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Alice Kimball Smith (1907–2001) was an American historian, writer, and teacher, particularly known from her writing from personal experience on the Manhattan Project.[1][2][3]

Early life and education

Smith was born in Oak Park, Illinois in 1907.[1] She first went to college at Mount Holyoke College[4] where she obtained her A.B in 1928.[1] Eight years later, she got her PhD from Yale University.[5]

War years

In 1943 her and her husband Cyril moved to Los Alamos when her husband joined the Manhattan Project.[1] She soon got a teaching job in Los Alamos where her and her husband became friends with J. Robert Oppenheimer and his wife Kitty.[1] She would use her experiences around Los Alamos as material in her future books.[6][7][8] Smith, in her study of American A-bomb scientists interviewed many Los Alamos scientists who gave blank answers about the nature of the weapon that they were creating.[9]

Post war years

Smith and her husband moved to Chicago after World War II ended.[1] Smith became the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists assistant editor where she worked for many years.[1] She was a lecturer at Roosevelt College and a dean, assistant dean and scholar at Radcliffe Institute for Independent Study.[1][10] Smith also briefly was a guest columnist in The New York Times in 1983.[11]

Books

Smith wrote books like A Peril and a Hope: The Scientists' Movement in America, 1945–1947[12][13] and co edited (with Charles Weiner)[14] Robert Oppenheimer: Letters and Recollections[15] with the latter being a collection of letters from J. Robert Oppenheimer between 1922 and 1945.[1][16][17][18] Her book A Peril and a Hope: The Scientist' Movement in America, 1945–1947 was nominated for a National Book Award for Nonfiction in the Science, Philosophy and Religion category.[19] A Peril and a Hope was about the growing negative sentiment of scientists about creating the atomic bomb due to their concerns over the sociopolitical consequences of its usage.[20]

Personal life

Alice Kimball was married to British metallurgist Cyril Smith.[1] She died on February 6, 2001, at her home in Ellensburg, Washington.[10]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j "Alice Kimball Smith". Atomic Heritage. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  2. ^ Buck, Peter (1978). "Images of the Scientific 'Community': Commentary on Papers by Alice Kimball Smith and Dorothy Nelkin". Newsletter on Science, Technology, & Human Values. 3 (24): 45–47. doi:10.1177/016224397800300322. JSTOR 688705. S2CID 144558873.
  3. ^ "Alice Kimball Smith's Interview". Voices of the Manhattan Project. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  4. ^ "Alumnae meets in Concord". Newspapers.com. The Portsmouth Herald. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  5. ^ "The Leonardo Da Vinci Medal". Technology and Culture. 8 (2): 310–313. 1967. JSTOR 3101992.
  6. ^ "When-americas Scientists knew sin hiroshima 70 years anniversary". Politico. August 6, 2015. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  7. ^ Monk, Ray (March 11, 2014). Robert Oppenheimer: A Life Inside the Center. Anchor. p. 880. ISBN 978-0385722049.
  8. ^ Boyer, Paul (September 30, 1994). By the Bomb's Early Light: American Thought and Culture At the Dawn of the Atomic Age (1st ed.). The University of North Carolina Press. p. 464. ISBN 978-0807844809.
  9. ^ Joravsky, David. "Beyond the laboratory: scientists as political activists in 1930s America". Highbeam (from Science). Science. Retrieved November 20, 2018.[dead link]
  10. ^ a b "Smith, 94, former dean of the Radcliffe Institute". Harvard Gazette. Harvard (University) Gazette. Archived from the original on July 19, 2001. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  11. ^ Smith, Alice Kimball (February 6, 1983). "Limited Opportunities". The New York Times. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  12. ^ Wang, Jessica (1992). "Science, Security, and the Cold War: The Case of E. U. Condon". Isis. 83 (2): 238–269. doi:10.1086/356112. JSTOR 234506. S2CID 144208511.
  13. ^ "Out of the lab into the lobby". Newspaper.com. The San Francisco Examiner. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  14. ^ "Oppenheimer the person is revealed in book". Newspapers.com. Albuquerque Journal. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  15. ^ "Historian of science Charles Weiner dies at 80". MIT. February 2012. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  16. ^ Strout, Cushing (2006). "A Rare Gift for Complication". Reviews in American History. 34 (1): 86–92. doi:10.1353/rah.2006.0016. JSTOR 30031579. S2CID 144381204.
  17. ^ Post, Robert C. (2010). "Back at the Start: History and Technology and Culture". Technology and Culture. 51 (4): 961–994. doi:10.1353/tech.2010.0078. JSTOR 40928034. S2CID 141901691.
  18. ^ "This week's Radio highlights". San Francisco Examiner. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  19. ^ "National Book Awards – 1966". National Book Foundation. Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  20. ^ "30 Jul 2000 pg 254". Newspapers.com. San Francisco Examiner. Retrieved November 20, 2018.

External links

  • Quotations related to Alice Kimball Smith at Wikiquote
source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Kimball_Smith