Civilian Life

Hobson: One thing that used to happen to particularly interesting and sensitive papers was that Kitty would take them home, and then they would get lost. Lots of things went that way, including a whole batch of interesting tapes. It was very embarrassing because we had promised [Dean] Acheson that only one copy would be made, […]

[To see an edited version of the interview published by S. L. Sanger in Working on the Bomb: An Oral History of WWII Hanford, Portland State University, 1995, click here.] Clare Whitehead: I got raised to Tech Sergeant, so he immediately got raised to Tech Sergeant. He said, “Well, we figured it was too bad we […]

Cindy Kelly: Okay. I am Cindy Kelly. I’m here in Albuquerque. It is Wednesday, October 12. Hal Behl: Okay. I’m Harold Behl. B as in boy, e-h-l. Known as Hal. Kelly: Okay. I just want to have you tell us when and where you were born and a little about your childhood. Behl: Well, I […]

[For Edwin McMillan’s lecture, which preceded Elsie’s, please click here.] Elsie McMillan: You know, I will tell you a secret. This is the very first time I have shared a platform, let alone shared it with my best beau and a Nobel Prize winner [Edwin McMillan]. I think my greatest difficulty this afternoon is going […]

Edwin McMillan: Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to start with two remarks. First, this is going to be a personal story, so if I use the first person singular, this is not pure egotism, it is simply the fact that that’s the part that I know best. Second remark is, the difficulty of establishing […]

Owen Gingerich: This is an interview between Owen Gingerich and Robert Wilson. You use your middle initial. It’s Robert R.? Robert Wilson: Yes, usually. Gingerich: Robert R. Wilson, who is a builder of high energy accelerators and who was one of the physicists at Los Alamos. We are speaking today in Philadelphia, where we both happen […]

Cindy Kelly: Okay, I am Cindy Kelly, Atomic Heritage Foundation. It’s August 9, 2016 and we are in Berkeley, California. I have with me Esther Floth. Our first question I want to ask is for her to tell us your name and to spell it. Esther Floth: My name is Esther Marie Green Floth. It’s […]

Louis Hempelmann: He [J. Robert Oppenheimer] just told me what the situation was. He did not ask me, which is the same thing when he got sick because I was in the radiology department here and I knew something about it. He would call me up, tell me what he had done, and then say […]

Martin Sherwin: Was there a lot of effort to trying to figure out the psychology that the people who were sitting in judgement [at J. Robert Oppenheimer’s security hearing] would have? That “They will probably be thinking this, so therefore we should do that?” Do you recall any of that? Verna Hobson: No. I remember […]

Jean Bacher: Ruth Valentine said, “I shall take Ruth [Tolman]’s desk.” She always saved letters. She had marvelous long letters from Robert, you know, especially at the time of the hearings. I knew they were just terribly close and shared a great deal. On the drawer of the desk, she’d said, “Destroy these.” Martin Sherwin: […]