David Lilienthal is rightly regarded as one of the pioneers of nuclear energy, in his role as inaugural chairman of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission pushing for the “peaceful atom,” but he left his post, after three years, embittered. He became an international merchant banker/developer and had little to do with nuclear affairs, but he consistently railed in private against what he. . .
Huge construction projects like building a power reactor seem to require ceremonies when construction first begins. Dignitaries assemble and make speeches before some earth is excavated to signify commencement. This is sometimes called “sod-turning” or “sod-cutting.” I’ve noted that such ceremonies can involve unexpected tensions and humor, and in my book I use a. . .
I’m researching and writing about the peaceful atom but the thought did occur to me when reading up about the Manhattan Project, how did they come up with the colossal amount of money needed? Well, a New York Times reporter has recently done a deep dig into just that subject, namely: It turns out that when Congress voted to fund the bomb, there was no debate and no discussion. Only seven. . .
Walker Cisler, an energetic, debonair electricity utility executive during the early years of nuclear power, penned a biography of sorts in 1976. He writes engagingly but I haven’t ended up using his material much, simply because other sources trump his. At one point he writes about the new Japanese market, which he obviously claims to have opened up for America, and refers to the Lucky. . .
History professor Brian Balogh wrote a readable, academic 1991 book (most obscure in Australia) about nuclear debate, covering the three decades to 1975. In 1956, he writes, based on National Security Council papers (which I now wish I’d sighted): …the OCB [Operations Coordinating Board] warned that “there are signs that the early emotional over-optimism on peaceful uses may turn into. . .
Key reactor pioneers in the 1950s spearheaded the creation of a new profession, that of nuclear engineering. A historian of science in Scotland, Sean Johnston, wrote a book on just this topic (he gave the academic book an evocative title, something I admire). Intriguingly, one of his key protagonists resisted the notion of a new profession, as Johnston writes (pp. 181-182): Hinton was averse to a. . .
The reactor pioneers of the 1940s and 1950s were, above all, practical. They politicked, they campaigned, but few of them could be said to display overt passion. Sometimes I had to divine their emotions from ephemera. In October 1956, just before the grand royal launch of Calder Hall, Christopher Hinton sent Mrs. Marr of Durdar, Carlisle a photograph of the plant as a memento, writing: “As you. . .
An intriguing minor personality in the 1950s was Jerome D. Luntz, editor of the new trade journal Nucleonics. Until the British, egged on by Christopher Hinton, established their own trade journal later in the decade, Nucleonics was avidly read around the globe by anyone remotely interested in the new science and technology. Luntz’s editorials were bold and unrestrained. He was as much a. . .
Conducting detailed archival research (at least for two countries, the United Kingdom and the United States) has meant that I’ve grown highly familiar with a great many “bit players” or “character actors” in the grand drama of nuclear power’s history. They are the middle managers, the senior scientists and engineers, the diplomats. Some might take part in. . .
One joy of archival research is stumbling across documents that reveal the character of key players. Christopher Hinton, the engineer who pioneered (with others) British power reactors, was a towering personality, often feared. Imagine then a London bureaucrat daring to challenge him on fiscal responsibility, especially as Hinton prided himself on budgetary control. Witness Hinton responding (Dec. . .