Pearl Harbor to Oak Ridge: How the Manhattan Project Came to East Tennessee

The exhibit panel at the X-10 Graphite Reactor. U.S. Department of Energy.

An exhibit panel at the X-10 Graphite Reactor, now part of Manhattan Project National Historical Park, covers the two years that led to Oak Ridge.

December 7: war

On December 7, Japanese planes attacked U.S. Navy ships at Pearl Harbor. President Roosevelt asked Congress to declare war on Japan, and the United States entered World War II.

The panel shows front pages of the day — The Galveston Daily News, "Japan Attacks U.S. in Pacific," and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, "Congress Declares War on Japan. 1500 Killed in Attack on Hawaii" — over an aerial photograph of damaged ships in a harbor, and a photograph of Roosevelt signing a document.

1942: the Manhattan Project

Leslie Groves of the Army Corps of Engineers was named director of the Manhattan Engineer District, and the Manhattan Project was born, with the goal of producing uranium and plutonium and developing an atomic bomb.

• Where: 59,000 acres bought in East Tennessee, between Clinton and Kingston.
• Why there: plenty of water and electricity (from the Tennessee Valley Authority), a sparse population, a ready labor supply, and road and rail access.
• What: the Corps of Engineers built Oak Ridge as the Clinton Engineer Works.
• The cost to residents: some 1,000 families were paid to leave their homes in less than 90 days.

Photographs on the panel show a small community seen from above among rolling hills, and a man in military uniform at a desk, papers in hand.

Visiting

The X-10 Graphite Reactor stands on the secure grounds of Oak Ridge National Laboratory; visitors can see it only on guided tours.

Sources

Based on "Oak Ridge X-10: 1941- The United States Enters World War II," a description of an exhibit panel, National Park Service, Manhattan Project National Historical Park; a work of the United States government in the public domain. The source's "S. Louis Post-Dispatch" is corrected to St. Louis.