Abstract
On May 7, 1945, 4 months before the end of the war in the Pacific, Dr. Briggs quietly celebrated his 71st birthday. A year beyond the compulsory retirement age, he had served as Director since 1932 under five Secretaries of Commerce, Roy D. Chapin, Daniel C, Roper, Harry L. Hopkins, Jesse H. Jones, and, since the first of the year, under Roosevelt’s new Secretary, Henry A. Wallace. Anxious to return to the comfort and quiet of his old laboratory in West building. Dr. Briggs submitted his resignation to Secretary Wallace.1
Editorial consultant, James R. Newman
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References
Dr. Briggs’ first years of retirement were spent, at Secretary Wallace’s request, compiling the report on NBS War Research (1949). Latter, Wallace to LJB, Oct. 11, 1945 (NARG 40, Box 112, file 67009, pt. 1, 7–12). See also E.U. Condon, “Lyman James Briggs (1874–1963),” Year Book, Am. Phil. Soc., 1963, pp. 117–121
One result of that concern was the publication of One World Or None (eds. Dexter Masters and Katharine Way, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1946),a report to the public on the meaning of the atomic bomb. Contributors to the report included Einstein, Bohr, Compton, Bethe, Langmuir, Oppenheimer, Szilard, Shapley, Seitz, Urey, Wigner, and Condon.
Communications to the author from Henry A. Wallace, Jan. 7, 1964,and from Dr. Hauser, Jan. 29, 1964 (NBS Historical File). See also Wallace letter in New Republic, 118, 10 (1948). For Wallace’s possible prior interest in Dr. Condon, see letter, LJB to H.A. Wallace, Aug. 2, 1945,sub: Standing of certain scientists (NBS Box 504,IG).
Hearings * * * 1947 (Jan. 29, 1946), p. 175.
Biographical note, “About Edward U. Condon,” What is Science? ed. James R. Newman (New York: Washington Square Press, 1961), pp. 105–108; interview with Dr. Condon, Oct. 27, 1963. With P.M. Morse, Condon writes Quantum Mechanics (1929) and with G.H. Shortley, The Theory of Atomic Spectra (1935), both standard works in their fields.
Time,35, 44 (Feb. 12, 1940), called him “king of the atomic world at Westinghouse,” where its new Van de Graaff generator, the only one in industry, was being used to make artificially radioactive substances for studies of nuclear structure.
Interview with Dr. Condon, Oct. 27, 1963.
Hearings * * * 1947 (Jan. 29, 1946), p. 183.
Hearings * * * 1947, pp. 183–184
Ibid., p. 184. For Chairman Rabaut’s great affection for and delight in Dr. Briggs, see Hearings * * * 1945 (Jan. 11, 1944) and Hearings * * * 1946 (Feb. 2, 1945), passim. For his reactions to Dr. Condon’s criticism, see Hearings * * * 1947, passim.
See “Making new atoms in the laboratory,” Sci. Am. 158, 302 (1938); “Sharpshooting at the atom,” Pop. Mech. 74, 1 (1940); “Physics in industry,” Science,96, 172 (1942); “Tracer bullets of science,” Pop. Mech. 77, 170 (1942); “Physics gives us nuclear engineering,” Westinghouse Eng. 5, 167 (1945); “Science and our future,” Science,103, 415 (1946); “Is war research science?” Sat. Rev. Lit. 29, 6 (1946); “Science and the national welfare,” Science,107, 2 (1948); “60 years of quantum physics,” Physics Today,15, 37 (1962). See also files of his speeches and addresses on electronics, nuclear physics and other fields of Bureau research in NBS Historical File.
Hearings * * * 1947, p. 178.
Interview with Dr. John Hoffman, Apr. 28, 1964.
Hearings * * * 1949 (Jan. 20, 1948), p. 526.
Hearings * * * 1947, p. 176.
Letter, EUC to Secretary of Commerce, Dec. 13, 1949, and letter, EUC to Director, Bureau of the Budget, Sept. 13, 1950 (“General Correspondence Files of the Director, 1945–1955,” Boxes 4 and 6).
BuOrd 51–18, June 1, 1951; Hearings * * * 1952 (Apr. 10, 1951 ), pp. 497–502; interview with Dr. Condon, Oct. 27, 1963.
The site was acquired in mid-December 1949 and construction began in the summer of 1951 (Department of Commerce records, NARG 40, file 83583; NBS BuOrd 52–7, Aug. 15, 1951 ).
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Cochrane, R.C. (1991). Measures for Progress. In: Barut, A.O., Odabasi, H., van der Merwe, A. (eds) Selected Popular Writings of E.U. Condon. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-3066-3_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-3066-3_5
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