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Home , Frank Oppenheimer, Harry Daghlian, Kenneth Bainbridge, Philip Morrison, Project Y

THE MEETING Meridel Rubenstein 1995

Palladium prints, steel, single-channel video Video assistance by Steina Video run time 4:00 minutes Tia Collection

The Meeting consists of twenty portraits of people from San Ildefonso Pueblo and —who met at the home of during the making of the first atomic bomb—and twenty photographs of carefully selected objects of significance to each group. In this grouping are people from San Ildefonso Pueblo and the objects they selected from the collections of the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture to represent their culture.

1A ROSE HUGHES 2A TALL-NECKED JAR 3A BLUE CORN 4A SLEIGH BELLS 5A FLORENCE NARANJO Rose Hughes holding a photograph of WITH AVANYU One of the most accomplished and (Museum of Indian Arts and Culture) Married to Louis Naranjo; her father, Tony Peña, who organized (plumed serpent) made by Julian and recognized of the San Ildefonso Sleigh bells are commonly used in granddaughter of Ignacio and Susana the building of Edith Warner’s second Maria Martinez, ca. 1930 (Museum of potters. Like many women from the ceremonial dances to attract rain. Aguilar; daughter of Joe Aguilar, who house. Hughes worked at Edith Indian Arts and Culture) Edith Warner pueblos, she worked as a maid for the Tilano Montoya returned with bells like helped Edith Warner remodel the Warner’s with Florence Naranjo one was shown a pot like this one in 1922 Oppenheimers. these from Europe, where he went on tearoom. Edith called her Florencita. summer. She recalls that Edith once on her first visit to San Ildefonso, in the tour with a group of Pueblo dancers. When she was about eleven, she and used an old clothes iron, warmed on home of Ignacio and Susana Aguilar. 3B CORN Rose (Peña) Hughes worked for Edith the stove, as a compress to She noted in her diary that the Corn, a staple and ritual food, is 4B ADAM MARTINEZ in the kitchen. relieve Rose’s headache. Avanyu, more than an ordinary snake, ground to meal and used by women Adam Martinez, the son of Maria is a sacred force who represents the to bless every aspect of daily life Martinez, the most famous Pueblo 5B RABBIT-HUNTING STICK 1B PRUNE PIE natural energies of water in the clouds, and religious practice. The corn ear potter, who owned the house at Otowi (Hopi, Museum of Indian Arts and Made by Pilar Aguilar She said that rain, and rivers. According to Polly represents the feminine generative bridge, where Edith Warner and Tilano Culture) whenever she made this pie, people Schaafsma, Avanyu “inhabits springs powers latent in seeds, the earth, Montoya lived. It was Maria who came to visit. and other underground waters. His and women. At birth every female suggested to Tilano that he work for 5C PILAR AGUILAR coming is announced by blowing on Pueblo child is given a corn fetish Edith. Adam, with his wife, Santana, Aguilar is holding a photograph of 1C LOUIS NARANJO a conch shell. He sends rain to those representing the Corn Mother, lived at the house but got lonely so her mother, Desideria Sanchez (sister (Santa Clara) Louis Naranjo was who lead good lives, and his horn who has given life to all humans, far away from the communal life of of Maria Martinez), who helped married to Florence Aguilar, is a symbol of his knowledge and plants, and animals. the Pueblo. Maria helped to plaster her plaster Edith Warner’s second granddaughter of Ignacio and supernatural powers. But as a the second house. Adam and Santana house. Pilar Aguilar worked at the lab Susana, Edith Warner’s first friends fearsome, unitive face, he sends 3C ISABEL ATENCIO also stayed in the second house, for fifteen years and was awarded at San Ildefonso. Fought with the destructive flooding rains and Niece of Tilano Montoya, cousin caring for Tilano after Edith died. They the Woman of Science Award. She liberating forces in Germany and earthquakes cleansing the powers of of MariaMartinez, who raised her. An were with him when he passed away. remembers the excitement of visiting Austria in 1944–1945. On his return, devastation.” accomplished potter. Helped plaster Adam’s older brother, Popovi Da, Edith’s at Christmas and getting gifts. he worked on construction and waste- Edith Warner’s second house. was stationed at the lab and shared a cleanup crews at the lab for over 2B SANTANA MARTINEZ bunk at test site with Kenneth 5D PUEBLO CLUB thirty years. He brought the vigas Married to Adam Martinez. Her sons 3D GAMING TUBES Bainbridge. (Jemez, Museum of Indian Arts and (beams) from Santa Clara Canyon for helped Tilano Montoya with the (San Ildefonso, Museum of Indian Arts Culture) Edith’s second house. chickens and his garden. Two of her and Culture) Gaming tubes were used 4C PUEBLO SHIELD sons, Julian and Frank, served in the for a Pueblo guessing game called (San Ildefonso, Museum of Indian Arts 1D FIRE DRILL AND HEARTH armed forces in World War II. Katce˙p ee˙, or concealed game stick. and Culture) Rawhide. (Ancestral Pueblo, Museum of Indian At Zuni Pueblo, this game was sacred Arts and Culture) 2C RATTLE to the War Gods, but at San Ildefonso 4D TOMASITA “CEDAR” Hearth found near Puye. (Santa Ana, Museum of Indian Arts and it is a gambling game in which players SANCHEZ Fire drill, used to start fires. Culture) Petrified wood. This rattle was guess the location of a hidden small Married to Red, grandniece of Tilano used in ceremonial dances to attract stick within the four hollow tubes. Montoya. Worked for Edith in the rain. The tubes are arranged in symbolic kitchen. With Edith when she died. patterns similar to those in Tewa 2D FACUNDO “RED” visual arts. Songs accompany the SANCHEZ game to distract the guesser. Son of Desideria Sanchez, married to Cedar. Worked for Tilano in the garden. He remembered taking surplus vegetables to town and selling them to buy food for the dinners. He also drove Tilano Montoya to people’s homes in Los Alamos to perform Pueblo social dances. Sanchez was with Edith Warner when she died. Died in 1993. The Meeting consists of twenty portraits of people from THE MEETING San Ildefonso Pueblo and Manhattan Project physicists— Meridel Rubenstein who met at the home of Edith Warner during the making 1995 of the first atomic bomb—and twenty photographs of carefully selected objects of significance to each group. Palladium prints, steel, single-channel video In this grouping are Manhattan Project physicists and Video assistance by Steina Video run time 4:00 minutes the objects they selected from the collections of the Tia Collection Bradbury that are all related to the making of the atomic bomb.

6A NICOLAS METROPOLIS 7A LOPO REACTOR 8A CARSON MARK 9A MOLTEN GLASS FROM 10A DAVID HAWKINS Nicolas Metropolis was a at Los (Bradbury Science Museum, Los Alamos Carson Mark came back to Los Alamos David Hawkins received his PhD in Alamos. He worked with National Laboratory) The first water boiler from Canada in 1945 as part of the British philosophy from UC Berkeley in 1940 and on the reactor project at the University of reactor, a critical assembly, was nicknamed Mission collaborating on the Manhattan taught there for two years before going to and joined the Manhattan Project Lopo because it ran at low power. It pro- Project. He managed the laboratory’s Los Alamos. He was a very close friend of J. in 1942 as a member of the Theoretical duced the first man-made, self-sustaining theoretical work between 1947 and 9B EDWARD TELLER Oppenheimer and had been active Division. He and set nuclear reaction with enriched 1973 and served as a laboratory consultant Edward Teller was one of the most in leftist circles before the war. At the lab up a repair shop to fix the Marchant and (U-235). and member of the Nuclear Regulatory controversial of the Manhattan Project he was the administrative officer in charge Friden hand calculators, which had broken Commission’s Advisory Committee on scientists, many of whom found him of security and draft deferment, the liaison down due to the enormous number of Reactor Safeguards. difficult to work with. His unwavering between the community and the army, and calculations necessary to the work at the 7B He and his wife, Kay, worked on Edith commitment to nuclear weapons was in charge of military personnel. In 1945 Lab. By 1943 the overtaxed calculators Philip Morrison was a theoretical physicist Warner’s second house. culminated in his design of the SDI he became the project historian, writing were replaced by the IBM punch-card teaching at MIT. He studied with J. Robert (Strategic Defense Initiative). He received : The Los Alamos Story. After the system. By 1948 Metropolis had become a Oppenheimer at UC Berkeley. At Los his PhD in 1930 but was forced to leave war he taught philosophy at the University leader of a Los Alamos team that designed Alamos he worked on the critical assembly 8B COCA-COLA BOTTLE Hungary, then Germany, because he of Colorado at Boulder. In the 1950s, and built the MANIAC, one of the of the implosion bomb. He rode with the (Bradbury Science Museum, was Jewish. He studied with Bohr in the University of Colorado stood behind first electronic digital computers. core in the back seat of an army Los Alamos National Laboratory) Copenhagen, went to the US in 1935 to him during the McCarthy hearings. In Metropolis ate dinner at Edith Warner’s sedan from the Hill to Trinity. While he The green of this Coca-Cola bottle turned work at George Washington University, and the 1960s, with his wife, Frances, he during the war and later helped build had expected to be most impressed by to gold when it was exposed to radiation. began work at Los Alamos in 1943, where founded the Mountain View Center for her new house. He recalled that Tilano the sight of the first atomic explosion, he he worked under Bethe in the Theoretical Environmental Education, where he held Montoya made the curvature in the adobe always remembered its intense heat. He Division. His project, the superbomb, 8C workshops for teachers and published the wall by rotating a Campbell soup can on its went on to Tinian to assemble the core for was not realized until 1954. Teller was popular magazine Outlook. He continued axis from the floor upwards. the Nagasaki bomb. Although Morrison Hans Bethe had to leave Germany so preoccupied with his work that he to be involved with worked on the hydrogen bomb after the because his mother was Jewish. In 1935 couldn’t recall many details of his dinners in elementary schools, sharing with the war, he became increasingly outspoken in he arrived in the to teach at at Edith Warner’s, except for a “seemingly late a concern for 6B WIRE his opposition to the control of scientific . At Los Alamos he was indestructible [fireplace] log that burned engaging children’s interest in science. (Bradbury Science Museum, Los Alamos research by the military. He later became head of the Theoretical Physics Division. and burned and never seemed to get For this work he was awarded a MacArthur National Laboratory) A manganese alloy well known as a science educator, for his Troubled by his part in producing the smaller.” Fellowship. He was an outspoken critic of wire, used to monitor the plutonium core book reviews in , and first atomic bomb, Bethe took a leading the proliferation of nuclear weapons. of the Trinity device, . for his appearances on the PBS NOVA role in the Emergency Committee of series. Morrison ate dinner at Edith Atomic Scientists. This group urged public 9C FAT MAN (1945) Warner’s and was a summer visitor to Los awareness of the danger of atomic war (Bradbury Science Museum, 10B PROJECT Y STAMP 6C WILLIAM HIGINBOTHAM Alamos after the war; he helped build her and the necessity for international control. Los Alamos National Laboratory) (Bradbury Science Museum, William Higinbotham was an electronics second house. He wrote: “Miss Warner, her Resisting strong pressure to work on the Fat Man was an implosion-type plutonium Los Alamos National Laboratory) expert. In 1945 he wrote to his mother home by the river, and her spirit of grace thermonuclear (hydrogen) bomb, also bomb tested at Trinity on July 16, 1945 Project Y was the code name for the from Los Alamos, “I’m not a bit proud of remain a part of everyone at Los Alamos known as the superbomb, he returned to — the world’s first nuclear explosion. Manhattan Project. This was their work the job we’ve done … the only reason for lucky enough to have known her. … Edith Cornell after the war and was recruited by A weapon based on that design was stamp seal. doing it was to beat the rest of the world Warner stands in the history of those Edward Teller in 1949. Through his work detonated 1,700 feet over Nagasaki, Japan, to a draw. … The alternative to peace is desperate times as a kind of rainbow …a he hoped to prove that a thermonuclear on August 9, 1945. It was 128 inches long now unthinkable.” Upon the Japanese sign that war and bombs are not all that bomb couldn’t be made. In 1967 he was and 60 inches in diameter, weighed 10,800 10C ROBERT CHRISTY surrender, he played his accordion while men and women are capable of building.” awarded the for explaining the pounds, and had a yield of 23 kilotons. Robert Christy was a theoretical physicist. leading the victory parade at Los Alamos, From The House at Otowi Bridge: The Story production of energy in stars. Bethe ate He received his PhD from UC Berkeley seated on the shoulders of the procession’s dinner at Edith Warner’s feeling that her and went to Los Alamos in 1943 from the of Edith Warner and Los Alamos, by Peggy 9D driver. He headed the Association of Pond Church (Albuquerque: University of home was “something of a lie to the world.” at the University Atomic Scientists, which was founded Press, 1988). Kenneth Bainbridge, an experimental of Chicago. He joined the Theoretical shortly after the death of on physicist, worked under Division, where he worked on the water September 14, 1945 — the second radiation 8D JEZEBEL REACTOR (1954) at the in England. boiler reactor and designed the core of fatality at Los Alamos. Even though this 7C BERYLLIUM COPPER ALLOY (Bradbury Science Museum, He designed and built the Harvard the implosion bomb, Fat Man, sometimes “revolt” went against army regulations, 100 TOOLS Los Alamos National Laboratory) and then worked on at known as the “Christy gadget.” He returned scientists immediately joined. Quotation (Bradbury Science Museum, The Jezebel Reactor was a remote-control MIT before going to Los Alamos in 1943. to the after the war from Brighter Than a Thousand Suns, by Los Alamos National Laboratory) critical assembly used to conduct tests for He first headed an instrumentation group as a professor and administrator. He went Robert Jungk (New York: Harcourt Brace These tools would not cause a spark on the construction of a thermonuclear bomb. in the Ordinance Engineering Division, to the Institute of Technology Jovanovich, 1968) impact — important for working around then in March 1944 was put in charge of in 1950, becoming vice president and high explosives. organizing the first atomic test at Trinity. provost in 1970. He was a member He chose the site and was in charge of of the National Academy of Sciences 6D SEISMOGRAPH arming the bomb. His response to the test: Committee, which surveyed the risks of (Bradbury Science Museum, 7D ROBERT WILSON “No one who saw it could forget it, a foul . Christy ate dinner at Edith Los Alamos National Laboratory) Robert Wilson was an experimental and awesome display.” His often quoted Warner’s on a regular basis with his closest This seismograph was used at Trinity test physicist who received his PhD from UC comment after its success: “Now we are all friends: the Wilsons, the Serbers, site to measure the direction and intensity Berkeley, working with sons of bitches.” He returned to teach at and the MacMillans. of earth movements caused by the blast. and J. Robert Oppenheimer. He was Harvard after the war until his retirement. teaching at Princeton when Oppenheimer He ate dinner at Edith Warner’s many times recruited him to go to Los Alamos, where and had many vivid memories. 10D SLIDE RULE (1952) he led the Cyclotron Program Group and, (Bradbury Science Museum, later, the Research Division. Forty-five years Los Alamos National Laboratory) later, after a visit to the Trinity test site, This slide rule, thought to be Enrico Wilson said: “I have two guilty feelings: Fermi’s, was altered to calculate fission. one that we didn’t make it fast enough … the other is that we made it at all.” After Los Alamos, he taught at Cornell University and went on to direct the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Chicago. Wilson remembered dining by candlelight at Edith Warner’s place. He always carved the roast lamb, and upon the birth of his first baby, Tilano Montoya sent him an arrowhead with the note: “Before you can be a great carver, you must be a great hunter.”