The Manhattan Project

by Cynthia C. Kelly

  Theodore Hall (1925–1999): American physicist and atomic spy for the Soviet Union. After graduating early from Harvard in January 1944, he was recruited to work at Los Alamos. In October 1944, Hall began providing atomic secrets to the Soviets, including detailed information about the “Fat Man” plutonium bomb. Hall was questioned but not charged in the early 1950s. In 1997, Hall issued a near-confession to authors Joseph Albright and Marcia Kunstel that detailed the reasons he decided to share secrets with the Soviets.

  Richard E. Heckert (1924–2010): American chemist. Heckert was selected from the Infantry Replacement Training Corps to work in the MP on uranium enrichment at the Y-12 plant at Oak Ridge, TN. After the war, he received a Ph.D. in organic chemistry, joined DuPont and eventually became its CEO before retiring in 1989.

  Donald Hornig (1920–2013): American chemist. Hornig went to work at the Los Alamos Laboratory in 1944 and came up with the implosion trigger mechanism used in the Trinity device and “Fat Man” bomb. The night before the Trinity test took place, he was assigned to supervise the “gadget” from a tin shack at the top of the shot tower. Hornig went on to serve as the science advisor for President Lyndon B. Johnson.

  Isabella Karle (1921–2017): American physical chemist. Karle joined her husband Jerome Karle at the Metallurgical Laboratory, University of Chicago, in 1943 and worked on plutonium chemistry. She later received the National Medal of Science and the Bower Award from the Franklin Institute.

  George Kistiakowsky (1900–1982): Ukranian-born chemist. Kistiakowsky was a professor at Harvard before he became a division chief in the National Defense Research Committee. In 1944, James Conant persuaded him to join the MP at Los Alamos, where he served as head of the Explosives Division and worked on lenses that focused the inward implosion for the plutonium bomb.

  John Lansdale Jr. (1912–2003): American lawyer and intelligence officer. Except for WWII, Lansdale spent most of his life as a lawyer in Cleveland and Washington, D.C. After joining the Army in June 1941, he was responsible for investigating potential subversive elements. In September 1942, Groves put him in charge of intelligence and security for the MP and the two became close associates. Lansdale also coordinated the Alsos mission to find out about the Italian, French, and German bomb programs.

  William L. Laurence (1888–1977): Lithuanian-born American journalist who was a science writer for the New York Times. In April 1945 in a special arrangement with the Times, Laurence was granted access to MP sites and visited Oak Ridge, Hanford, Los Alamos, and the university laboratories over the next three months. He was the only reporter present at the Trinity test and was an eyewitness to the dropping of an atomic bomb on Nagasaki. Laurence received the Pulitzer Prize in 1946 for his series of articles describing the project which was later the basis of his book, Dawn Over Zero: The Story of the Atomic Bomb (1946).

  Ernest O. Lawrence (1901–1958): American physicist and professor at the University of California, Berkeley. Lawrence received the 1939 Nobel Prize for Physics for his work on the cyclotron which became the prototype for the Y-12 plant at Oak Ridge. Before WWII, Lawrence’s Berkeley Radiation Laboratory was an important center for theoretical physics with J. Robert Oppenheimer and many other scientists who went on to work on the MP.

  Leona Woods Marshall Libby (1919–1986): American physicist. Libby worked with Enrico Fermi at the Chicago Metallurgical Laboratory during the MP. She was responsible for constructing neutron detectors at Chicago Pile-1 and was the only woman present at the first nuclear chain reaction.

  David E. Lilienthal (1899–1981): American government official. Lilienthal was appointed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt as director of the Tennessee Valley Authority in 1933. He was the chairman of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission from 1947–1950. During this time he contributed to diplomatic negotiations about regulating atomic energy and developed the Acheson-Lilienthal Report, which proposed the creation of an independent international governing body to control all fissile materials.

  Franklin T. Matthias (1908–1993): United States Army officer. Matthias was a lieutenant colonel in the Army Corps of Engineers during the MP. After being involved in the selection of the Hanford site for the production of plutonium in January 1943, Matthias (known as “Fritz”) was responsible for managing the operations of the Hanford Engineer Works.

  Dorothy McKibbin (1897–1985): Secretary to J. Robert Oppenheimer and “Gatekeeper to Los Alamos.” McKibbin’s office at 109 East Palace in Santa Fe, New Mexico was the first place that new Los Alamos recruits went to get their security badges, housing assignments, and orientation to life on “the Hill.” McKibbin formed close friendships with Oppenheimer and many of the scientists and their families at Los Alamos.

  Edwin McMillan (1907–1991): American physicist. McMillan worked on the cyclotron at University of California, Berkeley, before becoming a group leader in the Ordnance Division at Los Alamos. He also worked on radar and sonar during WWII and later won the 1951 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his co-discovery of plutonium and neptunium.

  Lise Meitner (1878–1968): Austrian-born physicist. Facing anti-Semitic laws with the annexation of Austria in 1938, Meitner fled to Stockholm where she continued collaboration with physicist Niels Bohr and others. In January 1939, she published a paper with her nephew Otto Frisch explaining the splitting of the uranium nucleus, which she termed “fission.” This publication spurred international interest in the possibility of harnessing atomic energy for weapons.

  Kenneth D. Nichols (1907–2000): United States Army officer. A graduate of West Point, Nichols served as District Engineer of the MP, reporting directly to General Groves. From his headquarters at Oak Ridge, Nichols supervised the research and development connected with the design, construction, and operation of all of the facilities required for the production of weapons-grade uranium 235 and plutonium.

  J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904–1967): American physicist. A brilliant theoretical physicist, Oppenheimer was a professor at both the University of California, Berkeley, and the California Institute of Technology before the MP. In November 1942, General Groves chose him to lead the scientific work. Oppenheimer was director of the laboratory at Los Alamos and is commonly recognized as the “father of the atomic bomb.”

  Rudolf Peierls (1907–1995): German-born physicist. Peierls studied nuclear physics in Germany with Werner Heisenberg and Wolfgang Pauli, but fled to England when Hitler rose to power in 1933. He helped to develop the theoretical foundation for the British atomic bomb project with the 1940 Frisch-Peierls memorandum. Peierls joined the MP in 1943 as part of the British Mission.

  Isidor I. Rabi (1898–1988): Austrian-born physicist. Rabi was a faculty member at Columbia before he became associate director of the Radiation Laboratory at MIT in 1940. At the Rad Lab, he was responsible for wartime research on radar. During the MP, Rabi served as a visiting consultant for the lab at Los Alamos and was present for the Trinity test. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1944.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945): President of the United States from 1933–1945. Roosevelt formed a committee to study uranium after Albert Einstein’s 1939 letter alerted him to the possibility of an atomic bomb. This committee became part of the National Defense Research Committee, which eventually developed into several precursor organizations of the MP. The Manhattan Engineer District was formally established in August 1942. Roosevelt died in April 1945, shortly before the Trinity test and dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

  Joseph Rotblat (1908–2005): Polish-born physicist. Rotblat worked at Los Alamos but left the project after nine months because of moral objections to continuing work on the atomic bomb after learning the bomb would probably not be used against Germany. Along with other scientists, Rotblat founded the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs in 1957 as part of a campaign to encourage arms control and eliminate nuclear weapons. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in 1995.

  Bertrand Russell (1872–197
0): British philosopher. Russell was known for his diverse work in mathematical logic and anti-war activism and received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1950. He played no role in the MP, though he later advocated against nuclear weapons, co-authoring the Einstein-Russell manifesto in 1955 and helping to organize the first Pugwash conference with Joseph Rotblat in 1957.

  Emilio Segrè (1905–1989): Italian-born physicist. Segrè studied under Enrico Fermi in Rome before immigrating to the U.S. in 1938, where he became a professor at the University of California, Berkeley. He served as a group leader at Los Alamos in the Experimental Physics division. Segrè went on to win the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1959.

  Robert Serber (1909–1997): American physicist. One of the first scientists at Los Alamos, Serber was a group leader in the Theoretical Physics division. He gave a series of introductory lectures explaining the physics behind atomic bomb development that were eventually published in a book given to all incoming staff, known as the Los Alamos Primer. After the Trinity test, Serber advised the crew in the Pacific responsible for dropping the bombs. He was with the first American team that entered Hiroshima and Nagasaki to measure radiation levels and assess the damage from the bombs.

  Maurice Shapiro (1915–2008): Born in Jerusalem, he immigrated to New York as a boy. Shapiro studied at the University of Chicago with Arthur Compton, Enrico Fermi, and several other MP scientists before going to Los Alamos, where he served as a group leader within the Ordnance Division. In 1946, Shapiro became Chairman of the Association of Los Alamos Scientists, which lobbied for international control of atomic energy.

  Henry DeWolf Smyth (1898–1986): American physicist. Chairman of the Princeton physics department, Smyth authored the federal government’s official report on the development of the atomic bomb, “Atomic Energy for Military Purposes.” Also known as the Smyth Report, it was made public shortly after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He remained at Princeton throughout the MP, but served as a special consultant to the laboratory at Los Alamos.

  Henry L. Stimson (1867–1950): American statesman. Stimson was Secretary of War from 1911–1913 and 1940–1945 and Secretary of State from 1929–1933. As the highest government official carrying out the President’s policies, Stimson—with Army Chief of Staff General George C. Marshall—was ultimately in charge of the MP, though enormous authority was given to General Groves. As development of the bomb neared completion in the spring and summer of 1945 he helped shape decisions about its targets, its use, and the post-war challenges of international control.

  Leo Szilard (1898–1964): Hungarian-born physicist. Szilard studied in Germany with Albert Einstein. In 1933 he conceived the nuclear chain reaction, and in 1939 drafted the letter from Einstein to President Franklin Roosevelt. He co-designed the first nuclear reactor with Enrico Fermi, known as the Chicago Pile-1, which first operated December 2, 1942. Beginning in 1944, he worked to prevent use of nuclear weapons on Japan, helped draft the Franck Committee report urging a demonstration, organized a petition to President Harry Truman signed by 155 scientists, and after World War II worked to control nuclear proliferation.

  Edward Teller (1908–2003): Hungarian-born physicist. Teller immigrated to the U.S. and joined the faculty of George Washington University in 1935. In 1939, along with Leo Szilard and Eugene Wigner, he encouraged Einstein to inform President Roosevelt of the power of nuclear fission and the potential for the atomic bomb as a weapon, which led to the eventual creation of the MP. Teller joined the laboratory at Los Alamos in early 1943 and served as a group leader in the Theoretical Physics Division. He is known for his later work on the hydrogen bomb.

  Harry S Truman (1884–1972): American politician. As Franklin Roosevelt’s vice president, Truman took over the presidency upon Roosevelt’s death in April 1945. Prior to this, he had no knowledge of the MP.

  Stanislaw Ulam (1909–1984): Polish mathematician. Ulam was on the faculty of the University of Wisconsin at Madison before he joined the MP at Los Alamos in 1943. He later worked on the hydrogen bomb with Edward Teller.

  Harold Urey (1893–1981): American chemist. A 1934 winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics, Urey was a professor of chemistry and head of war research at Columbia during WWII. Responsible for several important research projects related to the MP, his team developed the gaseous diffusion method of isotope separation that was used at Oak Ridge.

  Victor Weisskopf (1908–2002): Austrian-born physicist. Weisskopf immigrated to the U.S. in 1937, prior to the Nazi annexation of Austria. He worked at the University of Rochester before joining the MP at Los Alamos in 1943, where he served as a group leader in the Theoretical Physics division.

  George Weller (1907–2002): American writer and Pulitzer-prize winning journalist for the New York Times and Chicago Daily News. Weller was the first journalist to enter Nagasaki after WWII, though his graphic descriptions of the city in the aftermath of the bombing were withheld from publication until 2006.

  Eugene Wigner (1902–1995): Hungarian-born physicist. In 1930, Wigner was offered a professorship at Princeton and immigrated to the U.S. Along with Leo Szilard, he played a major role in pushing for the creation of the MP. During the war, Wigner worked at the University of Chicago with Enrico Fermi on the first chain reaction. He also designed the first large-scale reactors at Hanford, Washington. Wigner won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1963.

  William Wilcox (1923–2013): American chemist. Wilcox was recruited to work on the MP after graduating from Washington & Lee in 1943. He worked at the Y-12 plant at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Named the City of Oak Ridge’s official historian, he is well-known for his efforts to preserve the history of the MP at Oak Ridge.

  Robert Wilson (1914–2000): American physicist. Wilson began working on the cyclotron at the Radiation Lab in Berkeley in 1932. During the MP, he was a group leader in the Experimental Division at Los Alamos. After the surrender of Germany, Wilson questioned whether work on the atomic bomb should continue and prompted seminars on this topic at Los Alamos. Following the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, he helped to organize the Association of Los Alamos Scientists, a group that petitioned for international control of nuclear weapons.

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