People imagine that the second half of the twentieth century is easily explored, that everything is on the Internet, maybe even in an LLM. Not so. In America’s National Archives, I came across an almost trivial letter from Walter Zinn, head of Argonne laboratory, to an Atomic Energy Commission official:
The following paragraphs provide the information in your January 24 letter and the December 2 memorandum by W. Kenneth Davis in connection with the proposed U.S.A.-U.K. Joint Meeting on Reactor Hazards.
Zinn, Walter H. 1956. Zinn to Flaherty, Jan. 26, 1956. “Reading File, January 26, 1956,” Box 139, Laboratory Director’s Reading File, 1949-1957, RG 326. NARA-GL, Chicago, Illinois.
Not exactly riveting stuff and the rest of the letter covers a couple of minor Argonne papers and some relatively junior Argonne scientists assigned to go to Washington for the three days of May 8 to 10. But the import of this letter is that it’s the only material I’ve ever found about that American-English reactor safety meeting. It’s a meeting I’d love to be a fly on the wall at because this was a crucial period in both countries for the licensing (including safety prescriptions) of the first few power reactors. But I’ve found zilch beyond this letter (which is, of course, devoid of information about the actual meeting).
Just as frustrating is the discovery of British meeting notes of a trip to the mother country by Rogers McCullough, American head of the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS), just one month later. McCullough may well have been in the earlier Washington meeting. Regarding McCullough’s discussions (presumably in London although that’s not verified), I do have four pages of meeting notes but they’re from the British point of view and all they deal with is the nature of ACRS, not matters of safety substance. I don’t have the American notes nor do I have notes on any technical discussions, and again, I would love to hear the parlay.
Fletcher, P. T., & T. M. Fry. 1956. Meeting with the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards. AB 7/4710. National Archives, Kew, United Kingdom.
In effect I have confirmation that scientists and engineers from the two leading nuclear power countries chatted about safety but I possess no details whatsoever. And I haven’t spotted any reference to either event in secondary or tertiary references.
What is the point of this grumble? Nothing profound, I’m afraid. If I could go back to Maryland or Kew, into the two countries’ archives, would I be able to track down more? Maybe, maybe not (sometimes nuclear power archival records are exhaustive, sometimes there are huge holes). I thought I sucked both archives dry of relevant data but I might have fallen short. I guess my frustration is that I won’t go back, I’ll never know more, and oh, how I hope there are aspiring historians out there itching to dig into this fascinating history.