The Manhattan Project Heritage Preservation Association, Inc.

"Preserving, Exhibiting, Interpreting and Teaching the History of the Manhattan Project"

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The above photo is the giant K-25 Gaseous Diffusion Plant at Oak Ridge built by the J. A. Jones Construction Company.  The contract, the largest ever awarded, was given in September 1943.  The incredible U-shaped building was almost a half-mile long  and four hundred feet wide on each side.  The building had three floors and a basement, which was taken up by coolers and a maze of water and air pipes.  The diffusion process took place on the first floor, where uranium gas was recycled through the many thousands of cascade stages.  The forty-four acre floor area was deserted - no one worked around the hermetically sealed equipment. The photo was signed by Kenneth D. Nichols and given to Edwin L. Jones.  The inscription reads: "My most sincere thanks to the men who constructed it in record time". ("Jones Construction - Centennial - Looking Back, Moving Forward" published by Laney-Smith, Inc. Charlotte, NC.  Copyright 1989 by Jones Group, Inc. - Page 56)