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National Museum of Nuclear Science & History

Richard McCardell

Nuclear EngineerIdaho Falls

EngineerScientist
Richard McCardell Listen to Richard McCardell’s Oral History on Voices of the Manhattan Project

Richard McCardell was a nuclear engineer at the National Reactor Testing Station (today Idaho National Laboratory).

A native of Idaho, McCardell worked a series of jobs before graduating from Pocatello High School. In 1962, he earned his master’s degree in physics at Idaho State University and began working at the National Reactor Testing Station along side his wife Lynn McCardell, where he was involved with the Special Power Excursion Reactor Test, or “SPERT,” a series of reactor tests in Idaho Falls.

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