Government Official

Boris Pash (1900 – 1995) was a United States military intelligence officer who commanded the Alsos Mission during World War II. Pash was called to active duty with the Army in 1940, and became chief of counter-intelligence at the Ninth Corps headquarters at the Presidio in San Francisco two years later. After the United States entered World […]

George C. Marshall (1880 – 1959) was the Chief of Staff of the US Army and recipient of the 1953 Nobel Peace Prize. Marshall was chosen by President Roosevelt to serve on the Top Policy Group, which was tasked with the oversight of the atomic program. Along with Secretary of War Stimson, he was responsible […]

Harry S. Truman (1884-1972) was the 33rd President of the United States of America. Truman first learned of the Manhattan Project after the death of President Roosevelt in April of 1945, when he relinquished his role as Vice President and took the oath of office as the next president of the United States. Although he knew nothing […]

As Secretary of War under Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry Truman, Henry L. Stimson (1867-1950) oversaw the entire Manhattan Project, and was responsible for appointing key project leaders and authorizing project construction sites across the US. By the time Stimson became Secretary of War under Roosevelt, scientific processes behind the atomic bomb had been researched for nearly […]

Curtis LeMay (1906-1990) was a United States Air Force general. LeMay is known for designing and implementing the systematic strategic bombing campaign in the Pacific Theater during World War II. LeMay was stationed in the European theatre early in the war, where he became famous for his intense, relentless leadership style. LeMay personally led many of the missions he […]

Henry DeWolf Smyth (1898-1986) was an American physicist, diplomat, and bureaucrat. During World War II, Smyth was a member of the National Defense Research Committee’s Uranium Section. He also proposed the electromagnetic methods that were used to enrich the first samples of U-235 during the Manhattan Project. Smyth worked as a consultant for the Manhattan Project […]

Karl Taylor Compton was an American physicist and the brother of Nobel Prize winner Arthur Compton. Compton was born in 1887 in Wooster, Ohio. He received a B.A. in philosophy and an M.S. from the College of Wooster. He later received the Porter Ogden Jacobus Fellowship to study at Princeton University, where he would earn […]

James Bryant Conant (1893-1978) was an American chemist and government official.  Early Years Conant was born in Dorchester, Massachusetts, and attended the Roxbury Latin School. He received his B.S. from Harvard University in only three years, and went on to earn a Ph.D. in chemistry, also from Harvard. During World War I, Conant served in […]

Morris “Moe” Berg (1902-1972) was an American catcher in Major League Baseball from 1926-1939. He later became a spy for the Office of Strategic Services during World War II. Berg was born in New York City on March 2, 1902.  After graduating from Princeton in 1923, he began his career in Major League Baseball as […]

Vannevar Bush (1890-1974) was an American engineer, inventor and science administrator. In 1940 the National Defense Research Committee was established and President Roosevelt appointed Bush as its president. A year later the Office of Scientific Research and Development was created, absorbing the NDRC, with Bush as director.  This latter organization oversaw the Manhattan Project and […]