Well, that was interesting!

Post #435,667 by a6l6e6x 8/13/20 3:29:42 PM 8/13/20 3:29:42 PM Reply	Well, that was interesting! I just don’t remember hearing about Leo before. Obviously a most essential first step in seeing possibilities. Last fall, here at Sun City, Carolina Lakes, we had a “Life Long Learning” lecturer from Oak Ridge, TN. He is, and has been for decades, historian for the Y-12 plant. You can see him in the introduction video here: Y-12’s Anthology Anyway, I was hoping to visit Oak Ridge on the way West in my motor home this year. Unfortunately, Covid-19 killed that plan for now. Alex "There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge." -- Isaac Asimov
Post #435,687 by Ashton 8/15/20 6:02:00 PM 8/15/20 6:02:00 PM Reply	Indeed, Leo rarely gets even noticed in all those cursory Sci-'histories' churned out ..starting days after August Sixth 1945--not even in the gaggle of movies-about: people might recall Dr. Louis Slotin. whose screwdriver-slip killed him--as he stopped everyone {just after) In. Place. so that he can calculate Their doses. While fucking-Knowing: He. Is. Toast. fer-Damn-shure. That sane, quiet heroism quite trumps the Oops. At very least. (By now any serious-geek has peeped Feynman's books for-the-masses ..for a few other anecdotes, I guess) I looked-up, in the Lab's library: the saga re the Idaho ('SL-1', IIRC) reactor meltdown with explosion. So Much material as never makes it into the Pop-press {{sigh}} [as per Your Sig, a qed again]. :-/
Post #435,690 by Another Scott 8/16/20 12:28:46 AM 8/16/20 12:28:46 AM Reply	My recollection is... that Leo played a big role in Richard Rhodes' The Making of the Atomic Bomb - and deservedly so! (Also, IIRC) He was applying for patents for fission all the time too, but it took several false starts (with much lighter atoms) before he realized that U was the way to go. Cheers, Scott.
Post #436,028 by Ashton 8/30/20 1:01:50 AM 8/30/20 1:01:50 AM Reply	Was reading Rhodes' first book (next: Fusion] enroute from NYC --> Connecticut by train You've been keeping up; Nice :-) Had just bought from a pyramid of these, NYC-bookstore: it had just come out. Synchronicity, again! and fodder later on aeroplane flight West, to boot. (Old Greenwich CT--a haven for the über-rich of any age]. This was about the recent demise of my name-sake Uncle, who had taught me/tyke swimming tips, in Long Island Sound--all this pre-Web natch, or I might have checked* for some of Rhodes' Appendix connections. An O.G. phone just might have got the phone answered at least, I wot :-þ * with 20/20 hindsight--believe that thought would have made it to jelloware. IF. ('Course best that I rent a Jaguar, in that happenstance). Oh. Well. Life is like a box of candy ... sayeth a smarter 'Murican, I heard.

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