Post archives
Filtering for posts tagged with ‘Los Alamos’
2021
May 2021
17
Redactions | Visions
How the wrong settings on a photocopier has let us have a glimpse at a forbidden image of a modern thermonuclear warhead.
2017
2
Redactions
Was the first history of the atomic bomb biased towards physics to avoid public associations with chemical weapons? My take on a recent article.
2016
23
Redactions
Digging into the unusual death of Louis Slotin and the fate of the bomb core that killed him.
April 2016
8
Meditations
Inventing the bomb was hard. Maintaining the bomb was harder.
2015
December 2015
11
Redactions
Who killed J. Robert Oppenheimer's Communist lover?
4
Meditations
What caused the atomic spies of Los Alamos to do what they did? Somewhere in the zone between ideology and ego, monsters live.
November 2015
27
Visions
What does an atomic bomb scientist look like? Not just white men.
20
Redactions
Reading about the various radiation hazards in the Manhattan Project's history can be spine-tingling, even with a measured view of the dangers.
6
Visions
The popular version of Oppenheimer at Los Alamos is one of infinite competence, confidence, and charm. The reality is far more complex.
July 2015
17
Visions
What does the Trinity test signify, in the broad sweep of human history?
June 2015
12
Meditations
What remains of the Manhattan Project? A lot of documents. Some people. A few places. And a handful of artifacts.
May 2015
29
Meditations
Historians sometimes need a reminder that places and people, not just documents, make up the past.
11
Redactions
Along with almost getting hit by a car, he made important contributions to the atomic bomb's design.
February 2015
13
Redactions
The details of the two dozen Manhattan Project deaths at Los Alamos reveal much about the work of building the bomb, and the people who did it.
2014
November 2014
10
Redactions
The Trinity and Fat Man atomic bombs were powered primarily by plutonium — but not exclusively.
July 2014
11
Redactions
Richard Feynman's FBI file contains one very pointed, personal, anonymous attack. But can we figure out who wrote it from the context?
June 2014
6
Meditations
Most of Feynman's stories about the bomb are about his hijinks. But what did he really do on the Manhattan Project, and what did he think about the bomb?
2013
December 2013
27
Redactions
Why did three major DOE historical databases go offline in late 2013?
October 2013
23
Visions
"At the first sign of any unusual behavior inside the box he was to abandon the automobile and run as far away from it as his legs would carry him..."
September 2013
20
Redactions
How did an article about the work at the Los Alamos laboratory come to be published in March 1944?
August 2013
16
Redactions
Japan managed to avoid getting the world's third plutonium core dropped on them, but it still managed to leave behind a deadly legacy.
July 2013
30
Visions
Two new photoessays about the first atomic bomb and its creators.
May 2013
17
Meditations
Of the $2 billion spent on the Manhattan Project, where did it go, and what does it tell us about how we should talk about the history of the bomb?
March 2013
29
Meditations
How many ways are there to talk about secrecy? Quite a few.
January 2013
25
Meditations | News and Notes
Three recent losses — two people, one building — highlight that the living presence of the Manhattan Project is rapidly vanishing.
2012
December 2012
14
Visions
How does one recruit nuclear weapons designers? In the 1950s, you could just take out ads in popular magazines.
November 2012
15
Redactions
What would make a nuclear bomb attack even worse? How about a nuclear attack that generates its own thunderstorm?
October 2012
5
Meditations | News and Notes
Robert Christy, one of the last major recognizable names who worked on the atomic bomb, has passed away. How many major Manhattan Project figures remain?
August 2012
31
Visions
The security badges produced for the Los Alamos project present a dizzying display of the many people who worked on the atomic bomb.
29
Redactions
A document from 1947 points towards an interesting Los Alamos policy: banning all spheres, innocuous or not, from technical areas.
