Nuclear Workers, Nuclear Families, Nuclear Town: Los Alamos, New Mexico, 1947-74

University Of Colorado At Boulder, Boulder CO

Investigators

Abstract

SES 00 -0002965 - Lee Chambers-Schiller (University of Colorado) Nuclear Workers, Nuclear Town: Los Alamos, New Mexico, 1947-74 The award supports a series of approximately 100 oral histories to be taken over a year's time. The subjects include Los Alamos weapons scientists of the second generation (that is, those who came to the laboratory during the post-war build-up of 1947-54), their spouses, laboratory administrators and non-scientific workers, community leaders, and those who provided professional services or goods to the community. Many of these latter were Hispanics or Native Americans who lived in surrounding communities and commuted to work in Los Alamos. The interviews will be recorded on audiotape by the primary investigator using a largely open-ended format. The basic question underlying the interviews will be: "How did the laboratory and its mission shape your work, community and family life?" The purpose of these interviews is to provide primary source material for a book on the history of the laboratory and the community of Los Alamos during the early years of the Cold War. An in-depth community study, the project is nevertheless intended to address questions that go beyond the particularity of the Los Alamos experience in order to contribute to historical understanding of the arms race and the impact of weapons science, militarization and security culture on Cold War America.