As with many of these types of reunions, veterans were met by friends and co-workers that they hadn't seen for close to 60 years. Others spent hours talking about mutual acquaintances and shared experiences. We video-taped all of the event and a video is being worked on now. All in all, everyone had a great time. A listing of attendees and some photos have been added to our web site.

From the time we arrived at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, we were treated like royalty. When we were told that we would be housed on base, my military experience led me to envision a utilitarian room with a tile floor and a bed. Nothing could have been farther from this as we were housed at the VOQ (Visiting Officers Quarters) in the VIP wing, complete with a 3 room suite with kitchen. Friday evening we were treated to a private dinner with General Tibbets, "Dutch" Van Kirk, the navigator on the Enola Gay, and Mary Ferebee, wife of deceased Enola Gay bombardier, Tom Ferebee. The sit-down dinner and presentations on Saturday evening were held in one of the huge display hangars complete with a full-sized B-52 bomber at one end and a large cargo plane at the other. Click on the below link for more information and photos.

In late July we began re-writing the home page into a more traditional and streamlined format. We now have everything organized under major categories and hopefully this will enable our visitors to more quickly locate the information they are looking for. In addition, we have registered a second domain name (www.mphpa.org). This does not replace (www.childrenofthemanhattanproject.org) but adds an alternative. Both URL's arrive at our home page.

One of the most important uses for our interactive message board is to help family members of Manhattan Project veterans to locate people who may have known or worked with the veteran. We have several queries posted already and we will be relocating more than 200 from our web site to the message board in the next few weeks. Please let us know if you can think of any other uses or topics that would be appropriate for this new feature.

Arnold Kramish, a long-time member of our organization, was the SED co-worker dragged from the explosion site by John Hoffman. John Tompkins, another member of our organization, was also injured in the explosion. Click below for the full story.

During the same period, we had 37 (30 veterans, 6 family, and 1 friend) renew their memberships, many of them upgrading. They are as follows: James Ballou, William Spack, Elead Reitz, Gerald Smith, Dean Haworth, Frank Shelton, Frank Holden, Arthur Sucsy, Hal Behl, Marian Knight, Toney Allman, John Leary, Jack Bivans, Ward Alter, James Sealy, Robert Goodell, Myron Hawkins, Earl Kelso, Seymour Bernstein, Charles Latimer, Ruth Boe, Robert Alldredge, John Tucker, Adolph Molin, Betsy Daste, Harold Hoover, Raymond Murray, Phyllis Miller, Julian Culvern, Mrs. Jackson Davidson, Ralph Buehler, Harry Whitehurst, Howard Austin, Laurie Fawley, John Helms, Samuel Miller and Rex Leuze.....It is only because we have been able to get a majority of our members to renew that we have been able to keep going. If you haven't joined or renewed your membership, please consider doing so now. We have so much yet to do and we desperately need your help.

Recently we have been featuring several rare photos bearing the original signatures of various 509th Composite Group personnel. We have photos signed by Paul Tibbets, Fredrick Ashworth, Fred Olivi, Don Albury, Charles Sweeney, Jack Widowsky, and Morris Jeppson. We have one rare photo that we are not advertising in the store and we only have one available. It is an 8-1/2 x 11 color photo of the Operation Crossroads/509th Patch signed by 14 participants of Operation Crossroads including Paul Tibbets, Dutch Van Kirk, Thomas Ferebee, Fredrick Ashworth, Harlow Russ, and 9 others. (see photo at left). If you are interested in this very rare photo, please contact us directly.

As always, you may access this newsletter on our web site at the following link: 3rd Quarter Newsletter. Our next newsletter is scheduled for release around the end of November. If you have any information that you would like included, please let us know. Again, thank you for your interest in the Manhattan Project and our web site.