by Gino Segrè
Early on Sunday, November 28, 1954, Fermi had a fatal heart attack. Yet again, the Pope had been right. It was two days short of the calculations he made to Laura for his hospital bed rental. And he was two months past his fifty-third birthday. The time of his death coincided with the United Nations’ formation of a committee on peaceful uses of atomic energy and with Senator Joseph McCarthy’s denunciation by Congress. The world was on the verge of righting itself.
Fermi was buried in a private ceremony at Oak Woods Cemetery on Chicago’s South Side. On Friday, December 3, a memorial service was held at the University of Chicago’s Rockefeller Chapel. Judd had flown in from Oberlin. Even he, who assiduously avoided the many honorific events acknowledging Fermi, could not evade this one. Nella was at her mother’s side, offering whatever support she could. Appropriately, the service was not far from the squash court under Stagg Field. And it was exactly one day and twelve years after the power of the atom was unleashed, heralding the birth of the atomic age.
In announcing the triumph of the pile experiment, the head of Chicago’s Metallurgical Laboratory, Arthur Compton, had reported that “the Italian navigator has just landed in the new world.” It was a world forever changed. And the Pope had created his transformative legacy.
AFTERWORD
In this book, Bettina and I have sought to describe a remarkable man who shaped history, along with a turbulent history that shaped the man. Enrico Fermi was both a creator and a product of his times. A great deal is known about his astonishing intellect, but less is shared about his human side. We have combined both aspects of him, hoping to present a fuller portrayal of Fermi within the context of a mutable world.
Writing this book has been a personal journey for Bettina and me, most obviously because we are coauthors, but also on another level, since Bettina and I had each met Fermi. I met him only once and barely remember the details. Bettina met him a few times and barely remembers the details. My excuse is that I was not yet two years old. Bettina’s is that she was a teenager, oblivious to fame.
For both of us, under very different circumstances, Fermi was a household name. My family had known and admired Fermi in Italy; Bettina’s family knew and admired Fermi in the Atomic City of Los Alamos.
My family and the Fermis had escaped Italy in 1939. In both cases their flight had been prompted by the passage in 1938 of Italy’s anti-Semitic laws. Fermi was not Jewish, but his wife, Laura, was; my father was Jewish, although my mother was not.
Like many European émigrés, they sought a permanent position in the United States. My father, Angelo Segrè, had been a professor of ancient history in Italy and landed a modest appointment at Columbia University. Fermi, a Nobel Prize winner, joined Columbia’s physics department as a celebrated member.
The families had met through Emilio Segrè, the younger brother of my father. My uncle was Fermi’s first student in Rome and the two physicists became lifelong friends. Emilio also had fled Italy in 1938, taking a position at the University of California in Berkeley. Emilio and Enrico had many parallels in their lives and an abiding trust in one another. They were both part of the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory team whose work led to far-reaching consequences.
After the war my family returned to Italy. Growing up there, I came to appreciate what a source of pride Fermi was for his homeland. Fermi’s 1938 Nobel Prize constituted a tangible symbol of Italy’s scientific renaissance after a long drought. Like many of my Italian contemporaries, I wanted to be a physicist. And I became one.
Physics is what led to me meeting my wife, Bettina Hoerlin. Her parents, too, had fled a fascist regime. Herman Hoerlin and his Jewish wife, Kate, escaped Germany in 1939 to come to America. Hoerlin, a physicist who had been employed in industry, joined the postwar Los Alamos laboratory as a group leader. A physics colleague of mine knew the Hoerlins from Los Alamos summers. Luckily, he introduced me to Bettina.
During the summer of 1953, Fermi’s last in New Mexico, he—along with other emigrant European scientists and their families—typically went on weekend hikes in the high mountains. Bettina’s father was a natural leader for these excursions, given that his bona fides extended beyond physics to mountaineering; he had made first ascents in the Alps, Andes, and Himalayas. Among his fellow hikers in New Mexico, Hoerlin saved his greatest compliment for the Italian Nobel laureate, declaring in his German accent, “I never had to vorry [sic] about Fermi.”
Bettina and I have attempted to approach Fermi in terms of person and place. Interviews with family members and with people who knew him or his children provided rich fodder. We followed Fermi’s (physical) footsteps, first in Italy and then in America.
We traveled to the ancient city of Pisa, where Fermi entered the world of science at the prestigious Scuola Normale. We strolled around the city famous for another scientist, Galileo, who inspired the seventeen-year-old. And we held Fermi’s meticulously recorded notebooks that hinted at his future thoroughness.
In Rome, Bettina and I admired the Campo dei Fiori, where fourteen-year-old Enrico bought his first physics book, and crisscrossed Rome to Via Panisperna, spotting the villa that once housed the university’s Institute of Physics. It was easy to imagine the collegiality he experienced with his equally young peers, known as the Boys. The instruments used in their groundbreaking radioactive research are now lovingly displayed in a museum at the current university site.
When Bettina and I traveled to the University of Chicago to delve into the Fermi archives, it was another kind of experience. We re-created the bike ride made by Fermi from his comfortable home to work every day. The football stadium at Stagg Field, where the first nuclear pile went critical, has been torn down and in its place stands the university library and a large monument called Nuclear Energy. The silence of this symbolic amalgam of a mushroom cloud and a human skull speaks to a sense of foreboding and doom. Circling its eight-foot circumference, we understood the aim of its sculptor—Henry Moore—to create a cathedral-like experience, a tribute to the human spirit.
Reportedly, Laura Fermi was not fond of it, because it was “confusing atomic energy, which began with the Chicago Pile-1 experiment, with the birth of atomic weapons, which began with Trinity.” It is difficult to separate those two events, one that built upon the other, ushering in the atomic age. In each, Fermi played a key role, although more so with the pile.
In 1944, Fermi and his family went from Chicago to Los Alamos. The town is much changed now. Unchanged is Trinity, a few hours south, where the first nuclear bomb exploded. A monument also marks this history. An obelisk sits in the epicenter of ground zero, amid bits of trinitite—a residue mineral formed by the heat of the blast. The obelisk, over twelve feet tall, happens to approximate the height of the Nuclear Energy monument. In contrast to the latter’s sleek surface of rounded bronze, the obelisk is geometric, rough-sided, and constructed from local lava rock. The site is rarely open to the public, eerily quiet, fenced off. Adding to its surreal aura, a species of oryx roam the surrounding bleak desert.
Major national—and international—disputes regarding immigration, secrecy, and nuclear weaponry were in the news almost every day during the period when Bettina and I were writing this book. They were also the issues of Fermi’s day, when the atomic age was born. We seem not to have learned how to deal with them.
Today almost ten countries have atomic bombs; several others have the know-how but have either chosen not to make them or been deterred from doing so. So far, the threat of mutual annihilation has prevented use of nuclear bombs by one nation against another. Let us hope it continues that way. As articulated by Fermi, the future hinges on whether humankind will make “good use of the powers … acquired over nature.”
April 2016
NOTES
The page numbers for the notes that appeared in the print version of this title are not in your e-book. Please use the search function on your e-reading device to search for the relevant passages documented or discussed.
&nbs
p; To distinguish works by the same author, the publication date of the reference is given, for example, Maltese (2003) and Maltese (2010). The publication year is otherwise omitted.
ABBREVIATIONS
ARCF
Enrico Fermi Collection, Regenstein Library, University of Chicago.
EFP 1
Enrico Fermi. 1962. Collected Papers, Volume 1, edited by Emilio Segrè (editor in chief), Edoardo Amaldi, Herbert Anderson, Enrico Persico, Franco Rasetti, Cyril Smith, and Albert Wattenberg. University of Chicago Press.
EFP 2
Enrico Fermi. 1965. Collected Papers, Volume 2, edited by Emilio Segrè (editor in chief), Edoardo Amaldi, Herbert Anderson, Enrico Persico, Franco Rasetti, Cyril Smith, and Albert Wattenberg. University of Chicago Press.
ES
Emilio Segrè. 1970. Enrico Fermi, Physicist. University of Chicago Press.
LF
Laura Fermi. 1954. Atoms in the Family: My Life with Enrico Fermi. University of Chicago Press.
OHI
Oral History Interviews, American Institute of Physics.
PROLOGUE: TRINITY
“Suddenly there … than the eye”: Rigden, p. 156.
“For a moment … not possible”: ES, p. 147.
“I am become … destroyer of worlds”: Rhodes (1986), p. 676. Quoted in Len Giovanitti and Fred Freed, The Decision to Drop the Bomb. New York: Coward McCann, 1965.
PART 1: ITALY, BEGINNINGS
The history of the Fermi family and Enrico Fermi’s subsequent life has been told admirably from a physicist’s point of view in Emilio Segrè’s Enrico Fermi, Physicist. For a comprehensive view of Italian history, see Denis Mack Smith’s very readable Modern Italy.
2: THE LITTLE MATCH (IL PICCOLO FIAMMIFERO)
“small … frail-looking”: LF (1954), p. 15.
“to stop … not tolerated”: Ibid.
3: LEANING IN: PHYSICS AND PISA
“During the first … my self-control”: Letter from Fermi to Persico, December 12, 1918. ARCF, Box 9, folder 2.
4: STUDENT DAYS
“I have met … he understands everything”: Interview with Rasetti, April 8, 1963, OHI.
“I have a lot to … piece of filth”: Fermi to Persico, March 16, 1922. ARCF, Box 9, folder 2.
“Spaghetti and Levi-Civita”: Jackson, p. 11.
5: THE YOUNG PROTÉGÉ
“I became a Senator … surrounded by apparatus”: ES, p. 30, quoting Corbino in Conferenze e Discorsi (1937), p. 167.
“were very conscious … to stress the point”: Interview with Amaldi, April 8, 1963, OHI.
“I could never … morning to be a theoretical physicist”: Commentary by Harold Agnew, January 6, 1955. ARCF, Box 7, folder 2.
6: THE SUMMER OF 1924
“I have finished … for my funeral”: LF (1961), p. 229.
“Italy wants … forty-eight hours”: LF (1961), p. 245, and Smith (1970), p. 332.
“In the first few years … which happened in 1924”: Rasetti (1982), p. 24.
“So many young men … than Fascism”: LF (1954), p. 30.
“A hope … under Mussolini”: Ibid.
“Better a day as a lion than a hundred years as a sheep”: Italian proverb quoted by Mussolini on June 20, 1926.
“promotion and … throughout the world”: Kevles (1995), p. 83.
“really very nice … in a ghetto store for used clothing”: Letter from Fermi to Persico, October 23, 1924. ARCF, Box 9, folder 2.
“very nice person … (pity that he’s not a beautiful girl)”: Ibid.
“the characteristics … missing hypotheses”: Persico introduction to EFP1, p. 142.
7: FLORENCE
“an act of desperation”: Hermann (1971), p. 74.
“the first instance … of radiofrequency fields”: EFP1, p. 159.
“given the … very pleasing”: Letter from Fermi to Persico, October 15, 1925. ARCF, Box 9, folder 2.
8: QUANTUM LEAPS
“There was a moment … rise and was happy”: Van der Waerden (1967), p. 25.
“My impression … zoology of spectroscopic terms”: Letter from Fermi to Persico, September 29, 1925. ARCF, Box 9, folder 2.
“Now I’m trying to … so far I don’t understand it”: Interview with Rasetti, April 8, 1963, OHI.
“This was … perfect, admirable”: Born (1978), p. 226.
“I was absolutely … if not to say repelled”: Schrödinger (1926), p. 755.
“understood it and then … few people around him”: Interview with Rasetti, April 8, 1963, OHI.
“Italy should have … scientific achievement”: Segrè (1993), p. 46.
“I have serious … and trotting out Mussolini”: Eckert (2013), p. 301.
“Everybody began … through Germany”: Interview with Rasetti, April 8, 1963, OHI.
9: ENRICO AND LAURA
“We are going … as my father says”: LF (1954), p. 6.
“He shook … and amused”: Ibid., p. 3.
“dispassionate detachment … or strange plants”: Ibid., p. 34.
“country stock”: Ibid., p. 52.
“When I first met her … I had ever met”: Libby (1979), p. 28.
“Enrico caught his breath … teen-age Laura was”: Ibid., pp. 28–29.
“If she wanted … make it for herself”: ES, p. 33.
“Congratulations, Mrs. Fermi”: LF (1954), p. 57.
PART 2: PASSAGES
For more background on Italian Fascism, consult Laura Fermi’s interesting book Mussolini. Nuclear physics history during the period between the discoveries of the neutron and of fission is covered extensively in Edoardo Amaldi’s “From the Discovery of the Neutron to the Discovery of Nuclear Fission” in Physics Reports.
10: THE BOYS OF VIA PANISPERNA
“I believe … poetic feelings about it”: ES, p. 53.
“by tailing Rasetti … what was going on”: Segrè (1993), p. 45.
11: THE ROYAL ACADEMY
“What practical … matter’s intimate structure?”: EFP1, p. 371.
“that the work … purely abstract ideas”: Ibid., p. 377.
“Enrico felt … be prepared for emergencies”: LF (1954), p. 60.
“I was to learn … about physics”: Ibid., p. 58
“was mediocre prose … returns for many years”: Ibid., p. 62.
“I am the driver … let me in”: Orear, p. 78.
“I had once to take … I always regretted it”: Wick, quoted in Jacob, p. 11.
12: CROSSING THE ATLANTIC
“Almost my … by Fermi”: Feynman (2005), p. 377.
“His ability to … literature is infallible”: Schweber (2012), p. 193.
13: BOMBARDING THE NUCLEUS
“The study … for the physics of tomorrow”: ES, pp. 65–67.
“we should expect … of nuclear phenomena”: EFP1, p. 361.
“These numbers … energetic chemical bonds”: Ibid., p. 33.
“the depth and universality of Italian thought”: Cordella (2001), p. 202.
“I don’t believe … entirely out of character”: Chadwick (1964), p. 161.
“For the neutron … something else”: Segrè (1980), p. 184.
“They haven’t … heavy neutral particle”: Maltese (2010), p. 197.
“I forbid you to mention … go around discrediting me”: Ibid., p. 199.
14: DECAY
“Any physicist … Just the facts!”: Goldberger, quoted in Cronin (2004), p. 158.
“it contained … too remote from physical reality”: EFP1, p. 540.
“One can … inside the nucleus”: Bethe (1934), p. 532.
“There is no … the neutrino”: Ibid.
15: THE NEUTRON COMES TO ROME
“The problem … intellectual torpor”: Letter from Fermi to Segrè, September 30, 1932. ARCF, Box 11, folder 13.
“To Professor … slow neutrons”: Fermi 1939 Nobel Prize in Physics citation.
“I congratulate … sphere of theoretical physics”: EFP
1, p. 641.
“Now we will all have to learn Italian”: Holton, quoting Rabi in Bernardini (2001), p. 63.
“The Pope is upstairs”: LF, p. 89.
“The investigation … of this new element is certain”: Maltese (2010), p. 269.
“The public … to study the general phenomenon”: LF (1954), p. 92.
16: THE RISE AND FALL OF THE BOYS
“What a stupid … known to foresee it”: Cordella, p. 244.
“intuito fenomenale”: Maltese (2010), p. 266.
“worked with … part in the Spanish Civil War”: EFP1, p. 811.
“The paper contains.… in succeeding years”: Ibid., pp. 810–11.
“dare to take … bewilderment and misgivings”: LF (1954), p. 105.
17: TRANSITIONS
“Fermi had … reticence”: Segrè, quoted in Cronin (2004), p. 25.
“hopeless to think … these researches on an adequate basis”: Maltese (2010), p. 308.
“that are … one in Denmark”: Ibid., p. 309.
“in one single unshakable determination”: LF (1961), p. 352.
18: STOCKHOLM CALLS
“I had … firmly rooted in Rome”: LF (1954), p. 113.
“for reasons easily understood”: Maltese (2003), p. 14.
“Making use of my … because of the racial laws”: Ibid.
“a great honor … Duce … so I can take … in scientific circles of those countries”: Letter from Fermi to Oswaldo Sebastiani, December 3, 1938. ACRF, Box 3, folder 12.
“I hope I’ll see you soon”: LF (1954), p. 129.
“one or more elements … of Ausonium and Hesperium respectively”: Nobel Prize in Physics lecture (by Fermi), 1938.
“I thank … just like my preceding five visits … without special warmth”: Letter from Federzoni to Mussolini, January 5, 1939. ACRF, Box 3, folder 13.
PART 3: HELLO, AMERICA
For a general background to part 3, we can recommend two very good books by physicists and friends of Fermi: Arthur Compton’s Atomic Quest and Leona Marshall Libby’s The Uranium People.
19: FISSION