LOCAL HISTORY
On Aug. 21, 2020 I wrote an article about the involvement of my aunt and uncle in the making of the atomic bomb at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. I received several comments from others how they too had family members taking part in that Manhattan Project. A number of weeks later my cousin sent me a picture of my aunt in the nursing home beside her bed that had a beautiful quilt on it. On the quilt was a book titled, “The Girls of Atomic City.” While the snow and ice makes it treacherous for me to get out, I am going to give you numerous details of what it was like to be a part of that time in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The book answered many questions for me.
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eople came to work at Oak Ridge, Tennessee from all walks of life and with all levels of education. Kattie’s husband had left Alabama and her for a better paying job in Tennessee. Kattie was dusting the shelves in a library for a very small salary and she soon found herself heading 300 miles north to be part of the janitorial services at the Manhattan Project. Kattie left her children with grandma for a bigger salary so her children could have a better life. Her salary was sent home each week to help her children. When she arrived she had never seen such a large building that was being constructed. In fact she could not even see the end of it. She hoped she and her husband could have one of the little houses that were springing up all over the hillside. But they were Africa American and they were treated differently. Her living quarters was a 16 by 16 foot “hutment” with a “potbellied stove” in the middle. This plywood box would be home to four African American women and they each would pay $1.50 a week to live there. Kattie was determined to make it a home and she hoped there would be a church near-by. Guards could come in any time during the night to see if they were all in their quarters. Lise and Ida were also treated differently because they were women scientists with magnificent minds. They themselves never made it to the United States but their studies did. Lise managed to escape from Austria where her team had just discovered fission. Her nationality would make her a target for the Nazis so she had to leave her country. With the help of friends she made her way to Sweden and found work in a lab there. At times women physicists were considered inferior to men because of their hair style. It might catch on fire in a lab. Her mind was full of
• COLBERT
Continued from Page 6 business of college sports, have shifted their focus from good old-fashioned prep coverage to how high-school athletes are steppingstone to those colleges. High school state tournaments, which used to be front-page news, now only get a few paragraphs in the
COMMENTARY Betty Obendorf Polo Historical Society
new discoveries and she could not forget a 1909 meeting with Albert Einstein where they discussed turning mass into energy Lise kept in touch with the men and when they had questions, she had answers for them. She helped them figure everything out and yet they never gave her credit for any of her help probably because she was a woman. Ida’s work in the area of fission also had been noticed since she had made discoveries long before anyone else had figured it out. In a paper she wrote, “Some distinctly new nuclear reactions take place which have not been observed previously.”TOP They did not pay any attention to her scientific results and even poked fun at her. She was simply ahead of her time. She eventually married Walter another chemist who suggested one day that some of the head men talk to his wife about her studies. They refused and said they did not want to “embarrass” her. After the bombs were dropped and papers were written, these two women were never acknowledged for their contributions. Denise Kiernan wrote about them in her book and gave them the credit they deserved.
back section of big-city newspapers. Meanwhile, the recent college football recruit signing day dominated the sports page. The IHSA’s mission statement goes on to say – ‘participation in such interscholastic activities offers eligible students experiences in an educational setting, which provide enrichment to the educational experience’. Yes, that is not as glamorous as
what the college recruiters sell you on. They tell you how wonderful their program is, how much you are appreciated and how much your presence at their school would mean. Ego-feeding propositions like that aren’t healthy for teenagers. Of far greater importance to young people is what the IHSA espouses. Interestingly, they refer to ‘eligible’ students, meaning not everyone
TOP TWO PHOTOS: These are from Denise Kiernan’s book. Housing options included dorms and prefab homes, but also hutments and trailers. At the height of construction, new homes were erected as quickly as one per every 30 minutes. At left is the book’s cover. Photos supplied gets to play. Your grades better be acceptable and certainly that helps borderline students. Further, it states that sports are an enrichment to the educational experience. That’s where the privilege comes in. Instead of a straight diet of book learning, the opportunity exists to have fun playing sports. Shouldn’t that be enough?
OGLE COUNTY NEWS Ogle County Newspapers / oglecountynews.com • Friday, February 26, 2021
Lise and Ida treated differently as women scientists
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