Laboratory at Chicago originally included a preliminary study of the physics of the atomic bomb. In that same year, G. Breit got various laboratories started on the experimental study of problems that had to be solved before progress could be made on bomb design. J. R. Oppenheimer of the University of California gathered a group together in the summer of 1942, and coordinated further theoretical investigation in this experimental work. By the end of the summer, General L. R. Groves took charge of the entire project, after it was decided to expand the work considerably, and to set up a separate laboratory. In the choice of a site for this atomic-bomb laboratory, the all-important considerations were secrecy and safety. It was therefore decided to establish the laboratory in an isolated location, and to sever unnecessary connection with the outside world. By November 1942, a site had been chosen at Los Alamos, New Mexico, J.R. Oppenheimer would be the director of the laboratory, and it would be financed under a contract between the Manhattan District and the University of California.
With the vigorous support of General Groves, J. B. Conant, and others, Oppenheimer surrounded himself with outstanding scientists. The task of assembling the necessary apparatus, machines, and equipment was an enormous one. Three carloads of apparatus from the Princeton project filled some of the most urgent requirements. A cyclotron from Harvard, two Van de Graaf generators from Wisconsin, and a Cockcroft-Walton high-voltage device from Illinois arrived. The speed with which the laboratory was set up is evident by the fact that the bottom pole piece of the cyclotron magnet was not laid until April 14, 1943, yet the first experiment was performed in early July.
In April 1943, the available information of interest in connection with the design of atomic bombs was preliminary and inaccurate. Besides problems in theoretical and experimental physics, the...