Mary T. Burke was a research assistant in the Metallurgical Laboratory (“Met Lab”) at the University of Chicago during the Manhattan Project. She worked in the Instruments Division of the lab.
Burke was one of seventy scientists at the Met Lab to sign the Szilard Petition, a petition against the United States using atomic bombs against Japan. Drafted by physicist Leo Szilard, the petition was never read by President Truman or the Secretary of War before the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.