Man of the Hour
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“all too little,” “Like the need for speed . . .”: JBC, “The Mobilization of Science for the War Effort,” American Scientist 35, no. 2 (April, 1947).
“natural aristocracy”: Borrowman, “Conant, the Man,” 58–60.
“only a few elderly . . .”: GRC to MTR, September 29, 1941, CFP.
“doghouse”: Interview with Theodore Richards Conant.
“inefficiency, mismanagement . . .”: William M. Tuttle Jr., “The Birth of an Industry: the Synthetic Rubber ‘Mess’ in World War II,” Technology and Culture 22, no. 1 (January 1981): 37.
“fearless, independent . . .”: NYHT, July 27, 1942.
“investigate the whole rubber situation”: Tuttle, “The Birth of an Industry,” 54.
“a little bit disappointed . . .”: MSL, 309.
“Let me handle . . .”: Tuttle, “James B. Conant,” 330.
“thankless task”: NYHT, July 27, 1942.
“No, sir . . .”: Tuttle, “The Birth of an Industry,” 54. Jordan A. Schwarz, The Speculator: Bernard M. Baruch in Washington, 1917–1965 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1981), 389–96.
“Unquestionably, the very best . . .”: Ibid. NYT, August 2, 1942.
“getting the mostest rubber fastest”: Tuttle, “The Birth of an Industry,” 55.
“park bench committee”: “Three Men on a Bench,” Time, August 17, 1942. Schwarz, The Speculator, 389.
“keep our armed forces . . . ,” “bullying through . . . no middle course”: Tuttle, “James B. Conant,” 334–35.
“overlapping and confusing authority,” “rubber administrator”: Ibid.
“almost too good . . .”: JBC to BMB, August 11, 1944, as quoted in Tuttle, “The Birth of an Industry,” 65.
“the incantations . . .”: Schwarz, The Speculator, 394–95.
“excellent”: Tuttle, “The Birth of an Industry,” 58.
“What about you, Dr. Conant? . . .”: Tuttle, “James B. Conant,” 336.
“a plan”: Ibid.
“It’s all in there . . .”: NYHT, September 11, 1942. MSL, 348.
CHAPTER 14: A COLOSSAL GAMBLE
“To my mind . . .”: JBC to LRG, December 9, 1942, JBCPP. Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 163.
“grand scale,” “Napoleonic approach,” “desperate need for speed”: JBC to VB, May 14, 1942, VB-JBC files, NA.
“scientific aspects”: TNW, 71–73.
“the whole thing . . .”: POTA, 61.
“threatened to negate”: MSL, 288.
“near rebellion”: AQ, 109.
“too soon by one or two . . .”: TNW, 79–80. Baxter, Scientists Against Time, 436.
“cool reception”: POTA, 61.
“very seriously,” “abrupt and lacking in wit”: VB to JBC, September 17 and 21, 1942, JBCPP. VB to Harvey Bundy, as quoted in Leslie M. Groves, Now It Can Be Told, 20 (henceforth NCBT). Stanley Goldberg, “Groves Takes the Reins,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 48 (December 1992): 32–36, 38–39.
“I fear we are in the soup”: Ibid. Also see Richard Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, 427.
“unwieldy”: NCBT, 24.
“perform miracles”: MSL, 294.
“Conant had always been”: General Leslie Groves, pt. 1, interview by Stephane Groeff, Atomic Heritage Foundation, “Voices of the Manhattan Project,” January 5, 1965, http://manhattanprojectvoices.org/oralhistories/leslie-groves-interview.
“weakest horse”: TNW, 102; for a detailed technical description of all five competing methods, 85–115.
“boggled”: MSL, 291.
“champagne dinner,” “elephants with a peashooter”: TNW, 102, 91. AQ, 151.
“delayed,” “a marginal fraction,” “breaking out of control”: AQ, 137–38.
“in the middle of Chicago,” “disturbed,” “too late”: MSL, 289.
hazard of war: JBC, Secret History.
“unwarranted risk”: MSL, 289.
spoil the weapon: TNW, 109.
“rather fuzzy state . . .”: Ibid.; Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 162.
“Now is the time for faith ,” “It isn’t faith we need . . .”: AQ, 68.
“Our Italian navigator . . . ,” “Is that so . . .”: MSL, 290. AQ, 144.
“Everyone landed safe . . .”: Ibid.
“time schedule . . .”: JBC to LRG, December 9, 1942, JBCPP. Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 163.
“an uncertainty either way . . .”: TNW, 114–15.
“To my mind . . .”: JBC to LRG, December 9, 1942. Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 163.
“Conant has the gambling spirit . . .”: Baxter, Scientists Against Time, 434.
“totally unprepared”: Jonathan B. Tucker, War of Nerves, 41.
“lewisite was first discovered . . .”: Tuttle, “James B. Conant,” 12.
“How many years before . . .”: JBC, “The Fight for Liberty in Peace and War,” January 10, 1943, Harvard Bulletin 45, no. 7 (January 16, 1943): 236–39.
“jaundiced eyes”: MSL, 294.
“founded on possibilities”: NCBT, 19.
“long-haired scientists”: AQ, 113.
“Doctor,” “Professor”: Childs, American Genius, 335.
“soundness of his reasoning”: NCBT, 45.
“more drastically guarded . . .”: FDR to JRO, June 29, 1943, LOC.
“reliable information,” “we have become convinced . . . ,” “verify”: Thomas Powers, Heisenberg’s War, 161–63.
“The amount of bare-faced lying . . .”: MSL, 297.
“be of direct use”: Ray Monk, Robert Oppenheimer, 313.
“I am not a Communist . . .”: Nuel Phar Davis, Lawrence and Oppenheimer, 154.
“through the back door”: Monk, Robert Oppenheimer, 321.
“a necessary nuisance . . . investigation”: JBC to EOL, January 30, 1942, EOL Papers, BL.
“Whoever gets this first . . .”: Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 158; Davis, Lawrence and Oppenheimer, 154; Peter Michelmore, The Swift Years, 69–71.
“Oh! . . . Oh! . . . Oh my goodness!”: Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 158.
“complete ban”: MSL, 297.
“compartmentalization”: Robert S. Norris, Racing for the Bomb, 11.
“the desirability of asking Oppenheimer . . .”: EOL to JBC, March 26, 1942, VB-JBC files, NA.
coordinator of rapid rupture, “wisdom and firmness”: AQ, 127.
“showed a refined, sure . . . ,” “unforgettable,” “intellectual power . . .”: Monk, Robert Oppenheimer, 332.
“Status of the Bomb,” “150 times energy . . . ,” “Estimate devastation of area . . . terminated”: Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, 421.
“tremendous intellectual capacity,” “knew everything . . .”: NCBT, 61.
“strongly impressed . . .”: AQ, 129.
“down-to-earth”: NCBT, 61.
“None of them were go-getters . . .”: Jennet Conant, 109 East Palace: Robert Oppenheimer and the Secret City of Los Alamos (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005), 36.
“a lovely spot”: Alice Kimball Smith and Charles Weiner, Robert Oppenheimer, 236.
“This is the place”: Conant, 109 East Palace, 34.
“showed any great enthusiasm”: NCBT, 61.
“To most physicists . . .”: Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, 449.
“prestige among his fellow . . .”: NCBT, 62–63.
“it became apparent . . . ,” “snag,” “His background included . . .”: Ibid.
“duration of the war . . . greeted”: JRO to JBC, November 30, 1942, JRO Papers, LOC. Also see Smith and Weiner, Robert Oppenheimer, 247–48.
“The job we have to do . . .”: Ibid.
“Oppenheimer saw this faculty . . . policy matters”: Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 167.
“wondering whether we have found . . . on the idea”: Ibid.
“None of us would come”: John S. Rigden, Rabi, 150–51.
“the discussion of which . . . spe
ed required”: Ibid.
“on a strictly civilian basis,” “Through Dr. Conant”: Groves-Conant Letter to Oppenheimer, February 25, 1943, Atomic Heritage Foundation, info@atomicheritage.org.
“great experience . . .”: NCBT, 150–51.
“patience, courage . . . need and want”: Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 169.
“Uncle Jim”: Michelmore, The Swift Years, 168.
“We are addressing this letter . . . instrument of war”: Monk, Robert Oppenheimer, 344–45.
“fragment of a strange scientific history,” “This highly secret . . . to be achieved”: JBC, Secret History, 1, and pt. 2, 16–17, 30.
“unforeseen block,” “How many times . . . explosion”: Ibid.
“What the future a year hence . . . ,” “this scientific delirium tremens”: Ibid.
CHAPTER 15: UNEASY ALLIANCES
“The price of greatness . . .”: “Harvard Welcomes Mr. Churchill,” Harvard Alumni Bulletin 46, no. 1 (September 18, 1943): 18.
“President Conant of Harvard . . .”: H. G. Wells, “New Americans,” Collier’s, February 5, 1938.
“A good many million . . .”: J. Z. Jacobsen, “An American Radical: President Conant of Harvard Believes a New Program Is Essential for Us,” Fact Magazine, May 1943, 25.
“tempting fate,” “post-victory era,” “larger maladjustment,” “when it is not necessary . . . radical philosophy,” “we may well sow . . . $25,000 mark”: JBC, “Wanted: American Radicals,” Atlantic Monthly 171, no. 5 (May 1943): 41–45.
“splendid successor . . . worthy of note”: Editorial note, ibid., 41.
“this is not a dignified . . .”: Karabel, The Chosen, 160.
“a destructive sort of chap . . .”: Ibid., 158–59.
“disagreeable cold . . . extreme mood”: Ibid. Also see Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 178.
“potent and refreshing . . . schoolmaster”: WSJ, April 23, 1943.
“Conant for President”: JBC scrapbook, CFP.
“the stew continues . . .”: JBC to GRC, June 29, 1943, CFP.
“stirred up a hornet’s nest . . . ,” “crisis”: Karabel, The Chosen, 160.
“By the time you read this . . . may be wrong”: JBC to GRC, August 7, 1943, CFP.
“it won’t hurt my feelings . . .”: JBC to GRC, August 12, 1943.
“coordinated or even jointly conducted”: TNW, 270.
“very glad,” “in complete accord”: DAS, 98–99.
“nebulous”: JBC to VB, December 14, 1942, NDRC files, NA.
“essentially responsible to anyone . . .”: Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 180.
“wasting his time”: Ibid. For a detailed history of Anglo-American nuclear agreement, see TNW, 263–77.
“come as a bombshell . . .”: Martin J. Sherwin, A World Destroyed, 76.
“a sombre decision”: Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, 105.
“astounding,” “sit tight”: TNW, 274.
“renew, in an inclusive manner . . .”: Ibid.
“bawling him out . . . arrangement,” “Very well . . .”: POTA, 281–82.
“review”: Ibid.
“interested only in fighting . . . make you a proposition”: POTA, 283.
“all sorts of trouble”: Ibid.
“to fruition . . .”: TNW, 278.
“heavy sense of responsibility . . .”: DAS, 101–2.
“But if Bush, Conant, and Groves . . .”: Ibid., 109.
“a most interesting though strenuous . . .”: JBC to GRC, August 7, 1943, CFP.
“The Quebec Agreement . . . Nazi foe”: TNW, 279.
“Confidential,” “Academic meeting”: “Harvard Welcomes Mr. Churchill,” 11.
“I am once again in academic groves . . .”: Ibid., 18.
“the blitz was running hard”: Ibid.
“The price of greatness . . . all will fail”: “Harvard Welcomes Mr. Churchill,” 18, 13.
“national public relations job”: JBC to GRC, September 22, 1943, CFP.
“typical”: Roosevelt, “Harvard’s Prize Kibitzer,” 2.
“How did I do, Mother?. . . best”: GRC, “A Brief Visit from a Great Man or a Hostess Remembers,” unpublished reminiscence of Churchill visit, 1943, CFP.
“the empires of the future . . . ,” “The twentieth-century struggles . . .”: MSL, 289.
“most optimistic . . .”: JBC to GRC, August 7, 1943, CFP.
“atomic explosions”: Powers, Heisenberg’s War, 241.
“the gadget”: Conant, 109 East Palace, 105.
“the Super”: TNW, 240.
“gun method”: MSL, 292–93. TNW, 235.
“implosion method”: Ibid. For a detailed technical description of the development of the two methods, see TNW, 235–54.
“engineering”: John Bass, The Moment in Time: The Manhattan Project, documentary film, University of California, 2008.
“The reason why I am here today . . .”: Lawrence Badash, Joseph O. Hirschfelder, and Herbert P. Broida, Reminiscences of Los Alamos, 71.
“it might be regarded . . .”: NCBT, 162.
“intrinsic explosibility”: TNW, 240.
go-ahead signal: MSL, 291.
“fast” neutrons: TNW, 240.
“really mattered”: Badash, Hirschfelder, and Broida, Reminiscences of Los Alamos, 49.
“Thin Man,” “Fat Man,” “modifying a plane . . .”: Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, 481.
CHAPTER 16: ONE FELL STROKE
“the essence of war . . .”: JBC to VB, May 9, 1945, JBCPP.
“at least every difficulty . . .”: JBC, Secret History, pt. II, 17.
“by one fell, drastic stroke . . .”: NYT, December 3, 1943.
“Although this was sometimes . . .”: NCBT, 187.
“every effort should be made . . .”: JBC to VB, December 9, 1942. Powers, Heisenberg’s War, 209.
Germans occupied Norway . . seized Norsk Hydro plant: Norris, Racing for the Bomb, 281–84.
“some headaches”: NCBT, 188.
“S-1 targets,” “German process”: Powers, Heisenberg’s War, 209–10.
“the chances of seriously interfering . . . ,” “arrangements are now under way”: Ibid.
“It was clearly a drawing . . . ,” “a quite useless military weapon,” “If the people at Los Alamos . . .”: Jeremy Bernstein, “The Drawing or Why History Is Not Mathematics,” Physics in Perspective 5, iss. 3 (September 2003): 2–7.
“What do you think?”: Powers, Heisenberg’s War, 250.
“the killing of scientific personnel . . .”: Powers, Heisenberg’s War, 251.
“very probably knew”: Ibid, 537-38.
Aage Bohr’s dispute: Bernstein, “The Drawing or Why History is Not Mathematics,” 6.
“if so much as a word . . .”: Ibid., 399.
“almost any effort to stop . . .”: Ibid., 252.
“disastrous results,” “This was a time . . . disprove them”: NCBT, 200.
“It now seems extremely possible . . .”: Barton J. Bernstein, “Radiological Warfare: The Path Not Taken,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 41 (September 1985): 45–46.
“the application that seemed . . . half a million men”: Powers, Heisenberg’s War, 354–55.
“extremely unlikely”: NCBT, 200. Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 201.
Operation Peppermint, “unknown etiology”: NCBT, 201–5.
“emphasize our belief . . .”: Ibid.
“You scare the hell out of me”: POTA, 307.
“on the present available . . . of this nature”: NCBT, 205.
“I knew our advice”: Ibid., 206.
“some bad hours”: Ibid., 199.
“Well, Van, how do you feel . . . ,” “Very much relieved”: POTA, 307.
Thin Man problems: TNW, 251.
“All to no avail, alas!”: Ibid.
“The situation is a mess . . .”: Monk, Robert Oppenheimer, 429.
“May the Lord preserve us . . .”: Conant, 109 Ea
st Palace, 231.
“the situation was desperate”: MSL, 293.
“the most colossal egos”: George Kistiakowsky, “James B. Conant, 1893–1978,” Nature 273, no. 5665 (June 29, 1978): 793–95.
“explosive lenses”: Badash, Hirschfelder, and Broida, Reminiscences of Los Alamos, 50–52.
“Your confidence in our future . . .”: JRO to JBC, August 3, 1944, as quoted in Smith and Weiner, Robert Oppenheimer, 278–79.
“Just a line to tell you . . .”: JBC to JRO, October 20, 1944, ibid., 287.
“present expectations,” “reasonable success”: TNW, 252.
“leadership of the world,” “the American Century”: Steel, Walter Lippmann, 404.
“fight talk,” “decisive victory”: Tuttle, “James B. Conant,” 371–72.
“a friend of Eleanor’s, “queer ideas,” “bill of complaints,” “almost treacherous situation”: MSL, 295–96.
“loose talk about the inadequacies”: Ibid.
“did not know the score . . . felt left out”: Ibid., 296–99.
“the question was raised . . . ,” “I don’t want to know . . . lady to relax”: Ibid.
“spirit in Chicago”: Ibid., 295.
“so significant it neither could . . .”: Sherwin, A World Destroyed, n122.
“complete privacy . . .”: MSL, 300.
“We cannot emphasize . . . should be secure”: VB and JBC to HLS, September 19, 1944, AEC document, quoted in Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 204. MSL, 300.
“very much embarrassed”: Sherwin, A World Destroyed, 122–25.
“necessity for maintaining . . . ,” “for certainly it would be . . .”: Ibid.
“normal advisors,” “highly dangerous situation”: Ibid.
“This demonstration . . .”: TNW, 329.
“tentative,” “no diplomatic initiatives . . . scientists had urged,” “because of their position . . .”: Sherwin, A World Destroyed, 122, 127, 116.
“Alternatives[:] . . . stood???,” The question marks . . .”: Hershberg, Harvard to Hiroshima, 198–200.
“so transformed the art of war . . . bristling with weapons”: JBC, “The Effective Disarmament of Germany and Japan,” October 7, 1944, JBCPP. NYT, October 8, 1944. Tuttle, “James B. Conant,” 377–78.
“with a series . . .”: JBC to Major George Fielding Eliot, January 29, 1945, JBCPP. Tuttle, “James B. Conant,” 380.