J. Robert Oppenheimer was born on April 22, 1904 to an
affluent, Jewish New York family, and he grew up in a world of moderate luxury
on the Upper West Side. He attended the New York School for Ethical
Culture, where he gained a lifelong love for art, literature, philosophy,
and the classics. But his first love would always be science.
After graduating from Harvard University, Oppenheimer
moved to Europe. He studied theoretical physics at the world-renowned University
of Göttingen, center of the recent quantum physics revolution. Oppenheimer
held his own among the luminaries of the European lab, and he returned
home to the United States determined to create his own world-class
center for theoretical physics.
In 1929, Oppenheimer took a teaching position at the University of
California at Berkeley, where he soon became one of the most popular
professors at the school. While he was never able to achieve international
renown as a physicist, he did succeed in elevating the reputation
of his department. By the time he left Berkeley, it was considered
one of the best theoretical physics departments in the world.
While in California, Oppenheimer began to notice politics
for the first time. He had always led an insulated life, but the
advent of the Great
Depression and the rise of fascism in Europe forced
him to take notice of world events. He soon became acquainted with
Berkeley's radical fringe, joining radical organizations and befriending several
known communists. The radicalism, however, turned out to be nothing
more than a passing phase–by 1941, Oppenheimer was ready to turn
his attention toward more important matters: World War
II and nuclear fission.
The recent discovery of nuclear fission–the splitting
apart of a uranium nucleus–made scientists realize that there was
huge potential energy stored at the core of each atom. If that energy
could be controlled and released, man could create an enormously
powerful bomb.
The United States set off on a crash program to develop
such a bomb–and to do so before the Germans. Code-named the Manhattan
Project, the top-secret program attracted the best physicists in the
country. The core of the project was the Los Alamos laboratory, located
in the middle of nowhere, New Mexico. Directed by Oppenheimer, this
lab brought together the best minds in physics. They lived together
and worked together in total isolation for three years, in single-minded
pursuit of the atomic bomb.
In 1945, the physicists witnessed the first evidence of
their success: the world's first nuclear explosion at Trinity. They
were initially enthused that their device had worked–but they were
also awed and somewhat horrified by the enormous power the bomb had
unleashed. Only a month later, the United States used the bomb for
the first time, dropping one on the Japanese city of Hiroshima and
another on the city of Nagasaki. The bombs killed hundreds of thousands
of people and shocked the Japanese into almost immediate surrender.
Like the majority of the country, Oppenheimer believed
that nuclear weapons had been and would continue to be crucial to national
defense. However, he grew increasingly anxious about what the birth
of nuclear weapons spelled for the future of the world. Oppenheimer
felt a responsibility to help control the new power. He participated
in a number of government committees, serving as the public face
of science and a vocal advocate for international control of nuclear
weapons. But his popularity proved short-lived.
At the end of the decade, the Soviet Union exploded its
first nuclear device. In response, the United States initiated a
crash program to develop an even more powerful bomb, the hydrogen
bomb. Oppenheimer opposed this decision on moral grounds but was eventually
overruled. And after this opposition, Oppenheimer found he had lost
his voice in Washington.
Partly in retaliation for his opposition to the hydrogen
bomb, and partly because of continued suspicion about his communist
ties, Oppenheimer was put on trial by the government. A set of hearings would
decide whether or not he could keep his security clearance. The
hearings board eventually decided that Oppenheimer was not a spy.
Nonetheless, in a move that meant public humiliation for the father
of the atomic bomb, they voted to strip him of his security clearance.
In later years, Oppenheimer's image improved–as the government
moved past the paranoia of McCarthyism, they took steps to welcome
Oppenheimer back into the fold. But Oppenheimer's reputation never
truly recovered– and the outraged scientific community never forgot
his underserved fall from grace. Oppenheimer died on February 18,
1967, but his legacy lives on. Although he made no lasting contributions
to his chosen discipline–theoretical physics, he is still considered
to be one of the greatest scientific figures of the twentieth century.
