J. Robert Oppenheimer
Julius Robert Oppenheimer was born on the 22nd of April 1904, in New York City to Ella Friedman and Julius Seligmann Oppenheimer. His father had arrived from Hanau in the Kingdom of Prussia in 1888 without money or education yet became a wealthy textile importer within a decade. The family lived at an apartment on Riverside Drive near West 88th Street where their art collection included works by Pablo Picasso and Vincent van Gogh. Oppenheimer attended Alcuin Preparatory School before entering the Ethical Culture Society School founded by Felix Adler with the motto Deed before Creed. He completed third and fourth grades in one year and skipped half of eighth grade while taking private music lessons from French flutist Georges Barrère. A bout of colitis contracted prospecting in Jáchymov during a family vacation in Czechoslovakia delayed his entry into Harvard College until age 18 in 1922. He graduated summa cum laude in 1925 after only three years of study having taken six courses each term to compensate for lost time.
Oppenheimer wrote to Ernest Rutherford requesting permission to work at the Cavendish Laboratory despite Percy Bridgman's letter suggesting theoretical rather than experimental physics would be his forte. He developed an antagonistic relationship with tutor Patrick Blackett who later won a Nobel Prize. According to friend Francis Fergusson, Oppenheimer once confessed to leaving a poisoned apple on Blackett's desk though no records exist of either incident or probation. He left Cambridge for the University of Göttingen in 1926 to study under Max Born where he made friends including Werner Heisenberg Wolfgang Pauli and Edward Teller. Maria Goeppert presented Born with a petition signed by herself and others threatening a boycott unless Oppenheimer quieted down. He obtained his Doctor of Philosophy degree in March 1927 at age 23 supervised by Born. James Franck reportedly said I'm glad that's over after the oral exam because Oppenheimer was on the point of questioning him. His most cited work remains the Born, Oppenheimer approximation which separates nuclear motion from electronic motion in molecular calculations.
Australian physicist Mark Oliphant briefed Oppenheimer about the U.K.'s atomic bomb program during a September 1941 visit to Berkeley. On the 21st of October 1942, Ernest Lawrence brought Oppenheimer into what became the Manhattan Project assigning him to take over fast neutron calculations from Gregory Breit. Brigadier General Leslie R. Groves Jr. appointed Oppenheimer director of the secret weapons laboratory on the 20th of July 1943 despite concerns about his past political views. The Los Alamos Laboratory grew from a few hundred people in 1943 to over 6,000 in 1945. In April 1944 researchers discovered reactor-bred plutonium had higher concentrations of plutonium-240 making it unsuitable for gun-type weapons. Oppenheimer abandoned the Thin Man design in favor of an implosion-type weapon called Fat Man finalized in February 1945. He implemented a sweeping reorganization in August 1944 focusing development efforts on both gun-type and implosion devices simultaneously.
In the early morning hours of the 16th of July 1945 near Alamogordo New Mexico the world's first nuclear weapon detonated at a site Oppenheimer had code-named Trinity. Brigadier General Thomas Farrell recalled seeing Oppenheimer walk away with a strut like High Noon after witnessing the explosion. A 1949 magazine profile stated that while watching the blast Oppenheimer thought of verses from the Bhagavad Gita: If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky that would be like the splendor of the mighty one. He later quoted Now I am become Death the shatterer of worlds during a memorial service for President Franklin Roosevelt. On the 17th of August 1945 Oppenheimer traveled to Washington to hand-deliver a letter to Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson expressing revulsion and wishing to see nuclear weapons banned. Truman became infuriated when Oppenheimer said Mr. President I feel I have blood on my hands responding that he bore sole responsibility for using atomic weapons against Japan.
Oppenheimer accepted directorship of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton New Jersey in 1947 receiving $20,000 annually plus rent-free accommodation in a 17th-century manor. As chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission's General Advisory Committee starting in 1947 he lobbied vigorously for international arms control. The Soviet Union conducted its first atomic bomb test in August 1949 earlier than Americans expected sparking intense debate over developing the hydrogen bomb known as the Super. In October 1949 Oppenheimer and the GAC recommended against development citing ethical concerns about exterminating civilian populations and practical qualms regarding workable designs. Truman made the formal decision to proceed with the weapon on the 31st of January 1950 despite Oppenheimer's opposition. Teller and mathematician Stanislaw Ulam developed the Teller, Ulam design in 1951 making the weapon technically feasible though Oppenheimer officially acceded while still questioning testing or deployment.
The FBI under J. Edgar Hoover had followed Oppenheimer since before the war when he showed Communist sympathies as a Berkeley professor. On the 7th of November 1953 William Liscum Borden sent Hoover a letter saying more probably than not J. Robert Oppenheimer is an agent of the Soviet Union. Eisenhower ordered a blank wall placed between Oppenheimer and any government secrets on the 3rd of December 1953. Strauss told Oppenheimer his security clearance was suspended pending resolution of charges outlined by Kenneth D. Nichols on the 21st of December 1953. The hearing held April, May 1954 focused on past communist ties and association during the Manhattan Project with suspected disloyal scientists. Edward Teller testified that he considered Oppenheimer loyal but that his character defects posed risks. The board revoked Oppenheimer's clearance by a 2, 1 vote finding 20 of 24 charges true or substantially true while unanimously clearing him of actual disloyalty. Strauss wrote the majority opinion stressing Oppenheimer's falsehoods evasions misrepresentations and past associations with Communists.
Starting in 1954 Oppenheimer lived several months each year on Saint John island in the U.S. Virgin Islands where he built a spartan home on Gibney Beach in 1957. His first public appearance following clearance stripping was a lecture titled Prospects in the Arts and Sciences for Columbia University's Man's Right to Knowledge radio show. In February 1955 University of Washington president Henry Schmitz canceled an invitation to Oppenheimer causing 1,200 students to sign a petition protesting the decision. Oppenheimer received the Enrico Fermi Award in 1963 for contributions to theoretical physics though he never won a Nobel Prize despite four nominations between 1946 and 1967. On the 16th of December 2022 United States Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm vacated the 1954 revocation stating the process violated regulations and showed bias. John Earl Haynes Harvey Klehr and Alexander Vassiliev confirmed from KGB archives that Oppenheimer never engaged in espionage for the Soviet Union though intelligence services repeatedly tried to recruit him.
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Common questions
When was J. Robert Oppenheimer born and where did he grow up?
J. Robert Oppenheimer was born on the 22nd of April 1904 in New York City to Ella Friedman and Julius Seligmann Oppenheimer. The family lived at an apartment on Riverside Drive near West 88th Street.
What degree did J. Robert Oppenheimer obtain from the University of Göttingen?
J. Robert Oppenheimer obtained his Doctor of Philosophy degree in March 1927 at age 23 supervised by Max Born. His most cited work remains the Born, Oppenheimer approximation which separates nuclear motion from electronic motion in molecular calculations.
Who appointed J. Robert Oppenheimer as director of the Los Alamos Laboratory?
Brigadier General Leslie R. Groves Jr. appointed J. Robert Oppenheimer director of the secret weapons laboratory on the 20th of July 1943 despite concerns about his past political views. The Los Alamos Laboratory grew from a few hundred people in 1943 to over 6,000 in 1945.
When did the Trinity test occur and what quote is associated with it?
The world's first nuclear weapon detonated during the early morning hours of the 16th of July 1945 near Alamogordo New Mexico at a site J. Robert Oppenheimer had code-named Trinity. He later quoted Now I am become Death the shatterer of worlds during a memorial service for President Franklin Roosevelt.
Why was J. Robert Oppenheimer stripped of his security clearance in 1954?
A board revoked J. Robert Oppenheimer's clearance by a 2, 1 vote finding 20 of 24 charges true or substantially true while unanimously clearing him of actual disloyalty. Strauss wrote the majority opinion stressing J. Robert Oppenheimer's falsehoods evasions misrepresentations and past associations with Communists.
Did J. Robert Oppenheimer ever engage in espionage for the Soviet Union?
John Earl Haynes Harvey Klehr and Alexander Vassiliev confirmed from KGB archives that J. Robert Oppenheimer never engaged in espionage for the Soviet Union though intelligence services repeatedly tried to recruit him. The FBI under J. Edgar Hoover followed J. Robert Oppenheimer since before the war when he showed Communist sympathies as a Berkeley professor.