Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

The Impact of the Depression and Nuclear Research on Universities, Research, and Scholarly Publishing: 1929–1941

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Book cover The Growth of the Scholarly Publishing Industry in the U.S.

  • 208 Accesses

Abstract

Before 1939, Europe was the center of scientific research, including major atomic research projects in Germany. Albert Einstein, Leo Szilard, and others became concerned about the potential threat posed by Germany if it developed an atomic bomb. This chapter addresses Einstein’s 1939 letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt requesting that the U.S. ratchet up atomic research, Roosevelt’s response to Einstein’s letter, the role played by the National Bureau of Standards (and its impact triggering 227 scientific journals to “censor” the publication of atomic research in the U.S.), the creation of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, and ultimately the Manhattan Project’s impact on scientific research.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 44.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 59.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    The National Bureau of Economic Research. “U.S. Business Cycle Expansions and Contractions;” http://www.nber.org/cycles.html

  2. 2.

    Ibid.

  3. 3.

    Ben Bernanke and Harold James, “The Gold Standard, Deflation, and Financial Crisis in the Great Depression: An International Comparison,” in R. Glenn Hubbard, Financial Markets and Financial Crises, Chicago: University of Chicago Press for NBER, 1991. Barry Eichengreen. “Still Fettered After All These Years,” National Bureau of Economic Research, Working Paper 9276, October 2002. James D. Hamilton. “Monetary Factors in the Great Depression,” Journal of Monetary Economics, 1987, 145–69. Lester V. Chandler. American Monetary Policy, 1928 to 1941 (New York: Harper & Row, 1971). Peter Temin. Lessons from the Great Depression (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1989).

  4. 4.

    Gary Richardson, Alejandro Komala, Michael Gou, and Daniel Park. “Stock Market Crash of 1929;” The Federal Reserve; https://www.federalreservehistory.org/essays/stock_market_crash_of_1929?view=print

  5. 5.

    Gary Richardson. “The Great Depression;” The Federal Reserve; https://www.federalreservehistory.org/essays/great_depression?view=print

  6. 6.

    Nicholas Crafts and Peter Fearon. “Lessons from the 1930s Great Depression,” Oxford Review of Economic Policy 26, 3(October 2010): 287.

  7. 7.

    Ibid., page 286.

  8. 8.

    Albert N. Greco. “The Impact of Disruptive Technologies on Scholarly Journals,” the Journal of Scholarly Publishing 48, 1(October 2016): 17–39.

  9. 9.

    Peder Olesen Larson and Markus von Ins. “The Rate of Growth in Scientific Publication and the Decline in Coverage Provided by Science Citation Index,” Scientometrics 84 (2010): 575–603.

  10. 10.

    Sally Shuttleworth and Berris Charley. “Science Periodicals in the Nineteenth and Twenty-First Centuries,” Notes and Records 70 (October 5, 2016): 297–304.

  11. 11.

    Albert N. Greco. “Academic Libraries and the Economics of Scholarly Publishing in the Twentieth-First Century: Portfolio Theory, Product Differentiation, Economic Rent, Perfect Price Discrimination, and the Cost of Prestige,” Journal of Scholarly Publishing 47, 1(October 2015): 1–43.

  12. 12.

    The American Philosophical Society. “Publications;” http://www.amphilsoc.org/publications. The American Medical Association; https://www.ama-assn.org/about. The American Association for the Advancement of Science. “Origins: 1848–1899;” https://www.aaas.org/page/origins-1848-1899

  13. 13.

    The American Chemical Society; https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/about.html

  14. 14.

    Steven W. Usselman. “Research and Development in the United States Since 1900: An Interpretive History,” page 9; working paper; https://economics.yale.edu/sites/default/files/usselman_paper.pdf

  15. 15.

    The American Chemical Society. “ACS Statistical Summary 1907–2007;” http://www.jaici.or.jp/stn/pdf/casstats.pdf

  16. 16.

    Donald W. King, Dennis D. McDonald, and Nancy K. Roderer. Scientific Journals in the United States: Their Production, Use, and Economics. (East Stroudsburg, PA: Hutchinson Ross Publishing Company, a division of Academic Press, 1981), page 319. Also see Carol Tenopir and Donald W. King. “The Use and Value of Scientific Journals: Past, Present, and Future,” Serials 14, 2(July 2001): 113–120.

  17. 17.

    Albert Henderson. “Diversity and the Growth of Serious/Scholarly/Scientific Journals,” in Scholarly Publishing: Books, Journals, Publishers, and Libraries in the Twentieth Century, eds. Richard E. Abel and Lyman W. Newlin (New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2002), pages 133–162.

  18. 18.

    Albert N. Greco, Jim Milliot, and Robert M. Wharton. The Book Publishing Industry, 3rd ed. (New York: Routledge, 2014), pages 115–120.

  19. 19.

    Kenneth C. Davis. Two-Bit Culture: The Paperbacking of America (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984), page 16. For new title output, see Jean Peters. “Book Industry Statistics from the R.R. Bowker Company,” Publishing Research Quarterly 8, 3(Fall 1992), page 18.

  20. 20.

    Lutz Bormann and Rudiger Mutz, “Growth Rates of Modern Science: A Bibliometric Analysis Based on the Number of Publications and Cited References;” https://arXiv.org/abs/1402.4578

  21. 21.

    Anon. “90th Anniversary Issue: 1930s,” Science News 181, 6(March 9, 2012): 23.

  22. 22.

    Niels Bohr. “On the Constitution of Atoms and Molecules,” 1913; http://gsjournal.net/Science-Journals/Historical%20Papers/View/2438

  23. 23.

    Max Planck. “On the Law of Distribution of Energy in the Normal Spectrum,” Annalen der Physik 309, 3(1901): 553–563.

  24. 24.

    Victor F. Hess. “New Results of Cosmic-Ray Research,” Terrestrial Magnetism and Atmospheric Electricity 41, 4(1936): 345–350; in the Fordham University Achieves, where Dr. Hess was Professor of Physics.

  25. 25.

    Albert Szent-Gyorgyi. Papers available at the U.S. National Library of Medicine; https://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/WG

  26. 26.

    Albert Einstein. “On a Heuristic Point of View about the Creation and Conversion of Light;” Annalen der Physik 17, 6(1905): 132–148; “Investigations on the theory of Brownian Movement;” Annalen der Physik 17, 8(1905): 549–560; “On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies;” Annalen der Physik 17, 10(1905): 891–921; and “Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon Its Energy Content?” Annalen der Physik 18, 13(1905): 639–614.

  27. 27.

    Richard Panek. “The Year of Albert Einstein. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-year-of-albert-einstein-75841381

  28. 28.

    Professor H. Pieijel. “The Nobel Prize in Physics 1933;” https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1933/press.html. The 1932 Nobel was awarded in 1933. Also see David C. Cassidy. “Werner Heisenberg: A Bibliography of His Writings, 1922–1929, Expanded Edition;” http://www.aip.org/history/heisenberg/bibliography/contents/htm. Nevill Mott and Rudolf Peierls. “Weiner Heisenberg 5 December 1901–1 February 1976,” Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society,” Royal Society 23 (1977): 212; doi.https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbm.1977.0009

  29. 29.

    Emilio G. Segre. “The Discovery of Nuclear Fission,” Physics Today 42, 7(July 1989): 38. Some examples this research included: E. Fermi, E. Amaldi, O. D’Agostino, F. Rosetti, and E. Segre. “Artificial Radioactivity Produced by Neutron Bombardment,” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series A. Containing Papers of a Mathematical and Physics Character, 146, 857(September 1, 1934): 483–500; Carl D. Anderson. “The Positive Electron,” Physical Review 43, 491(March 15, 1933); https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRev.43.491; Fredric Joliot. “Chemical Evidence of the Transmutation of Elements,” Nobel Lecture December 12, 1935; https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laueates/1935/joliot-fred-lecture.pdf; Niels Bohr. “Neutron Capture and Nuclear Constitution,” Nature 137 (February 29, 1936): 344–349; Lise Meitner, Otto Hahn, and Friedrich Wilhelm “Fritz” Strassmann. “Uber die Umwandlungsreihen des Urans, die durch Neutronenbestrahlung erzeugt warden,” Zeitschrift fur Physik 106, 3–4(March 1937): 249–270; Otto Hahn, and Friedrich Wilhelm “Fritz” Strassmann. “Uber die Entstehung von Radiumisotopen aus Uran durch Bertrahlem mit schnellen und verlangsamten Neutronen,” naturwissenschaften 26, 46(November 1938): 755–756; Hans Bethe. “On the Theory of Metals. I. Eigenvalues and Eigenfunctions of the Linear Atom Chain,” Zeitschrift für Physik, 71 (1931): 205–226. James Chadwick and Maurice Goldhaber. “A ‘Nuclear Photo-Effect’: Disintegration of the Diplon bty-Rays,” Nature 134, 3381(1934): 237. Otto R. Frisch. “Physical Evidence for the Division of Heavy Nuclei Under Neutron Bombardment,” Nature 143, 3616(February 18, 1939): 276–278.

  30. 30.

    Rexmond C. Cocrane. The National Academy of Sciences: The First Hundred Years 1863–1963 (Washington, D.C.: National Academy of Sciences, 1978), page 2. Also see Lise Meitner and Otto R. Frisch. “Disintegration of Uranium by Neutrons: A New Type of Nuclear Reaction,” Nature 143, 3615(February 11, 1939); 239–240. The U.S. Department of Energy, Office of History and Heritage Resources. “The Manhattan Project: Exploring the Atom;” https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Events/1890s-1939/exploring.htm. The U.S. Department of Energy, Office of History and Heritage Resources. “The Manhattan Project: Atomic Bombardment;” https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Events/18902-1939/atomic_bombardment.htm

  31. 31.

    Alan Turing. “On Computable Numbers, With an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem,” Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society, Series 2 42(1937): 230–265. Also see Andrew Hodges. Alan Turing: The Enigma (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2014), pages xvi–xxxii.

  32. 32.

    Sam Preston. “The Nazi Atomic Bomb: the Mistaken Assumption that Started the Cold War,” page 5; https://asit-prod-web1.cc.columbia.edu/historydept/wpcontent/uploads/sites/20/2017/07/Sam=Preston.pdf

  33. 33.

    Max Born and J. Robert Oppenheimer. “On the Quantum Theory of Molecules,” Annalen der Physik 389, 20(1927): 457–484. Also see The U.S. Department of Energy, Office of History and Heritage Resources. “The Manhattan Project: The Discovery of Fission;” https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Events/1890w-1939/discovery_fission.htm

  34. 34.

    David Cassidy. Uncertainty: the Life and Sciences of Werner Heisenberg (New York: W.H. Freeman, 1922); pages 37–55.

  35. 35.

    Luisa Bonolis. “International Scientific Cooperation During the 1930s: Bruno Rossi and the Development of the Status of Cosmic Rays into a Branch of Physics,” Annals of Science 21, 3(2014): 355–409.

  36. 36.

    The U.S. Department of Energy, Office of History and Heritage Resources. “The Manhattan Project: Einstein’s Letter;” https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Events/1939-1942/einstein_letter.htm. This letter from Einstein to President Roosevelt is at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, NY; http://www.fdrlibraryvirtualtour.org/graphics/07-27/7-27-FDR-24a.pdf. Also available at: http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/archives/pdfs/docsworldwar.pdf. Also see Anon. “The Einstein Letter That Started It All: A Message to President Roosevelt 25 Years ago and launched the atom bomb and the Atomic Age.” The New York Times , August 2, 1984, page 169; https://www.nytimes.com/1964/08/02/archives/the-einstein-letter-that-started-it-all-a-message-to-president.html. Also see The U.S. Department of Energy, Office of History and Heritage Resources. “The Manhattan Project: Fission Comes to America;” https://www.osti.gov/opennet/Events/1890s-1939/fission_america.htm

  37. 37.

    Robert Dallek. Franklin D. Roosevelt: A Political Life (New York: Viking, 2017), page 165.

  38. 38.

    Ibid. Also see The Department of Energy, Office of History and Heritage Resources. “Early Uranium Research;” https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Events/1939-1942/uranium_research.htm

  39. 39.

    Roger Daniels. Franklin D. Roosevelt: The War Years 1939–1945 (Urbana, Chicago, and Springfield: University of Illinois Press, 2016), page 44.

  40. 40.

    Cocrane. The National Academy of Sciences: The First Hundred Years 1863–1963, page 3.

  41. 41.

    Ibid. Also see The Department of Energy, Office of History and Heritage Resources. “Piles and Plutonium;” https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Events/1939-1942/piles_plutonium.htm

  42. 42.

    Franklin D. Roosevelt. “Order Establishing the National Defense Research Committee;” copy at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, NY; http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/psf/boc2/a13v01.html. Also see A. Hunter Dupree. “The History of American Science – A Field Finds Itself,” American Historical Review 71, 3(April 1966): 863–874.

  43. 43.

    Vannevar Bush. Pieces of the Action (New York: Morrow, 1970), pages 31–33, 56–78, 99–112. Also see Anon. “The National Defense Research Committee,” Science 92, 2395(November 22, 1940): 484–486. Anon. “Summary Technical Report of the National Defense Research Committee;” unclassified 529 page document; www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/221610.pdf. David K. van Keuren. “Science Goes to War: Their Radiation Laboratory, Radar, and Their Technological Consequences,” Reviews in American History 25, 4(December 1997): 643–647. MIT Department of Physics. “the History of the MIT Department of Physics;” http://web.mit.edu/physics/about/history/1940-1945.html

  44. 44.

    Franklin D. Roosevelt. “Executive Order 8807;” copy at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, NY; http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/archives/collections/franklin/?p=collections/findingaid&id=507

  45. 45.

    Donald Fleming and Bernard Bailyn, eds., The Intellectual Migration: Europe and America 1930–1960 (Cambridge: Harvard University press, 1969), page 3.

  46. 46.

    Petra Moser. “German Jewish Emigres and U.S. Invention,” Research Briefs in Economic Policy No. 2; https://www.cato.org/publications/research-briefs-economic-policy/german-jewish-emigres-us-invention. Also see Richard Bernstein. “European Minds Who Fled Fascism,” The New York Times , September 23, 1989; https://www.nytims.com/1989/09/23/movies/european-minds-who-fled-fascism.html. Anon. “Scientific Exodus;” https://www.atomicheritage.org/history/scientific-exodus. Eric Weiss. “The Impact of the Intellectual Migration on the United States and Eastern Europe;” https://www.vanderbilt.edu/AnS/physicists/brau/H182/term%2Qpapers/Eric%20Weiss.html

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Fordham University, Bronx, NY, USA

    Albert N. Greco

Authors
  1. Albert N. Greco
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Greco, A.N. (2019). The Impact of the Depression and Nuclear Research on Universities, Research, and Scholarly Publishing: 1929–1941. In: The Growth of the Scholarly Publishing Industry in the U.S.. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99549-6_2

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation