Price 3
Jason Price
Dr. Heath
History 1302
October 24, 2014
Trinity
The Government and the Army started the Manhattan Project during the beginning of World War II. News had arrived in the U.S. that the Nazis were progressing towards the creation of an atomic bomb, nuclear weapons. Though they were already behind, the U.S. believed they could not allow the Nazis to build such a powerful weapon first. In fear, the Army and Government responded with the Manhattan Project, a race against Nazi, Germany. They needed someone who is very skilled and knowledgeable with physics and calculations. They appointed Julius Robert Oppenheimer, a physicist to be the scientific director of the Manhattan Project. He was in charge of coordinating, calculating, and leading a team of scientists that developed the first Atomic bomb.
In order to have a greater success in the creation of the atomic bomb, Oppenheimer gathered some of the world's greatest theoretical physicists later dubbed the Luminaries, to discuss the Atomic Bomb design.
The Luminaries consisted of Felix Bloch, Hans Bethe, Edward Teller, and Robert Serber, while John H. Manley assisted Oppenheimer in coordinating nationwide fission research. General Leslie Groves, the officer in charge of the Manhattan Project, elected Julius Robert Oppenheimer to be the Scientific Director of the Manhattan Project. Oppenheimer, along with General Groves, were to discuss and select a new location for the weapons laboratory. They needed a place far away from civilization to conduct research and testing on the Atomic bombs. Oppenheimer and Groves agreed on Los Alamos, New Mexico.
Robert Oppenheimer, a brilliant physicist, was brought into the Manhattan Project by the Government and the Army to calculate the amount of Uranium-235 needed to hold and sustain a chain reaction for nuclear fission. During some testing on Uranium,