In addition to Oak Ridge, there were smaller SED groups at newly organized
Los Alamos and Hanford, at some Universities (Chicago-Berkeley-Columbia), and
the Uranium mining facilities. The SED was organized when the major
organizations concerned with the Manhattan (A-Bomb) Project (Columbia University, Universities of California and Chicago, Union Carbide, DuPont, Kodak, etc) screamed at the Army that while they could find all the low level hillbillies, and 60+ year old PhD's, they could find no young middle Technical/management people - they all had been drafted or were working in "essential" areas! So the reason we
all were there, and had not been allowed to stray into other military
assignments, was that the National Roster had actually been watching over us all
along, and had allocated us to the A Bomb project. The time at OSU was also spent
by the security people doing a detail check into our backgrounds - In Long
Beach, they interviewed my neighbors, my school teachers, the Mayor, and the
Police and Fire Chiefs! People kept coming to my parents with roundabout polite
questions asking whether I was in Jail, or had done something horrible.

The Oak Ridge group of the SED put out a "Yearbook", something like those
that colleges put out every year - It included pictures and a short background of
all the "GIs" - The NAM library has a copy of mine.

I was assigned to Union Carbide Corporation's operation at the K-25 area
(Tennessee Eastman and DuPont were at other locations on the reservation). Each of
the 3 plants were following a distinctly different method of extracting
Uranium 235 from Natural Uranium (there is only about 0.7% of the 235 isotope). I
went into the Engineering Department of the K-25 Laboratory, which at that time
consisted only of one civilian, the Supervisor. Naturally, as the second
person, I became the Assistant Supervisor!. By the time I left Oak Ridge, we had
about 5 Engineers, a secretary/draftslady, a scientific glass shop with 2
glassblowers, and a precision machine shop with 3 master machinists - about half
of our people being military - Our main job was designing and building
specialized Laboratory, Health Physics, and process equipment. The SED people were truly integrated within the 3 operating organizations, working as civilians-that
is, working for military and/or civilians, and having military and/or
civilians reporting to them. Doug Crossland remembers Bill Stinson, our civilian boss,
as being a very petty character. Must have been the 7 daughters he had. I
remember being invited home to dinner a few times with the comment " with all the
people eating, another mouth isn't a problem - I don't even have to call and
warn my wife".

The work was fascinating - As a member of the Lab Director's staff, I got to
hear, and meet, Nobel prize winners like Fermi, Urey, Lawrence, and to work on
things that most College Physics professors of the day had never even heard
of, or imagined. We designed, built, and patented an adjustable mass
spectrometer tube and a high vacuum selector valve. Almost none of the people working on the Project had any idea of what they were working on - The huge plants, miles of piping, tremendous care taken in not allowing any of the chemicals to
touch people (the K-25 plant used Uranium Hexaflouride, which was extremely
corrosive), and the fact that the commercial operators were essentially chemical
companies, had the uninitiated believing that it was a poison gas operation. The
3rd day I was in the Lab, someone called me into his office, closed the door,
and asked me what I thought we were up to. I told him that I thought we were
working on some sort of Atomic Energy - "For What?" - "Transportation, maybe -
ships, trains, etc." - ""You poor fool, you're a civilian at heart like the
rest of us - WE'RE MAKING A BOMB!!"

Reg was teaching at Long Beach, NY High School, and I checked to see if the
local school system could use a super Art Teacher - They could, and Reg wrote
to Dr. Blankenship, the Superintendent, thinking that she'd be in a little red
schoolhouse at a Tennessee crossroads - He needed her right now, Long Beach
released her, and when she arrived, she was shocked to find that there were
actually 10 elementary schools, and a 3,000 student High School on the
reservation. (she became the head Art Teacher for the system before we left). The 2nd day there, while she was still living in a transient dorm, she made the mistake
of eating in a nearby contractor cafeteria, and spent the next few days in the
hospital with ptomaine poisoning. Martha Zukas was already nursing in the
hospital, so she had good care. The schools were great - Reg had all the supplies
that she asked for, and her huge art room was adjacent to the music room, so
that they were able to coordinate their activities. She had about 1,000 kids
per week coming through.