109 East Palace (65 page)

George Kistiakowsky (
below
) and Enrico Fermi (
left
), both initially consultants at Los Alamos, were persuaded to move to the Hill during the project’s second year and helped with the big push to perfect the implosion bomb.

(
Right
) Frank Oppenheimer, a physicist and Robert’s brother, came to Los Alamos in 1945 and worked at the Trinity site.

Top scientific advisors Vannevar Bush (
above, far left
) and James B. Conant (
above, center
), touring one of the Manhattan Project sites with Groves.

The scientists’ wives waged their own battles with Groves, demanding that something be done about the old-fashioned post laundry which had hand-operated mangles (
above
) and the chronic shortage of milk and eggs in the commissary (
right
).

Scientists and soldiers lined up to buy newspapers, magazines, and cigarettes at the PX (
below
) but because of wartime shortages and uncertain deliveries, often had to do without.

The pressure to build the bomb worked on everyone’s nerves, and drinking and dancing were popular ways to let off steam. A fair amount of carousing went on at the PX (
above
), which had a jukebox and a dance floor.

Impromptu office parties like this SED bash in the electronics division were often fueled by Tech Area 200-proof liquor.

Oppenheimer mandated that Sundays were a day of rest, and the scientists streamed down to the meadows for picnics. Dorothy McKibbin (
left
), taking a well-deserved nap. Robert Serber (
below
), one of Oppie’s protégés, tried to plant rumors that Los Alamos was really a rocket factory.

Serber’s wife, Charlotte (
above
), was one of a handful of strong women Oppie counted on to help with the smooth operation of the laboratory, along with his assistant, Priscilla Greene (
right
), shown with Truchas, the English bulldog that Dorothy found for her.

Hiking was a popular pastime. After Dorothy took over the old Frijoles Canyon Lodge at Bandelier National Monument and turned it into a weekend retreat, the scientists and their families flocked to the picturesque spot to escape the drab confines of their mountain hideout. Dorothy recalled that “some rode their horses over, some came to fish, and most came to eat because the food was excellent.”

Shirley Barnett, one of Oppie’s assistants, and her husband, Henry, Los Alamos’s much in demand pediatrician. He had his hands full coping with the exploding birth rate at the laboratory.

Skiing was an obsession with some of the more intrepid scientists, including Enrico Fermi (
above, far left
) and Hans Bethe (
above, second from left
), who were undaunted by the steep slopes around Los Alamos. Niels Bohr (
left
) put younger men to shame on Sawyer’s Hill.