2. Joseph Volpe, Aug. 31, 1998, personal communication; Stern, (1969), 105; “Re: Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer,” Apr. 16, 1954, Robert Oppenheimer file, FBI.
3. Groves to Lilienthal, Nov. 14, 1946; Lilienthal to Groves, Dec. 4, 1946; Groves to Lilienthal, Dec. 19, 1946; Rolander to Ford, Sept. 2, 1948, box 2, JRO/AEC; Groves (1962), 397.
4. Bernstein (1990), 1398.
5. Washington, D.C., field report, Apr. 7, 1947, Robert Oppenheimer FBI file, box 2, JRO/AEC.
6. San Francisco field report, Apr. 5, 1947, and Riley to files, July 17, 1947, Robert Oppenheimer FBI file, box 2, JRO/AEC.
7. Hoover to Vaughan, Feb. 28, 1947, president’s secretary’s files, Harry Truman papers, Truman Library, Independence, Mo. Hoover had first sent Robert Oppenheimer’s file to Vaughan in November 1945 and forwarded Frank’s file a few months later. Bernstein (1990), 1396; Hoover to attorney general, Mar. 18, 1946, box 3, JRO/AEC.
8. Stern (1969), 101; Lilienthal (1964), 157.
9. Hoover to Lilienthal, Mar. 8, 1947, and Rolander to Mitchell, Feb. 18, 1954, box 2, JRO/AEC.
10. Both files are in box 2, JRO/AEC; Lilienthal (1964), 157. Neither report made any mention of Chevalier approaching Frank for information to pass to the Soviets.
11. Wilson to file, Mar. 11, 1947, box 2, JRO/AEC; Conant to Lilienthal, Mar. 29, 1947, file 1193/4/2, general administrative files, MED/NARA.
12. Davis (1993), 273; Lansdale to Davis, Oct. 18, 1968, box 5, Groves/NARA. My thanks to Stan Norris for a copy of Lansdale’s letter.
13. Groves to Lilienthal, Mar. 24, 1947, box 3, JRO/AEC. Patterson wrote that he had “confidence in [Oppenheimer’s] character and loyalty to the United States.” ITMOJRO, 375–77.
14. Author interview with Joseph Volpe, Washington, D.C., May 30, 1996. In other cases, Strauss showed himself to be the AEC commissioner most concerned with security. Hewlett and Duncan (1990), 101.
15. Stern (1969), 104.
16. One bureau informant turned out to be a twelve-year-old boy. Los Angeles field report, Apr. 4, 1947, Robert Oppenheimer FBI file, box 2, JRO/AEC.
17. Relations between Lilienthal and Hickenlooper had been strained from the start. In one of his first acts as JCAE chairman, the senator had asked the commission for both Robert and Frank Oppenheimer’s files; Lilienthal refused.
18. Lilienthal objected to the fact that the bureau refused to identify the source of the allegations contained in its reports. Volpe interview (1996).
19. Wilson to file, Mar. 12, 1947, box 3, JRO/AEC; ITMOJRO, 379. Starting in Apr. 1948, the AEC provided its personnel security files to the Joint Committee. Lilienthal to Clark, June 19, 1949, Justice Department file, series 11, AEC/NARA.
20. Menke to file, Mar. 12, 1947, and Menke, “Analysis of Report on J. Robert Oppenheimer,” Mar. 14, 1947, box 2, JRO/AEC.
21. T. O. Jones to file, Mar. 27, 1947, file 1143/4/2, general administrative files, MED/NARA.
22. Davis (1993), 275.
23. Hoover to Lilienthal, Apr. 12, 1947, box 3, JRO/AEC; Rhodes to Hickenlooper, July 18, 1947, no. 201, JCAE; Riley to file, July 17, 1947, box 3, JRO/AEC.
24. Jones to Belsley, July 18, 1947, box 3, JRO/AEC.
25. Jones to file, July 14, 1947, box 2, JRO/AEC.
26. Jones to Uanna, Aug. 11, 1947; and Uanna to AEC, Aug. 14, 1947, box 2, JRO/AEC.
27. Hoover sent Attorney General Clark the results of the 1947 investigation of Oppenheimer on Aug. 25, 1948. “Re: Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer,” Apr. 16, 1954, Robert Oppenheimer file, FBI.
28. The disillusionment may have been mutual. The ICCASP had withdrawn an invitation to Oppenheimer to speak on its behalf because of Oppie’s support of the May-Johnson bill.
29. That February, in a speech at the University of Denver, Oppenheimer described Soviet communism as “deeply abhorrent.” The following month, a speech that Oppenheimer wrote in response to the Russians’ latest attack on the Baruch plan reportedly had to be toned down before it could be delivered by the U.S. representative to the UN. Stern (1969), 100; New York field report, Apr. 7, 1947, Robert Oppenheimer FBI file, box 2, JRO/AEC. Fermi’s comment is in a Chicago FBI field report of Apr. 3, 1947, in the same folder.
30. ITMOJRO, 41, 344.
31. Branigan to Hoover with memo, Jan. 31, 1947, CINRAD file, FBI.
32. Glavin to Tolson, Sept. 29, 1948, HUAC file, no. 54, FBI.
33. The FBI noted that no prosecution “was instituted in regard to Nelson or Weinberg, apparently because the only information obtained indicating their espionage activities was obtained from a combination microphone-technical surveillance on the residence of Steve Nelson.” HUAC file, 54, FBI.
34. Lawrence to Buchta, Oct. 16, 1946, folder 11, carton 46, EOL.
35. Field report, Mar. 15, 1947, Frank Oppenheimer file, FBI.
36. Bureau agents were asking Buchta about Frank even before he got to campus. “They went there just to make him leary [sic] of me before I arrived,” Frank wrote. “The Tail that Wags the Dog,” unpublished manuscript, unmarked folder, Frank Oppenheimer papers.
37. Lilienthal suspected that Groves was behind these and other recent leaks. Lilienthal (1964), 224; Stern (1969), 109.
38. “U.S. Atom Scientist’s Brother Exposed as Communist Who Worked on A-Bomb,” Washington Times-Herald, July 12, 1947.
39. “Oppenheimer Hits Red Tag,” Oakland Tribune, July 13, 1947; F. Oppenheimer to Dean T. R. McDonnell, materials re HUAC, 1945–50, box 4, Frank Oppenheimer papers.
40. Higinbotham to F. Oppenheimer, July 14, 1947, materials re HUAC, 1945–50, Box 4, Frank Oppenheimer papers.
41. June 9, 1947, and Oct. 21, 1947, memos, Sproul papers; Birge, vol. 5, xix–20.
42. Lawrence to Oppenheimer, Oct. 21, 1947, box 45, JRO.
43. Alvarez (1987), 158.
44. Bevatron: Robert Seidel, “Accelerators and National Security: The Evolution of Science Policy for High-Energy Physics, 1947–1967,” History and Technology 2 (1994), 394–95.
45. Fisk to Lawrence, Dec. 1, 1947, folder 25, carton 32, EOL.
46. Hewlett and Duncan (1990), 117.
47. Underhill to Sproul, Dec. 15, 1947, Underhill papers, LANL; Dec. 31, 1947, memos, Sproul papers. Brookhaven-Berkeley rivalry: Robert Seidel, “Accelerating Science: The Postwar Transformation of the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory,” Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences, 14, no. 2 (1983), 394.
48. Dec. 31, 1947, memos, Sproul papers; Underhill to Sproul, Dec. 29, 1947, and Dec. 31, 1947, Underhill papers, LANL.
49. Jan. 9, 1948, memos, Sproul papers.
50. Sproul to Wilson, Jan. 24, 1948, Underhill papers, LANL.
51. Bradbury’s induction into the
