Marjorie Hall Bradner was a secretary at Los Alamos during the Manhattan Project. She was also the wife of Los Alamos physicist Hugh Bradner.
At Los Alamos, Marjorie served as a secretary for J. Robert Oppenheimer, the director of the Los Alamos site.
Marjorie and Hugh married in 1943. According to Marjorie, it was love at first sight: “Hugh was the first person I met when I came through. I walked in Dorothy McKibbin’s Santa Fe office, and this good-looking guy said, ‘Come in,’ and I fell for him.” McKibbin helped play matchmaker and ultimately hosted their wedding at her Los Alamos house.
Captured on Hugh Bradner’s home movies, the wedding featured Priscilla Greene Duffield as maid of honor, Henry Barnett as the best man, and Oppenheimer as the stand-in father of the bride. To watch Bradner’s home movies, click here.
The Bradners were married for sixty-five years and had one daughter, Bari.
At the age of eighty-nine, she died on April 10, 2008 in California.
For more information about the Bradners, please see the following resources:
- Washington Post Obituary for Hugh Bradner
- 109 East Palace: Robert Oppenheimer and the Secret City of Los Alamos