The United States government took possession of the site at Los Alamos early in 1943, as it waited for a local boys' school to close term. Two years later, in July of 1945, the first atomic test occurred. Scientists detonated the project Trinity above the desert floor. Conservative estimates stated the bomb's explosion carried the force of ten thousand tons of TNT. The lab constructed the bombs Fat Man and Little Boy which were used against the Japanese cities of Nagasaki and Hiroshima later that year. The national laboratories at Los Alamos contributed directly to the ending of World War II in the Pacific Theatre.
Today, Los Alamos appears as nothing more than a small community with an atmosphere similar to a college town. Its numerous parks, offices, and fast food restaurants have all but robbed it of its mystique. The national laboratories still operate there, but have branched out to other projects, such as mapping the human Genome. If you were dropped in the center of town without any knowledge of your location, your last guess would be the town that constructed a nation's early atomic arsenal. There are no mushroom cloud monuments or road-side signs pointing out where Oppenheimer stood as he gauged the whether to build a laboratory there. Los Alamos is a city that is assuredly aware of its past, but does not market itself as the birthplace of the atom bomb.
- Daniel Manuel
2 comments:
The unpopulated area is being developed into something and surprisingly, the people near it doesn't even know that the construction is on-going.
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