The laboratory had an array of charts, blackboards, maps, and equations in various states of development. It was actually a group of laboratories, collectively known as the Technical Area, or Tech Area, directed by Oppenheimer. Arthur Compton, as the leader of a small group of theoreticians who would be studying the bomb’s detonation capabilities, had originally proposed Oppenheimer for a job. But General Leslie Groves, not particularly fond of Compton and enthralled by Oppenheimer’s ideas, instead had promoted Oppenheimer as the head of the entire bomb design project, in July 1943, in essence, taking the job away from Compton. It was a blow to Compton, given that he had spearheaded the success of the very first chain reaction in Chicago.
In July 1943, the Office of Scientific Research and Development, upon the request by General Groves, granted security clearance to Oppenheimer to become full director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Up until that point, Oppenheimer had no practical experience in administration. It was an odd choice; as many of those who knew him from his Berkeley days had said, at one point or another, that “he couldn’t run a hamburger stand.”
Oppenheimer was young and brilliant, a product of the University of California, and he did not like secrets among the scientists. He often instructed those who worked for him to share their work, and his, with one another. He believed they could benefit from a free exchange of ideas, bouncing their theories off each other. He went so far as to hold weekly informal meetings where they all debated the merits of what they were working on. Aside from the sharing of ideas, this type of environment helped with everyone’s morale. They also looked over one another’s work for mistakes, of which they found very few.
Leona had once met Oppenheimer at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton University. She had not particularly liked him, and that feeling carried over when she met him again in Los Alamos. She thought him “an accomplished actor,” a charismatic man who played his cards right. She would watch as he charmed others into following him, and his ideas benefited from the relationship he had developed with General Groves.
While Leona thought Oppenheimer was a dedicated and gifted teacher, she never fell under his spell. She found it puzzling, and a little disturbing, how his students, and even some of his coworkers, went so far as to copy his gestures, the way he spoke, and even the way he thought, as if in doing so they could come close to greatness. She knew that he could influence others greatly, and she feared that.
She thought it odd that he always managed to ask a lot of questions, to elicit a lot of information from his peers and devotees, yet hardly ever gave a response himself. His method of teaching was to instigate complicated trains of thought, which he wanted others to unravel. She suspected that perhaps he had the answers already but wanted to give others the opportunity to reach the conclusions themselves.
The tensions within the Tech Area, when there were any, normally came to the forefront when General Groves visited. With his bombastic personality, he took the brunt of the scientists’ frustration. For his part, General Groves did not understand the scientists and made no effort to learn about them. His dismissive attitude toward their problems made him come across as naive about the sciences at best, crude and vulgar at worst. Often the squabbling became so ferocious that Oppenheimer had to put himself in the middle to stop it.
The Technical Area could be entered only if one wore a white, pink, or green badge, and it was heavily guarded. Upon arrival, Joan was given security clearance and also a pink badge, which gave her access to a few other restricted areas of Los Alamos. Here worked the scientists, the chemists, the metallurgists, the other experts in their fields, some of whom remained on the premises all day long and well into the night. Army cots were set up against the walls, and Joan learned that some of the men hardly ever went home, doing so only occasionally to shower and change and to kiss their wives and children hello.
“The laboratories had a cluttered, disorderly, academic air. The offices were simple enough, though incredibly dirty, overcrowded, and badly equipped,” said Charlotte Serber, who worked there as a technical librarian. “Physically, the Tech Area was certainly not a very unusual place. But it did have a spirit which was strange. Its tempo was too fast; its excitement was almost too high. The area was in a state of continuous crisis, and it soon became clear that speedup was its permanent tempo and excitement its permanent mood. The hyperthyroid quality was contagious and soon, in each newcomer to the Area, any disappointment with its physical drabness, was rapidly followed by a real enthusiasm for both its work and its personnel.” The pace was so fast, there seemed to be no time to catch one’s breath.
There was no general sense of unease among the scientists about what they were doing. Maybe doubts crept in once they left the laboratories and returned home, but within their work compounds, for the most part, there was only a feeling of urgency; they needed to finish the project as soon as possible. Any day that passed, any hour that went by without progress, brought the Germans closer to their own finished product. What if the Germans unleashed the bomb first?
Despite the importance of the work that went on there, Los Alamos was an informal place, and most people liked the casual feel of it and the fact that no one cared to dress up or to shine their shoes. No one bothered with titles or formalities, and nicknames abounded.
Joan was surprised to see so many women at Los Alamos, as she had been told that only a few female scientists, like herself, had been hired. Only later did she understand that most of the women were not scientists; they were there in other capacities. She later read a quote by General Groves: “This system was designed to encourage the wives of our people to work on the project, for those who worked obtained priority on household assistance. Some of the wives were scientists in their own right, and they, of course, were in great demand. But,” he said, “with labor at a premium we could put to good use everyone we could get, whether as secretaries or as technical assistants or as teachers in the public school that we started for the children.”
Joan Hinton was told she would be assisting Enrico Fermi, and soon thereafter she was assigned to work with his group on the high-power (HYPO) reactor. One morning, as she entered the lab, someone whispered to her, “The plutonium has come. It’s in a little room. It feels warm to the touch.”
Handling plutonium was a risky business. Working with it in the water boiler was dangerous, mostly because of the properties of the reactor, particularly the high radioactivity level; but there was also the possibility of a meltdown. Furthermore, the scientists were not very familiar with plutonium. It was still a relatively new discovery, and they dealt with it haphazardly, largely unaware of the damage it could cause.
Although Joan had been warned not to do so, she cautiously stole into the next room to look at the plutonium when no one else was around. She didn’t dare touch it, but she stood there a moment, marveling at its awesome power. It stunned her that something so small could apply such force. The substance was about the size of a baseball and as malleable as soft cheese. It was toxic to inhale, though the scientists working alongside her seemed oblivious to such details. She stared at the plutonium for a moment, then walked away, smiling. She now knew that they were almost ready.
All the researchers were excited when the first few small quantities of plutonium arrived at Los Alamos, even if they had received only a fraction of what they needed. Then, at the start of 1944, additional grams of plutonium began arriving with more regularity, first from Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and then from Hanford, Washington.
Joan Hinton learned that Fermi had two groups of scientists working at Los Alamos. The first group was made up of theoretical physicists who also performed experiments. The second group seemed a little more interesting to her, and it was to this group that she was assigned. The members were appointed to work in a canyon some distance away from the main facility. They were charged with building one of the first reactors that would use enriched uranium for fuel. As it turned out, they built two reactors as
testing sites, one for uranium and one for plutonium.
They were isolated from the rest of the group, and Joan suspected that this was done on purpose. In case an accident occurred, only those in the one group would be involved, only they would be hurt.
Her job was to help with the design and construction of the central rods. However, she also assisted with the piling of beryllium blocks around the physical core and manufacturing the electronic circuit.
They lived on the edge, and Joan was aware of that; it was exciting, perilous, and frightening in many ways. Before this, scientists had worked with only very small amounts of radioactive materials, whereas the Manhattan Project required the handling of huge stores of uranium and plutonium. How would coming so close to these materials affect the body? In very small doses, plutonium was not extremely dangerous, but what if someone got irradiated by a large dose? What would that do to the body? Could one survive? The scientists were experimenting with elements they had never practiced with before; if an accident occurred, they did not know if they would be capable of handling it. And on more than one occasion that became painfully obvious.
Not long after arriving, a colleague of Joan’s, Harry Daghlian, left the canyon for the laboratory located inside the facility there to perform an elaborate and detailed experiment: He was to measure the critical mass of uranium. But something went awry, and his hands were immediately irradiated. Joan heard the urgent screams as she entered the laboratory. Harry Daghlian was rushed to the hospital, and for the next three weeks his limbs turned gray and wasted, and he soon descended into a slow, painful death that Joan had not even considered possible before coming to Los Alamos.
The accident left an indelible mark on her, as it did on everyone who knew him. It was then that the questions began. If a small amount of radiation had caused such an outcome on one individual, what would an atomic bomb do when dropped on a country where millions of people lived? How many would die right away, and how many would suffer the effects afterward? How many would survive the blast without any actual effects? And they were building two bombs in Los Alamos, which meant twice the number of victims.
It finally became clear to officials that as the project progressed, all the workers would be dealing not only with new substances but also with huge amounts of radioactivity, the likes of which they had never come across before. Given the possibilities, new medical limits had to be implemented to ensure safety. The health of the workers became of paramount importance, much as reaching their goal did, and the Manhattan Project Medical Section was therefore established. This section not only doled out medical care but also conducted safety drills and coordinated biomedical research between the sites and the universities associated with the project. Their goal was to study radiation and its long-term effects on the individual, as well as to prevent any experiments from becoming too dangerous.
The doctors in the medical section routinely examined the fingertips of those scientists who worked with the radioactive substances, as that was the first area to show physical changes. If any serious accidents occurred or following prolonged exposured to radiation, they immediately tested blood and urine samples. They also treated ordinary medical problems. Each of the sites had its own medical section that dealt with everyday concerns, particularly those of the children who lived on the bases.
In Los Alamos, Enrico Fermi had traded his hours swimming in Lake Michigan for hours spent hiking in the local mountains. Always accompanying him was a big, burly Italian American bodyguard who could hardly keep up the pace. He was often heard complaining, as he would have preferred going up on a horse, particularly when the hike involved heading up toward Lake Peak. However, soon enough, the bodyguard got the relief he yearned for when someone else replaced him: Joan Hinton became a confidante to Enrico Fermi. She began joining him on his walks and showed off her skiing expertise going down the slopes next to the famous physicist. And she played violin in Fermi’s quartet, which also included Edward Teller.
It certainly was, Joan later mused, the experience of a lifetime, work more interesting than anything she had ever imagined she would find when she’d enrolled at the university. As the days rolled by, she reckoned that she might stay for the duration of the project, even if the seclusion and the secrecy of it were getting to her. Perhaps, if things were good after the bomb project ended, the Manhattan Project might continue and ask her to stay longer. She thought she might say yes.
chapter fourteen
Diz
Los Alamos was the nerve center of the Manhattan Project. Secret, isolated, a community designed to be self-sustaining located at an altitude of around 7,500 feet, it had been built from the ground up deep in the Jemez Mountains of north-central New Mexico. It was to there that some of the greatest American and European scientific minds were spirited away to work on the atomic bomb. It was a strange notion, at once exciting and frightening, to have all this intellectual power collected at one spot to bring to life an atomic bomb.
When officials started searching for a perfect site on which to create the bomb, they knew it had to have certain conditions: The weather had to be temperate, even in winter. It had to be close to a railroad station and to an airport, so that people could easily access it. But it also had to possess a certain measure of remoteness and be only sparsely populated, so that guards could fend off the curious.
The New Mexico location took its name from the Los Alamos Ranch School for Boys, a former exclusive private school whose facilities were now occupied by the military, which had also taken over Fuller Lodge—still being used as it had been before, as a dining space serving mediocre food. What remained of the school’s halls and rooms became a small shop and some additional residences. There were actually two shops on the premises, neither of which offered anything worth indulging in. If one happened to be in the mood for warm Coca-Cola and an assortment of sandwiches featuring limp deli meats and day-old egg salad, well, those were the places to be. But they had a jukebox, and music was always a welcome reprieve.
When the United States Army took over the area, at the start of the Manhattan Project, it also took over the nearby ranches, where it built laboratories and testing facilities. Here the scientists tackled unanswered questions and worked on mysterious, puzzle-like projects. Upon arriving, most of them felt like children running free within a candy store, the only difference here being that their results could have catastrophic outcomes for everyone involved.
It did not take long for Joan Hinton to sense that working at the facility would be a challenge. The project required discretion, she was warned often. Even though there weren’t many outsiders to whom she and the others could divulge any information, she was told that secrecy was of the utmost importance at Los Alamos.
In addition, they had to report all their movements, however minor, to the Los Alamos officials: whether they were going into town for shopping or for pleasure, and whom they met along the way. Clearance was required to leave Los Alamos, and questions, almost similar to those at an inquisition, were asked of anyone whom they happened to bump into and talk with.
The laboratories were located above a mesa, some thirty miles from Santa Fe, and painted a bilious green color. One reached Los Alamos through a treacherous road that ran along the San Ildefonso Mountains and over the Rio Grande, which could be muddy and brown, at once tumultuous or a mere trickle, depending on the weather and its temperament. Still, the view was stunning as people drove up toward the mesa, with the Sangre de Cristo Mountains as the backdrop. Some made it a point to arrive at sunset to watch the color palette change in ways they had never seen before—a blend of various shades of pink, orange, scarlet, and lavender. The pink shades reminded many new arrivals of salmon, and made a few recall youthful fishing trips with their parents and grandparents. Below it was the desert plain, a rusty color varnished by the winds, smooth and flat.
Before anyone could enter Los Alamos, the military police guards who manned the gate stopped them. Everything was inspec
ted. The guardhouse was small, but it did the trick, sheltering those on duty from the elements, whether sun, wind, rain, or the occasional dust storm. It was painted the same ugly shade of green as the laboratories, the color giving the newly arrived a preview of what they could expect on the inside.
The location was so remote, enveloped in such an oppressive hush-hush atmosphere, that Joan hardly ever saw anyone who didn’t belong there. And that could play havoc with the mind, Elizabeth Graves, the physicist she met soon after arriving, told her—especially if one yearned for friends and companions. Joan also learned that there was a housing shortage, services were limited, and there was no entertainment to speak of. Still, much like Elizabeth, most of the new arrivals were happy and excited to be there, to be working on a project that promised to end the war.
Elizabeth Graves went by the nickname of Diz. She had married Al Graves when they were both graduate students in physics at the University of Chicago. After completing his PhD, Al had accepted a faculty position at the University of Texas at Austin, where Diz thought she would be teaching, too. But despite her PhD in nuclear physics from the University of Chicago, the University of Texas refused to hire her, citing their strict nepotism rules. However, Diz knew that was just an excuse: The head of the physics department at UT Austin had a less than positive view of the new crop of female physicists, and of women in science in general, often expressing his opinion of where women should remain: in the bedroom and in the kitchen. Diz had sent a strongly worded letter expressing her opinions to the department and the institution, but it was ignored.
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