The Manhattan Project in Los Alamos

7 Locations | Curated by Abigail Beus, Brigham Young University

In 1943, what had once been a quiet Ranch School for young boys underwent a transformation, evolving into a top-secret national laboratory with a singular mission: developing a weapon of mass destruction ahead of the Axis powers during WWII. Los Alamos, New Mexico, a previously inconspicuous town, became the pioneering prototype of its kind. Hastily constructed with utmost secrecy and populated by young scientists, Los Alamos served as the epicenter for the United States’ highly classified Manhattan Project. Civilian scientist Dr. Robert J. Oppenheimer and military leader General Leslie R. Groves jointly directed this massive and unprecedented undertaking. Under these extraordinary circumstances, traditionally marginalized groups including immigrants, women, and Jews, played integral roles in this clandestine arms race.

In less than 5 years of frenzied research and development, the world’s first nuclear weapons were successfully detonated, first in White Sands, New Mexico, and later over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. However, the conclusion of WWII in 1945 did not mark the end of Los Alamos. What was initially conceived of as a temporary scientific and military initiative continued to flourish during the Cold War, eventually leading to the invention of the Hydrogen bomb and various breakthroughs in a wide range of scientific disciplines from advanced weaponry to the decoding of the human genome. Today, Los Alamos endures as a thriving and distinctive community that emerged out of a wartime necessity. The national laboratory remains the primary employer for a significant portion of its residents and continues to embrace a diverse population hailing from around the world.

From a soggy bog to a beloved community gathering place, the change and continuity of Ashley Pond illustrates the many eras of Los Alamos from homestead to Ranch School to government laboratory to the vibrant community of today.
View Story Show on Map

As scientists raced to build the first atomic weapon during WWII, they were required to sacrifice their time, academic careers, energy, bathtubs, and more in the remote desert highlands of New Mexico.
View Story Show on Map

The Manhattan Project would not have been possible without the efforts of Dorothy McKibbin, the Gatekeeper of Los Alamos. From attaining marriage licenses to transferring phone calls, Dorothy McKibbin was an integral and diversely skilled cog in the large machine of building the first nuclear weapons.
View Story Show on Map

Los Alamos residents in the 1940s found themselves in unusual circumstances. John von Neumann explained that, “At great expense we have gathered on this mesa the largest collection of crackpots ever seen.” Yet these people continued life under the cover of secrecy and created a community which has lasted until this day.
View Story Show on Map

The first successful detonation of an atomic weapon on July 16, 1945 in a remote New Mexican desert had global and historic consequences. “A new thing had been born; a new control; a new understanding of man, which man had acquired over nature” (Isidore I. Rabi).
View Story Show on Map