The accomplishment in construction
has been described as the equivalent of building a Panama
Canal each year for three consecutive years.
Simultaneously with the selection of the Tennessee site,
determination had been made to obtain uranium-235 for use
in an atomic weapon through two methods, the gaseous diffu-
sion and the electromagnetic processes. These plants were to
be at Oak Ridge. A third plant for obtaining 11-235, tne
thermal diffusion method, was authorized for Oak Ridge in
*944-
On December 2, 1942, in an experiment beneath the West
Stands of Staff Field at the University of Chicago, a small
group of scientists under the leadership of Dr. Enrico Fermi
and Dr. Arthur H. Compton witnessed the advent of a new
era as man first initiated a self-sustaining nuclear chain re-
action and controlled it. Through the medium of such a
chain reaction, production of plutonium, another element
for use in an atomic weapon, was possible on a large scale.
[42]
OF THOSE WHO CAME
Plutonium is a man-made element not occurring naturally
on earth.
The successful step resulted in a decision of the Manhattan
District to establish a plutonium pilot plant at Clinton En-
gineer Works. To carry out plutonium production on a
massive scale, 400,000 acres near Pasco in the State of Wash-
ington were selected for construction of plants. This became
known as the Hanford Engineer Works, now called the Han-
ford Works.
This installation cost $382,000,000 and was built and man-
aged during wartime by E. I. du Pont de Nemours and
Company. It is now operated by General Electric Company.
Early in 1943, the Manhattan Project established in New
Mexico its most secret installation — Los Alamos. The site of
45,000 acres is a pine-dotted mesa towering nearly 7500 feet
above sea level where young men once attended the exclusive
Los Alamos Ranch School 35 miles northwest of Santa Fe, the
state capital. This became headquarters for developing the
techniques and mechanisms of atomic bombs using uranium-
235 from Oak Ridge and plutonium from Hanford.1
1 The atomic energy undertaking begins with uranium ores and ends with
uranium-235 and plutonium, the fuels of atomic energy. Uranium first ac-
quired a commercial interest around the beginning of the Twentieth Century
when radium was discovered and put to use. Radium always is associated with
uranium, both coming from pitchblende, which is heavier than iron, about
as hard as steel and is grayish black, sometimes with a greenish cast.
Major fields of pitchblende are in Canada and the Belgian Congo. They are
the source of most high-grade uranium ores. Our own country has so far pro-
duced little high-grade uranium ores, although progress is being made in
processing low-grade uranium-bearing metals, of which carnotite ore found
in the Western United States is one.
Uranium ore is mined like any other element, gold, silver, copper, iron.
The ore is then processed through large rolling mills, where it is crushed and
refined. Reasonably pure uranium is then delivered to other plants within the
United States for further chemical processing as feed material for the units
[43]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
The course set, 1943 dawned over Tennessee amid a ca-
cophony of bulldozers, caterpillars and other earth-moving
equipment; the whirr and the whine of machines and saws
clearing the valleys and the ridges, the sounds of blasting and
the clicks of the time-pieces in clock-in alleys with the mount-
at Oak Ridge which produce uranium-235, an(* for those at Hanford, which
produce plutonium.
This feed material takes the form of a gaseous uranium compound (for the
Oak Ridge 0-235 production plants) and solid pieces of pure uranium of cer-
tain size (for the Hanford plutonium production plants and for other ura-
nium chain-reactors).
The amount of uranium-235 in natural uranium is very small — about one
part in 140. Even more serious than its scarcity is the difficulty of separating
it from the more abundant uranium-238, which makes up about 99.3 per cent
of the pure uranium. Both U-235 and 0-238 are atoms, or isotopes (from the
Greek "iso," same, and "tope," place) which go to make up the pure uranium;
that is, they do not differ chemically one from the other, but they do differ
very slightly in mass or weight. Of the two atoms, 0-235 and 0-238, only
0-235 is suitable, because of the rules of nature, as atomic energy fuel. 0-238
will not fission in the manner desired for a chain-reaction blast.
Three ways were developed at Oak Ridge in World War II to obtain the
rare 0-235 from the more abundant 0-238. These are physical and mechani-
cal separation methods — like separating cream from milk. The thermal dif-
fusion process used tremendous quantities of heat to bring about a separation
of 0-235 from 0-238. The electromagnetic separation process whirled uranium
atoms in large semi-circular arcs in a magnetic field. 0-235 atoms followed a
slightly different path from that followed by the heavier 0-238 atoms. 0-235
and 0-238 then were collected at different points at the end of the arc.
The third process, gaseous diffusion, has proven the most efficient and eco-
nomical and is now the major source of 0-235. In this process, a gas, uranium
hexafluoride, is circulated and re-circulated under great pressure through bar-
riers containing billions of holes much smaller than the point of a pin — each
one actually being only around two-millionths of an inch in diameter. As the
gas is pressured through thousands of successive stages into these invisible
holes, 0-235 g°es one waY» the heavier 0-238 another. At the end of the
"line," 0-235 is collected.
An entirely different method, a combination transmutation-chemical sepa-
ration process, was developed to obtain plutonium, the fissionable material
produced at Hanford. Plutonium is not simply extracted or separated from
the feed material, which are slugs of pure uranium metal. It is a new element
created by nuclear fission — a transmutation of one basic element (uranium)
[44]
OF THOSE WHO CAME
ing flow of construction workers who were to reach a peak of
47,000 in Oak Ridge in the Spring of 1944 shortly before
D-Day on the beaches of France. The peak operating force
was 40,000 in May 1945. The overall peak employment on the
project, construction, operating and other, was 82,000 in May
into another (plutonium), which is then chemically separated from the parent
uranium, since it is a different chemical element. The transmutation occurs
in huge reactors, or so-called atomic "furnaces." A substance far more pre-
cious and useful than gold is produced by this modern alchemy. Once pro-
duced, plutonium also has properties of fission, or breaking up, under certain
conditions, with release of great amounts of energy.
One type of a plutonium-producing reactor is a huge "pile," or solid mass,
of graphite pierced at intervals by tubes that run from one side of the pile
to the other. Uranium, in the form of slugs, is placed in these tubes in cer-
tain geometric designs. Nuclear fission then transmutes a small portion of the
uranium into plutonium.
Chain reactions occur in both chain reactors, or "piles," and in atomic ex-
plosions. In a "pile" operation, the reaction is controlled by skilled operators;
in an atomic explosion, the reaction is uncontrolled, and runs its course.
Both U-235 and plutonium, under certain man-made conditions, will fission
— that is, break up and actually lose part of their mass with release of great
amounts of energy in a chain reaction, such as in an atomic bomb. Fission is
a particular kind of disintegration of an atomic nucleus and an explosion can
be produced by bringing sufficiently large masses of fissionable material to-
gether rapidly. An atomic weapon is a device for doing this.
A chain reaction is any chemical or nuclear transmutation in which some
of the products of a particular change assist the continuation of that change.
In the atomic bomb, or the power-producing uranium "pile," fission is caused
by the capture of a neutron by a uranium atom. Then, when fission occurs,
more neutrons are released, which in turn produce fission in additional ura-
nium atoms, and so on. Thus a chain reaction. A neutron is a particle with
no electric charge. Because of that, neutrons can move rather freely through
solid matter.
Atomic energy itself differs radically from ordinary types of energy since
it involves a fundamental change in the atom's nature. In this change, some
matter is converted into energy. In burning coal, for example, carbon, hydro-
gen and oxygen atoms are regrouped into new molecules forming new sub-
stances. The atoms remain unchanged — they are still carbon, hydrogen and
oxygen. They do not lose mass of any consequence.
In releasing atomic energy, however, through splitting or breaking up of
the atom, the atom changes identity completely. It loses part of its mass, which
[45]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
1945. A total of 110,000 construction workers were hired
from 1942 through 1945 to build the town and plants; around
400,000 construction workers were interviewed with only one
out of three being employed.
Those who came in a steady stream in 1943 as the pace of
building mounted worked amid scenes having all the frontier
trappings of a Western movie. The slow-paced voices of
Southerners mingled with the twang of the Midwesterner, the
sharp, direct speech of the Easterner and the deliberate, color-
is converted into energy. The energy liberated is in proportion to the amount
of atomic mass destroyed.
Elements, the basic substance of the universe, make up all matter. Each
element is made up of atoms which are alike in chemical behavior but may
have different weights. Furthermore, the atoms of each element are structur-
ally different from atoms of other elements. Virtually all of the 98 elements
discovered by mankind to date contain some types of atoms which undergo
spontaneous "atomic explosions," but all such "explosions" in atoms of ele-
ments below uranium, element 92, are very minute when compared to ura-
nium-235 or plutonium as they undergo fission, or break up.
The difference is one of degree, in that some of the atoms of the common
elements break up so slowly over so many thousands and millions of years
that the energy released is practically negligible. It is this slow, almost con-
stant, rate of breaking up of all the elements in nature, plus the cosmic radia-
tion from the sun, which is commonly referred to as background radiation
(that radiation found to be normally present in any given geographical loca-
tion). Background radiation in any location is dependent on the kinds and
abundance of the elements present in that location. Mankind is constantly
being bathed in background radiation; it is part of our daily lives.
Why, one may ask, cannot fission of major proportions as that occurring
in uranium-235 or plutonium be accomplished with atoms of ordinary stable
elements — tin, zinc, aluminum, sodium, copper, iron?
The answer, simply stated, is that the "excitement" or "energy level" within
the atoms of common elements is too low. When uranium-235 or plutonium
soaks up a neutron, a very high degree of "excitement," or energy level, is
reached. To relieve this excitement, a major change in the atom occurs, such
as the splitting into two more or less equal parts and the release of a great
deal of energy. When atoms of the more common elements take in a neutron,
the same high degree of excitement is not reached, and the energy is released
in a less spectacular and much more deliberate manner. In other words, the
nuclei of fissionable materials must have a great amount of excess energy.
[46]
OF THOSE WHO CAME
ful talk of the Westerner. License plates of the thousands of
automobiles (25,000 daily at one time) which poured into the
project and ofttimes ran virtually bumper to bumper during
the mornings and the afternoons between the project and
Knoxville, Clinton, Lenoir City, Maryville, Harriman, Oliver
Springs, Rockwood, Lake City, Kingston and other nearby
communities, were from every state in the Union.
A cosmopolitan city which was to be 7 miles long and from
1 1/2 to 2 miles wide, approximately 9,000 acres or 14 square
miles, began to take roots in the northeast corner of the area;
in once isolated valleys, foundations for great new structures
were beginning to take form.
The original builders and workers were drawn from every
stratum of American life. From Pittsburgh came the iron and
steel workers; from Grand Rapids the woodworkers; from
Detroit the machinists; from the TVA the electrical experts.
Truckers, riveters, crane operators, carpenters and other
craftsmen, and clerks, stenographers, auditors, accountants
and general help came from everywhere. The little and the
big — the laborer to the scientist — worked in a common
cause.
Their sacrifices, their perseverance, their will to get a job
done rivalled the resoluteness and strength of the pioneers
who had come into the same valleys 150 years before. The
newcomers, 65 per cent of them from the states comprising
the great Tennessee Valley and adjoining states in the South,
came for the purpose of building a city with a purpose, al-
though at the time they knew not why.
Simultaneously with the surge of people into the new area,
stores, shops and various other commercial enterprises moved
into hastily-assembled structures — awaiting the building of
more permanent facilities — to serve the needs of the new-
comers; prominent in the vanguard was the famous Fuller
[47]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Brush "man," his wares prominently displayed, with an ap-
propriate sign, in front of a "hut" in the midst of the thriving
new business section.
Those who came learned to live in deep mystery, isolating
themselves along with the project, all the while hoping they
were making some tangible contribution to the war effort.
They, too, were following an uncharted path. Many felt as
the old Negro, who, showing his identification badge as a
laborer, requested a bus driver to "please, suh, look at my
badge and tell me where I want to go."
All in all, they came for patriotism. Between January 1 943
and June 1945, 5500 persons in various occupations were de-
ferred from the Armed Forces for work with the Manhattan
District, at Oak Ridge and elsewhere. And the tough Ameri-
cans, those who build the skylines of America, came because
they like to beat tough assignments. Oak Ridge enticed them
all.
Site preparation for the community began in October 1942
immediately after Stone & Webster construction personnel
reached the site. The first structure begun was the main ad-
ministration building of the Manhattan District which was
started November 22, 1942, and completed March 15, 1943,
enabling key persons of the District to move from New York.
Meanwhile, in Washington, War Production Board officials
became familiar with the strange words "Manhattan District."
Throughout the building of Oak Ridge and other atomic
facilities, the WPB gave valuable assistance in obtaining vital
supplies and equipment for a project about which they knew
little.
The first phase of Oak Ridge community planning evolved
early in 1943 for a town of around 13,000 residents. The
second phase, initiated in the Fall of 1943, provided for a
population of around 42,000 and the third phase, initiated
[48]
OF THOSE WHO CAME
in the Spring of 1945, provided for a population of 66,000.
Even this latter estimate proved too low; the peak popula-
tion of the Oak Ridge Area in September 1945 was 75,000
(the fifth largest city in Tennessee, exceeded only by Mem-
phis, Nashville, Knoxville and Chattanooga), occupying 10,-
ooo family dwelling units, 13,000 dormitory spaces, 5,000
trailers and more than 16,000 hutment and barracks accom-
modations. In the 1950 Census, Oak Ridge had a population
of 30,205, maintaining its place as Tennessee's fifth largest
city.
During one period of the construction of the family dwell-
ings known as Cemestos, units were turned over to the Gov-
ernment by the contractors at the average rate of one every
thirty minutes — fully equipped with refrigerators, stoves,
heating equipment and all the facilities necessary for imme-
diate use.
The first of the Cemesto, or semi-permanent-type houses,
built under supervision of Stone & Webster, were constructed
south of Tennessee Avenue — six months before only a field
dotted with pines — in what was designated the Elm Grove
Community. All the foundations in a given area were laid at
once, the chimneys coming next — the red brick looking like
strange trees — and then the Cemesto siding was slipped into
place.
In July, prefabricated wooden huts were ready for occu-
pancy by construction workers and trailers were obtained
from the Federal Public Housing Authority and wheeled
into place at Middletown. Looking across from the Man-
hattan District's main administration building at night in
July, few patches of light designating houses could be seen.
But week by week, they spread on and on and Black Oak
Ridge sparkled like so many stars.
By August, plans for the project were revised upward.
[49]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
More housing units were needed for the construction forces
which were simultaneously working on the huge plants four,
10 and 12 miles away and for the increasing number of op-
erating and technical personnel who were beginning to move
in. To save time and labor, prefabricated houses were brought
in by trucks, clogging the highways for months. Panelized
duplex houses constructed at other war plants were knocked
down, shipped to the area and reassembled. Two and four-
family units and 1 2-family apartments were built. More Gov-
ernment trailers were obtained and accommodations pro-
vided for privately-owned trailers. Along with the housing,
schools, stores, recreation and general facilities were enlarged
accordingly.
The first family moved into its trailer home in Middletown
on July 13, and on July 27, 1943, the first Cemesto house was
occupied on Thornton Road, off Tennessee Avenue. In the
same month, Col. Robert C. Blair, then in charge of Clinton
Engineer Works, asked for suggestions from employees for a
name for the new community. Oak Ridge was chosen because
the site on which the town was being built was known as
Black Oak Ridge and its rural connotation held outside curi-
osity to a minimum.
Earlier, in January of 1943, ground had been broken for
the first fire headquarters, for the first dormitory, and for
recreation buildings. On February i , construction of the great
electromagnetic plant was begun. On the same day, grading
was begun at the site for Clinton Laboratories, site of the first
uranium chain-reactor which was to supply the initial signifi-
cant amounts of plutonium for research leading to the build-
ing of the great Hanford plants. Rigid control over project
entry was established April i, 1943, when armed guards were
placed at "gates" at Elza, Edgemoor, Blair, Solway and other
road points. Wire fencing began to appear at strategic places
[50]
OF THOSE WHO CAME
and mounted patrolmen began to watch the stretches of
Clinch River which meanders 35 miles around the project
site.
The family of Capt. Philip Anderson of Little Rock, Ar-
kansas, an officer assigned to the Manhattan District, was the
first to move into a semi-permanent-type home in Oak Ridge.
Like thousands of other families who came later, the Ander-
sons underwent experiences seldom seen since the Gold Rush.
"It was raining the day we moved in," Mrs. Anderson re-
calls, "and the truck with the furniture got stuck in the mud.
When we finally struggled into the house, the painters were
still in the kitchen. There were no phones in the houses at
that time and when they had trouble with the electricity they
had no way of letting you know. I'd be in the middle of get-
ting dinner ready for company, when the lights and the stove
would go off, twice when I was washing my hair the water
went off. . . . We weren't born soon enough for the Gold
Rush, but we made up for it at Oak Ridge."
The new city's first drug store opened August i, the first
grocery store made its first sale August 4 and the Guest House,
the local hotel, welcomed its first guest August 5. This
wooden structure was to serve as a stop-over for many of the
world's leading scientists and executives — among them Dr. J.
Robert Oppenheimer, Dr. Ernest O. Lawrence, Dr. Harold
Urey, Dr. G. T. Seaborg, Dr. Enrico Fermi, Dr. J. B. Co-
nant, Dr. George T. Felbeck, H. D. Kinsey, Crawford H.
Greenewalt, James A. Rafferty, T. J. Hargrave, James C.
White, P. S. Wilcox, P. C. Keith, Jr., Dr. Eugene Wigner, Dr.
Vannevar Bush, Dr. Charles A. Thomas, Dr. W. H. Zinn,
Dr. Arthur H. Compton and the Englishman, Dr. M. L.
Oliphant — all moving like shadows through the mysterious
recesses of the plants, unrecognized by the thousands who
were building what they, the scientists, had planned. For
[51]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
security reasons the scientists went under assumed names —
Dr. Fermi, for example, was "Farmer," Dr. Compton "Co-
mus" and Lawrence "Lawson."
The first movie "In Which We Serve" was shown in the
Center Theatre August 31, fifteen days after the U. S. Post
Office was opened by the first postmaster, George E. Bowling,
and the first letter was dispatched bearing the Oak Ridge
cancellation stamp.
"We opened the first grocery and made our first sale even
before the construction crew got the doors up," Horace
Sherrod, the manager, states. "I started filling my shelves in
1943 and didn't manage to get them completely filled until
1946. When I asked the big shippers to send me food, they'd
say 'We never heard of Oak Ridge, it can't be a priority city.'
A carload of merchandise I ordered hadn't arrived in four
weeks and I inquired about it. The shipper wrote back and
said nobody could tell him where Oak Ridge was; he said he
didn't believe there was such a place. A flour salesman lost
hundreds of dollars in commissions because his company
couldn't locate Oak Ridge after the orders arrived, and they
refused to ship."
In the Summer of 1943, Oak Ridgers began looking for
recreation. The residents needed some place to shake the mud
off their feet and the grime off their hands. With the comple-
tion of the first cafeteria, this was utilized for dances under
the direction of the Oak Ridge Recreation and Welfare Asso-
ciation, which was activated July 2 1 and which eventually had
230 full-time employees supervising social, welfare and recrea-
tional activities encompassing a "teen-age" center, athletics,
library services, folk dancing, music, art, drama, handicraft,
outdoor dancing and other diversified undertakings. The
association was dissolved in 1947. ,*•
The first issue of a small four-page mimeographed publica-
[52]
OF THOSE WHO CAME
tion known as the Oak Ridge Journal (it eventually grew to a
regular size newspaper of 12 pages under the editorship of
Mrs. Frances Smith Gates, a graduate of Mt. Holyoke College,
assisted by Richard B. Gehman, Dixon Johnson and Thomas
F. X. McCarthy), came to the attention of residents Septem-
ber 4 with Army Warrant Officer Murray Levine of Brooklyn
as editor. He was succeeded a short time later by Carl Jealous.
The Journal's second issue called for the organization of clubs
and associations. The reception was enthusiastic. By the Sum-
mer of 1945, Oak Ridge had more than 100 organized groups
ranging from a Rabbit Breeders Association to a Folk Dancing
Group to a Civic Music Association. The first civic organiza-
tion in Oak Ridge, the Junior Chamber of Commerce, was
formed in May, 1945; the Rotary Club was second, being
organized in December, 1945. The Lions, Kiwanis and Ex-
change Clubs followed. The Masons, Elks, Eagles and Moose
and other groups developed Oak Ridge organizations at in-
tervals.
On September 12, the Interdenominational Young People's
Fellowship Union staged a campfire sing at a pond close by
the new community. A Civil Air Patrol was organized Sep-
tember 14 and plans were well underway for a full-fledged
Red Cross chapter. Army enlisted men and members of the
Woman's Army Corps began arriving. On September 18, Boy
Scouts were signing up for organizations of Troops and a
Little Theatre was formed. Bowlers organized an association
on September 30 with 86 men's and 27 women's teams.
On September 23, the Army announced a contract with an
organization which was to become a close part of the daily life
of every Oak Ridge resident — the Roane-Anderson Company,
the housekeeper for the Atomic City (Chapter VII).
The frontier atmosphere of Oak Ridge's early days is re-
flected in a letter to the residents from the first Town Mana-
[53]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
ger, Capt. P. E. O'Meara of the Manhattan District, appear-
ing in the mimeographed Oak Ridge Journal September 25,
1943. The letter said:
"Yes, we know it's muddy. . . . You think prices are too
high in the grocery store. . . . Coal has not been delivered.
... It takes six days to get your laundry. . . . The grocer
runs out of butter and milk. . . . Your laundry gets lost. . . .
The post office is too small. . . . There are not enough bowl-
ing alleys. . . . Your house leaks. . . . Everyone is not cour-
teous. ... It takes too long to get your passes. . . . The
water was cold. . . . The beer ran out. . . .
"The telephones are always busy. . . . You can't get all the
meat you want. . . . Your house isn't ready. . . . There's
confusion in the cafeteria. . . . The dance hall is crowded.
. . . There's no soda fountain. . . . The guest house is full.
. . . Employees are inexperienced. . . . You don't like the
way things are run. . . . You could do better. . . . Someone
said someone asked someone who told them someone said
they knew something, and you don't like it. ... Your win-
dows aren't clean in your house. . . . You have seen the
movie. . . . Your floors aren't waxed. . . . The butcher
didn't wait on you in turn. . . . You want more sugar. . . v
The roads are dusty. . . . Your shirts come back without
buttons. . . . Things were different 'back home' .... You
would have planned it differently. . . .
"What you want to know is ... WHAT'S BEING DONE
ABOUT IT?
"Well . . . Roads WILL be paved. . . . The grocer is ob-
ligated to not charge prices in excess of those in Knoxville.
. . . Coal WILL be delivered. . . . Sidewalks WILL be laid.
... A third shift will be started in the laundry as soon as we
can get help. . . . Milk WILL be imported, maybe butter. . . .
The townsite WILL be restricted. . . . An officer is in Wash-
[54]
OF THOSE WHO CAME
ington now arranging for the change from a fourth to second
rate post office. . . . More bowling alleys WILL be built. . . .
Workmen WILL come by and ask where your house leaks.
"Town Management personnel has been instructed that
YOU are always right. . . . Personnel estimates increased faster
than dorms could be built, more WILL be built. . . . They
ran out of beer in Knoxville and 'back home' the same night
it ran out here. . . . More telephones are coming. . . . Meat
is rationed. . . . 3,000 people cannot be fed in two hours and
not have confusion.
"Every effort is being made to get your houses ready. . . .
Construction must go on, even when you are asleep. . . .
More dance space WILL be made available. . . . The guest
house will be full for months. . . . Soda fountain equipment
is almost unobtainable, but we WILL have one. . . .
"Some employees will ALWAYS be inefficient. . . . Someone
will always be saying someone asked someone who told them
someone said they knew something, that DOESN'T make it a
fact. . . .
"We WILL get more first run movies. ... A plan is ready to
furnish clothes line posts and tools and you put them up. . . .
The butcher didn't mean to pass you up. . . . The barbers
are busy back home during rush hours. . . . Sugar is rationed.
. . . Your shirts will continue to come back without buttons;
we would put them on if we had help enough. ... A shoe
repair shop WILL be opened soon. . . .
"Your dormitory WOULDN'T be noisy if everyone were as
considerate as he would like his neighbor to be. ... Were
you ever ANYWHERE that you liked everyone. . . . Things
WEREN'T different back home. . . . Everything can't be done
at once, because we need more help. We would have planned
it differently too if we had thought of it in '33."
Early in October, 1943, Oak Ridge's first school sessions,
[55]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
where the engineer's boy from Nebraska sat next to the ac-
countant's son from Brooklyn, got underway.
The Oak Ridge Hospital was completed later in the month,
with formal opening November 17, 1943. The first staff mem-
bers under the supervision of Dr. Charles Rea, a Minnesotan
and a Colonel in the Army Medical Corps, had arrived in
July. The hospital was under the direction of Col. Stafford L.
Warren, chief of the Medical Division of the Manhattan Dis-
trict, with Lt. Col. H. L. Friedell as Executive Officer. Colonel
Rea was director of clinical services.
With construction on all sides, the dust created a major
problem in hospital operations and the job of keeping oper-
ating room instruments sterile was a major difficulty. Between
July and October, while the hospital was nearing completion,
the hospital staff conducted what was almost a mobile hospital
unit, setting up clinics and giving typhoid and smallpox
inoculations in the cafeterias. A key figure at the hospital was
a psychiatrist, for the mental health of the worker was of
prime concern. The long, critical hours, the elaborate secu-
rity and safety rules, the unreality and the need to produce
at top efficiency and speed brought about pressure of great
magnitude.
In November 1943, the hospital's bed capacity was 50; by
the summer of 1945, it had grown to 337; today 260 beds are
utilized. The hospital, now operated by a nonprofit corpora-
tion composed of seven representative Oak Ridge citizens, is a
member of the American Hospital Association and is ap-
proved by the American College of Surgeons and the Ameri-
can Medical Association for intern training. A completely
equipped dental clinic is nearby.
House-to-house milk delivery also began in October, 1943.
Housewives with children were the first to get delivery. Con-
densed milk, recombined with water, augmented the local
[56]
t' iff &£*,
I
1
03
6
OF THOSE WHO CAME
supply and milk sheds as far away as Wisconsin were con-
tacted for supplies. Even then, there was no laboratory ex-
amination of milk sold on the area — most of it came in bulk
in large cans — until January 1944, when the Department of
Public Health was set up. During the building of Oak Ridge
and in peacetime, the community has established an enviable
health record. There has never been a serious outbreak of any
disease or an epidemic in Oak Ridge.
October also saw the establishment of Oak Ridge's first
banking facility, an extension of the Hamilton National Bank
of Knoxville. On November 18, 1942, the first telephone was
installed on the project by Southern Bell; in 1945, the total
was almost 10,000. Today, approximately 14,000 telephones
serve Oak Ridge.
The women who came to Oak Ridge with their husbands
to help share the pioneering in a new land were distressed
over what they found. Security demanded silence and silence
was golden in Oak Ridge. The wives were upset when they
first saw the drab countryside of Oak Ridge. But they learned
to take it in stride. This transition was aptly described by a
young stenographer, a dormitory resident: "You either catch
on here fast, or you don't catch on at all."
Even fun had an awkward time. Young girls, immaculately
dressed for dances, often removed a mud-caked pair of hip
boots at the door, stacked them in racks in the hall with
others and then slipped on their dancing shoes. Furthermore,
it was considered proper to remove one's shoes before enter-
ing a house.
As related by Mrs. Stafford Warren, a columnist for the
Oak Ridge Journal, housewives confined their conversations
to lighter topics and were discreet in inquiring as to their
husbands' destinations on trips. They got used to a "left-out"
feeling. For the wives, 1943 through a part of 1945 was a two-
[57]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
and-a-half-year period of a concentration of curiosity. In the
"outside" world, relatives and friends also had their doubts
about Oak Ridge.
"It's all right, son," one mother wrote, "if you can't tell me
what you're doing in Oak Ridge, but I do hope it's honor-
able." A friend in another city wrote to a housewife: "For a
bright young engineer, your husband certainly knows less
about what he is doing than I would have expected" and a
relative in Chicago put it this way: "If you and John don't
care to correspond with your old aunt any longer, just let me
know."
On the other hand, those on the outside couldn't properly
sympathize with Oak Ridgers on the agony of shopping for
food in the early days because the new resident couldn't ex-
plain that one grocery store was attempting to serve 10,000
persons, nor could they appreciate why church members were
not chagrined at the sign over an Oak Ridge movie theatre
entrance: "NOW SHOWING: METHODIST CHURCH." The church
was happy to have the accommodations.
One scientist worked out his own technique for avoiding
discussions with his wife on the nature of his work. He said to
her: "I'll give you a choice. I'll tell you exactly what I'm do-
ing, but then you can't breathe a word of it to a soul. Or I'll
continue to keep you in the dark and you can make up all the
stories you want to tell your friends." She thought it over, and
being a woman, took the choice of not knowing and being
able to speculate.
During the hectic period when Oak Ridge was born, tem-
pers flared and tensions mounted in the wake of the thousands
upon thousands of persons who swelled the populations of
Knoxville and adjoining communities during rationing and
tightening of the belts. Quarrels developed between the na-
tives and the newcomers. The Knox County Court — made
[58]
OF THOSE WHO CAME
up of "squires" — adopted, 22 to 3, a resolution seeking a Con-
gressional investigation of reports that some Clinton Engineer
Works' employees were paid for work they did not perform.
The action was dropped but it was a reflection of the times.
The confusion was contagious. One workman, on the job
only five days, insisted to his superior that he wanted to "ter-
minate." The superior asked why he was dissatisfied.
"Well," the worker said, "it's that paper they wanted us to
sign, sign up for the 'fire squad.' I'm willing to do all I can
here but I don't like killing Americans. I don't want to have
to fire on anybody in Oak Ridge." He was in the same mental
state as the Negro who called the Oak Ridge Hospital: "Please
send an ambulance to the colored huts; this man's havin' a
confusion" and the Mounted Patrolman who aimed at a
skunk and shot a perfectly good Government-owned horse
through the head.
At 5 A.M. on the morning of November 4, 1943, a historic
first step in Oak Ridge operations was taken. At that time, the
first uranium chain-reactor in the world with a production po-
tential was placed in operation, the famous atomic "furnace"
at Clinton Laboratories, to be known later in peacetime as
the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The "pile" had been
completed in eight and one-half months by E. I. du Pont
de Nemours and Co. and turned over on October 16 to the
Metallurgical Laboratory of the University of Chicago, which
originally operated the completed plant under the leadership
of Dr. A. H. Compton.
Meanwhile, construction of the main process building for
the gaseous diffusion U-235 plant was started September 10
by the J. A. Jones Construction Company of Charlotte, N. C.
Oak Ridge's first Christmas in 1943 was a painful one for
most families. They were away from relatives and old ties and
Security did not encourage visitors. Work went on apace, for
[59]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
the loss of only one day in construction meant a one-day delay
sometime in the future in the use of mankind's newest
weapon. And the children did not ask Santa Glaus to bring
the usual toys. They were interested in what they lived
around — bulldozers, dump trucks, caterpillars, wheelbarrows
and cranes.
Oak Ridge was a city of boardwalks, badges and some boot-
leggers but never boredom. There was a touch of the Klon-
dike, the fervor of a boom. Friends one hadn't seen in years
would suddenly appear and as suddenly disappear. Scientists
and mountaineers worked side by side, but the only people
really at home were engineers who had experienced construc-
tion before.
Early in 1944, Stone and Webster completed the first opera-
tions building in the production area known as ¥-12 and on
January 27 a select group of Manhattan District personnel
and officials of Stone and Webster and the Tennessee East-
man Corporation, a subsidiary of Eastman Kodak and plant
operator, witnessed the epochal first "run" of uranium-235
on a mass basis by the electromagnetic method. The run was
marred by discovery of foreign matter in certain pipes which
had to be immaculately clean for successful operations, but
the ingenuity of engineers and technical personnel quickly
solved the problem and in February, first full-time produc-
tion was under way. The uncharted path was beginning to
clear.
Few Oak Ridgers were aware of an event transpiring in
1943 which was to affect each and every resident.
Early that year, the Tennessee Legislature, alarmed by the
growing number of Federal projects in the State and the sub-
sequent loss of state lands and taxes from such lands, declined
to cede sovereignty to the Federal government over the land
taken over by the War Department for the Oak Ridge project.
[GO]
OF THOSE WHO CAME
Prentice Cooper of Shelbyville was Governor of Tennessee at
the time.
Thus, Oak Ridge is not a Federal Reservation, merely a
Federal area, and the people who lived there during the war
years and who live there now were and are beholden to the
Criminal and Civil laws of the counties of Roane and Ander-
son and the State of Tennessee. Until the community becomes
an incorporated municipality of the state, laws will be en-
forced by Oak Ridge policemen deputized by the sheriff of
Anderson County.
As residents, however, of an area in which state laws pre-
vail, the citizens, after residence in Tennessee of a year, can
vote in state and county elections. The decision of the Legis-
lature in 1943 not to cede sovereignty eventually brought a
healthier condition.
When peace came and Oak Ridge started on the road to
normalcy, the transition in becoming a more integral part of
Tennessee's civic, business, political and community life was
facilitated.
Cost and Layout of Oak Ridge
The cost of building the town of Oak Ridge alone was $96,-
000,000.
Its construction as a service to the atomic energy plants was
accomplished by Stone and Webster Engineering Corpora-
tion to provide living quarters for personnel necessary for
plant operations.
Also assigned the construction of the huge electromagnetic
facility, Stone and Webster turned over the town planning
and housing phase to the architect-engineer firm of Skidmore,
Owings and Merrill of Chicago, which prepared building
plans and town layout. The John B. Pierce Foundation of
[6,]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Raritan, New Jersey, developed the designs for semi-perma-
nent housing units.
Stone and Webster was responsible, however, for coordina-
tion of all work, procurement of materials, supervision of sub-
contractors building the homes, and construction of roads
and utilities. Principal sub-contractors in building the town
were John A. Johnson & Sons, Inc., New York; Clinton
Home Builders, Charlotte, N. C.; O'Driscoll and Grove, Inc.,
New York; Harrison Construction Co., Pittsburgh and Mary-
vine, Tenn.; Foster and Creighton Co., Nashville; A. Farnell
Blair, Decatur, Ga., and Rock City Construction Co., Nash-
ville.
The layout of the nearly 200 miles of streets for the city
was controlled mainly by the contours or grades of the area.
Thus there are no "blocks" or "squares" as in other cities.
Several main roadways run east and west. Oak Ridge Turn-
pike was once the southern limits but new neighborhoods
have now been developed south of the Turnpike. Tennessee
Avenue runs through the main section of the town. Continua-
tions to the west of Tennessee Avenue are Pennsylvania,
Hillside Road and Robertsville Road. Outer Drive runs near
the top of the ridge.
Main "Avenues," which generally run north and south or
up and down hill, connect these three main east and west
roadways.
Roads, Lanes and Places branch off the Avenues. These
branches are called "Roads" when they form connections be-
tween other roadways; "Circles" when they form short loops
which return to the same road from which they started, and
"Lanes" or "Places" when they have dead ends.
Except for the main east and west connecting roads, all
Avenues of the town as originally laid out have names with
first letters progressing alphabetically from east to west. For
OF THOSE WHO CAME
example, "Alabama" and "Austin" on the east, "Georgia" to
"Kentucky" near the center, and "Vermont" and "Victoria"
toward the west. Later expansion of the town, west of Penn-
sylvania Avenue, started with the street names beginning with
"H," "I" and "J," and continued alphabetically to the west
with other letters not used in the original half of town.
Similarly, the names of "Roads," "Lanes" and "Circles"
progress alphabetically from south to north or east to west,
but with the same first letter as in the name of the "Ave-
nue" from which they start. Thus all Roads and Lanes lead-
ing from Florida Avenue begin with "F," while all which
lead from Outer Drive begin with "O."
Highest point above sea level in Oak Ridge is 1204 feet on
Outer Drive; lowest is 775 feet along Clinch River, which
serves as an area boundary.
The average mean temperature in the Oak Ridge Area
over a period of the past 78 years has been approximately 60
degrees.
Schools, Churches and Babies
First school sessions in Oak Ridge began October 4, 1943,
with an enrollment of 830 under the direction of Dr. A. H.
Blankenship of Columbia University, superintendent, who
arrived in July 1943 to build a school system which was to
accommodate pupils from every state in the Union and from
every conceivable background and which later was to be
chosen one of the 40 most modern school systems in the na-
tion. High point in Oak Ridge school enrollment was 8,223
on October 5, 1945; present day enrollment approximates
6,300. Dr. Blankenship left Oak Ridge in 1946 and was suc-
ceeded by Dr. R. H. Ostrander January i, 1947.
First baccalaureate service in Oak Ridge school history
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
was held June 18, 1944, in the high school auditorium. In-
vocation and benediction were given by the Rev. W. A. Rule
of the Baptist Church; the sermon was delivered by Father
Joseph H. Seiner of the Catholic Church. On June 20, the
first senior class was graduated from the high school. Dr.
Blankenship presented the diplomas. The invocation was
given by the Rev. B. M. Larson. Carolyn Lakin and Stafford
Warren tied for first honors; second honors went to Barbara
Lee Wensel.
There were 1 6 churches in the Oak Ridge Area when it was
selected for building of atomic energy plants in 1942. Of
these, five were in the section where the town was built and
they were used by new congregations made up of the families
of men who came to build and operate the town and plants.
Church bells were removed from those remote from the resi-
dential section and installed in fire headquarters throughout
the area.
Two new churches, Chapel-on-the-Hill in the central part
of the city and another in East Village, East Chapel, were
built by the Army. Two of the structures already in the
Townsite area in 1942, West Chapel and Iroquois Chapel,
were set aside for services but later it was necessary to utilize
the high school auditorium, the grade schools, recreation halls
and theatres for the 29 different church groups which even-
tually were established at Oak Ridge.
The first formal church services were conducted in Oak
Ridge July 25, 1943, in the Central Cafeteria by the Rev.
B. M. Larson, a Presbyterian, of Knoxville at the request of a
United Church group totaling 154. Father Joseph H. Seiner
said the first Catholic Mass in Central Recreation Hall Au-
gust 22, 1943, with 85 attending. As the population of Oak
Ridge increased, other denominations organized and by the
OF THOSE WHO CAME
time Chapel-on-the-Hill was dedicated October 19, 1943, the
Baptist, Episcopal, Methodist, Jewish and other congregations
were prepared to conduct services.
In the present-day Oak Ridge, church groups are building
their own churches on land purchased from the Government.
The first child born in the Oak Ridge Hospital was Robert
William O'Neal, son of Mr. and Mrs. James O'Neal, at 8:34
o'clock on the night of November 11, 1943, six days before
the hospital was formally opened. Since that time, more than
6,700 children have been born in the hospital.
Birth rates per 1000 population in Oak Ridge generally ex-
ceed Tennessee and U. S. rates. In 1948, for example, Oak
Ridge rates were 27.4 per 1000 population; Tennessee was
26.4 and the U. S. 24.2.
Death rates per 1000 population in Oak Ridge for 1948
were 2.7 as compared to 9.4 for Tennessee and a slightly
higher figure for the U. S.
CHAPTER V
They Couldn't Say a Word
late John Sharp Williams, United States Senator
X from Mississippi, once appeared on the same platform
with a tiresome opponent, who, when he made his speech,
filled it with such expressions as "Dame Rumor says that Sen-
ator Williams, etc.," and "Dame Rumor hath it that Senator
Williams, etc." On completion of his opponent's address, Sen-
ator Williams would arise and say "Dame Rumor lies" and
then sit down.
Those in charge of building Oak Ridge found Dame Ru-
mor operating at peak efficiency in 1943, 1944 and part of
1945. So irritating and at times threatening to the completion
of certain operations did the rumors and gossip become that
in 1944 the Manhattan District ordered a full-dress publicity
campaign to arouse the South to the danger of loose refer-
ences to operations at Clinton Engineer Works.
The campaign was directed at such remarks as:
"Thousands of kegs of nails are stacked up, run over by
caterpillar tractors and covered up with bulldozers";
"Buildings erected according to blueprints, complete with
expensive plumbing fixtures have been faced the wrong way,
then saturated with gasoline and burned to the ground so as
to hide the mistake from the general public";
[66]
THEY COULDN T SAY A WORD
"Wire sufficient to put a 1 5-foot fence around the City of
Knoxville, but never unrolled, has been dumped into ditches
and covered over";
"Hinges costing $70 per door are put in many buildings;
similar practices in construction are followed";
"Millions of feet of first-class lumber have been saturated
with kerosene and gasoline and burned up"; and
"A Social Security project of unparalleled waste not neces-
sary to the war effort is being constructed."
The last charge was particularly obnoxious to the few
who knew the project's objective since President Roosevelt
had approved in the Summer of 1942 a $2,000,000,000 gam-
ble on the word of several eminent scientists that they be-
lieved atomic energy could be developed on a large scale for
use as a weapon of war. But among the rumors which contin-
ued to envelop the project were such as these:
"It's a Roosevelt boondoggle merely to have men at work,"
and
"It will be a home and a place for returning service men
to live and work."
One observer has remarked that the only mystery to native
Tennesseans was not the project itself but the mystery of why
it was a mystery. He concluded that because they could see
nothing tangible coming out of the smokeless, mysterious
plants, even after operations had begun, they formed their
judgments on a few fragmentary details. "They couldn't un-
derstand," he said, "why their Government just didn't an-
nounce in the beginning what it was trying to do and then
proceed to do it, without all the fuss of secrecy."
But in a special memorandum from the White House in
the Fall of 1942, President Roosevelt told General Leslie R.
Groves, the Commanding General of the Manhattan Project,
that "secrecy and security" were to be paramount. To carry
[67]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
out that mandate, there was set up in the Manhattan District
an Intelligence and Security Division which was later de-
scribed as "having successfully accomplished the outstanding
security mission of the war."
This group which clothed and guarded with extraordinary
care the objective of the project was comprised of chemical,
mechanical, civil, electrical and fire protection engineers,
physicists, lawyers, accountants, school teachers, public offi-
cers, newspapermen and linguists. The group operated in-
dependently of the Army Intelligence Organization but in
close cooperation with it and the Federal Bureau of Investiga-
tion.
Oak Ridge was headquarters for the special detachment
which carried out various assignments throughout the coun-
try under the direction from Washington of two men hand-
picked for the Project from the Army Military Intelligence
Division — Col. John Lansdale, Jr., of Cleveland, Ohio and
Col. W. A. Consodine of Newark, N. J. In Oak Ridge the de-
tachment was first under the leadership of Major H. K. Cal-
vert of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, assigned to Col. K. D.
Nichols, district engineer of the Manhattan District. Calvert
later was sent to London to handle foreign aspects of the
bomb development and was replaced by Lt. Col. W. B.
Parsons of Seattle, Washington, with Capt. B. W. Menke as
Executive Officer.
In maintaining secrecy, Manhattan Project agents traced
rumors and speculations to their source. No serious sabotage
occurred; what did happen could be attributed to personal
spite. But espionage always was in the air. So well was the
secret guarded, however, that the Germans believed, even to
the war's end, that the United States had not progressed be-
yond the early research stages in development of the atomic
bomb. With success of the project dependent upon the safety
[68]
THEY COULDNT SAY A WORD
of key scientists, elaborate measures to protect their identity
and whereabouts were carried out and agents who were safe
automobile drivers and who would never lose a briefcase
were assigned as constant bodyguards.
The agents went half way around the earth to check on and
plug leaks. They went to the front lines in Belgium (an
American officer wrote a friend in Oak Ridge asking if he
were working on atomic energy), to France and the British
Isles and to the uranium ore fields of the Belgian Congo and
Canada. They even chased a case of skin rash to South Amer-
ica; a workman formerly employed at Oak Ridge who may
have been allergic to some common acid or to Tennessee
poison ivy was rumored to believe his rash was from queer
rays.
Their work carried them into many different fields. Stocks
and bonds to be issued on the great exchanges by companies
having contracts with the Manhattan District had to be
worded so as not to reveal the atom secret. Education of thou-
sands upon thousands of workers in how to talk and act with
outsiders was necessary, as was the reading of hundreds of
newspapers, the scanning of science reports and attendance
at scientific meetings to see there were no inadvertent slips
of the tongue. They even examined books in libraries to de-
termine whether sections on uranium and atomic energy had
been thumbed too frequently. They fingerprinted over 300,-
ooo persons who came to work on the project.
They even denied a Bible salesman entrance to Oak Ridge
in the Spring of 1944 because indiscriminate peddling was
not allowed, and in Washington, Superman of the comic
strips met his match when the Office of Censorship asked
Superman's creator to delete mention of atom-smashing cyclo-
trons.
The full-time efforts of a large number of agents were re-
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
quired to combat loose talk, rumor and gossip, much of
which, as it turned out upon investigation, was innocent spec-
ulation. They trailed honest remarks through churches, ser-
mons, columns, editorials, and wayside restaurant conversa-
tions, not because the speakers were suspected but because it
was necessary to head off conversation if the world's greatest
secret was to be kept. An Oak Ridge bus rider once found
himself the subject of an investigation after he had innocently
asked a companion, while working a cross-word puzzle, the
symbol for Uranium.
On one occasion in 1944, a report reached the Intelli-
gence Unit at Oak Ridge that a preacher at Maryville, 35
miles from Oak Ridge, had dangerously skirted the subject
of the atom in a sermon. An Agent called upon the pastor. He
discovered that the preacher, having read a speculative article
on atomic energy in an old magazine, had used it as a sermon
topic, stressing the relationship of the Divine Being to the
mysteries of the possible new force of the atom. The Agent
and the pastor reached a gentleman's agreement that the topic
would not be used again.
This incident was not as perplexing as another which oc-
curred.
From Kansas City, Missouri, one day in 1944 came a long
distance telephone call to Oak Ridge from a woman seeking
to locate a brother working on the project. The operator re-
ported his name not listed and asked the caller if she was sure
she was calling the right place.
"Sure," the woman replied, "Oak Ridge is the place where
they're smashing those atoms, isn't it?"
That was probably the first time the operator had ever
heard the word "atom" mentioned in connection with the
project. But she notified Security immediately. Within a few
days Agents had found the woman, who said she was merely
[70]
THEY COULDN T SAY A WORD
passing on rumors her brother had written her from Oak
Ridge. Agents reprimanded both her and the brother and
they agreed to be more circumspect.
One mountaineer was at one time positive he had discov-
ered the project's objective by keeping his ears open and his
mouth shut. "I know what they're making," he confided to a
friend. "It's sympathetic rubber." Such deductions were
mingled with such comment as "they're making fourth-term
buttons" and "suit-cases for Eleanor."
In 1944, an article appearing in an Atlanta newspaper fur-
rowed the brows of Security Agents. Knoxville was then rid-
ing the crest as the hottest war-boom town in the South. The
newspaper sent a reporter to check on Clinton Engineer
Works.
"It's hush-hush all the way," his article said, "in a manner
to make writers of fiction despair of their imagination.
"A weird picture emerges out of the welter of rumor, con-
jecture, guesses and attempts to put two and two together
with the logical result of four.
"There are thousands of workers at the plant, all pledged
to unnecessary secrecy for the simple reason they do not know
what they are working on. They go about like orderly, well-
paid ghosts.
"The 'heart' of the plant is said to be a building sur-
rounded by three bar bed- wire enclosures. The wire is charged
with electricity. Guards sit atop towers near the barbed-wire
walls, rifles ready, prepared to shoot intruders.
"The latter, too, seems to be carrying precaution a bit too
far. Because intruders couldn't possibly get near the so-called
heart of the plant. Why? Because workers are finger-printed
when they go from department to department. It has been
reported that one worker was finger-printed 27 times in a
single day.
[71]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
"What goes in? And what comes out? Mystery again. No
one has ever seen materials go in or products come out. Yet
the plant covers vast acreage, and its edges have the aspect of
a construction camp deep in a South American jungle.
"The plant is in operation. Yet workers see no smoke, hear
no noises, feel no rumbles, touch no tangible evidence. The l
place is said to be alive with military intelligence men, check-
ing, guarding, observing, keeping the deep, dark and doubt-
less deadly secret.
"Rumors run rife, however. Folks conjecture all the way
from new gases to new ammunition, to synthetic rubber, to
new explosives, to rockets to the moon, to smashing of the
atom, to fourth-term buttons for Roosevelt."
The reference to the atom brought the steam of the Intelli-
gence Division to a full head.
A news commentator for the Mutual Broadcasting Com-
pany also caused much consternation in Washington and Oak
Ridge in August 1944 when he mentioned Columbia Uni-
versity (a key point in the project's research phase), Oak
Ridge, atomic energy and new explosives on his broadcast.
An investigation revealed that a radio reporter had ob-
tained a few basic facts from a scientist who had been asso-
ciated in a minor way with the work at Oak Ridge. With the
meager information, the reporter called upon his imagina-
tion. The commentator's staff thought the material so im-
probable, however, that they laid it aside until one night
when copy was short. Then it went into the news script
merely as a "filler." The reporter who originated the mate-
rial explained on being interviewed that he was a pacifist and
had written a seemingly exaggerated script in the hope it
would reach the Germans and terrify them into requesting
an armistice. But his exaggeration was too near the truth.
The editors and the radio newsman in these two incidents
[72]
THEY COULDN T SAY A WORD
obviously were either not aware of or had overlooked the fol'
lowing confidential note which had been sent out by the Of'
fice of Censorship in Washington on June 28, 1943, to 20,000
news outlets over the country:
"You are asked not to publish or broadcast any informa-
tion whatsoever regarding war experiments involving:
"Production or utilization of atom smashing, atomic en-
ergy, atomic fission, atomic splitting, or any of their equiva-
lents;
"The use for military purposes of radium or radioactive
materials, heavy water, high voltage discharges, equipment,
cyclotrons;
"The following elements or any of their compounds: Polo-
nium, uranium, ytterbium, hafnium, protractinium, radium,
rhenium, thorium, deuterium."
Many editors, reporters and commentators undoubtedly as-
sociated this memorandum with the elaborate goings-on at
Clinton Engineer Works, but for the individual without ac-
cess to such warnings, the project became somewhat of a fan-
tasy. Two occurrences in 1943 and 1944 pointed up the pre-
vailing confusion.
Shortly after barriers and admission gates were established
at Elza, Edgemoor, Solway and Oliver Springs entrances on
April i, 1943 — they were to remain until March 19, 1949,
when the community of Oak Ridge itself was opened to the
general American public — a curious old gentleman turned
up at Elza. He was an herb doctor. His pockets were as full
of roots as country new ground.
He eyed the guard furtively and then approached him.
"I understand," he said to the man barring his way, "that
they're building a new White House in there," explaining
that he desired to file for a position with the White House
staff.
[73]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
"Beat it," the guard informed him gruffly. "We don't know
what's being built in there."
The answer didn't please the old man at all. "Well," he
said most pointedly, "if you don't know what's being built,
how do you know it isn't the White House?"
The old gentleman was as confused as one of the many
Anderson County farmers who left their workaday world to
obtain employment on the "project." This particular em-
ployee was a farmer who also peddled eggs to residents of Nor-
ris, near Oak Ridge. For a long time, his customers missed
him but one day in 1944 he showed up again.
One of his customers asked where he had been.
"I've been working on the project," he confided.
"Were you discharged?" the customer asked.
"No," the farmer replied. "I just quit. And I'll tell you
why.
"There they were, all those thousands of people. They
were all getting good money, same as I was. And there were
more buildings than you can imagine, and a lot of new roads
and a lot of other new things, and they were costing a heap
of money.
"I thought it all over, thought it over long and hard. And,
to tell you the truth, I had in mind that whatever it was the
Government was making over there, it would be cheaper if
they went out and bought it."
A simple, frugal man of the hills, the scope of the project
had overwhelmed him.
Espionage
Two spy cases involving atomic energy stirred the Ameri-
can people in post-war years.
In 1946 a British scientist, Dr. Alan Nunn May, was sen-
[74]
THEY COULDN T SAY A WORD
tenced to 10 years in prison by a British court for slipping
samples of uranium to a Russian agent. He was accused of
violating Britain's official secrets act while engaged in atomic
research in Canada in 1945, work which also brought him
in contact with atomic energy developments in the United
States.
On February i, 1950, another British scientist, Dr. Klaus
E. J. Fuchs, was arrested by his Government on charges of
passing atomic energy information to the Russians and sen-
tenced to a prison term of 14 years.
Fuchs, member of a British wartime mission to the United
States, held an important post at the Los Alamos project, wit-
nessed the test explosion of the first atomic bomb at Alamo-
gordo, New Mexico, in July, 1945, and had access to a great
deal of information on atomic matters, according to the
charges filed against him.
Fuchs was accused of twice passing atomic secrets to for-
eign agents — once in the United States in 1945 and again in
Britain in 1947. In 1947, Fuchs visited the United States
again as a member of a British delegation to participate in
discussions of atomic energy information with the United
States, Canada and Britain.
May and Fuchs did not work at atomic energy plants at
Oak Ridge; their activity carried them elsewhere in the
United States.
The Fuchs case led to the arrest by the Federal Bureau of
Investigation of several Americans. They included Harry
Gold, a Philadelphia research chemist; David Greenglass, a
machinist who served at Los Alamos during World War II as
an Army technical sergeant; Alfred D. Slack, a chemist who
worked during World War II at both Oak Ridge and King-
sport, Tennessee; Julius Rosenberg, a New York engineer,
and Morton Sobell, a New York electrical engineer.
[75]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Lie Detector
In post-war years, Security has been strengthened at Oak
Ridge through the use of a machine called the Lie Detector,
known technically as a Polygraph.
In use by the Atomic Energy Commission at Oak Ridge
since 1946 through an arrangement with the firm of Russell
Chatham, Inc., the Lie Detector has been used to give more
than 20,000 examinations in the interest of national security.
Of all persons who successfully passed the Polygraph exami-
nations, none has been denied security clearance, and in no
case has a subsequent investigation contradicted the findings
of the Polygraph. The Polygraph does not supplant any other
means of investigation, but is another tool in a well-rounded
security program.
The Lie Detector is used by banks, jewelry stores and other
commercial establishments over the country to check em-
ployees. In Oak Ridge, the Lie Detector examinations are
designed:
To detect in employees motives or intentions inimical to
security and not otherwise disclosed;
To detect a change in an employee's motives and inten-
tions from those compatible with the security requirements
of the job to those inimical to security of the project;
To prevent and detect any unauthorized disclosures of in-
formation;
To prevent and detect any theft or improper handling of
classified material or equipment; and
To determine whether an unauthorized disclosure of in-
formation was the result of inadvertence or was intentional
and to determine whether a report of improper handling of
classified material was inadvertent or intentional.
[76]
CHAPTER VI
The Wonders of a New World
THE word "amazing," when used in connection with the
building of the town of Oak Ridge and the atomic en-
ergy plants, loses its luster of description. It has been said that
the work was performed on a "time schedule only slightly
short of impossible."
Some strange and wondrous facts emerged in the building
of the unprecedented facilities. For instance:
Twelve million square feet of blueprints, a number which
would furnish a reader with his favorite newspaper for 650
years, if that newspaper averaged 28 pages on weekdays and
was three times that size on Sundays, were used by Stone and
Webster Engineering Corporation alone in drafting plans
and specifications for the electromagnetic plant;
Planning for the gaseous diffusion plant by the Kellex Cor-
poration required 20,000 pages of specifications, 12,000 draw-
ings and 10,000 pages of operating instructions;
Because copper was short and time was more valuable than
gold, 14,000 tons of silver having a monetary value of over
$500,000,000 was borrowed from the United States Treasury
and used for electrical conductors and bus-bars in the electro-
magnetic plant;
Hundreds of East Tennessee high school girls, with not the
[77]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
faintest idea of what their jobs were about, were trained by
the Tennessee Eastman Corporation to operate complex dials
on electronic equipment used to control delicate machinery
in the production of uranium-235;
A total of 6,200,000 linear feet, or 1175 miles, of piping —
water lines, oil lines for cooling purposes, chemical lines, vac-
uum piping and nearly nine miles of glass piping — and al-
most one quarter of a million valves were installed in the
electromagnetic plant;
Magnets nearly 100 times as large as any previous magnet
ever built and containing thousands of tons of steel were in-
stalled; they were scores of feet long, so powerful that their
pull on the nails in a pair of shoes sometimes made walking
difficult and snatched wrenches from workmen's hands if the
tools were loosely held;
Pumping equipment was designed and built capable of
producing a vacuum 30,000,000 times that commonly used in
standard power plant practice;
Essential tolerances necessary for successful operation of
equipment in the gaseous diffusion plant and the uranium
chain-reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory are much
finer than the works in the finest watch;
Leak-proof pumps were developed for use at the gaseous
diffusion plant to operate at velocities greater than the speed
of sound; the time spent in research, development and design
of the pumps alone totaled 250,000 man hours or the equiva-
lent of one engineer working every day for 100 years;
Porous barriers for the concentration of uranium-235 by
the gaseous diffusion method were developed which not only
contained billions of holes smaller than two-millionths of an
inch in diameter but had to be amenable to manufacture in
large quantities, measured in acres;
[78]
THE WONDERS OF A NEW WORLD
Cleanliness is so vital in the gaseous diffusion operations
that a thumbprint represents contamination; so critical was
the problem of producing welded joints to meet tightness
and cleanliness specifications that special welding schools had
to be held; total welding machines in simultaneous operation
were 1200, the total length of welding was: Arc welding, 400
miles, atomic hydrogen welding, 100 miles and airtight weld-
ing on enclosures, 100 miles;
A total of 3800 miles of electrical conductors and 825 miles
of electrical conduits, involving more than 90,000 separate
tests on electrical systems, were built, and half a million
valves installed, together with thousands of precision instru-
ments requiring 4,000,000 feet of copper tubing and 3,000,-
ooo feet of copper wire — all in the gaseous diffusion plant,
the largest continuous chemico-physical process in the world;
The operating floor of the gaseous diffusion plant is so vast
that technical personnel use bicycles to reach recording in-
struments stretching for a distance of nearly half a mile;
The 37,562,000 board feet of lumber used in building the
electromagnetic plant, if utilized for homes, would equal
7,680 average-sized individual dwelling units, enough for a
town of 23,040; the 350,000 cubic yards of concrete used in
the gaseous diffusion plant is equal to a solid block of con-
crete 105 feet high, the size of a city block; the 40,000 tons of
structural steel used in the gaseous diffusion plant would
build a railroad line 303 miles long; the 5,000,000 bricks
used in the same plant would, if placed end to end, stretch
632 miles and the 15,000 tons of sheet steel used in the same
plant would provide cooking utensils sufficient for 600,000
average families;
A steam power plant costing $34,000,000 to serve the gas-
eous diffusion plant, the largest steam plant ever constructed
[79]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
in one operation, has generating equipment with a maximum
capacity of 238,000 kilowatts (twice the capacity of Norris
Dam of the Tennessee Valley Authority).
These are but a few of the strange statistics on the building
of the atomic energy facilities.
The present-day main operating plants at Oak Ridge are
the gaseous diffusion plant, the electromagnetic plant and the
Oak Ridge National Laboratory, nuclear research center, but
another plant which made a vital contribution to the war ef-
fort by supplying additional quantities of uranium-235 was
the thermal diffusion plant.
On June 26, 1944, the H. K. Ferguson Company of Cleve-
land, Ohio, was retained as architect-engineer-manager for
the building of the thermal diffusion plant after Dr. P. H.
Abelson, of the Navy's Research Laboratory at Washington,
proved the operability of the thermal diffusion method for
obtaining 11-235.
Ferguson Company officials estimated that the plant could
be designed and built in six months if given top priority.
Manhattan District officials instructed that it be finished in
four months, later revising the completion schedule to three
months. Actually, the plant was in operation in 75 days flat,
furnishing feed material to the electromagnetic units. Among
material used in the thermal diffusion plant, which cost $10,-
500,000, were 50 miles of nickel pipe and 20 miles of iron
pipe. Sub-contractors included the Edenfield Electric Com-
pany, Turner and Ross Co., Pittsburgh Pipe and Equipment
Co., the National Valve Co., the Tri-State Asbestos Co., the
Tennessee Roofing Co., the Pacific Pump Co., Westinghouse,
Mehring and Hanson Co., and the Grinnel Corporation. The
Fercleve Corporation, a subsidiary of the H. K. Ferguson Co.,
operated the unit.
Having made its contribution to the war effort, the thermal
[so]
OriqinaJ Sample Of
UFe Which Is Tne
Gaseous Compound Of
Uranium Used tr» The
Diffusion Method.
J. E. Westcott
This small unit served as a model .
THE WONDERS OF A NEW WORLD
diffusion plant was placed in standby October 18, 1945, and
later discontinued.
The Gaseous Diffusion Plant
Design work on the gaseous diffusion plant was started in
1942 by the Kellex Corporation, a unit of the M. W. Kellogg
Corporation of New York City, which also handled the super-
vision of construction and procurement of equipment. Fun-
damental research for the gaseous diffusion plant was carried
on principally at Columbia University under the leadership
of Dr. H. C. Urey and Dr. John R. Dunning.
The J. A. Jones Construction Company of Charlotte,
North Carolina, built the main plants while Ford, Bacon &
Davis, Inc., of New York City designed, constructed and for
a time operated a huge auxiliary plant to condition equip-
ment before placement in the process plant. The main gas-
eous diffusion process building is a huge U-shaped structure,
2,450 feet long and averaging 400 feet in width and 60 feet
in height. The total area of the main building is 44 acres.
Close by are other huge gaseous diffusion process areas, one
of which was completed after World War II ended and two
others on which construction was begun in 1949 and 1950 by
the Maxon Construction Company, of Dayton, Ohio.
The plant area contains many additional buildings, bring-
ing the total area to around 1,000 acres. Special warehouses
contain tens of thousands of different types of spare parts. A
special railroad spur branching off the Southern System was
built to serve the area. It was operated during the war by J. A.
Jones Company; the Southern Railroad now operates it.
Construction of the main process plant was started Septem-
ber 10, 1943, by the Jones Company and the first units for the
production of U-2$5 began operating February 20, 1945. The
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
construction forces on this plant reached 25,000 in May, 1945.
The entire gaseous diffusion plant, which cost around $500,-
000,000, is operated by Carbide and Carbon Chemicals
Division, Union Carbide and Carbon Corporation. Carbide
and Carbon signed a contract with the Manhattan District
effective January 18, 1943, to operate the plant. Carbide fur-
nished technical consultants and service to aid in the design,
engineering, construction, and finally to operate, upon its
completion, the gaseous diffusion plant. Clark E. Center is
general superintendent for Carbide in Oak Ridge.
The Chrysler Corporation, Allis-Chalmers, the American
Machine Defense Corporation, the Valley Iron Works, Apple-
ton, Wis.; the F. J. Stokes Machine Co., the Beach-Russ Co.,
New York; Westinghouse, the National Research Corpora-
tion, the Midwest Piping and Supply Co., Houdaille-Her-
shey Co., the Taylor Instrument Co., General Electric, the
Pacific Pump Works and the Wolverine Tube Division of the
Calumet and Hecla Consolidated Copper Co. were among
the many industrial organizations which contributed to solv-
ing the extremely complex problems of design and manufac-
ture. Du Pont, Harshaw Chemical Co., Hooker Electrochemi-
cal Co., and Columbia University, Johns Hopkins, Ohio
State, Purdue and Princeton also made significant contribu-
tions, as did the Mallinckrodt Chemical Works of St. Louis,
Mo.
Principal structural sub-contractors under J. A. Jones Co.
were D. W. Winkleman, Syracuse, N. Y.; Oman-Creighton
Co., Nashville, Tenn.; Wolfe-Michael Construction Co., St.
Augustine, Fla.; Bethlehem Steel Co., Bethlehem, Pa.; Vir-
ginia Bridge Co., Roanoke, Va.; Lambert Brothers, Knox-
ville, Tenn.; Birmingham Slag Co., Birmingham, Ala.;
Cooney Brothers, Tarry town, N. Y.; Bryant Electrical Co.,
High Point, N. C.; Midwest Piping 8c Supply Co., St. Louis,
[8*1
THE WONDERS OF A NEW WORLD
Mo.; Poe Piping & Heating Co., Greenville, S. C.; G. G. Ray
& Co., Charlotte, N. C.; Kerby-Saunders Inc., New York,
N. Y.; and the Ce-Mas-Co Floor Co., Chicago, 111.
Sixty thousand carloads of materials were used to build
this plant alone.
The gaseous diffusion plant provides large-scale separation
of the uranium isotope 235 from a chemical compound of
uranium by gaseous diffusion through porous barriers — bar-
riers which must contain billions of holes smaller than two-
millionths of an inch, withstand a pressure head of 1 5 pounds
per square inch, and can not become enlarged or plugged up
as a result of corrosion or dust coming from elsewhere in the
system.
The process involves several thousand stages in which half
of the gas processed in each stage diffuses through the porous
barriers as enriched U-235 product and is then sent on to the
next higher stage for further concentration. The impover-
ished half is re-pressured and re-cycled through the next low-
est stage. The volume of gas re-cycled is enormous — over
1,000,000 times the volume of the enriched gas. The princi-
pal behind the separation of U-235 fr°m natural uranium
(11-238) is to convert the solid metal into a gas and make use
of the difference in the velocity of the two isotopes in diffus-
ing through the porous barriers. U-235 being the lighter, it
has a faster diffusion velocity, so the gas eventually diffused
through the barrier is richer in U-235 than the feed gas. After
passing through the several thousand stages, an appreciable
concentration of U-235 *s realized.
Essential tolerances and complexities of the plant were
such that many advisors considered the plant impossible to
build, and many more felt that even if built it would not
work. Indeed, one eminent American physicist requested
Manhattan District officials, after $100,000,000 had been
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
spent on construction, to discontinue construction since he
felt certain technical problems could not be overcome. The
problems were reconciled, however, through the ingenuity
of American industry, as were other problems that called for
excursion beyond any known method of design and construc-
tion.
Industry will eventually reap rich rewards from technical
advancements made in the development of this plant.
Industrial applications of techniques developed in the con-
struction of the U-235 plants seem pertinent for the petro-
leum and chemical and processing industries (improved
pumping, possible new methods for gasoline fractionation,
new type of heat exchanges and improved automatic con-
trol); manufacture of pressure and vacuum vessels (pre-test-
ing vessels for leaks and improved vacuum techniques); high
vacuum industries (improved methods for vitamin distilla-
tion, new method of maintaining high vacuum and low pres-
sure, low temperature dehydration); industries employing
corrosive chemicals (new pump and valve lubricants, new
treatment of metal surfaces, and induction operated pumps);
refrigeration industry (increased safety in equipment and
improved handling of fluorides) and electrical industry (new
electronic techniques in high vacuum and improved micro-
sensitive instrumentation).
The Electromagnetic Plant
The Stone and Webster Engineering Corporation of Bos-
ton designed and constructed the electromagnetic plant in
co-operation with technical experts from the Radiation Lab-
oratory of the University of California. The cost was approxi-
mately $427,000,000.
Ground was broken for the first plant building on Feb-
THE WONDERS OF A NEW WORLD
ruary i, 1943. The first production building was put into use
by the operating company, the Tennessee Eastman Corpora-
tion of Kingsport, Tennessee (a subsidiary of Eastman Ko-
dak) in January, 1944. The Tennessee Eastman Corporation,
which entered into a contract with the Manhattan District in
January, 1943, collaborated with Stone and Webster and
University of California personnel to check and perfect
equipment designs and furnished technical consultants and
service.
Peak employment of construction workers totaled 13,200.
The peak of operational personnel was 22,000 in 1945. The
plant has a total of 170 buildings with a floor area of 4,500,-
ooo square feet and covers approximately 500 acres.
Principal construction sub-contractors under Stone and
Webster were Harrison Construction Co., Pittsburgh, Pa.
and Maryville, Tenn.; Ralph Rogers Company, Nashville,
Tenn.; Transit-Mix Concrete Corp., New York, N. Y.; D. W.
Winkleman, Syracuse, N. Y.; C. O. Struse & Company, Phila-
delphia, Pa.; Fluor Corp., San Francisco, Calif.; Bethlehem
Steel Co., Bethlehem, Pa.; Watson-Flagg Engineering Co.,
New York, N. Y.; Hanley & Company, Chicago, 111.; Rock-
wood Sprinkler Co., Worcester, Mass.; Tennessee Roofing
Company, Knoxville, Tenn.; Bristol Steel & Iron Works,
Bristol, Va.-Tenn.; Drainage Contractors, Inc., Detroit,
Mich.; and Sullivan, Long & Haggerty, Bessemer, Ala.
On May 5, 1947, the plant operations were taken over by
Carbide and Carbon Chemicals Division, Union Carbide
and Carbon Corporation, after the Tennessee Eastman Cor-
poration, which received a War Department salute for its
splendid work, asked to be relieved of its responsibility be-
cause of the end of the wartime emergency.
The electromagnetic plant involved problems of design
and construction never before encountered. Since it became
[85]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
the first and only plant of its kind in the world, there was no
time to construct even a small pilot plant to carry out the
methods of separating the uranium atoms (U-235 from 0-238)
under the electromagnetic process as developed by Dr. E. O.
Lawrence of the University of California, who receives the
largest share of credit for the scientific development which
made possible the remarkable transmutation of a laboratory
model into a great industrial plant.
General Electric, Westinghouse, Allis-Chalmers and Link
Belt Co., among many others, were the manufacturers and
suppliers of equipment.
The theoretical operation of the electromagnetic type of
plant involves ionizing uranium particles, accelerating a con-
tinuous stream of these particles in a closely-defined path to a
speed approaching that of light, bending this stream into
semi-circles by means of a powerful magnet field in an almost
absolute vacuum, and then catching the particles of U-235
and U-238 in different containers as soon as they become sep-
arated. The semi-circular paths of these ionized particles have
radii proportional to their momenta. Accordingly, the U-235
is mainly in an arc which has a greater radius than the arc
containing U-238.
The electromagnetic plant was flexible — one reason for its
selection. Units were built in groups, although most of the
controls were separate from each unit. Thus, it was possible
to build the plant in steps and start operating the first unit
before the second was begun. Design of subsequent units was
changed as construction proceeded. So successful was this pro-
gram that obsolescent equipment was replaced rapidly by new
designs, which ultimately resulted in such an improvement
in process that it was possible to carry on operations with
much less personnel than the peak operating force of 22,000
employees.
[86]
THE WONDERS OF A NEW WORLD
The U-235 produced in the electromagnetic plant during
the war was so precious that Stone & Webster designed a
chemical salvage plant 100 times as large as any test plants
that could be used as guides. Every possible grain of U-235
was reclaimed — from work clothes, from water and steel, and
even in the air in the plants. And all of the production units
had to be controlled through amazing automatic mechanisms
operated by personnel of average intelligence (many of the
employees were high school girls), who had not the faintest
idea what their jobs were about, but who operated dials to
produce the material which, when used, liberated a part of
the power of the universe.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
The Oak Ridge National Laboratory was designed and
built by E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company. It was
originally a small pilot plant on which the design of the huge
plutonium separations units at Hanford Engineer Works in
the State of Washington was based.
Construction began February i, 1943, and operations of
the first uranium chain-reactor in the world with a produc-
tion-potential began at 5 A.M., November 4, 1943. First sig-
nificant amounts of plutonium for research leading to the
building of the Hanford Plant were obtained here.
The plant covers more than 150 acres and cost approxi-
mately $13,000,000. Peak construction employment reached
3,247. Peak operating employment in wartime was 1,234;
now it is much larger.
From the time of completion until July i, 1945, the plant
was supervised by the Metallurgical Laboratory of the Uni-
versity of Chicago. It was then taken over by the Monsanto
Chemical Company of St. Louis, for operation as a nuclear
[87]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
research center. On December 31, 1947, the Atomic Energy
Commission announced that Carbide and Carbon Chemicals
Division, Union Carbide and Carbon Corporation, would op-
erate the Laboratory beginning March i, 1948. On February
i, 1948, the Atomic Energy Commission announced that the
new name for the facility would be Oak Ridge National Lab-
oratory. It was formerly known as Clinton Laboratories.
This area contains more than 160 buildings. These include
three chemistry buildings, a technical laboratory, a pile (ura-
nium chain-reactor) building (a pile of specially designed
graphite into which slugs of 0-238 are placed), a physics lab-
oratory, a power house, an instrument laboratory, research
development shops, a lead shop, a metallurgical building, a
medical building (headquarters for the Health Physics group
which controls and studies radiation hazards) and several ad-
ministration buildings and warehouses.
The Laboratory has been enlarged in the past few years in
keeping with its designation as a permanent National Lab-
oratory.
The pile at Oak Ridge National Laboratory is the source
of production and distribution of radioactive isotopes which
are now being widely used for research in medicine, biology,
agriculture and industry. Since August 2, 1946, thousands of
shipments have gone to various research groups over the
country — and abroad. The distribution of these radioisotopes
(radioactive isotopes are variations of common elements with
the same chemical properties as the stable element but having
a different atomic weight and exhibiting the property of ra-
dioactivity) is one of the most important peacetime applica-
tions in the development of atomic energy.
Other peacetime work being carried on at Oak Ridge Na-
tional Laboratory in nuclear research include studies in
tracer chemistry; biological research; a health physics pro-
[88]
THE WONDERS OF A NEW WORLD
gram which not only controls but continues to study improve-
ments on the control of radiation hazards, and research on
uranium chain-reactors looking toward eventual use of
atomic energy for commercial power purposes. Increased em-
phasis has been placed on basic research and chemical process
development work at the Laboratory.
The Steam Power Plant
A high-temperature, high-pressure steam power plant lies
near the gaseous diffusion process and is an important ad-
junct in the process carried on in the production of 11-235.
The plant was designed and developed by the Kellex Corpo-
ration and Sargent and Lundy of Chicago and constructed by
the J. A. Jones Construction Company at a cost of $34,000,-
ooo.
Sub-contractors included A. S. Schulman Electric Co. of
Chicago, William A. Pope Co. of Chicago, The Foundation
Co. of New York, the Bethlehem Steel Co., Combustion Engi-
neering Co., Research Corporation, Allis-Chalmers, General
Electric and Westinghouse.
It is the largest steam plant ever constructed in one opera-
tion and has generating equipment with a capacity of 238,000
kilowatts (twice N orris Dam of the TV A). The paradox of
this gigantic steam plant in the heart of the TVA region is
explained by plant requirements for variable frequency cur-
rent and the necessity for minimizing possibilities of inter-
ruption of power. The use of the steam plant is in addition
to such power as is available from the TVA, the general
source of supply for all of the Oak Ridge Area.
The power house contains three boilers, each designed
to produce 750,000 pounds per hour of superheated steam
at a pressure of 350 p.s.i. and a temperature of 950 degrees
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
and 14 turbo-generators ranging in size from 1500 to 35,000
kilowatts. Adjacent to the power plant there is a main switch
house, and an auxiliary switch house, a pump house, a 154
KV switchyard, a service building and the necessary facilities
for storage and handling of coal.
Construction of the power plant started June i, 1943, and
initial operation was begun April 13, 1944. It reached its full
generating capacity in July, 1945. Until 1950, coal was used
solely as fuel; now natural gas from the Texas fields also is
utilized under a contract between the Atomic Energy Com-
mission and the East Tennessee Natural Gas Company. The
plant is operated by Carbide and Carbon Chemicals Division,
Union Carbide and Carbon Corporation.
A Potent Factor
Carbide and Carbon Chemicals Division, Union Carbide
and Carbon Corporation, is the most powerful single factor
in present-day Oak Ridge operations.
This great industrial organization entered the atomic en-
ergy program early in the history of the activity when, effec-
tive January 18, 1943, its officers signed a contract with the
Manhattan District. The terms called for Carbide to "furnish
technical consultants and service to aid in the design, engi-
neering, construction, and finally to operate upon its comple-
tion, the gaseous diffusion plant at Oak Ridge." In carrying
out this obligation, the people of Carbide made significant
contributions to many phases of the facility. Similar work
was done by Carbide on the huge steam power plant nearby.
In May of 1947, the Atomic Energy Commission requested
Carbide to accept the further assignment of operating the
facilities of the ¥-12 electromagnetic separation plant. In
March, 1948, an additional facility at Oak Ridge was placed
[90]
THE WONDERS OF A NEW WORLD
in their hands to operate and manage, the Oak Ridge Na-
tional Laboratory.
Thus the production and research facilities of these three
operations are now coordinated under a single management.
The technical know-how and skill of Carbide personnel has
brought many improvements, greater production, and nota-
ble progress in Oak Ridge operations.
Participation by Union Carbide and Carbon Corporation
in the atomic energy program in World War II went far be-
yond operation of the gaseous plant by one of its units.
The Corporation built and operated plants for the process-
ing of raw materials and assumed management of laboratories
formerly under university supervision. The United States
Vanadium Corporation and The Linde Air Products Com-
pany, both Corporation units, built and operated certain stra-
tegic plants; Electro Metallurgical Company, a unit, man-
ufactured special alloys; Bakelite Corporation, a unit,
produced important plastic materials; and National Car-
bon Company, Inc., another unit, developed and manufac-
tured certain critical carbon products.
Billions and Billions
Of the more than $5,000,000,000 that has been spent or ap-
propriated for atomic energy developments in the United
States since 1942, a total of over $2,000,000,000 has been
for Oak Ridge building and operations.
When the atomic story was released to the world in August
1945, a total of $1,106,393,000 had been spent on Oak Ridge,
$382,401,000 on Hanford, and $59,429,000 on Los Alamos.
From 1942 until August 6, 1945, Congressional appropria-
tions for the work were obtained by the War Department
through requests which covered up the actual description of
[91]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
the project; in fact, neither the Manhattan District nor its
objective was mentioned. A few key Congressional leaders,
having been made aware by Secretary of War Stimson of the
purpose of the development, guided the "covered-up" re-
quests through Congress. Among them were Senators Alben
Barkley, Kenneth D. McKellar of Tennessee and Styles
Bridges of New Hampshire, and Representatives Sam Ray-
burn of Texas and Clarence Cannon of Missouri.
X-JG, Y-i2 and K-2j
The strange combinations of letters and figures as designa-
tions for two of the Oak Ridge facilities, X-io and ¥-12, have
no particular significance. For the third, K-25, there is a
meaning.
The X as applied to Clinton Laboratories (now Oak Ridge
National Laboratory) came from the fact that "X" was used
by the University of Chicago in its original description of the
site. The addition of the " 10" had no significance.
The "Y" as applied to the electromagnetic plant was used
because it was equally unlikely to have any particular mean-
ing. The "12" was added for no particular reason, except for
the purpose of confusion.
The "K" as applied to the gaseous diffusion plant was used
because the plant was designed by the Kellex Corporation.
Because "25" was used throughout the project to designate
U-235, it was added arbitrarily. With the building of other
gaseous diffusion plants, K-27, K-2g and K-gi were applied as
designations to identify them as separate units.
During the war, the Oak Ridge Area as a whole was known
as "Site X," the Hanford area as "Site W" and the Los Ala-
mos area as "Site Y." The letters were utilized simply for
cover-up purposes.
[92]
CHAPTER VII
Atomic City Housekeeper
IF, on May 6, 1902, when a young engineer by the name of
Henry C. Turner launched the Turner Construction
Company in New York City, he had been told that a strange
adventure, entirely outside the sphere of normal construction
activity, would befall his firm in 1943, he probably would
have reacted as did a workman at Oak Ridge when the news
of the atomic bomb blast over Hiroshima struck the world.
Said the workman: "I am doggoned."
But the Turner Construction Company, which had for its
first contract in 1902 the building of a small reinforced con-
crete vault for the Thrift, a savings institution in Brooklyn,
and since that time has produced close to a billion dollars in
construction in this country and abroad, had, like many other
firms in the United States, a date with destiny.
In 1943, the Army, its hands full fighting a war and creat-
ing an atomic bomb, had neither the time nor the inclination
to operate and manage a community which was beginning to
rise in the hills of East Tennessee. When the need developed
for a private organization to operate Oak Ridge, the Man-
hattan District, which had been impressed by the job the com-
pany had done for the Army's Corps of Engineers at an Air
Depot at Rome, New York, turned to Turner.
[93]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Thus was born the Roane-Anderson Company, which en-
tered the Oak Ridge scene September 23, 1943, under a con-
tract with the Manhattan District as landlord and house-
keeper of the Atomic City. Turner Construction Company, a
firm headed by Quakers, organized Roane-Anderson, named
for the two counties in which the project is situated, as a man-
agement firm under Tennessee charter to relieve the Army of
the details of running a community. The company estab-
lished its project office October 7, 1943.
A great and imposing array of America's construction and
industrial organizations, together with the country's leading
universities, helped bring about the miracle of Oak Ridge.
But the organization which affected the day-by-day life of
each Oak Ridge resident, especially the housewife, most di-
rectly, was Roane-Anderson.
The average housewife might not have known the facts on
plant construction and operations, but she was acutely aware
of Roane-Anderson. For Roane-Anderson collected the rent,
delivered the coal, picked up the garbage, fixed the faucet, re-
placed the fuse, repaired the loose plank, replaced the win-
dow pane, supplied the maid, and carried out myriad other
duties in catering to the needs of 75,000 persons in times of
great secrecy and security.
Roane-Anderson did not build Oak Ridge. But as rapidly
as facilities — houses, stores, utility and water systems, dormi-
tories— were completed in 1943, 1944 and 1945, Roane-An-
derson assumed the responsibility of managing, operating and
maintaining the "secret city." Its assignment was to keep the
residents in a reasonably satisfied state of mind; the whims of
a tenant thus had high priority. In time, an Army officer at-
tached to the Manhattan District described Roane-Anderson
as "the best whipping boy the Army ever had."
Turner officials themselves declare that "the management
[94]
ATOMIC CITY HOUSEKEEPER
of the city of Oak Ridge didn't come any closer to being a
construction job than Hirohito came to riding his white horse
through the streets of Washington," but it was, however, a
vast and complicated undertaking.
An idea of the scope and variety of functions Roane- Ander-
son carried out in meeting the unique challenge of Oak
Ridge can be gleaned from the fact that:
It organized and operated a transportation system of over
800 busses, the ninth largest in the United States during the
war years, covering over 2,400,000 miles a month and carry-
ing an average of 120,000 passengers per day during peak op-
erations;
It supervised the operations of 1 7 cafeterias and food-eating
establishments which served a million and a quarter meals a
month, or 40,000 a day;
It operated a cold storage plant which handled 1,200,000
pounds of perishable merchandise a month, of which 75 per
cent was meat;
It ran a farm on the Oak Ridge Area which had a herd of
3,000 cattle and also operated a chicken ranch to supply meat
during the wartime shortages;
It operated a 35-mile railroad line with five locomotives
and a crew of 105 men in keeping 3,000 cars of construction
materials and equipment rolling to the plants each month
(officials of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, which
brought the cars to the area boundary and delivered it to
Roane-Anderson crews, were puzzled by the fact that they
saw thousands of loaded cars going in but only empties com-
ing out);
It operated a million-dollar-a-year laundry business, han-
dling 2,500 dry cleaning and 9,000 laundry customers a week
in addition to 100,000 pounds of flatwork;
It supervised the assignment of more than 500 housemaids
[95]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
and other common labor to the homes of residents and com-
mercial establishments, and for a time employed a group of
hostesses to assist newcomers in becoming oriented;
It served as landlord for over 35,000 housing units which
were in the city of Oak Ridge proper at peak operations, ran
a hotel which had as its guests many of America's most dis-
tinguished men, purchased the supplies for a 337-bed hos-
pital, and paid the salaries of hundreds of patrolmen, police-
men and firemen;
It carried out what was undoubtedly one of the most com-
prehensive "hotel" management jobs in history — the shelter-
ing of 15,000 dormitory residents, almost equally divided be-
tween men and women;
It sought out and brought in nearly 200 private business
cestablishments and service organizations — department stores,
drug stores, shoe shops, barber shops, grocery stores, a bank,
dry cleaners — to serve Oak Ridge residents;
It maintained the nearly 300 miles of roads of a new com-
munity which grew to such size that if you start from the
Empire State Building in New York as one end of the city of
Oak Ridge, the other end will be Passaic, New Jersey; and
It employed 1 0,000 persons at peak operations to carry out
its varied duties.
In addition, it maintained schools and other public build-
ings, operated directly such public services as water supply,
the electric system, central steam plants and sewage and gar-
bage disposal and supervised activities which in any other city
would be performed by all the various individual property
owners, real estate operators and commercial operators.
As in all landlord-tenant relationships, there were at times
discordant notes. A telephone conversation in 1944 illustrates
the attitude of some.
One afternoon the wife of a Carbide and Carbon official
[96]
ATOMIC CITY HOUSEKEEPER
telephoned the Roane-Anderson project manager's wife to in-
vite her to a party. The operator informed her the telephone
was unlisted.
"But," the wife of the Carbide official said, "I'm not calling
on business and I am sure they will not object. Besides, I'm
one of their friends."
The operator was courteous but firm.
"Madam," she replied, "for your information, Roane-An-
derson has no friends."
The telephone operator's analysis of the situation was no
doubt extreme, yet the mushrooming of Oak Ridge during
the war years presented complex problems of management.
But at the war's end, high praise went to Roane-Anderson
from the Manhattan District for the company's contributions
to the atomic project.
In the past few years, Roane-Anderson relinquished many
of its functions in Oak Ridge, although it retained opera-
tional responsibility. Many of its operations were turned over
to private enterprise during the transition of the community
from a war-born Government-dominated city into one having
more of the aspects of the normal American community of
the same size.
For example, the railroad into the city is now an L & N-
operated line, the restaurants and cafeterias are under private
management, the tenants have certain maintenance responsi-
bilities, the 200-bus transportation system is operated by a
private firm, American Industrial Transport, Inc., which
took over in February 1945; laundry and dry cleaning is ac-
complished by private firms, and the principal hotel is under
private management of Alexander Hotels, Inc. Many other
similar steps directed toward normalcy have been taken.
Roane-Anderson Company has done its complex manage-
ment job under a contract prescribing a certain fixed monthly
[97]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
fee for the company, which turns over all funds collected to
the Government.
The contributions of Turner Construction Company in
World War II were not confined to running the community
of Oak Ridge through its subsidiary, the Roane-Anderson
Company. The firm was a part of the far-flung construction
forces which built vital Naval bases in the Pacific. It also con-
structed many important plants for private companies and
branches of the Armed Forces. Among such contracts were
plants for the Atlas Powder Company, Atlas Point, Del.; Elec-
tro Metallurgical Company (a subsidiary of Union Carbide
and Carbon Corporation) Ashtabula, Ohio; Hercules Powder
Company, Belvidere, New Jersey; General Electric Company,
Everett and Lynn, Mass.; Higgins Aircraft, Inc., New Or-
leans; Naval Shipyard, Brooklyn; Pratt & Whitney Aircraft
Corporation, Kansas City, Mo.; the Glenn L. Martin Com-
pany, Middle River, Maryland; the United States Rubber
Company, Chicopee Falls, Mass., and the U. S. Air Base at
Rome, N. Y.
In the latter part of 1943, an elderly woman approached
the Roane-Anderson employment office in Oak Ridge seeking
a job. She called it the "Rogue and Angerson Company."
Asked what she could do and why she wanted to work for
Roane-Anderson, she replied that she was interested in ' 'get-
ting that money time and time again." Slightly confused, she
had heard that good pay was available through "time and
overtime."
"Time and time again," the Turner Construction Com-
pany has made significant contributions in helping to build
up the nation's industrial capacity.
As one of its projects during World War I, Turner built
the War and Navy Office Buildings in Washington under a
contract approved by the then Secretary of the Navy, Frank-
. [98]
ATOMIC CITY HOUSEKEEPER
lin D. Roosevelt; in World War II it managed a "secret city"
as part of a $2,000,000,000 "calculated risk" approved by
President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Turner Construction Company, in two World Wars, has
built and managed for the arsenal of democracy.
[99
CHAPTER VIII
A Story Is Born
IN April 1945, events moved swiftly in the saga of the
A-Bomb. A few days after his inauguration following the
death of President Roosevelt on April 12 at Warm Springs,
Ga., President Truman, who as a United States Senator and
Vice-President had been aware of the project and its implica-
tions, was given a complete, up-to-date picture of the atomic
program at a White House conference by Secretary of War
Stimson and General Groves.
Simultaneously, the 5ogth Composite Group, 31 3th Bomb
Wing, 20th Air Force, was completing its tests on runs with
dummy bombs at its secret base at Wendover, Utah, where
training had started in the Fall of 1944, and was preparing to
leave for the Pacific.
On Tinian, in the Pacific, from which point the "Enola
Gay," a 6-29 with Col. Paul W. Tibbetts, Jr., of Miami, Fla.,
at the controls was to take off on August 5 with its nose
turned toward Hiroshima, construction was well under way
on the Atomic Base under the direction of Col. Elmer E.
Kirkpatrick, who later was to serve as commanding officer at
Oak Ridge.
And in a ceremony in April at the Knoxville, Tenn., Air-
port, a 6-25 bomber, purchased with $250,000 contributed by
A STORY IS BORN
workers in Oak Ridge's K-25 Area, was christened ' 'Sunday
Punch" before being flown to combat in the Pacific.
Earlier in April, the first step was taken in making arrange-
ments for developing the background information for the
newspaper releases which were to fall on a startled world in
August.
At that time, General Groves and Col. W. A. Consodine,
press relations advisor to the General, requested Jack H.
Lockhart, assistant to Byron Price, Director of the Office of
Censorship in Washington, which collaborated closely with
the Manhattan District during the war in maintaining the
secrecy of the atomic venture, to take the War Department
assignment of writing the official story of the A-Bomb. Be-
cause of other commitments, Mr. Lockhart, now Assistant
General Editorial Manager for the Scripps-Howard Newspa-
pers, declined, but recommended William L. Laurence, em-
inent science writer for the New York Times and a Pulitzer
Prize winner in 1937, whose familiarity with the possibilities
of the atom had been revealed as far back as May 5, 1940, in
a Times article. Mr. Laurence also had written an article for
the Saturday Evening Post, September 7, 1940, entitled "The
Atom Gives Up," a stirring look into the future.
When actual work on the atomic project started in 1942,
the Post was requested by Intelligence officials to take the
September 7, 1940, issue out of circulation. Similar requests
were made of libraries over the country and all persons in-
quiring for that particular issue were investigated.
Mr. Laurence, who was to be the only newspaperman pres-
ent at the Alamogordo test explosion in New Mexico July 16,
and later an observer of the Nagasaki blast, reported for duty
with the Manhattan District in Washington on May 8 after
General Groves and Colonel Consodine had discussed his
availability with Edwin L. James, managing editor of the
[101]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Times, in a New York conference. To Mr. Laurence, it was
"one of the biggest stories of all time."
The job of putting the official War Department story of
the atom on paper began May 10 in Oak Ridge when Mr.
Laurence reported to Col. K. D. Nichols, District Engineer
for the Manhattan District. On the previous day, Colonel
Nichols, in a statement concerning the German surrender
May 6, had informed Oak Ridge employees that "the opera-
tions at Clinton Engineer Works will continue in full force
until complete victory over Japan." At that time, the total
strength of the Japanese Army was estimated at 5,000,000.
Mr. Laurence began his quest for official facts with visits
into the huge, restricted Oak Ridge plants. The quest then
took him to Los Alamos, Hanford, Berkeley, California; Chi-
cago and New York, and back again to Oak Ridge, where he
wrote the majority of his stories in a special office set aside
for him in District headquarters. In all, Mr. Laurence trav-
eled over 50,000 miles on his A-bomb itinerary, a tour cli-
maxed as he rode in an escort plane when the second bomb
fell over Nagasaki August 9.
By July, details had been synchronized for the handling
and distribution of the atom story. In Oak Ridge, Lt. George
O. Robinson, Jr., formerly of the Memphis Commercial Ap-
peal, and Public Relations Officer for the Manhattan District,
set up a restricted reproduction room, where 12 hand-picked
members of the Woman's Army Corps Detachment at Oak
Ridge cut the stencils and produced thousands upon thou-
sands of mimeographed sheets which were to go to the public
after the first use in world history of an atomic bomb in
warfare.
Meanwhile, in Washington, Colonel Consodine was enlarg-
ing his staff in preparation for the big break. Assigned to him
there were Lt. Col. Clyde Mathews, formerly with the Jackson
A STORY IS BORN
(Mississippi) Daily News; Major John F. Moynahan, formerly
with the Newark, N. J., News and Capt. Kilburn R. Brown,
former magazine writer. At Hanford Engineer Works, Lt.
Milton R. Cydell, formerly with the Seattle Times, was as-
sisting in the preparations. All aided in writing and develop-
ing the first releases.
Shortly after the arrival of Mr. Laurence in Oak Ridge,
James E. Westcott, staff photographer for the Public Rela-
tions Office, was assigned to take aerial and ground pictures
throughout the Area. Westcott made over 200 exposures from
a chartered plane. Assisted by the late H. B. Smith, another
official Oak Ridge photographer, Westcott's office processed
over 5,000 prints of the 33 pictures — Oak Ridge and Han-
ford scenes and pictures of Manhattan District officials —
which had been selected for official distribution after clear-
ance by Manhattan District Security and War Department
officials. Legends for the photographs were prepared in Oak
Ridge and the pictures assembled there. On July 18, two
days after the Alamogordo test blast, Westcott, entirely un-
aware of the significance of his mission, made the last of
the official pictures, photographs of General Groves and his
assistant, General Thomas F. Farrell, in Washington.
A few days before the end of July, all was in readiness.
Thousands of mimeographed pages of 14 separate press re-
leases had been prepared and together with hundreds of sets
of the 33 official pictures had been flown to Hanford, Los
Alamos and Washington in an Air Force plane under heavy
guard to be held for distribution.
Simultaneously, the last shipment of U-235 for the Hiro-
shima bomb left Oak Ridge July 25, arriving at Tinian
July 27. And on July 25, a directive was prepared for the
signature of General Thomas T. Handy, acting in the absence
of General George C. Marshall, who was in Potsdam, author-
. [ "03 ]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
izing the 5ogth Bomb Group to attack Hiroshima, or as alter-
nates Kokura, Niigata or Nagasaki.
With the completion July 27 of the reproduction of the
first press releases and pictures, Intelligence and Security
agents were dispatched from Oak Ridge, armed with the
official handouts, to key Southern cities — among them Nash-
ville, Memphis, Chattanooga, Atlanta and Birmingham — to
await word of the dropping of the bomb. Releases for the
Knoxville newspapers and radio stations were held in readi-
ness at Oak Ridge and arrangements made to service other
news media directly from Oak Ridge.
The 14 written releases embraced:
1. Account of the July 16, 1945, New Mexico test.
2. General news story based on President Truman's an-
nouncement of the use of the atomic bomb.
3. Story of the discovery of uranium fission.
4. Atomic energy, derivation and theory.
5. The gaseous diffusion plant at Oak Ridge.
6. The electromagnetic plant at Oak Ridge.
7. The thermal diffusion plant at Oak Ridge.
8. The town of Oak Ridge.
9. Hanford Engineer Works.
10. Labor aspects, including recruitment, of the project.
1 1 . Biographical, General Leslie R. Groves, commanding
general of the Manhattan Project.
12. Biographical, General Thomas F. Farrell, Assistant to
General Groves.
13. Biographical, Colonel Kenneth D. Nichols, District En-
gineer, Manhattan District.
14. Biographical, Colonel Franklin T. Matthias, officer in
charge of the Hanford Engineer Works.
The basic work completed, key officials of the Manhattan
District and the War Department stood at alert for a week as
U. S. Armed Forces
World's first atomic bomb blast (inset) was at Alamogordo, New Mexico; Nagasaki
blast (top)
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A STORY IS BORN
the S-i, the code name for the new weapon, neared its ren-
dezvous with destiny.
As of August 5, President Truman was somewhere in the
Atlantic aboard the USS Augusta on his way home from the
Potsdam Conference. (On January 27, 1947, in a letter to
Dr. Karl Compton of the Massachusetts Institute of Technol-
ogy, President Truman said he had personally made the de-
cision to use the bomb.) In Washington, where the War De-
partment Public Relations Department had been advised by
the Manhattan District to be prepared for the big story, Colo-
nel Consodine, Colonel Mathews and Captain Brown, to-
gether with Robert Ebbinger and Edmund Durkin, were
standing by and Lt. Robinson at Oak Ridge and Lt. Cydell
at Hanford were awaiting the go-ahead signal.
Major Moynahan was with General Farrell on Tinian
awaiting word from the crew of the "Enola Gay," already
winging its way toward Hiroshima, with Admiral William S.
Parsons, Naval ordnance expert, who was as responsible as
any military man for the bomb's development, as the " weap-
oneer" who armed the new machine of destruction. After the
Hiroshima drop, Major Moynahan and General Farrell wrote
leaflets which were scattered over Japan cautioning surrender
lest still more cataclysmic events befall the homeland.
On Monday, August 6, Washington was quiet. The first-
comers to the White House press room had no way of know-
ing that the dawn of the atomic age was about to burst upon
them. The President was still away. At 10 A.M., Eben Ayres,
assistant press secretary, informed the newsmen that "there
might be something later."
At 1 1 A.M., the more than two score newsmen who were by
that time present were met by Maj. Gen. Alexander D. Surles,
War Department Public Relations Officer. Before him was a
press release, the official announcement of the President, who
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
had radioed his approval from the USS Augusta. Additional
press releases were on hand at the Pentagon Building.
Mr. Ayres read the first paragraph, handed out copies. In
a few seconds, press wires throughout the world were hum-
ming with the story of the atomic bomb; little else was to oc-
cupy the attention of the press for some time. On August 9,
the second atomic bomb fell on Nagasaki, delivered by a 6-29,
the "Bockscar," piloted by Major Charles W. Sweeney, of
North Quincy, Mass. Russia entered the war against Japan
and surrender was near. November i was the date which had
been officially set for the invasion of the Japanese homeland
by American troops. The estimates of the expected Amer-
ican casualties varied, but they ran as high as a million. Be-
cause of the atomic bombs, thousands of American boys
whose fate would have been otherwise were safe and no
longer in danger.
President Truman's dramatic August 6 announcement . . .
"Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one
bomb on Hiroshima. That bomb had more power than
20,000 tons of TNT. It is an atomic bomb ... a har-
nessing of the basic power of the universe."
. . . fell on Oak Ridge with a strange impact.
Persons with access to radios were the first to hear. The
men in the plants who had helped to produce the first U-235
to be used in warfare received the news when their wives
telephoned to tell them of what Oak Ridge had done.
"I felt," explained one employee, "that when my wife said
some mention had been made of the atom, she might be split-
ting up herself."
For several hours, there was a strange stirring in the com-
munity, and talk was hushed — some men instinctively whis-
pered "sh-sh-shush" — as if further details were necessary to
A STORY IS BORN
make people believe. By midafternoon, however, the shock
had worn off. Great rejoicing coursed through the business
section, the plants and the homes. Oak Ridgers were so anx-
ious for information that "extras" of Knoxville newspapers
sold for $1.00 a copy; one circulation man disposed of 1600
papers in 35 minutes. In New York, the wife of an official of
Union Carbide and Carbon Corporation greeted her husband
at the door of their home on his return from work: "On the
radio today I heard about a place called Oak Ridge, Tennes-
see. Is that Shangri-La?" Some Carbide people had used
"Shangri-La" as a code word for Oak Ridge during the hush-
hush days.
Oak Ridgers, at last, could talk. Certain words once re-
corded "secret" were no longer secret. After many months of
toil and stress and "buttoned" lips, they could mention the
atom and they rolled out the word with great relish and ex-
hilaration. The workers who had talked about everything but
their work — "your wife, the school system, Heaven and hell,
even the price of babies" — could now discuss the project.
With the dropping of the bomb, Oak Ridge became the
focal point for scores of newspaper, radio, newsreel and maga-
zine representatives. From special press rooms set up in a
dormitory, Casper Hall, by the Public Relations Office, 200,-
ooo words of copy were moved the first four days alone. Rep-
resentatives of the press and radio who have visited Oak
Ridge since that time and continue to visit one of the world's
most unusual cities are numbered in the hundreds.
The revelation of the bomb was an exhilarating experience
for Oak Ridgers. They had said "no" for so long that they
found it difficult to say "yes." Sworn to silence, the force of
habit had become second nature. Never before had so many
people said so little about so much.
They confined their discussions to information officially re-
[ 107]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
leased and to the official statements, one of which, from Colo-
nel Nichols, eased the fears of Tennesseans that there might
be danger of an atomic explosion in Oak Ridge itself. "The
safety records achieved are superior; many industries have
far greater hazards," the jittery were advised.
The exuberance of the occasion reached far and wide.
On the morning of August 7, when the Southern Railroad's
train from Washington rolled into the Knoxville station, a
Pullman porter announced to his passengers:
"You are now entering Knoxville, the gateway to Oak
Ridge."
Today, Oak Ridge is the gateway to a bright, new world in
constructive uses of atomic energy.
Roosevelt and Oak Ridge
President Roosevelt did not get to see Oak Ridge.
On April 10, 1945, however, two days before the Presi-
dent's death, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson made a tour
of the plants. Special ramps were built in one of the plant
areas to accommodate Mr. Stimson; because of the ramps,
word spread that Mr. Roosevelt was en route to Oak Ridge.
Instead, he was at Warm Springs.
Mr. Roosevelt, it is recorded, was given his last information
on the status of the A-Bomb program on March 25, 1945, by
Secretary Stimson at the White House.
Significant Dates
Three significant events occurred during World War II on
the Sixth of the Month.
On June 6, 1944, General Dwight Eisenhower's forces
stormed the French Coast on D-Day; on May 6, 1945, the
A STORY IS BORN
Germans surrendered and on August 6, 1945, the first atomic
bomb used in warfare was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan.
Oak Ridge also apparently has an affinity for the month of
August. In addition to the first atomic bomb being dropped
August 6, 1945, the Manhattan District was established Au-
gust 13, 1942; the bill establishing a Civilian Commission to
take over the atomic project from the War Department was
signed into law by President Truman on August i, 1946, and
the first radioactive materials for purposes of peacetime re-
search in biology, medicine, agriculture and industry were
shipped from the atomic "furnace" at Oak Ridge National
Laboratory on August 2, 1946.
[ 109]
CHAPTER IX
Into Civilian Hands
THE miracle of the atomic bomb was wrought by the most
unusual combination of fundamental scientific research,
of technical development both in and out of the laboratory,
of mass production and of management and labor ever
achieved in American history. The results were obtained
through the most zealous, active and self-sacrificing coopera-
tion, by hundreds of thousands of Americans in numerous
different walks of life, that this country has ever known, all
carried out in absolute secrecy and seclusion.
In a stragetic race against time, a generation of national
effort was, in effect, compressed into a period of barely five
years.
When the hostilities ended, the Manhattan Project, at a
cost of nearly $2,000,000,000 had developed two atomic
bombs which helped hasten the fall of Japan. The military
objective of the project had been reached. In the American
tradition, the time had come for transfer of the vast enter-
prise into civilian hands.
The transfer, however, was slow in evolving. The Congress,
with the national and international implications of the new
force of atomic energy weighing heavily upon it, was immedi-
ately indecisive as how best to set up a civilian organization
[110]
INTO CIVILIAN HANDS
which would assume responsibility for utilizing atomic en-
ergy for improving the public welfare and promoting world
peace. The powers to be granted such a civilian organization
and the extent to which the military would participate in its
program brought on lengthy debate.
After long examination by a special Committee of the Con-
gress established in the Fall of 1945 to examine the nature
and implications of atomic energy and to frame the basic law
under which atomic energy would be controlled and devel-
oped, an Act was finally written and agreed upon in July
1946.
On August i, 1946, almost a year to the day after the first
atomic bomb fell on Hiroshima, President Truman signed
into law the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, better known as the
McMahon Act, named for Senator Brien McMahon of Con-
necticut, who introduced the legislation as first chairman of
the Senate-House Joint Committee on Atomic Energy.
On October 28, 1946, President Truman announced the
members of the five-man Atomic Energy Commission as pro-
vided in the Atomic Energy Act. As chairman, he designated
David E. Lilienthal, former chairman of the Tennessee Valley
Authority, who also had served as chairman of a Board of
Consultants to the Secretary of State's Committee on Atomic
Energy. The Board prepared a report which was used in the
development of the American proposals for atomic energy
control to the United Nations' Atomic Energy Commission,
commonly referred to as the Acheson-Lilienthal Report.
(Dean Acheson, later to be named Secretary of State by Presi-
dent Truman.)
Others members named were Dr. Robert F. Bacher, a lead-
ing U. S. physicist who participated in the development of
the atomic bomb; Sumner T. Pike, business executive and
former member of the Securities Exchange Commission;
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Lewis L. Strauss, New York business leader and a Rear Ad-
miral in World War II; and William W. Waymack, editor of
the Des Moines Register-Tribune.
On January i, 1947, the Manhattan Project, which owned
or leased more land than all of Rhode Island and had in its
possession more material and equipment than could be
stored in the Empire State Building, was officially transferred
to the Atomic Energy Commission. But the Commission it-
self was not to be formally cleared to take office until April
9, 1947, when, after lengthy and spirited hearings before the
Senate Committee on Atomic Energy on the qualifications of
Mr. Lilienthal and the other nominees, the Senate confirmed
them by a vote of 50 to 31.
From the hearings emerged what is generally regarded
as one of the most dramatic and forceful enunciations of its
kind on record of an individual's conception of the meaning
of democracy and the American way of life. The speaker was
Mr. Lilienthal. Questioned on his political views and phi-
losophy, Mr. Lilienthal, in an oral statement delivered ex-
temporaneously under the pressure of a public hearing, said:
"I believe in — and I conceive the Constitution of the
United States to rest upon, as does religion — the fundamental
proposition of the integrity of the individual; and that all
government and all private institutions must be designed to
promote and protect and defend the integrity and the dignity
of the individual.
"Any form of government, therefore, and any other institu-
tions, which make men means rather than ends, which exalt
the state or any other institutions above the importance of
men, which place arbitrary power over men as a fundamental
tenet of government, or any other institutions, are contrary
to this conception; and therefore I am deeply opposed to
them.
[112]
INTO CIVILIAN HANDS
"The Communistic philosophy, as well as the Communistic
form of government, fall within this category, for its funda-
mental tenet is quite to the contrary. The fundamental tenet
of Communism is that the state is an end in itself, and that
therefore the powers which the state exercises over the indi-
vidual are without any ethical standards to limit them. That
I deeply disbelieve.
"It is important to believe those things which provide a
satisfactory and effective alternative. Democracy is that satis-
fying affirmative alternative.
"One of the tenets of democracy that has grown out of this
central core of a belief that the individual comes first, that all
men are the children of God and their personalities are there-
fore sacred, carried with it a great belief in civil liberties and
their protection and a repugnance to anyone who would steal
from a human being that which is most precious to him, his
good name; either by imputing things to him, by innuendo,
or by insinuation.
"I deeply believe in the capacity of democracy to surmount
any trials that may lie ahead provided only we practice it in
our daily lives."
In taking over the atomic energy project, the Atomic En-
ergy Commission found that the uncertainty at the end of the
war and the delay in the development of a clear, concise di-
rective on future policies for the great, new enterprise had
dulled the momentum of the Manhattan Project. The per-
sonnel problem as it related to key scientific workers, many of
whom desired to return to the universities and the classrooms,
was especially acute. The massive production and research
facilities had been unable to go forward with the full speed
necessary to maintain this country's pre-eminence in the field
of atomic energy. The War Department, acting as custodian
of the properties until proper civilian control could be estab-
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
lished, had been given no decisive order enabling it to de-
velop a long-range program.
Thus it came about that when the Atomic Energy Com-
mission assumed jurisdiction in 1947, it was faced with a tre-
mendous task. But once confirmed by the Senate, the Com-
mission advanced rapidly in its reorganization of the project
and in formulating long-range plans designed to obtain the
maximum benefits from atomic energy. By August 15, 1947,
when the Manhattan District was dissolved by the War De-
partment— almost five years to the day since it had been es-
tablished— the Atomic Energy Commission was making swift
progress in the development of sound programs for the peace-
ful application of atomic energy.
Today, the Commission, which under the Atomic Energy
Act maintains its headquarters in Washington, guides the
destinies of a great enterprise which has made and continues
to make rapid advances in the atomic energy field.
Under its jurisdiction come a General Manager with of-
fices in Washington and separate offices of operations in
different parts of the country. A Manager is in charge of
each Office of Operation. The offices are Oak Ridge, site of
the production facilities for uranium-235 and the Oak Ridge
National Laboratory, nuclear research center; New York,
which has as its primary function the preparation of feed
materials for the plants, and also supervises the contract for
the operations of Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long
Island; Hanford, site of the production facilities for pluto-
nium; Los Alamos, the center of weapons research, develop-
ment and production; and Chicago, which administers the
contract for the Argonne National Laboratory, the third of
the Commission's national laboratories. In addition, Chicago
administers the contracts for research activities at Ames,
Iowa; Berkeley, California; Pittsburgh, Pa., and Schenectady,
INTO CIVILIAN HANDS
N. Y., and Oak Ridge administers the contracts for research
activities at Miamisburg, Ohio, and Marion, Ohio, in facili-
ties operated for the Commission by the Monsanto Chemical
Company.
The Atomic Energy Commission's program is basically con-
cerned with the production of fissionable and special mate-
rials, military applications of atomic energy, the development
of nuclear reactors, research in the fields of biology and medi-
cine and research in the physical sciences. Nearly 1300 plants,
laboratories, research centers and participating institutions
are engaged on this work under contract with the AEC.
Production activity ranges from the exploration for ura-
nium ores to the refinement of plutonium. The discovery,
development, mining and extraction of uranium from ores
requires extensive geological exploration and the stimula-
tion of activity by private prospectors and mining companies.
A great deal of this activity centers in the area of the Colorado
Plateau. In addition, large quantities of uranium ore are pro-
cured from the Belgian Congo and from Canada.
The New York Operations Office supervises the contracts
for converting the uranium concentrates into two principal
types of feed material for the production plants. One is pure
uranium metal required for the giant nuclear reactors at
Hanford. The other is uranium in the form of gaseous ura-
nium hexafluoride which is the feed material for the Oak
Ridge production plant. Purity standards normally found
only in pharmaceutical materials are demanded.
The final product at Oak Ridge is Uranium-235, an in-
gredient essential either for atomic bombs or for special nu-
clear reactors useful for a variety of purposes and ultimately,
it is hoped, for the production of power for commercial pur-
poses. The product at Hanford is plutonium, a man-made
element produced by the transmutation of Uranium-238
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
atoms into plutonium, an ingredient also essential for atomic
bombs.
Los Alamos is the headquarters for the research, develop-
ment, production and tests of atomic weapons, which are
complicated pieces of machinery and involve many other com-
ponents beyond U-235 and plutonium and many activities
beyond these conducted at Los Alamos.
Many laboratories over the United States are involved in
the development of nuclear reactors, the first major atomic en-
ergy machine developed other than the bomb. In this field
lie the real hopes for the future peaceful applications of
atomic energy in the form of power and the production of
new and useful materials. A few years may pass before re-
actors will be built which provide useful energy for the gen-
eration of electricity — power for factories, lights for homes
and propulsion for ships and planes — but the problem has
been attacked with vigor by the Commission in the establish-
ment in Idaho of a national nuclear reactor testing station
comprising around 400,000 acres. Users of this field facility, a
proving ground for the national reactor development pro-
gram, include the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the
Brookhaven National Laboratory, the Los Alamos Scientific
Laboratory, the General Electric Company and the Westing-
house Electric Corporation.
In the field of biology and medicine, the Commission's
three national Laboratories, together with many schools and
universities working under contracts administered by the
Atomic Energy Commission, are pursuing research programs
having far-reaching implications. The effects of radiation
upon living organisms and abnormal cell reproduction (can-
cer) and the effects of radiation on heredity are being studied.
At Oak Ridge National Laboratory, a program involving
100,000 mice is being carried out to determine radiation ef-
INTO CIVILIAN HANDS
fects and the mutation rate caused by measured doses of
radiation. Fruit flies, fish, corn and bread mold also are being
utilized in radiation studies in other programs over the coun-
try. The field of biology and medicine also includes programs
for protection of personnel engaged in atomic energy work,
how best to control radioactive wastes and extensive courses
in the training of people in the new arts developing from
atomic energy.
In the Commission's program for research in the physical
sciences, the National Laboratories at Oak Ridge, at Brook-
haven and at Argonne are playing leading roles. Other major
laboratories also are making vital contributions toward en-
larging the still meager understanding of the mysteries of the
atomic nucleus.
Other important phases of the atomic energy program are
being carried on at Oak Ridge by the Oak Ridge Institute of
Nuclear Studies, Inc., the University of Tennessee, the Re-
search Project for the Application of Nuclear Energy to the
Propulsion of Aircraft and the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology.
The Oak Ridge Institute is composed of 26 member uni-
versities in the South and Southwest and chartered under
Tennessee law. General purposes are (i) to stimulate coopera-
tion between the Government and participating universities
in undertaking fundamental research in atomic energy (2) to
foster increased improved programs of graduate studies and
education in nuclear energy in southern educational institu-
tions and (3) to aid in the unique facilities in Oak Ridge for
graduate research and instruction. The Institute also con-
ducts courses for scientific and medical personnel from over
the country in the handling of radioactive isotopes and car-
ries forward a long-range study of the treatment of malignant
diseases using radioactive materials.
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Member universities are Alabama Polytechnic Institute,
University of Arkansas, Catholic University of America, Duke
University, University of Florida, Emory University, Georgia
Institute of Technology, University of Georgia, Louisiana
State University, Mississippi State College, North Carolina
State College, Rice Institute, Tulane University, University
of Alabama, University of Kentucky, University of Louisville,
University of Mississippi, University of North Carolina, Uni-
versity of Oklahoma, University of South Carolina, Univer-
sity of Tennessee, University of Texas, University of Vir-
ginia, Vanderbilt University, Texas A & M College and
Virginia Polytechnic Institute.
On a 3,ooo-acre tract in the Oak Ridge Area, a program of
general agricultural research has been developed by the Ex-
periment Station of the University of Tennessee under con-
tract with the Atomic Energy Commission. The program in-
cludes both animal and horticultural work. Studies have
involved a herd of cattle which suffered radiation damages in
the atomic bomb test explosion at Alamogordo, New Mexico,
July 16, 1945. Various experiments on animals and crops are
being made using radioactive materials as laboratory tools of
investigation.
The Research Project for the Application of Nuclear En-
ergy to the Propulsion of Aircraft (NEPA) is a combined op-
eration of nine selected companies from the aircraft industry,
operating as members, and the NEPA Central Group, headed
by the Fairchild Engine and Airplane Corporation, prime
contractor under a contract jointly sponsored by the Depart-
ment of the Air Force and the Navy Bureau of Aeronautics.
The Atomic Energy Commission and the National Advisory
Committee for Aeronautics are cooperating. The NEPA proj-
ect comprises investigation of the application of nuclear en-
[us]
INTO CIVILIAN HANDS
ergy to all possible systems of propulsion of aircraft. It in-
cludes studies of closed cycle turbines, open cycle turbines,
turbo-jets, ram jets and rocket devices.
A practice school is conducted in Oak Ridge by the Massa-
chusetts Institute of Technology for certain students in its
School of Engineering.
At Argonne National Laboratory near Chicago, 31 Mid-
western universities and organizations are participating in an-
other far-reaching research program. They are Battelle Me-
morial Institute, Carnegie Institute of Technology, Illinois
Institute of Technology, Indiana University, Iowa State Col-
lege, Kansas State College, Loyola University of Chicago,
Marquette University, Mayo Foundation, Michigan College
of Mining and Technology, Michigan State College, North-
western University, University of Missouri, University of Ne-
braska, University of Pittsburgh, Notre Dame University,
Ohio State University, Oklahoma A & M, Purdue University,
St. Louis University, University of Chicago, University of
Cincinnati, University of Illinois, University of Iowa, Uni-
versity of Kansas, University of Michigan, University of
Minnesota, University of Wisconsin, Washington University
of St. Louis and Western Reserve University.
At Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island, nine
universities of the Northeast are participating in atomic re-
search programs as members of Associated Universities, Inc.,
operator of the Laboratory. They are Columbia University,
Cornell University, Harvard University, Johns Hopkins Uni-
versity, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Princeton
University, University of Pennsylvania, University of Roches-
ter and Yale University.
Other important atomic research facilities are Ames Lab-
oratory (Iowa State College), the University of California
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Radiation Laboratory, the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory,
Schenectady, N. Y.; and the University of Rochester, Roch-
ester, N. Y.
Vigorous comprehensive programs in all fields of atomic
energy are being pursued in many different places under the
auspices of the Atomic Energy Commission. Production of
vital materials has been increased, research programs have
been expanded and great strides have been made in the de-
velopment of nuclear reactors for the ultimate production of
useful power. In tests of atomic weapons in the Pacific — at
Bikini in July 1946 and at Eniwetok in April 1948 — new and
important facts were learned concerning the national de-
fense and security.
Resignations of four members of the original five-man Com-
mission occurred in 1949 and 1950. First to leave was Mr.
Waymack. His resignation was followed by that of Dr. Bacher,
and on November 23, 1949, Mr. Lilienthal ended 20 years of
public service by resigning as Commission chairman. Mr.
Strauss left the Commission April 15, 1950. In a letter to Pres-
ident Truman, Mr. Lilienthal said:
"Although this resignation does bring my work as a public
servant to a close, it does not mean that I do not intend to
continue to be active in public affairs, for this is the first re-
sponsibility of all citizens in a democracy. Indeed, one of my
chief reasons for wishing to return to private life is that I
may be able to engage in public discussion and public affairs
with a greater latitude than is either feasible or suitable for
one who carries public responsibility."
"You have indeed/' the President replied in accepting the
resignation, "through almost 20 consecutive years of public
service in tough pioneering jobs — always under tremendous
pressure — earned the right to retire to private life."
t
INTO CIVILIAN HANDS
Named as successors in the summer of 1949 to Mr. Way-
mack and Dr. Bacher were Gordon Dean, Professor of Law at
the University of California, who served as Assistant to Su-
preme Court Justice Jackson, United States Chief of Counsel
for prosecution of the major Nazi war criminals; and Dr.
Henry DeWolf Smyth, Chairman of the Department of Phys-
ics at Princeton University, and author of the famous "Smyth
Report," the historic technical document on the development
of atomic energy released August 12, 1945, under War De-
partment auspices.
(Of the document, which became a controversial issue as to
the extent it furnished pertinent information for the develop-
ment of atomic weapons, Dr. Smyth told the Joint Congres-
sional Committee on Atomic Energy May 12, 1949: "I would
hate to be the director of a project that was handed that re-
port and asked to make atomic bombs on the basis of it, be-
cause I don't believe I would get very far.")
In 1950, President Truman named Mr. Dean as Commis-
sion chairman and Mr. Pike, Dr. Smyth, Thomas E. Murray,
New York industrial engineer, and T. Keith Glennan, presi-
dent of Case Institute of Technology, Cleveland, Ohio, as
other Commission members.
Atomic Energy's First Great Gift
Radioactive isotopes have been described as the most useful
research tool since the invention of the microscope in the i7th
Century. As atomic energy's first significant contribution to
the development of peacetime welfare, they have become ex-
ceedingly useful in biological, medical, agricultural and in-
dustrial research. They are speeding the fight against disease;
they are enabling scientists to gain a better understanding of
[121]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
the working of the human body and they are helping man to
make more efficient use of nature's materials, to grow more
food and to produce better goods.
Radioactive isotopes assist science as sources of radiation
for many important uses, including the treatment of disease,
and as "tracers" of biological and physical processes formerly
difficult or impossible to observe. Isotopes, already at work in
hundreds of laboratories and hospitals in the United States
and abroad, are adding much to man's knowledge about him-
self and the world around him.
What is an isotope and how is the isotope of an element
made radioactive?
The word isotope is derived from two Greek words: "iso,"
meaning same, and "topos" meaning place. Isotopes are
atoms; in fact the word isotope is merely used to identify
different kinds of atoms of the same element. Most elements
have families of atoms. The element carbon, for example,
has four members in its family, carbon 1 1, carbon 12, carbon
13, and carbon 14. Some elements have more, some less. Each
member of a particular element is called an isotope of that
element and it can be distinguished by its individual and
characteristic weight. In the case of carbon, the isotopes car-
bon 1 2 and carbon 1 3 occur in nature and are stable, whereas
carbon 11 and carbon 14 are "man-made" and radioactive.
Because carbon 1 1 and 14 are radioactive they will emit radia-
tions by which scientists can also detect their presence. All
isotopes of the same element, regardless of whether they are
radioactive or stable, behave chemically in the same way. Be-
cause this is so and because some isotopes, the radioactive
kind, can be identified by the radiation which they give off,
they can be mixed with ordinary stable isotopes of the ele-
ment and used to trace the atoms of this particular element
through any chemical, biochemical or physical process. The
[
INTO CIVILIAN HANDS
identity and location of the radioactive isotope, invisible but
potent, is determined by sensitive instruments.
Most elements, that is, the stable isotopes of the element,
can be made radioactive by bombarding them with tiny par-
ticles called neutrons. Millions upon millions of these neu-
trons are produced every second in a nuclear reactor or
"atomic furnace" by the splitting or fissioning of uranium-
235 atoms. In the reactor at the Oak Ridge National Labora-
tory, the source of most of the radioactive isotopes being
made available, about a million times a million neutrons are
formed every second in a space the size of your little finger-
nail. For this reason, a nuclear reactor is the best device yet
found for making radioactive isotopes.
The atomic rays in the "atomic furnace" are confined by
a huge, protective, concrete shield which surrounds the "fur-
nace," which is a huge "pile" of graphite in which uranium
slugs of pre-determined size are arranged in a certain manner
to bring about a chain reaction. If a sample of some stable
element such as phosphorus, copper, zinc or iron is inserted
in the "furnace" to be bombarded by the rays, they are made
radioactive, or teeming with radiation.
This is what takes place. A sample of a stable element is
placed in a small aluminum can. This is then inserted in a
graphite carrier and shoved through a special opening into
the "furnace." The whole operation may be likened to put-
ting biscuits into an oven to cook — in this case an "atomic
oven." The sample is "cooked" — actually irradiated by the
intense breaking up of the uranium-235 atoms in the chain
reaction — for some specified length of time, usually a week to
over a month. It is now radioactivated; the result is a radio-
active isotope from the original stable element placed in the
"furnace."
The fact that radioisotopes of most of the elements can be
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
made in the uranium chain-reactor has made possible a wide
scope of use in such fields as medical therapy, animal and
plant physiology, bacteriology, physics, chemistry, industrial
and agricultural research and metallurgy.
In the medical field, radioactive iodine is being used to
treat persons with overactive thyroid glands, or with cancer
of the thyroid, because the gland absorbs almost all the iodine
taken into the body. Radioiodine is similarly being used to
trace out new cancers that have spread from a thyroid root.
Radiophosphorus is being used to curb the excessive pro-
duction of red blood corpuscles in patients with the disease
polychthemia vera and has gained relief for patients with
leukemia, a disease marked by the cancerous overproduction
of white blood corpuscles.
Medical workers are using radioactive iodine in tagged
radioactive dye (diiodofluorescein) to locate brain tumors be-
fore surgery. The dye is taken up more selectively by brain
tumor tissue than by normal brain tissue. The radioactive io-
dine's radiations penetrate the skull of the patient's head and
show the surgeon where the tumor mass is located. Some in-
vestigators also are using radioactive phosphorus or P 32 as a
supplementary tool in brain tumor surgery. The radiation
from P 32 cannot penetrate through the skull and therefore
cannot be used in the same way. If the patient is given P 32
before surgery, however, it also is selectively absorbed by
brain tumor tissue. After the surgical incision has been made
the surgeon can insert a small Geiger-counter tube (about
one-eighth inch in diameter) through the incision into the
mass of the brain and determine by the concentration of
radioactivity what part of the tissue is tumor.
Metallic cobalt, when irradiated, emits radiations very sim-
ilar to those of radium. Radiocobalt is being used as a substi-
tute for radium, one of the established tools for destroying
J. E. Westcott
are shipped throughout the world to help humanity.
INTO CIVILIAN HANDS
cancer cells. Radiocobalt, much cheaper in price than radium,
can be made up in various pliable shapes having more potent
radiation than radium and can be stored with proper protec-
tion as a fine wire on a spool and clipped off in quantities as
desired. Irradiated cobalt plaques equivalent to million-volt
X-ray machines have been developed. A powerful new tool is
now available in the fight against cancer.
These uses are indicative of the wide value of the new re-
search tool — radioactive materials. The first shipment of
radioactive materials for research and medical purposes left
the Oak Ridge National Laboratory August 2, 1946, almost
a year from the time the first atomic bomb used in warfare
fell on Hiroshima. Since that time, thousands upon thou-
sands of shipments of radioactive isotopes of various elements
have gone to research institutions and hospitals in this coun-
try and abroad.
An isotope helped make history; uranium-235, used in the
first atomic bomb, is one of the isotopes of uranium. From
the constructive uses of the new "man-made" radioactive iso-
topes will unfold new knowledge which will give comfort to
all mankind.
American Museum of Atomic Energy
The American Museum of Atomic Energy, the world's first
permanent museum devoted exclusively to telling the story
of the atom, is situated in Oak Ridge. It is operated by the
Oak Ridge Institute of Nuclear Studies, Inc.
Through scale models, pictures, maps and diagrams, the
Museum shows, among other things, the massive plants for
the separation of uranium-235, the model of a uranium
chain-reacting pile (atomic "furnace"), the production of
radioactive isotopes, the possibilities for production of power
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
from nuclear energy, a 25o,ooo-volt generator used in atomic
energy work, a model of a pitchblende mine and the first
small-scale model for the production of U-235 DY tne gaseous
diffusion method. These and many other processes and prin-
ciples of atomic energy are explained in exhibits occupying
18,000 square feet of floor space.
The Museum is operated for the benefit of the public.
CHAPTER X
Oak Ridge and the Future
CHANGE is the only tradition that Oak Ridge has known
in its brief but dramatic existence.
Oak Ridge is taking deep root in Tennessee soil — green
grass, rose bushes and well-kept lawns bespeak of community
pride and permanency — but the changes continue. The tran-
sition is from a town wholly-owned and operated by the
United States Government to one administered by its own
citizens under established procedures of local self-rule — a
self-governing and self-financing community.
An objective has been set for the city. It is for a community
which will provide good living for people depended upon to
do good work; it is to give Oak Ridge as great a degree of
normality as can be achieved within the bounds of national
defense and security and the efficient operation of the pro-
gram it is built to serve — leadership in all fields of atomic
energy.
In 1948, the Atomic Energy Commission set its sights on
three major steps to make Oak Ridge a self-governing, self-
supporting municipality occupying a normal place among
other cities and towns of Tennessee.
They were (i) the elimination of barriers guarding Oak
Ridge and the opening of the community proper to the
[127]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
general public with a simultaneous elaboration of security
measures for the atomic energy production and research
facilities; (2) private ownership of real property within Oak
Ridge, either on the basis of sale or long-term lease of land,
thereby stimulating development of needed facilities by pri-
vate enterprise and stimulating home ownership; and (3) in-
corporation of the city under Tennessee charter.
The first of these objectives has been accomplished. The
second step has been developed. Until the third problem is
reconciled, Oak Ridge's city functions — police, fire and
health departments, schools, street work and repairs and
other activities — will continue to be administered by city
officials appointed and employed by the Atomic Energy Com-
mission. The city has no tax structure, nor many other mu-
nicipal features of the normal American community. Incor-
poration of the city is the prime requisite in this direction.
From the Spring of 1943 to March 1949, the entire Oak
Ridge Area was closed. All entrances to the Area were re-
stricted and passes to enter any portion of the Area, including
the town itself, were necessary. For all intents and purposes,
Oak Ridge was a forbidding, isolated place for the general
American public.
But at 8:47 A.M. on Saturday, March 19, 1949, the commu-
nity of Oak Ridge entered a new era. At that moment, in a
ceremony at Elza Entrance — near the spot where five men
stood on September 19, 1942, and made definite selection of
a site for the building of secret atomic energy plants — a sig-
nal was given for the opening of the city. The signal was a
small mushroom of smoke as an electrical impulse generated
in the uranium chain-reactor at Oak Ridge National Lab-
oratory 13 miles to the Southwest ignited a tape which had
been treated with potassium chlorate and magnesium.
From 1943 to 1949, a total of 32,243,000 passes had been
[1*8]
OAK RIDGE AND THE FUTURE
written for admittance of persons into the city; now passes
were no longer required. Of the Oak Ridge Area's 58,762
acres, 24,000, including the community, were opened for
access to the public through Elza, Edgemoor, Solway and
Oliver Springs entrances. New security fences were built to
protect the new controlled area of 34,762 acres, not open to
the general public, in which stand atomic energy production
and research units.
Seventy-five thousand persons crowded into the city on
March 1 9 for the festivities. They heard Vice-President Alben
Barkley take note of the unique "opening" of an American
town to warn that "the United States does not propose to be
fenced in by any nation in the world"; they heard Senator
Brien McMahon of Connecticut describe the event as "con-
trary to the current of the times; elsewhere in the world, areas
of freedom are contracting, while here, in the least likely of
places, the boundaries of freedom are expanding"; and they
heard David E. Lilienthal, then Chairman of the Atomic
Energy Commission, declare that "it is not natural and nor-
mal for Americans to live behind barriers; guards and fences
and secret stamps on documents in themselves do not pro-
mote real security."
They heard not only these men, but others, including
Senator Estes Kefauver, Governor Gordon Browning and
Congressmen Albert Gore and John Jennings, Jr., all of
Tennessee, and mingled with movie stars, among them Lee
Bowman, Marie McDonald, Rod Cameron and Adolphe
Menjou, who expressed the hope that "never again in the
history of mankind will it be necessary for Oak Ridge to
unleash the genii of atomic energy for the destruction of
mankind."
For Oak Ridge, it was the biggest day since August 6, 1945.
Being different — living behind wire fences and guards — had
[
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
become tiresome for most of the residents. The fears of a few
dissenters that the opening of the city would increase crime,
encourage prowlers, and endanger children through non-
observance of safety rules by an influx of visitors, have not
been realized.
Many factors are giving impetus to the movement of Oak
Ridge toward normality. Serving the community is a five-day-
a-week afternoon newspaper, The Oak Ridger, and a radio
station, WATO, both independently owned and operated.
A Chamber of Commerce is active; the city has a Golf and
Country Club.
Hundreds of new homes and apartments to replace emer-
gency shelter built during wartime have been constructed,
as have new schools. The site for a new central business dis-
trict, on which private businesses have been encouraged to
erect their own buildings, has been developed. A Master
Plan for the orderly transition of the city from its camptown
atmosphere to one having permanent aspects has been used
as a guide for the city's future physical growth.
Land already has been sold to churches for construction of
their own buildings. Two funeral homes are in operation
but so far no cemeteries for use by Oak Ridge residents have
been set aside; the 65 cemeteries in the Oak Ridge Area are
those taken over by the Government in 1942. Oak Ridge
has no railroad station or airport, but these have been dis-
cussed. Management of residential and business property re-
mains in Government hands but it is anticipated that private
interests will eventually handle all the properties.
When World War II ended, opinions differed as to what
had been hatched in Oak Ridge besides the material for the
atomic bomb. Some felt it was a "hellish" place, others re-
garded it as "heavenly."
[ 130]
OAK RIDGE AND THE FUTURE
Those sharing the latter view subscribed to the prediction
made around the turn of the Twentieth Century by John
Hendrix, the prophet of the East Tennessee hills, that the
great city he saw in his visions and which he said would be
built on the ridges and the valleys now constituting the Oak
Ridge Area would be known as "Paradise."
But Oak Ridge is no "paradise." The people who make it
up are the same as those who make up the thousands of other
American cities and towns.
The future of Oak Ridge depends on many minds and
hearts. On September 23, 1949, President Truman an-
nounced to the American public that "we have evidence that
within recent weeks an atomic explosion occurred in Russia."
With agreement on international control of atomic energy
still undetermined on that date, the immediate reaction of
the United States Government was the authorization of con-
struction of giant, new facilities for the production of fission-
able materials at Oak Ridge involving an expenditure of
millions of dollars. Research facilities also have been
strengthened.
Then, on January 31, 1950, President Truman, in a world-
shaking announcement, revealed that "I have directed the
Atomic Energy Commission to continue its work on all
forms of atomic weapons, including the so-called hydrogen,
or super-bomb . . . until a satisfactory plan for interna-
tional control of atomic energy is achieved." Congress ap-
propriated millions for the project and a site other than Oak
Ridge was selected for the building of plants for production
of certain materials.
So, of Oak Ridge, the city, and of Oak Ridge, the atomic
center, at least one accurate prediction can be made:
Oak Ridge will never be an entirely normal place. For not
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
only are the 30,000 persons who make up its population con-
cerned with it but 150,000,000 other Americans as well. Oak
Ridge can never live unto itself alone.
Safety in the Atomic Age
From its inception, Oak Ridge's record in all fields of
safety has been remarkable. Despite the great hazards of
radiation during the building and operation of the atomic
energy facilities, there have been no known overexposures
to radiation in Oak Ridge. The Manhattan District program
of protection against radiation hazards was developed by
Col. Stafford L. Warren, chief of the District's Medical Divi-
sion, and Dr. Robert S. Stone, of the University of Cali-
fornia, who served as Associate Project Director for Health.
The program has been carried forward and improved on by
the Atomic Energy Commission, so successfully that in 1949
a representative of the insurance industry said that "from the
standpoint of health and safety, the records of the atomic
plants and laboratories are excellent. It is as safe to work in
any atomic energy plant as it is to work in any heavy or
chemical industry."
On December 5, 1945, the Manhattan District and its con-
tractors were presented the National Safety Council's Award
for Distinguished Service to Safety for "achieving and main-
taining low accident rates at the Manhattan District facilities
throughout the country under the urgent demands for speed
in the unique processes attaining the development of the
atomic bomb and thereby making a signal contribution to
early victory."
Oak Ridge, the city, won the National Safety Council's
Award of Merit Plaque in 1945 for its record of traffic safety.
In 1946, 1947 and 1948, the city received the National Safety
Council's Citation for Achievement in traffic safety. An
Atomic Energy Commission
and new apartments . . .
J. E. Westcott
. of modern design . . *
Atomic Energy Commission
as it travels . . .
Atomic Energy Commission
toward a new era
OAK RIDGE AND THE FUTURE
Award of Recognition from the Tennessee Safety Council
also went to the city in 1948.
At 3:15 A.M. on November 5, 1949, one of the most im-
pressive records in the history of American safety campaigns
— for cities of over 15,000 population — 1,423 days without
a traffic fatality in Oak Ridge — came to an end with the
death of an automobile driver as his car left the fog-shrouded
Oak Ridge Turnpike and overturned.
In 1945, 1946, 1947, 1948 and 1949, Honor Roll Certifica-
tions from the National Safety Council went to the eleven
schools in Oak Ridge for their safety accomplishments.
In 1949, American Industrial Transport, Inc., operators
of the Oak Ridge bus system, was awarded first place in the
nation by the National Safety Council for its safety record in
the city suburban division contest for the period July i, 1948,
to June 30, 1949. American Industrial Transport also placed
first in safety in 1947 in Group One, City Buses Division,
National Safety Council contest and was second in the same
division in 1948.
The city also has received several awards in fire prevention
campaigns, placing first in 1947 and 1948 in the United
States and Canada in contests sponsored by the National Fire
Prevention Association. In 1948, the city also received a Cer-
tificate of Merit in the Fire Waste Contest sponsored by the
United States Chamber of Commerce.
The K-25 and Y-12 plants of Carbide and Carbon Chem-
icals Division tied for first place in 1948 in the National
Industrial Competition of the National Fire Prevention As-
sociation and Roane-Anderson Company, management con-
tractor for the community, placed fourth.
[•S3]
Appendices
Organizations Receiving Army-Navy "E" Awards.
Personnel in Manhattan District Receiving Significant
War Department Awards.
An Accounting of the World's First Atomic Bomb Blast.
Scientific Developments Leading to the Formation of the
Manhattan District and the Building of Oak Ridge.
The Provision of Manpower for the Manhattan Project.
Tribute to Manhattan District Personnel.
An Accounting of the Successful Operation of the First
Self-Sustaining Nuclear Chain Reactor in World History.
Organizations and Churches in Oak Ridge.
t'34]
APPENDICES
"E" Awards
In a ceremony at Oak Ridge September 29, 1945, at which
Secretary of War Robert Patterson was the principal speaker,
the following contractors who participated in the building
and operations of Oak Ridge facilities were presented the
Army-Navy "E'* Award for "excellence in war production":
Carbide and Carbon Chemicals Division, Union Carbide
and Carbon Corporation
Tennessee Eastman Corporation
Stone & Webster Engineering Corporation
Monsanto Chemical Company
H. K. Ferguson Company
The Fercleve Corporation
Ford, Bacon and Davis, Inc.
J. A. Jones Construction Company
Kellex Corporation
Other organizations which also received "E" Awards as
participants in the Manhattan District program were:
Hooker Electro-Chemical Company, Niagara Falls, N. Y.
Electro Metallurgical Company, Niagara Falls, N. Y.
Linde Air Products Company, Buffalo, N. Y.
Harshaw Chemical Company, Cleveland, Ohio
Chrysler Corporation, Detroit, Michigan
Houdaille-Hershey Company, Decatur, 111.
Mallinckrodt Chemical Works, St. Louis, Mo.
Iowa State College, Ames, Iowa
Scientific Laboratory, University of California,
Los Alamos, New Mexico
McKee Construction Company, Los Alamos, New Mexico
E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, Richland,
Washington
['35]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Certificates of Merit signed by the Secretary of War also
were presented the University of California, the University
of Chicago and Columbia University.
Awards to Army Personnel
Special War Department recognition went to the follow-
ing Army personnel in the Fall of 1 945 for their work on the
A-Bomb Project:
Distinguished Service Medal
General Leslie R. Groves (Washington)
General Thomas F. Farrell (Washington)
Col. Kenneth D. Nichols (Oak Ridge)
Col. Stafford L. Warren (Oak Ridge)
Col. Franklin T. Matthias (Hanford)
Legion of Merit
(Oak Ridge personnel)
Col. Walter J. Williams
Lt. Col. Richard W. Cook
Lt. Col. Charles Vanden Bulck
Col. Earl H. Marsden
Col. W. B. Parsons
Lt. Col. John S. Hodgson
Lt. Col. John R. Ruhoff
Lt. Col. Arthur V. Peterson
Lt. Col. Hymer L. Friedell
Lt. Col. Charles E. Rea
Lt. Col. Mark C. Fox
Lt. Col. Alfonso Tammaro
Lt. Col. W. P. Cornelius
Lt. Col. Curtis A. Nelson
Major Harry S. Traynor
APPENDICES
Capt. Arlene G. Scheidenhelm
Warrant Officer Murray S. Levine
Lt. George O. Robinson, Jr.
Legion of Merit
(Other Manhattan District personnel)
Col. Donald E. Antes
Col. Clarence D. Barker
Major H. K. Calvert
Col. William A. Consodine
Col. John A. Derry
Lt. Col. Peer de Silva
Major Harold A. Fidler
Lt. Col. Allan C. Johnson
Major Wilbur E. Kelley
Col. John Lansdale, Jr.
Brig. Gen. James C. Marshall
Capt. James F. Nolan
Lt. Walter A. Parish
Major Claude C. Pierce, Jr.
Col. Lyle E. Seeman
Major Francis J. Smith
Lt. Col. Stanley L. Stewart
Lt. Col. James C. Stowers
Col. Gerald R. Tyler
Major John E. Vance
Lt. Joseph Volpe, Jr.
Major Robert J. Wier
An Accounting of the World's First Atomic Bomb Blast,
Alamogordo, New Mexico, July 16, 1945, Official
War Department Release — August 6, 1945
Mankind's successful transition to a new age, the Atomic
Age, was ushered in July 16, 1945, before the eyes of a tense
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
group of renowned scientists and military men gathered in
the desertlands of New Mexico to witness the first end re-
sults of their $2,000,000,000 effort. Here in a remote section
of the Alamogordo Air Base 120 miles southeast of Albu-
querque the first man-made atomic explosion, the outstand-
ing achievement of nuclear science, was achieved at 5:30 A.M.
of that day. Darkening heavens, pouring forth rain and
lightning immediately up to the zero hour, heightened the
drama.
Mounted on a steel tower, a revolutionary weapon des-
tined to change war as we know it, or which may even be the
instrumentality to end all wars, was set off with an impact
which signalized man's entrance into a new physical world.
Success was greater than the most ambitious estimates. A
small amount of matter, the product of a chain of huge spe-
cially constructed industrial plants, was made to release the
energy of the universe locked up within the atom from the
beginning of time. A fabulous achievement had been
reached. Speculative theory, barely established in pre-war
laboratories, had been projected into practicality.
This phase of the Atomic Bomb Project, headed by Major
General Leslie R. Groves, was under the direction of Dr.
J. R. Oppenheimer, theoretical physicist of the University of
California. He is to be credited with achieving the imple-
mentation of atomic energy for military purposes.
Tension before the actual detonation was at a tremendous
pitch. Failure was an ever-present possibility. Too great a
success, envisioned by some of those present, might have
meant an uncontrollable, unusable weapon.
Final assembly of the atomic bomb began on the night of
July 12 in an old ranch house. As various component assem-
blies arrived from distant points, tension among the scien-
tists rose to an increasing pitch. Coolest of all was the man
APPENDICES
charged with the actual assembly of the vital core, Dr. R. F.
Bacher, in normal times a Professor at Cornell University.
The entire cost of the project, representing the erection of
whole cities and radically new plants spread over many miles
of countryside, plus unprecedented experimentation, was
represented in the pilot bomb and its parts. Here was the
focal point of the venture. No other country in the world
had been capable of such an outlay in brains and technical
effort.
The full significance of these closing moments before the
final factual test was not lost on these men of science. They
fully knew their position as pioneers into another Age. They
also knew that one false move would blast them and their
entire effort into eternity. Before the assembly started a re-
ceipt for the vital matter was signed by Brigadier General
Thomas F. Farrell, General Groves' deputy. This signalized
the formal transfer of the irreplaceable material from the
scientists to the Army.
During final preliminary assembly, a bad few minutes de-
veloped when the assembly of an important section of the
bomb was delayed. The entire unit was machine-tooled to
the finest measurement. The insertion was partially com-
pleted when it apparently wedged tightly and would go no
farther. Dr. Bacher, however, was undismayed and reassured
the group that time would solve the problem. In three min-
utes' time, Dr. Bacher's statement was verified and basic as-
sembly was completed without further incident.
Specialty teams, comprised of the top men on specific
phases of science, all of which were bound up in the whole,
took over their specialized parts of the assembly. In each
group was centralized months and even years of channelized
endeavor.
On Saturday, July 14, the unit which was to determine the
[ 139]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
success or failure of the entire project was elevated to the
top of the steel tower. All that day and the next, the job of
preparation went on. In addition to the apparatus necessary
to cause the detonation, complete instrumentation to deter-
mine the "pulse beat" and all reactions of the bomb was
rigged on the tower.
The ominous weather which had dogged the assembly of
the bomb had a very sobering effect on the assembled experts
whose work was accomplished amid lightning flashes and
peals of thunder. The weather, unusual and upsetting,
blocked out aerial observation of the test. It even held up the
actual explosion scheduled at 4 A.M. for an hour and a half.
For many months the approximate date and time had been
set and had been one of the high level secrets of the best kept
secret of the entire war.
Nearest observation point was set up 10,000 yards south of
the tower where in a timber and earth shelter the controls
for the tests were located. At a point 17,000 yards from the
tower at a point which would give the best observation the
key figures in the atomic bomb project took their posts.
These included General Groves, Dr. Vannevar Bush, head of
the Office of Scientific Research and Development, and Dr.
James B. Conant, president of Harvard University.
Actual detonation was in charge of Dr. K. T. Bainbridge
of Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He and Lieuten-
ant Bush, in charge of the Military Police Detachment, were
the last men to inspect the tower with its cosmic bomb.
At three o'clock in the morning the party moved forward
to the control station. General Groves and Dr. Oppenheimer
consulted with the weathermen. The decision was made to
go ahead with the test despite the lack of assurance of favor-
able weather. The time was set for 5:30 A.M.
General Groves rejoined Dr. Conant and Dr. Bush and
[
APPENDICES
just before the test time, they joined the many scientists
gathered at the Base Camp. Here all present were ordered to
lie on the ground, face downward, heads away from the blast
direction.
Tension reached a tremendous pitch in the control room
as the deadline approached. The several observation points
in the area were tied in to the control room by radio and
with 20 minutes to go, Dr. S. K. Allison of Chicago Univer-
sity took over the radio net and made periodic time an-
nouncements.
The time signals, "minus 20 minutes, minus fifteen min-
utes," and on and on increased the tension to the breaking
point as the group in the control room which included
Dr. Oppenheimer and General Farrell held their breaths, all
praying with the intensity of the moment which will live
forever with each man who was there. At "minus 45 sec-
onds," robot mechanism took over and from that point on
the whole great complicated mass of intricate mechanism
was in operation without human control. Stationed at a re-
serve switch, however, was a soldier scientist ready to attempt
to stop the explosion should the order be issued. The order
never came.
At the appointed time, there was a blinding flash lighting
up the whole area brighter than the brightest daylight. A
mountain range three miles from the observation point stood
out in bold relief. Then came a tremendous sustained roar
and a heavy pressure wave which knocked down two men
outside the control center. Immediately thereafter, a huge
multi-colored surging cloud boiled to an altitude of over
40,000 feet. Clouds in its path disappeared. Soon the shift-
ing substratosphere winds dispersed the now gray mass.
The test was over, the project a success.
The steel tower had been entirely vaporized. Where the
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
tower had stood, there was a huge sloping crater. Dazed but
relieved at the success of their tests, the scientists promptly
marshalled their forces to estimate the strength of America's
new weapon. To examine the nature of the crater, specially
equipped tanks were wheeled into the area, one of which
carried Dr. Enrico Fermi, noted nuclear scientist.
Had it not been for the desolated area where the test was
held and for the cooperation of the press in the area, it is
certain that the test itself would have attracted far reaching
attention. As it was, many people in that area are still dis-
cussing the effect of the smash. A significant aspect, recorded
by the press, was the experience of a blind girl near Albu-
querque .many miles from the scene, who, when the flash of
the test lighted the sky before the explosion could be heard,
exclaimed, "What was that?"
Interviews of General Groves and General Farrell give the
following on-the-scene versions of the test. General Groves
said: "My impressions of the night's high points follow:
After about an hour's sleep I got up at 0100 and from that
time on until about five I was with Dr. Oppenheimer con-
stantly. Naturally he was tense, although his mind was work-
ing at its usual extraordinary efficiency. I attempted to shield
him from the evident concern shown by many of his assist-
ants who were disturbed by the uncertain weather condi-
tions. By 0330 we decided that we could probably fire at
0530. By 0400 the rain had stopped but the sky was heavily
overcast. Our decision became firmer as time went on.
"During most of these hours the two of us journeyed from
the control house out into the darkness to look at the stars
and to assure each other that the one or two visible stars were
becoming brighter. At 0510 I left Dr. Oppenheimer and re-
turned to the main observation point which was 17,000 yards
from the point of explosion. In accordance with our orders
['42]
APPENDICES
I found all personnel not otherwise occupied massed on a bit
of high ground.
"Two minutes before the scheduled firing time, all persons
lay face down with their feet pointing towards the explosion.
As the remaining time was called from the loud speaker from
the 10,000 yard control station there was complete awesome
silence. Dr. Conant said he had never imagined seconds
could be so long. Most of the individuals in accordance with
orders shielded their eyes in one way or another.
"First came the burst of light of a brilliance beyond any
comparison. We all rolled over and looked through dark
glasses at the ball of fire. About forty seconds later came the
shock wave followed by the sound, neither of which seemed
startling after our complete astonishment at the extraordi-
nary lighting intensity.
"A massive cloud was formed which surged and billowed
upward with tremendous power, reaching the substrato-
sphere in about five minutes.
"Two supplementary explosions of minor effect other than
the lighting occurred in the cloud shortly after the main ex-
plosion.
"The cloud traveled to a great height first in the form of a
ball, then mushroomed, then changed into a long trailing
chimney-shaped column and finally was sent in several direc-
tions by the variable winds at the different elevations.
"Dr. Conant reached over and we shook hands in mutual
congratulations. Dr. Bush, who was on the other side of me,
did likewise. The feeling of the entire assembly, even the
uninitiated, was of profound awe. Drs. Conant and Bush and
myself were struck by an even stronger feeling that the faith
of those who had been responsible for the initiation and the
carrying on of this Herculean project has been justified."
General Farrell's impressions are: "The scene inside the
[143]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
shelter was dramatic beyond words. In and around the shel-
ter were some twenty odd people concerned with last minute
arrangements. Included were Dr. Oppenheimer, the Director
who had borne the great scientific burden of developing the
weapon from the raw materials made in Tennessee and
Washington, and a dozen of his key assistants, Dr. Kistiakow-
sky, Dr. Bainbridge, who supervised all the detailed arrange-
ments for the test; the weather expert, and several others.
Besides these, there were a handful of soldiers, two or three
Army officers and one Naval officer. The shelter was filled
with a great variety of instruments and radios.
"For some hectic two hours preceding the blast, General
Groves stayed with the Director. Twenty minutes before the
zero hour, General Groves left for his station at the base
camp, first because it provided a better observation point
and second, because of our rule that he and I must not be
together in situations where there is an element of danger
which existed at both points.
"Just after General Groves left, announcements began to
be broadcast of the interval remaining before the blast to the
other groups participating in and observing the test. As the
time interval grew smaller and changed from minutes to
seconds, the tension increased by leaps and bounds. Everyone
in that room knew the awful potentialities of the thing that
they thought was about to happen. The scientists felt that
their figuring must be right and that the bomb had to go off
but there was in everyone's mind a strong measure of doubt.
The feeling of many could be expressed by 'Lord, I believe;
help Thou mine unbelief/
"We were reaching into the unknown and we did not
know what might come of it. It can safely be said that most
of those present were praying and praying harder than they
[ 144]
APPENDICES
had ever prayed before. If the shot were successful, it was a
justification of the several years of intensive effort of tens of
thousands of people — statesmen, scientists, engineers, manu-
facturers, soldiers, and many others in every walk of life.
"In that brief instant in the remote New Mexico desert,
the tremendous effort of the brains and brawn of all these
people came suddenly and startlingly to the fullest fruition.
Dr. Oppenheimer, on whom had rested a very heavy burden,
grew tenser as the last seconds ticked off. He scarcely
breathed. He held on to a post to steady himself. For the last
few seconds, he stared directly ahead and then when the an-
nouncer shouted "Now!" and there came this tremendous
burst of light followed shortly thereafter by the deep growl-
ing roar of the explosion, his face relaxed into an expression
of tremendous relief. Several of the observers standing back
of the shelter to watch the lighting effects were knocked flat
by the blast.
"The tension in the room let up and all started congratu-
lating each other. Everyone sensed "This is it!" No matter
what might happen now all knew that the impossible scien-
tific job had been done. Atomic fission would no longer be
hidden in the cloisters of the theoretical physicists' dreams.
It was almost full grown at birth. It was a great new force to
be used for good or for evil. There was a feeling in that shel-
ter that those concerned with its nativity should dedicate
their lives to the mission that it would always be used for
good and never for evil.
"Dr. Kistiakowsky threw his arms around Dr. Oppen-
heimer and embraced him with shouts of glee. Others were
equally enthusiastic. All the pent-up emotions were released
in those few minutes and all seemed to sense immediately
that the explosion had far exceeded the most optimistic ex-
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
pectations and wildest hopes of the scientists. All seemed to
feel that they had been present at the birth of a new age —
The Age of Atomic Energy — and felt their profound respon-
sibility to help in guiding into right channels the tremen-
dous forces which had been unlocked for the first time in
history.
"As to the present war, there was a feeling that no matter
what else might happen, we now had the means to insure its
speedy conclusion and save thousands of American lives. As
to the future, there had been brought into being something
big and something new that would prove to be immeasurably
more important than the discovery of electricity or any of the
other great discoveries which have so affected our existence.
"The effects could well be called unprecedented, magnifi-
cent, beautiful, stupendous and terrifying. No man-made
phenomenon of such tremendous power had ever occurred
before. The lighting effects beggared description. The whole
country was lighted by a searing light with the intensity
many times that of the midday sun. It was golden, purple,
violet, gray and blue. It lighted every peak, crevasse and
ridge of the nearby mountain range with a clarity and beauty
that cannot be described but must be seen to be imagined. It
was that beauty the great poets dream about but describe
most poorly and inadequately. Thirty seconds after, the ex-
plosion came first, the air blast pressing hard against the
people and things, to be followed almost immediately by the
strong, sustained, awesome roar which warned of doomsday
and made us feel that we puny things were blasphemous to
dare tamper with the forces heretofore reserved to The Al-
mighty. Words are inadequate tools for the job of acquaint-
ing those not present with the physical, mental and psycho-
logical effects. It had to be witnessed to be realized."
APPENDICES
Scientific Developments Leading to the Formation of
the Manhattan District and the Building of Oak Ridge
The phenomenon of uranium fission, the fact that absorp-
tion of a neutron by a uranium nucleus (11-235) sometimes
causes that nucleus to split into approximately equal parts
with the release of enormous quantities of energy, was con-
firmed early in January 1939 in Denmark by Lise Meitner,
a woman, and O. R. Frisch, both refugees from Hitler's
Germany and colleagues of Dr. Niels Bohr, eminent physi-
cist of Copenhagen. They confirmed experiments originally
made by Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassman at the Kaiser Wil-
helm Institute in Berlin.
Dr. Bohr, who at a later date in World War II was spirited
from under the Nazis' noses in Denmark by British Intelli-
gence and taken to England to assist in certain phases of
atomic energy development, communicated the fact of ura-
nium fission to a former student, J. A. Wheeler and others
at Princeton University, while on a visit to the United States
in the latter part of January 1939.
The news reached other physicists, including Dr. Enrico
Fermi, Italian-born physicist, at Columbia University. Fol-
lowing conversations between Dr. Fermi, Dr. J. R. Dunning
and Dr. G. B. Pegram, also of Columbia, arrangements were
made for additional experiments.
Experiments at Columbia not only confirmed uranium
fission and the implication of a chain reaction but simultane-
ous experimental confirmation came from other research
groups at Carnegie Institution of Washington, Johns Hop-
kins University and the University of California.
The possible military importance of uranium fission was
called to the attention of the Navy in a conference, arranged
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
through Dr. G. B. Pegram in March 1939, by Dr. Fermi, who
suggested the possibility of achieving a controllable uranium
chain reaction for explosive purposes. The Navy asked to be
kept informed on developments.
Dr. Leo Szilard and Dr. Eugene Wigner, also foreign-born
physicists, made the next move to stimulate Government in-
terest. In July 1939 they conferred with Dr. Albert Einstein.
A short time later Drs. Einstein, Szilard and Wigner dis-
cussed the problem with Alexander Sachs, a New York econ-
omist and friend of Roosevelt. That Fall, Mr. Sachs, sup-
ported by a letter from Dr. Einstein, explained to President
Roosevelt the urgency of the matter. The President then ap-
pointed an "Advisory Committee on Uranium" consisting
of L. J. Briggs as chairman, Colonel K. F. Adamson of the
Army Ordnance Department and Commander G. C. Hoover
of the Navy Bureau of Ordnance.
First funds for the purchase of necessary materials — graph-
ite and uranium oxide — for certain measurements was a
sum of $6,000 from the Army and Navy. When the Commit-
tee next met on April 28, 1940, new factors pointing to suc-
cessful use of atomic energy for bombs had been developed
and arrangements were already underway with the Union
Miniere of the Belgian Congo looking toward obtaining a
large supply of uranium ore.
With the organization of the National Defense Research
Committee in June 1940, President Roosevelt directed that
the Uranium Committee be reconstituted as a subcommittee
of the NDRC, reporting to Dr. Vannevar Bush, NDRC
chairman. First contracts for research from the NDRC went
to Columbia University, where in time the first U-235 was
obtained through the gaseous diffusion process on a labora-
tory scale. (This laboratory model now rests in the American
Museum of Atomic Energy at Oak Ridge.)
APPENDICES
Other research contracts went to Princeton University,
Standard Oil Development Company, Cornell University,
Carnegie Institution of Washington, Johns Hopkins Univer-
sity, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of
Virginia, National Bureau of Standards, the University of
Chicago, the University of California, and the University
of Minnesota, where Dr. A. O. Nier first obtained U-235
through the mass spectrograph method, which stimulated
Dr. E. O. Lawrence of the University of California to de-
velop the electromagnetic separation of U-235, feasibility of
which was confirmed by Lawrence on December 8, 1941, the
day after Pearl Harbor.
By November 1941, $300,000 had been allotted for re-
search. In December, with interchange of information with
the British already underway, Dr. Bush and associates felt
that the possibility of obtaining atomic bombs was great
enough to justify an "all out" effort.
This led to the formation of a separate organization, the
Office of Scientific Research and Development. At a meeting
December 16, 1941 — nine days after Pearl Harbor — of the
Government's Top Policy Committee composed of Vice-
President Henry A. Wallace, Secretary of War Henry L. Stim-
son and Dr. Bush (General George C. Marshall and Dr. J. B.
Conant of Harvard, other members, were absent), decisions
were reached which gave great impetus in 1942 to research
on the gaseous diffusion, electromagnetic and thermal diffu-
sion methods for obtaining U-235 and the uranium chain-
reactor program for obtaining plutonium.
On June 13, 1942, a report recommended expansion of
the atomic bomb program. President Roosevelt approved it
on June 17. On June 18 Colonel J. C. Marshall, Corps of
Engineers, was instructed by the Chief of Engineers to form
a new Engineer District to carry on special work (atomic
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
bombs) in behalf of the United States, Britain and Canada
and their allies. Great supplies of uranium ore were to be
furnished by Canada from its Great Bear Lake region.
Formation of the Manhattan District followed on August
13, 1942. On September 17, 1942, Secretary of War Stimson
placed Brig. Gen. L. R. Groves of the Corps of Engineers in
complete charge of all Army activities relating to the secret
DSM (Development of Substitute Materials) Project.
The Provision of Manpower for the Manhattan Project,
Official War Department Release — August 6, 1945
Once the magnitude of the atomic bomb project had been
established, manpower immediately was recognized as one of
the key ingredients which would spell the difference between
success or failure. The Army was faced with its two largest
construction jobs, the largest in modern times and possibly
the largest in history. In addition to the usual obstacles, a
stepped-up schedule had to be met, time being of the essence
in a grim race against the unknown schedule of the Germans.
The project had an unusual obstacle to face. Security was
paramount. At this time, national competition for manpower
was acute. Industries and war projects were vicing with each
other in this competition, citing the key part their people
were playing in the war effort. No such inducement could
be made to attract labor to the Atomic Bomb Project. Noth-
ing whatsoever could be told in recruitment beyond the fact
that the work would be in the top interests of the war en-
deavor.
At first, the general attitude was that the project's con-
struction was just another job — or that ' 'business as usual"
was the order of the day. Trade unions, the War Manpower
Commission, plus the Manhattan District's expediters,
['50]
APPENDICES
teamed to achieve what at times seemed impossible provi-
sion of adequate manpower. Heading this program was Colo-
nel Clarence D. Barker, chief of the Labor Division of the
Office of the Chief of Engineers.
By the time the Manhattan District began its large scale
recruiting activities, the War Manpower Commission and its
agencies were well established and labor recruiting was car-
ried on primarily through their services. The U. S. Employ-
ment Service utilized the American Federation of Labor to
recruit and move skilled tradesmen. The common laborers'
union, however, did not have sufficient membership to sup-
ply demands and these were recruited through the U. S. E. S.
from the general labor market.
Types of personnel necessary to man the project covered
practically all occupational skills. These ranged from com-
mon laborers, carpenters and plumbers to glass blowers,
chemists and physicists. The mass of personnel, however, fell
into two general classes: construction laborers and mechan-
ics and plant operators.
Recruitment of special skills such as chemists, physicists,
laboratory technicians and others presented many problems.
As a whole, they were as difficult to find as the larger num-
bers of the more common skills. The most difficult problems
in this phase were handled personally by Dr. Samuel Arnold,
Dean of Men at Brown University, himself an eminent
scientist.
Much of the supervisory and technical personnel were re-
cruited by the many contractors of the Manhattan District
within their own organizations. Many of the top scientists
were brought to the project through contracts placed with
various universities.
The recruiting of operations people was particularly a dif-
ficult problem because of the necessity of training all new
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
people for the work. It necessitated the stripping of the op-
erating contractors of a great many of the key men of their
organizations which in view of the increased activities
brought on by the war programs other than that connected
with the Manhattan District had made the situation more
complex.
This was the overall personnel procurement program of
the Manhattan Engineer District. But there were many prob-
lems which at times seemed to defy solution. Had it not been
for the complete coordination of the whole problem, several
situations could have progressed to disastrous proportions.
The construction, by reasons of its immensity and unique-
ness and also because of a great many new practices devel-
oped which had never been used in the industry before ne-
cessitated the support of the top labor leaders. On several
occasions it was necessary that Judge Robert Patterson, the
Under Secretary of War call in the leaders, including the
President of A. F. of L., Mr. William Green and the General
Presidents of several Building Trades Unions to seek their
cooperation and to give them a better understanding of the
problems involved.
They, in a great many instances, broke down conditions of
long standing in order that the completion on schedule be
not interfered with. Judge Patterson also gave a great deal of
his personal time to this phase when it was required.
By June 15, 1944, the shortage of electricians at the Han-
ford Engineer Works, Washington, and the Clinton Engi-
neer Works, Tennessee, had become so acute that work
schedules were seriously endangered. Twenty-five hundred
electricians had to be recruited. A plan was worked out by
the Under Secretary of War and Edward J. Brown, president
of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
Electricians would be borrowed from other employers for a
APPENDICES
period of go days. The National Electrical Contractors As-
sociation was called in and a carefully worded news release
for security reasons was issued by the War Department stat-
ing the project's predicament. In two months' time, the bot-
tleneck was completely and satisfactorily broken. The plan
was continued throughout construction.
An acute shortage of machinists and toolmakers late in
1943 resulted in stringent measures. The New Mexico in-
stallation urgently needed 190 men in these skills. The War
Manpower Commission issued instructions to its regional
directors on October 21, 1943, authorizing them to certify
certain workers as available to the Manhattan District even
over the protests of their employers, many of whom were in
other essential war programs. With this authority as a basis,
special recruiting teams composed of an Army officer, a re-
cruiter, and a security agent procured the workers needed in
one month.
The Manhattan District experienced more unusual prob-
lems of turnover and absenteeism than other war industries
and installations. This was directly due to the isolation of
the projects, the extended length of the construction period,
expansions in the construction program, security, and lim-
ited housing and crowded transportation facilities.
A rigorous campaign was set up to solve these problems.
Exit interviews salvaged many. In hundreds of cases, com-
petent employees were either persuaded to go back to work
or to take other jobs on the same project. Employees made
available by reduction in force were also picked up in this
manner and directed to other jobs on the project or in some
cases returned to essential industry. These interviews also
determined why workers were leaving and set up a basis for
corrective action.
Companion problem to turnover was absenteeism. Re-
[153]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
peated absenteeism was the greatest single cause for termina-
tions. War economy with its larger incomes resulting from
higher wages and longer hours provided less compulsion for
steady work than the lower incomes of peace time. There-
fore, every effort was made, within the limits of the isolated
areas where the projects were established, to better living
and working conditions.
It was soon found that job dissatisfaction as a whole
hinged on lack of facilities present in normal American
communities. To the seasoned construction worker, condi-
tions were average. To the men having their first fling at
construction and to the men and women who took produc-
tion jobs, life was markedly different. The Army attempted
to make conditions more normal by providing recreation
facilities as movie houses, baseball diamonds, tennis courts
and recreation halls. These facilities greatly assisted in keep
ing workers on the job.
The Army also provided subsidized transportation, nursery
schools for working mothers, tire and gasoline rationing
boards and conveniently located shopping facilities.
The following unions were associated with the construc-
tion phases of the project:
Int'l Ass'n of Heat and Frost Insulators and Asbestos Workers
Intl Brotherhood of Boiler Makers, Iron Ship Builders and
Helpers
Bricklayers, Masons and Plasterers' Int'l Union
United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners
Int'l Brotherhood of Electrical Workers
Int'l Union of Elevator Constructors
Int'l Union of Operating Engineers
Int'l Ass'n of Bridge, Structural and Ornamental Iron Workers
Int'l Hod Carriers, Bldg., and Common Laborers Union
[ 154]
APPENDICES
Wood, Wire and Metal Lathers' Int'l Union
Brotherhood of Painters, Decorators and Paperhangers
Operative Plasterers and Cement Finishers Int'l Ass'n
United Slate, Tile and Composition Roofers, Damp & Water-
proof Workers Ass'n
United Ass'n of Journeymen Plumbers and Steam Fitters
Sheet Metal Workers' International Ass'n
Int'l Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen
and Helpers
Building Trades Dept. of AFL
Int'l Ass'n of Machinists
Int'l Brotherhood of Firemen and Oilers
Tribute to Manhattan District Personnel, Official War
Department Release — August 9, 1945
OAK RIDGE, Term,— Col. Kenneth D. Nichols, District
Engineer of the Manhattan Engineer District, has paid trib-
ute to the hundreds of organizations and thousands of per-
sons whose coordinated efforts have made possible the utili-
zation of atomic power within the time span of this war for
use in bombs against Japan.
Explaining that the progress of fundamental research in
physics and chemistry prior to the war indicated that utiliza-
tion of atomic power might have been feasible in 15 to 20
years, Colonel Nichols declared that the combined effort of
the many different people and organizations connected with
the project has compressed the time to three years, an ac-
complishment which will endure as a monument to the
ingenuity and vision and determination of all those, from
scientists to laborers, who have had a part in the work.
"These people and organizations — scientific, engineering,
contracting, manufacturing, procuring and others — working
[ 155]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
in harmony among themselves and with Government agen-
cies deserve unlimited credit for the successful accomplish-
ment of an almost impossibly vast and complicated task,"
Colonel Nichols declared.
In addition, he pointed out that the District's staff of spe-
cially selected officers, WACs, enlisted men, and civilians
deserve a large measure of credit for the success of the Army's
part in the project. Paying tribute to the work they have
done, Colonel Nichols declared that "each assistant has spent
long hours of work each day and collectively have made it
possible for the Manhattan District to control the large vol-
ume of research, construction, and production necessary to
complete the project."
Colonel Nichols said it is impossible to list the several
hundred names of military and civilian personnel assigned
to the Manhattan District, but added that he wished to men-
tion a few of those who "have made exemplary contributions
to the success of the project."
Among these, he said, are:
Col. E. H. Marsden, of New Haven, Conn., Executive Of-
ficer for the District; Col. F. T. Matthias, of Curtis, Wiscon-
sin, Area Engineer for the Hanford Engineer Works at Rich-
land, Wash.; Col. G. R. Tyler, of Philadelphia, Pa., Area
Engineer at Santa Fe; and Col. S. L. Warren, of Rochester,
N. Y., Chief of the Medical Section, who was formerly Pro-
fessor, School of Medicine and Dentistry, University of
Rochester.
In addition, Colonel Nichols said, there are:
Lt. Col. R. W. Cook of Muskegon, Mich., Operations Of-
ficer for one of the production areas; Lt. Col. W. P. Cor-
nelius of Ennis, Texas, Construction Officer on one of the
production plants; Lt. Col. M. C. Fox, of Brooksville, Ohio,
APPENDICES
Construction Officer on one of the production plants;
Lt. Col. H. L. Friedellof Minneapolis, Minn., Executive Of-
ficer of the Medical Section;
Lt. Col. P. L. Guarin, of Houston, Texas, Area Engineer
in one of the New York Areas; Lt. Col. J. S. Hodgson, of
Montgomery, Ala., Construction Officer on one of the pro-
duction plants; Lt. Col. A. C. Johnson, of Brooklyn, N. Y.,
who, as liaison officer in Washington, D. C., was in charge of
procurement for the District; Major W. A. Bonnet, Assistant
to Colonel Hodgson;
Lt. Col. H. R. Kadlec, now deceased, of Chicago, who was
Chief of Construction at the Hanford Engineer Works; Lt.
Col. R. W. Lockridge, of Hyattsville, Maryland, technical
assistant to the Area Engineer at Santa Fe; Lt. Col. C. A.
Nelson, of Pine Bluff, Ark., Director of Personnel for the
District;
Lt. Col. W. B. Parsons, of Seattle, Wash., Chief of the
Security Division of the District; Lt. Col. A. V. Peterson, of
Brooklyn, N. Y., former Area Engineer on the research and
development of the Hanford Project and now chief of the
Production and Combined Operations Section of the Dis-
trict; Lt. Col. C. E. Rea, of St. Paul, Minn., the head of the
Oak Ridge, Tenn., hospital;
Lt. Col. B. T. Rogers, of Eau Claire, Wis., Chief of Con-
struction and Deputy Area Engineer at Hanford Engineer
Works; Lt. Col. J. R. Ruhoff, of St. Louis, Mo., who partici-
pated in the early scientific developments for the manufac-
ture of basic materials and became Area Engineer for the
supply of such materials; Lt. Col. S. L. Stewart of Bisbee,
Ariz., Area Engineer for procurement at Santa Fe;
Lt. Col. J. C. Stowers, of Natchez, Miss., Area Engineer on
the design of one of the production plants; Lt. Col. A. Tam-
[157]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
maro, of Providence, R. I., who was Area Engineer on the
manufacture of certain materials for one of the production
plants;
Lt. Col. C. Vanden Bulck, of Lincoln Park, N. J., Chief
of the Administrative Division of the District; Lt. Col. W. J.
Williams, of Spaulding, Ala., who was construction officer in
charge of one of the production plants; Major J. O. Acker-
man, of Hastings, Minn., Technical Officer on some of the
operations at Santa Fe;
Major E. J. Bloch, of St. Louis, who was Unit Chief on
coordinating the design, construction and administration of
the town of Oak Ridge; Major T. J. Evans, of Florence, Ala.,
Unit Chief on construction and operation of one of the
production plants; Major J. L. Ferry, of Whiting, Ind., head
of the industrial division of the medical section; Major H. A.
Fidler, of Cambridge, Mass., Area Engineer on the research
and development for one of the production processes;
Major O. H. Greager, of Wilmington, Del., who was re-
search division head at the Clinton Laboratories at Oak
Ridge with full responsibility for the development of one of
the main processes to be used on the Hanford project; Lt.
Commander T. M. Keiller, USNR, of Houston, Texas, who
was in charge of naval personnel serving in a technical ca-
pacity at Clinton Engineer Works; Major W. E. Kelley, of
New Albany, Ind., who was unit chief on one of the produc-
tion plants during design, construction and initial operations;
Major E. J. Murphy, of New York City, who was opera-
tions officer of the Clinton Laboratories and related research
and experimental work; Major G. W. Russell, of Teaneck,
New Jersey, who assisted in the procurement and manufac-
ture of certain basic materials; Major J. F. Sally, of Mal-
verne, Long Island, who was Area Engineer on the design
APPENDICES
and construction of one highly specialized phase of opera-
tion;
Major W. T. St. Glair, of Nashville, Tenn., assistant to the
construction officer on one of the production plants; Major
W. O. Swanson of Jamestown, N. Y., Area Engineer on the
design of one of the production plants and also chief of the
Utilities and Maintenance Branch at the Clinton Engineer
Works; Major H. S. Traynor of Syracuse, N. Y., Production
Officer on one technical phase of the project and also chief
of the Historical Section; Major J. E. Vance, of New Haven,
Conn., Executive and Technical Officer on the procurement
of basic materials;
Capt. S. S. Baxter, of Philadelphia, Pa., Area Engineer on
medical and scientific research at the University of Roches-
ter; Capt. J. H. King of Anniston, Ala., who was area en-
gineer on one production phase; Capt. A. G. Scheidenhelm,
of Mendota, 111., Commanding Officer of WAG personnel as-
signed to the District; Capt. B. G. Seitz, of Buffalo, N. Y.,
statistics officer; Lt. J. J. Flaherty (JG) USNR, of Battle
Creek, Mich., deputy chief of the personnel division and
Chief Warrant Officer M. S. Levine of Brooklyn, N. Y., who
supervised the administration of selective service deferments.
Colonel Nichols said that civilian personnel with the Dis-
trict who made outstanding contributions are:
J. C. Clarke of Philadelphia, Pa., assistant to the chief of
the Administrative Division; J. G. LeSieur of Lilbourne,
Missouri, chief of the general administrative branch of the
Administrative Division; J. R. Maddy, of Enid, Okla., chief
of the safety and accident prevention branch of the District;
E. A. Wende, of Buffalo, N. Y., chief of the engineering sec-
tion of the Central Facilities Division at the Clinton Engi-
neer Works and Dr. H. T. Wensel of Washington, D. C.,
[ 159]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
technical advisor to the District Engineer on research under
the supervision of the District.
An Accounting of the Successful Operation
of the First Self-Sustaining Nuclear Chain
Reactor in World History *— Officially
Released December i, 1946
On December 2, 1942, man first initiated a self -sustaining
nuclear chain reaction, and controlled it.
Beneath the West Stands of Stagg Field, Chicago, late in
the afternoon of that day, a small group of scientists wit-
nessed the advent of a new era in science. History was made
in what had been a squash court.
Precisely at 3:25 P.M., Chicago time, scientist George Weil
withdrew the cadmium plated control rod and by his action
man unleashed and controlled the energy of the atom.
As those who witnessed the experiment became aware of
what had happened, smiles spread over their faces and a
quiet ripple of applause could be heard. It was a tribute to
Enrico Fermi, Nobel Prize winner, to whom, more than to
any other person, the success of the experiment was due.
Fermi, born in Rome, Italy, on September 29, 1901, had
been working with uranium for many years. In 1934 he bom-
barded uranium with neutrons and produced what appeared
to be both element 93 (uranium is element 92) and also ele-
ment 94. However, after closer examination it seemed as if
nature had gone wild . . . several other elements were pres-
ent, but none could be fitted into the periodic table near
uranium — where Fermi knew they should have fitted if they
had been the transuranic elements 93 and 94. It was not un-
til five years later that anyone, Fermi included, realized he
* Written for the Manhattan Project by E. R. Trapnell and Corbin Allar-
dice.
[,6o]
APPENDICES
had actually caused fission of the uranium and that these
unexplained elements belonged back in the middle part of
the periodic table.
Fermi was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1938 for his work
on transuranic elements. He and his family went to Sweden
to receive the prize. The Italian Fascist press severely criti-
cized him for not wearing a Fascist uniform and failing to
give the Fascist salute when he received the award. The
Fermis never returned to Italy.
From Sweden, having taken most of his personal posses-
sions with him, Fermi proceeded to London and thence to
America where he has remained ever since.
An outsider, looking into the squash court where the ex-
periment took place, would have been greeted by a strange
sight. Shrouded on all but one side by a grey balloon cloth
envelope, was a pile of black bricks and wooden timbers.
During the construction of this crude appearing vitally im-
portant "pile" — the name that has since been applied to all
such devices — the standing joke among those working on it
was: "If people could see what we're doing with a million-
and-a-half of their dollars, they'd think we were crazy. If
they knew why we were doing it, they'd be sure we were."
In relation to the fabulous atomic bomb program, of
which the Chicago Pile experiment was a key part, the suc-
cessful result reported on December 2 formed one more
piece for the jigsaw puzzle which is atomic energy. Confirma-
tion of the chain reactor studies was an inspiration to the
leaders of the bomb project, and reassuring at the same time,
because the Army's Manhattan Engineer District had moved
ahead on many fronts. Contract negotiations were under
way to build production-scale nuclear chain reactors, land
had been acquired at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and millions of
dollars had been obligated.
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
Three years before the December 2 experiment, it had
been discovered that when an atom of uranium was bom-
barded by neutrons, the uranium atom sometimes split, or
fissioned into two parts. Later, it had been found that when
an atom of uranium fissioned, additional neutrons were
emitted and became available for further reaction with other
uranium atoms. These facts implied the possibility of a chain
reaction, similar in certain respects to the reaction which is
the source of the sun's energy. The facts further indicated
that if a sufficient quantity of uranium could be brought
together under the proper conditions, a self-sustaining chain
reaction would result. This quantity of uranium necessary
for a chain reaction under given conditions is known as the
critical mass, or, as more commonly referred to, the "critical
size" of the particular pile.
For three years the problem of a self-sustaining chain
reaction had been assiduously studied. On a cold afternoon
nearly a year after Pearl Harbor, a pile of critical size was
finally constructed. It worked. A self-sustained nuclear chain
reaction was a reality.
Years of scientific effort and study lay behind this demon-
stration of the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction.
The story goes back at least to the fall of 1938 when two
German scientists, Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassman, working
at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in Berlin found barium in
the residue material from an experiment in which they had
bombarded uranium with neutrons from a radium-beryllium
source. This discovery caused tremendous excitement in the
laboratory because of the difference in atomic mass between
the barium and the uranium. Previously, in residue material
from similar experiments, elements other than uranium had
been found, but they differed from the uranium by only one
or two units of mass. The barium differed by approximately
APPENDICES
98 units of mass. The question was, where did this element
come from? It appeared that the uranium atom when bom-
barded by a neutron had split into two different elements
each of approximately half the mass of the uranium.
Before publishing their work in the German physical
journal NATURWISSEN-SCHAFTEN, Hahn and Strass-
man communicated with Lise Meitner who, having fled the
Nazi controlled Reich, was working with Neils Bohr in Co-
penhagen, Denmark.
Meitner was very much interested in this phenomenon
and immediately attempted to analyze mathematically the
results of the experiment. She reasoned that the barium and
the other residual elements were the result of a fission, or
breaking, of the uranium atom. But when she added the
atomic masses of the residual elements, she found this total
was less than the atomic mass of uranium.
There was but one explanation: The uranium fissioned or
split, forming two elements each of approximately half of its
original mass, but not exactly half. Some of the mass of the
uranium had disappeared. Meitner and her nephew O. R.
Frisch suggested that the mass which disappeared was con-
verted into energy. According to the theories advanced in
1905 by Albert Einstein in which the relationship of mass to
energy was stated by the equation E — me2 (energy is equal
to mass times the square of the speed of light), this energy
release would be of the order of 200,000,000 electron volts
for each atom fissioned.
Einstein himself, nearly 35 years before, had said this the-
ory might be proved by further study of radioactive ele-
ments. Bohr was planning a trip to America to discuss other
problems with Einstein who had found a haven at Princeton
University's Institute of Advanced Studies. Bohr came to
America, but the principal item he discussed with Einstein
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
was the report of Meitner and Frisch. Bohr arrived at Prince-
ton on January 16, 1939. He talked to Einstein and J. A.
Wheeler who had once been his student. From Princeton
the news spread by word of mouth to neighboring physicists,
including Enrico Fermi at Columbia. Fermi and his associ-
ates immediately began work to find the heavy pulse of
ionization which could be expected from the fission and
consequent repulse of ionization which could be expected
from the fission and consequent release of energy.
Before the experiments could be completed, however,
Fermi left Columbia to attend a conference on theoretical
physics at George Washington University in Washington,
D. C. Here Fermi and Bohr exchanged information and dis-
cussed the problem of fission. Fermi mentioned the possibil-
ity that neutrons might be emitted in the process. In this
conversation, their ideas of the possibility of a chain reaction
began to crystallize.
Before the meeting was over, experimental confirmation
of Meitner and Frisch's deduction was obtained from four
laboratories in the United States (Carnegie Institute of
Washington, Columbia, Johns Hopkins, and the University
of California). Later it was learned that similar confirmatory
experiments had been made by Frisch and Meitner on Janu-
ary 15. Frederic Joliot-Curie in France, too, confirmed the
results and published them in the January 30 issue of the
French scientific journal, COMPTES RENDUS.
On February 27, 1939, Walter Zinn and Leo Szilard, both
working at Columbia University, began their experiments
to find the number of neutrons emitted by the fissioning
uranium. At the same time, Fermi, and his associates,
Herbert L. Anderson and H. B. Hanstein commenced their
investigation of the same problem. The results of these ex-
periments were published side-by-side in the April edition
APPENDICES
of the PHYSICAL REVIEW and showed that a chain reac-
tion might be possible since the uranium emitted additional
neutrons when it fissioned.
These measurements of neutron emission by Fermi, Zinn,
Szilard, Anderson and Hanstein were highly significant steps
toward a chain reaction.
Further impetus to the work on a uranium reactor was
given by the discovery of plutonium at the Radiation Labor-
atory, Berkeley, California, in March 1940. This element,
unknown in nature, was formed by Uranium-agS capturing
a neutron, and thence undergoing two successive changes in
atomic structure with the emission of Beta particles. Plu-
tonium, it was thought might undergo fission if the rare iso-
tope of uranium, 0-235 did.
Meanwhile, at Columbia, Fermi and his associates were
working to determine operationally possible designs of a
uranium chain reactor. Among other things, they had to find
a suitable moderating material to slow down the neutrons,
since uranium 235 is most readily fissioned by neutrons trav-
eling at relatively low velocities. In July 1941, experiments
with uranium were started to obtain measurements of the
reproduction factor, (called "K") which was the key to the
problem of a chain reaction. If this factor could be made
sufficiently greater than i, a chain reaction could be made to
take place in a mass of material of practical dimensions. If
it were less than i , no chain reaction could ocur.
Since impurities in the uranium and in the moderator
would capture neutrons and make them unavailable for
further reactions and since neutrons would escape from the
pile without encountering uranium atoms, it was not known
whether a value for "K" greater than unity could ever be
obtained.
One of the first things that had to be determined was how
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
best to place the uranium in the reactor. Fermi and Szilard
suggested placing the uranium in a matrix of the moderating
material, thus forming a cubical lattice of uranium. This
placement appeared to offer the best opportunity for a neu-
tron to encounter a uranium atom. Of all the materials
which possessed the proper moderating qualities, graphite
was the only one which could be obtained in sufficient quan-
tity of the desired degree of purity.
The study of graphite-uranium lattice reactors was started
at Columbia in July 1941, but after reorganization of the
entire uranium project in December 1941, Arthur H. Comp-
ton was placed in charge of this phase of the work, under
the Office of Scientific Research and Development, and the
chain reactor program was concentrated at the University of
Chicago. Consequently, early in 1942 the Columbia and
Princeton groups were transferred to Chicago where the
Metallurgical Laboratory was established.
In a general way the experimental nuclear physics group
under Fermi was primarily concerned with getting a chain
reaction going, the chemistry division organized by F. H.
Spedding (later in turn under S. K. Allison, J. Franck, W. C.
Johnson, and T. Hogness) with the chemistry of plutonium
and with separation methods, and the theoretical group un-
der E. Wigner with designing production piles. However,
the problems were intertwined and the various scientific and
technical aspects of the fission process were studied in what-
ever group seemed best equipped for the particular task.
At Chicago, the work on sub-critical size piles was con-
tinued. By July 1942 the measurements obtained from these
experimental piles had gone far enough to permit a choice
of design for a test pile of critical size. At that time, the dies
for the pressing of the uranium oxides were designed by
Zinn and ordered made. It was a fateful step, since the entire
t'66]
APPENDICES
construction of the pile depended upon the shape and size of
the uranium pieces.
It was necessary to use uranium oxides because metallic
uranium of the desired degree of purity did not exist. Al-
though several manufacturers were attempting to produce
the uranium metal, it was not until November that any
appreciable amount was available. At that time, Westing-
house Electric and Manufacturing Company, Metal Hy-
drides Company, and F. H. Spedding, who was working at
Iowa State College at Ames, Iowa, delivered several tons of
the highly purified metal and it was placed in the pile, as
close to the center as possible. The procurement program
for moderating material and uranium oxides had been han-
dled by Norman Hilberry. R. L. Doan headed the procure-
ment program for pure uranium metal.
Although the dies for the pressing of the uranium oxides
were designed in July, additional measurements were neces-
sary to obtain information about controlling the reaction, to
revise estimates as to the final critical size of the pile, and to
develop other data. Thirty experimental sub-critical piles
were constructed before the final pile was completed.
Meantime, in Washington, early in 1942 Dr. Vannevar
Bush, Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Devel-
opment, had recommended to President Roosevelt that a
special Army Engineer organization be established to take
full responsibility for the development of the atomic bomb.
During the summer the Manhattan Engineer District was
created, and early in September 1942, Major General L. R.
Groves assumed command.
Construction of the main pile started in November. The
Chicago project gained momentum, with machining of the
graphite blocks, pressing of the uranium oxide pellets, and
the design of instruments. Fermi's two construction crews,
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
one under Zinn and the other under Anderson, worked al-
most around the clock. V. C. Wilson headed up the instru-
ment work.
Original estimates of the critical size of the pile were pessi-
mistic. As a further precaution, it was decided to enclose the
pile in a balloon cloth bag which could be evacuated to re-
move the neutron-capturing air.
This balloon cloth bag was constructed by Goodyear Tire
and Rubber Company. Specialists in designing gas-bags for
lighter-than-air craft, the company's engineers were a bit
puzzled about the aerodynamics of a square balloon. Security
regulations forbade informing Goodyear of the purpose of
the envelope and so the Army's new square balloon was the
butt of much joking.
The bag was hung with one side left open, in the center
of the floor a circular layer of graphite bricks was placed.
This and each succeeding layer of the pile was braced by a
wooden frame. Alternate layers contained the uranium. By
this layer-on-layer construction a roughly spherical pile of
uranium and graphite was formed.
Facilities for the machining of graphite bricks were in-
stalled in the West Stands. Week after week this shop turned
out graphite bricks. This work was done under the direction
of Zinn's group, by skilled mechanics led by millwright Au-
gust Knuth. In October, Anderson and his group joined
Zinn's men.
Describing this phase of the work, Albert Wattenberg, one
of Zinn's group, said: "We found out how coal miners feel.
After eight hours of machining graphite, we looked as if we
were made up for a minstrel. One shower would only remove
the surface graphite dust. About a half-hour after the first
shower the dust in the pores of your skin would start oozing.
"Walking around the room where we cut the graphite was
APPENDICES
like walking on a dance floor. Graphite is a dry lubricant,
you know, and the cement floor covered with graphite dust
was slippery."
Before the structure was half complete measurements indi-
cated that the critical size at which the pile would become
self-sustaining was somewhat less than had been anticipated
in the design.
Day after day the pile grew toward its final shape. And as
the size of the pile increased, so did the nervous tension of
the men working on it. Logically and scientifically they knew
this pile would become self-sustaining. It had to. All the
measurements indicated that it would. But still the demon-
stration had to be made. No matter how well planned, there
is always a chance that an experiment will not fulfill expec-
tations. So, as the eagerly awaited moment drew nearer, they
gave greater and greater attention to details, the accuracy of
measurements, and exactness of their construction work.
Guiding the entire pile construction and design was the
nimble-brained Fermi, whose associates describe him as
"completely self-confident but wholly without conceit."
So exact were Fermi's calculations, based on the measure-
ments taken from the partially finished pile, that days before
its completion and demonstration on December 2, he was
able to predict almost to the exact brick the point at which
the reactor would become self-sustaining.
But with all their care and confidence few in the group
knew the extent of the heavy bets being placed on their
success. In Washington, General Groves had proceeded with
negotiations with E. I. du Pont de Nemours Company to
design, build, and operate a plant based on the principles of
the Chicago pile. A "pilot" plant at Oak Ridge and the
$350,000,000 Hanford Engineer Works at Pasco, Washing-
ton, was to be the result.
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
At Chicago during the early afternoon of December i , tests
indicated that critical size was rapidly being approached. At
4 P.M., Zinn's group was relieved by the men working under
Anderson. Shortly afterwards, the last layer of graphite and
uranium bricks was placed on the pile. Zinn, who remained,
and Anderson made several measurements of the activity
within th« pile. They were certain that when the control
rods were withdrawn, the pile would become self-sustaining.
Both had agreed, however, that should measurements indi-
cate the reaction would become self-sustaining when the rods
were withdrawn, they would not start the pile operating un-
til Fermi and the rest of the group could be present. Conse-
quently, the control rods were locked and further work was
postponed until the following day.
That night the word was passed to the men who had
worked on the pile that the trial run was due the next
morning.
About 8:30 on the morning of Wednesday, December 2,
the group began to assemble in the squash court.
At the north end of the squash court was a balcony about
ten feet above the floor of the court. There the largest part
of the observers stayed. Fermi, Zinn, Anderson and Compton
were grouped around an instrument console at the east end
of the balcony. The remainder of the observers were
crowded on the rest of the balcony. R. G. Nobles, one of the
young scientists who worked on the pile put it this way:
"The control cabinet was surrounded by the 'big wheels'; us
'little wheels' had to stand back."
On the floor of the squash court, just beneath the balcony,
stood George Weil, whose duty it was to handle the final
control rod. In the pile were three sets of control rods. One
set was automatic and could be controlled from the balcony.
Another was an emergency safety rod. Attached to one end
[170]
APPENDICES
of this rod was a rope running through the pile, weighted
heavily on the opposite end. The rod was withdrawn from
the pile and tied by rope to the balcony. Hilberry was ready
to cut the rope with an axe should something unexpected
happen, or in case the automatic safety rods failed. The third
rod, operated by Weil, was the one which actually held the
reaction in check until the rod was withdrawn the proper
distance.
Since this demonstration was new and different from any-
thing ever done before, complete reliance was not placed on
mechanically operated control rods. Therefore, a "liquid-
control squad," composed of Harold Lichtenberger, W. Nyer
and A. C. Graves, stood on a platform above the pile. They
were prepared to flood the pile with cadmium-salt solution
in case of mechanical failure of the control rods.
Each group rehearsed what they had to do during the ex-
periment.
At 9:54 Fermi ordered the electrically operated control
rods withdrawn. The man at the controls threw the switch
to withdraw them. A small motor whined. All eyes watched
the lights which indicated the rods' position.
But quickly, the balcony group turned to watch the count-
ers, whose clicking stepped up after the rods were out. The
indicators of these counters resembled the face of a clock,
with "hands" to indicate neutron count. Near-by was a re-
corder, whose quivering pen traced the neutron activity with
the pile.
Shortly after ten o'clock, Fermi ordered the emergency
rod, called "Zip," pulled out and tied.
"Zip out," said Fermi. Zinn withdrew "Zip" by hand and
tied it to the balcony rail. Weil stood ready by the "vernier"
control rod which was marked to show the number of feet
and inches which remained within the pile.
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
At 10:37 Fermi, without taking his eyes off the instru-
ments, said quietly:
"Pull it to 13 feet, George." The counters clicked faster.
The graph pen moved up. All the instruments were studied,
and computations were made.
"This is not it," said Fermi. "The trace will go to this
point and level off." He indicated a spot on the graph. In a
few minutes the line came to the indicated point and did
not go above that point. Seven minutes later Fermi ordered
the rod out another foot.
Again the counters stepped up their clicking, the graph
pen edged upwards. But the clicking was irregular. Soon it
levelled off, as did the thin line of the pen. The pile was not
self-sustaining — yet.
At 11 o'clock, the rod came out another six inches; the
result was the same: an increase in rate, followed by the
levelling-off.
Fifteen minutes later, the rod was further withdrawn and
at 11:25 was moved again. Each time the counters speeded
up, the pen climbed a few points. Fermi predicted correctly
every movement of the indicators. He knew the time was
near. He wanted to check everything again. The automatic
control rod was reinserted without waiting for its automatic
feature to operate. The graph line took a drop, the counters
slowed abruptly.
At 11:35, the automatic safety rod was withdrawn and set.
The control rod was adjusted and "Zip" was withdrawn. Up
went the counters, clicking, clicking, faster and faster. It was
the clickety-click of a fast train over the rails. The graph pen
started to climb. Tensely, the little group watched, and
waited, entranced by the climbing needle.
Whrrump! As if by a thunder clap, the spell was broken.
Every man froze — then breathed a sigh of relief when he
['72]
APPENDICES
realized the automatic rod had slammed home. The safety
point at which the rod operated automatically had inadvert-
ently been set too low.
"I'm hungry," said Fermi. "Let's go to lunch."
Perhaps, like a great coach, Fermi knew when his men
needed a "break."
It was a strange "between halves" respite. They got no
pep talk. They talked about everything else but the "game."
The redoubtable Fermi, who never says much, had even less
to say. But he appeared supremely confident. His "team"
was back on the squash court at 2:00 P.M. Twenty minutes
later, the automatic rod was reset and Weil stood ready at
the control rod.
"All right, George," called Fermi, and Weil moved the
rod to a predetermined point. The spectators resumed their
watching and waiting, watching the counters spin, watching
the graph, waiting for the settling down and computing the
rate of rise of reaction from the indicators.
At 2:50 the control rod came out another foot. The count-
ers nearly jammed, the pen headed off the graph paper. But
this was not it. Counting ratios and the graph scale had to be
changed.
"Move it six inches," said Fermi at 3:20. Again the change
— but again the levelling off. Five minutes later, Fermi
called:
"Pull it out another foot."
Weil withdrew the rod.
"This is going to do it," Fermi said to Compton, standing
at his side. "Now it will become self-sustaining. The trace
will climb and continue to climb. It will not level off."
Fermi computed the rate of rise of the neutron counts
over a minute period. He silently, grim-faced, ran through
some calculations on his slide rule.
[173]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
In about a minute he again computed the rate of rise. If
the rate was constant and remained so, he would know the
reaction was self-sustaining. His fingers operated the slide
rule with lightning speed. Characteristically, he turned the
rule over and jotted down some figures on its ivory back.
Three minutes later he again computed the rate of rise in
neutron count. The group on the balcony had by now
crowded in to get an eye on the instruments, those behind
craning their necks to be sure they would know the very in-
stant history was made. In the background could be heard
William Overbeck calling out the neutron count over an
annunciator system. Leona Marshall — the only girl present
— Anderson, and William Sturm were recording the readings
from the instruments. By this time the click of the counters
was too fast for the human ear. The clickety-click was now a
steady brrrr. Fermi, unmoved, unruffled, continued his com-
putations.
"I couldn't see the instruments," said Weil. "I had to
watch Fermi every second, waiting for orders. His face was
motionless. His eyes darted from one dial to another. His
expression was so calm it was hard. But suddenly, his whole
face broke into a broad smile."
Fermi closed his slide rule —
"The reaction is self-sustaining," he announced quietly,
happily. "The curve is exponential."
The group tensely watched for twenty-eight minutes while
the world's first nuclear chain reactor operated.
The upward movement of the pen was leaving a straight
line. There was no change to indicate a levelling off. This
was it.
"O.K., 'Zip' in," called Fermi to Zinn who controlled that
rod. The time was 3:53 P.M. The rod entered the pile.
Abruptly, the counters slowed down, the pen slid down
across the paper. It was all over.
[174]
APPENDICES
Man had initiated a self-sustaining nuclear reaction — and
then stopped it. He had released the energy of the atom, and
controlled it.
Right after Fermi ordered the reaction stopped, the Aus-
trian-born theoretical physicist Eugene Wigner presented
him with a bottle of Chianti wine. All through the experi-
ment Wigner had kept this wine hidden behind his back.
Fermi uncorked the wine bottle and sent out for paper
cups so all could drink. He poured a little wine in all the
cups, and silently, solemnly, without toasts, the scientists
raised the cups to their lips — Fermi, Compton, Wigner, Zinn,
Szilard, Anderson, Hilberry and a score of others. They
drank to success — and to the hope they were the first to
succeed.
A small crew was left to straighten up, lock controls, and
check all apparatus. As the group filed from the West Stands,
one of the guards asked Zinn:
''What's going on, Doctor, something happen in there?"
He didn't hear the report which had gone to General
Groves nor the message which Arthur Compton was giving
James B. Conant at Harvard, by long distance telephone.
Their code was not prearranged.
"The Italian navigator has landed in the New World,"
said Compton.
"How were the natives?" asked Conant.
"Very friendly."
List of Those Present at "Chicago Pile" Experiment,
December 2, 1942
H. M. Agnew, Denver, Colo.
S. K. Allison, Chicago
H. L. Anderson, Chicago
H. M. Barton, Bartlesville, Okla.
T. Brill, Chicago
[175]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
R. F. Christy, Pasadena, Calif.
A. H. Compton, St. Louis
E. Fermi, Chicago
R. J. Fox, Bentonville, Ark.
S. A. Fox, Bentonville, Ark.
D. K. Froman, Denver, Colo.
A. C. Graves, Los Alamos, N. Mex.
C. H. Greenewalt, Wilmington, Del.
N. Hilberry, Chicago
D. L. Hill, Corinth, Miss.
W. H. Hinch, Denver, Colo.
W. R. Kanne, Schenectady, N. Y.
P. G. Koontz, Fort Collins, Colo.
H. E. Kubitschek, Maywood, 111.
H. V. Lichtenberger, Chicago
Mrs. L. Woods Marshall, Chicago
G. Miller, Chicago
G. Monk, Jr., New York City
H. W. Newson, Lawrence, Kans.
R. G. Nobles, Willow Springs, 111.
W. E. Nyer, Chicago
W. P. Overbeck, Richland, Wash.
H. J. Parsons, Chicago
L. Sayvetz, New York City
G. S. Pawlicki, Chicago
L. Seren, Schenectady, N. Y.
L. A. Slotin, Winnipeg, Can. (deceased)
F. H. Spedding, Ames, Iowa
W. J. Sturm, Chicago
L. Szilard, Chicago
A. Wattenberg, New York City
R. J. Watts, Denver, Colo.
G. L. Weil, New York City
E. P. Wigner, Oak Ridge, Tenn.
M. Wilkening, Chicago
V. C. Wilson, Chicago
W. H. Zinn, Chicago
[176]
APPENDICES
Biographies
ARTHUR HOLLY COMPTON, now chancellor of
Washington University at St. Louis, and former dean of the
division of physical sciences at the University of Chicago, is
probably the world's foremost experimentalist in the field
of radiant energy. He received the Nobel Prize in Physics
in 1927, making him the third physicist in American history
to receive the award. He joined the University of Chicago
in 1923, and in 1940 was made dean. For the period of 1941-
45 he was in charge of the Metallurgical Project of the Man-
hattan Project.
ENRICO FERMI, self-exiled Italian physicist, consultant
to the Argonne National Laboratory and professor of physics
at the University of Chicago, received the Nobel Prize in
1938. He was cited by the War Department as the first man
to achieve nuclear chain reaction. During the war, he was
associate director of the Los Alamos Laboratory. Fermi was
born in Rome and was professor of theoretical physics at the
University of Rome from 1927 to 1938, when he left the
country because of opposition to Fascism. He was the first to
systematize the science of physics in Italy. Mr. Fermi studied
at the University of Pisa, Italy, from 1918-22, and has honor-
ary degrees from the Universities of Utrecht and Heidelberg.
Before coming to Chicago with the Metallurgical Laboratory,
Fermi worked at Columbia University, New York.
WALTER H. ZINN, director of the Argonne National
Laboratory, was one of the original members of the Fermi
group to work on chain reactors. Zinn was born in Kitchener,
Ontario, Canada, in 1906. He received his bachelor's and
master's degrees from Queen's University in Canada and his
doctor's degree from Columbia University, New York, New
York. He taught at Columbia, and City College, New York,
before coming to Chicago with the Metallurgical Laboratory.
[177]
THE OAK RIDGE STORY
With Leo Szilard he performed early experiments showing
that neutrons are emitted in the fission process; this work
became fundamental in studies on atomic energy. Zinn was
in charge of a group which constructed the first chain react-
ing pile and later supervised the design and construction of
the first pile using heavy water as the moderator.
HERBERT L. ANDERSON, assistant professor in physics
in the Institute for Nuclear Studies, University of Chicago,
received his bachelor of science, bachelor of arts and doctor
of philosophy degrees from Columbia University. On the
atomic bomb project, Anderson did research on nuclear
chain reactors with the original Fermi group at Columbia
University at Chicago and Los Alamos.
LEO SZILARD, internationally known physicist, who was
instrumental in getting President Franklin D. Roosevelt in-
terested in the atomic energy field, is professor of biophysics
and professor of social sciences at the University of Chicago.
He began his work in the field of nuclear physics in 1934 in
London and later continued his work at the University of
London. Szilard worked with Enrico Fermi, Nobel Prize
physicist, on the early phases of work on chain reaction at
Columbia University and at the Metallurgical Laboratory at
the University of Chicago. He was born in Budapest, Hun-
gary, in 1898. Szilard received his Ph.D. from the University
of Berlin in 1922 and served on the University's faculty there
from 1925 to 1933. He became an American citizen in 1943.
NORMAN HILBERRY, associate director of the Argonne
National Laboratory, was one of the scientists who worked
on the December 2 pile. His was the responsibility for pro-
curing moderator material and uranium oxide for the re-
actor. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1899, Hilberry received
his bachelor's degree from Oberlin College, Ohio, and his
Ph.D. in physics from the University of Chicago. He taught
[178]
APPENDICES
at the University of Chicago, and New York University. He
is a fellow of the the New York Academy of Spectroscopy,
and has carried on extensive studies of the discharge of elec-
tricity through gases; physical optics; cosmic ray showers;
and the constitution of primary cosmic rays and their second-
ary radiations.
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[»79]
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