Beschreibung:

MANHATTAN PROJECT – GROVES, Leslie (1896-19770), and OPPENHEIMER, J. Robert (1904-1967). An archive of correspondence featuring three typed letters signed ("Robert Oppenheimer") to Leslie Groves, Princeton, 1961-65; together with letters from numerous other scientists, military figures, former Presidents, and public officials, as well as Groves's occasional outgoing carbons. Approximately 163 items in total, c.1940s-60s (most dating 1950s-60), with Oppenheimer letters on three pages, various sizes, 190 x 150mm to 280 x 215mm. "There is no rational answer to your question about the code name Trinity": Oppenheimer reflects on the Manhattan Project. Together, Groves and Oppenheimer, the military general and the Berkeley physicist, led the top secret research project during the Second World War. Afterward, Groves entered the private sector before retiring in 1961, at which point he turned his full attention to writing about the Manhattan Project and publishing a book on the subject – Now it Can Be Told – in 1962. In an apparently unpublished letter, Oppenheimer comments, "As for the Manhattan Project, it is not likely that you and I would have very different things to say about it. Certainly when you were assigned responsibility there were many questions, not only of detail, but of fundamental feasibility, which were still open." He further considers that "The purpose of the program must, in the context of the present day, make a kind of sense – must command the interest and the devotion of those will have to work on it. This, by and large, the Manhattan Project did" (17 May 1961). In another letter, he famously looks back on the Manhattan Project's code name, where he tells Groves, "There is no rational answer." He concedes: "There is a poem of John Donne, written just before his death, which I know and love. From it a quotation: 'As West and East / In all flatt Maps – and I am one – are one, / So Death doth touch the Resurrection.' That still does not make Trinity; but in another, better known devotional poem Donne opens, 'Batter my heart, three person'd God; – ' Beyond this, I have no clues whatever" (20 October 1962). Over 150 other letters document Groves's career as well as the Manhattan Project's legacy throughout the 1950s and 60. British physicist James Chadwick comments: "You must not expect me to agree wholly with your statement that B and C were the first to realize that the bomb might be made in time to be used during the war. I realized this in the early spring of 1941. I had no one to talk to, and the possible consequences caused me great anxiety…" General MacArthur thanks Groves for his book and writes "The Manhattan Project represented the greatest development of military power since the invention of gunpowder. […] I have always believed that the greatest mistake that Eisenhower made was in not putting you in charge of the entire nuclear program of the country. The world would be a different place to live in now if this had been done." Other incoming correspondence likewise responds to Groves's book after publication, or seeks to clarify a factual point, or congratulates him on his achievements, including various awards or commendations, such as the 1970 Atomic Pioneer Award he received from President Nixon. Later, after his death, letters send condolences to his son, Brigadier General Richard H. Groves, and wife Mrs Groves. The archive includes letters from Harry Truman, Herbert Hoover, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Douglas MacArthur, Richard Nixon, Harry Truman, William F. Buckley Jr, Vannevar Bush, Rudolf Peierls, Shields Warren, Harold C. Urey, W.G. Penney, Harry Boyd, James F. Byrnes, Philip J. Philbin, Norman Ramsey, H.G. Rickover, M.B. Ridgway, Charles Duval Roberts, John D. Rockefeller Jr., Charles Sawyer, Abner Sibal, William Childs Westmoreland, Earle G. Wheeler, Bernard Baruch, Peter Batty, Earl H. Blaik, Frank Boyden David C.G. Gattiker, A.M. Gaudin. [ With: ] Original contract, Leslie Groves and Richard