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Harry Allen: Mr. Wilson and company set us up a purchase request for a barber chair, because they couldn’t get off work in time to get their hair done. Robert Van Gemert:  There was only one man cutting hair, I think, up there. Allen: The barber service was extremely limited, and we just happen to […]

General Kenneth Nichols: —found we did not have the authority to satisfy DuPont. Stephane Groueff: But why did DuPont challenge your authority? Nichols: Because they had trouble, in World War I, being called munitions makers and investigated after World War I, so they are more conservative than most companies. And they wanted to have in their […]

Tom Ryan: In the early morning of August 6, 1945, three B-29 bombers departed from Tinian Island in the Pacific Ocean. Six hours later, they changed the course of history. A single atomic bomb dropped from the Enola Gay exploded over Hiroshima, Japan. In an instant, over four square miles of the city and an […]

Stephane Groueff: [Enrico] Fermi had the characteristics of a real genius. Colonel Franklin Matthias: Almost every time you would get in contact with him, something would come up that was impressive. Physically, he was a small man, unimpressive person, but he grew real large when he started talking about things he knew. Groueff: Was he […]

Siegfried Hecker: The Gramm-Rudman-Hollings [Act] brings back memories.    Richard Rhodes:  No, exactly. Hecker: It was very interesting. When I came into the directorship, the thing that I was really immensely concerned about was the future of this institution. I inherited this jewel and it was now in my hands; I had to make sure […]

Stephane Groueff: Hello. Colonel Matthias, if you can tell me the story of how the plutonium was shipped. Colonel Franklin Matthias: Is this good enough. Groueff: Yeah, it is good enough. The plutonium was shipped from Hanford to—? Matthias: To Los Alamos. Groueff: To Los Alamos. Matthias: We spent a lot of time trying to […]

Richard Rhodes: So what I thought we might do since you just came back from – was this work related to the Russian collaboration? Siegfried Hecker: Yes. Rhodes: Then maybe we should debrief you about that first before we go back and do the earlier part of the story. Does that make sense to you? […]

Walter Goodman: My name is Walter Goodman and I was born in 1922, which is a very long time ago. I was particularly interested in engineering and in the military from the time I was a young boy. When I did get into the service, I ended up continuing in school, and finished electrical engineering. […]

Richard Rhodes: I really am going to have to go through and revise the Perseus discussion, I think. Robert Lamphere: It’s got Lona [Cohen] and the tissue thing. I think it became a story that she told. But who’s to know? I just found that Greenglass’s information on implosion was the first news the Soviets […]

Robert Lamphere: They said that he [Klaus Fuchs] annoyed some of the people because he wanted to keep certain [inaudible]. That’s a little point of irony.  Richard Rhodes: Although, again, there was one guy who later thought, “Well, maybe he was pushing to find out what was the most valuable information.” Which I hadn’t thought […]