The Apocalypse Factory: Plutonium and the Making of the Atomic Age

by Steve Olson

Overview

A thrilling narrative of scientific triumph, decades of secrecy, and the unimaginable destruction wrought by the creation of the atomic bomb.

It began with plutonium, the first element ever manufactured in quantity by humans. Fearing that the Germans would be the first to weaponize the atom, the United States marshaled brilliant minds and seemingly inexhaustible bodies to find a way to create a nuclear chain reaction of inconceivable explosive power. In a matter of months, the Hanford nuclear facility was built to produce and weaponize the enigmatic and deadly new material that would fuel atomic bombs. In the desert of eastern Washington State, far from prying eyes, scientists Glenn Seaborg, Enrico Fermi, and many thousands of others—the physicists, engineers, laborers, and support staff at the facility—manufactured plutonium for the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, and for the bombs in the current American nuclear arsenal, enabling the construction of weapons with the potential to end human civilization.

With his characteristic blend of scientific clarity and storytelling, Steve Olson asks why Hanford has been largely overlooked in histories of the Manhattan Project and the Cold War. Olson, who grew up just twenty miles from Hanford’s B Reactor, recounts how a small Washington town played host to some of the most influential scientists and engineers in American history as they sought to create the substance at the core of the most destructive weapons ever created. The Apocalypse Factory offers a new generation this dramatic story of human achievement and, ultimately, of lethal hubris.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393634983
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	07/28/2020
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	824,028
File size:	8 MB

About the Author

Steve Olson is the author of Eruption: The Untold Story of Mount St. Helens (winner of a Washington State Book Award), Mapping Human History (a finalist for the National Book Award), and other books. He has written for the Atlantic, Science, Smithsonian, and more. He lives in Seattle, Washington.

Hometown:

Suburban Washington, D.C.

Date of Birth:

September 5, 1956

Place of Birth:

San Diego, California

Education:

B.A. in Physics, Yale University, 1978

Table of Contents

Prologue 1

Part 1 The Road toe Hanford

Chapter 1 Beginnings 9

Chapter 2 The Chain Reaction 18

Chapter 3 Element 94 28

Chapter 4 The Decision 35

Chapter 5 The Met Lab 43

Chapter 6 Plutonium at Last 49

Chapter 7 The Demonstration 54

Part 2 A Factory in the Desert

Chapter 8 The Evicted 63

Chapter 9 The Builders 72

Chapter 10 The B Reactor 85

Chapter 11 The T Plant 101

Chapter 12 Implosion 111

Chapter 13 Washington, Dc 122

Chapter 14 Trinity 137

Chapter 15 Tiniah Island 153

Part 3 Under the Mushroom Cloud

Chapter 16 Nagasaki Medical College Hospital 167

Chapter 17 The Urakami Valley 177

Chapter 18 Nagasaki 183

Part 4 Confronting Armageddon

Chapter 19 The Cold War 191

Chapter 20 Building the Nuclear Arsenal 210

Chapter 21 Peak Production 221

Chapter 22 The Reckoning 238

Chapter 23 Remembering 255

Epilogue 274

Acknowledgments 279

Notes 283

Bibliography 301

Index 319

Editorial Reviews

05/11/2020

Science writer Olson (Eruption) delivers a lucid, fast-paced chronicle of the discovery and weaponization of plutonium and the unforeseen consequences of the nuclear arms race. Delving deeply into the history of the Hanford nuclear facility in south-central Washington State, the first full-scale nuclear reactor in the world, Olson documents how material produced at Hanford as part of the Manhattan Project during WWII was tested at the Trinity site in New Mexico and used in the bomb detonated over Nagasaki in August 1945. He covers the struggle between researchers and the military for control of nuclear weaponry, and the sincere but ultimately counterproductive efforts by scientists to reduce the chances of nuclear war by “stoking people’s fears” of nuclear annihilation. During the Cold War, the Hanford site expanded from three to nine nuclear reactors and supplied most of the plutonium for the American nuclear arsenal. Meanwhile, inadequate safety standards and waste disposal procedures, as well as rushed production, contributed to groundwater contamination and high cancer rates in the surrounding region. Olsen has a knack for explaining complex chemistry in ways that even the most science-averse reader can follow, and he packs many intriguing tangents into the narrative. This comprehensively researched and compulsively readable account deserves a large audience. (July)

Publishers Weekly

"Hanford, the vast complex that bred plutonium for the first atomic bombs on the banks of the mighty Columbia River in eastern Washington, has never had its full story told. Steve Olson now meets that challenge in a lively, dramatic, thrilling narrative of wartime crisis and scientific brilliance."

Richard Rhodes

"Olson writes lucidly, making even the most recondite details of the science involved clear to a nonscientist. And he’s eloquent in his chronicling of the lives affected — and sometimes destroyed — by the invention and use of the world’s most deadly weapon… [A] deft, informative, sometimes terrifying book."

Seattle Times - Michael Upchurch

"The Apocalypse Factory traces the pathway from the discovery of plutonium to the rise of immense production facilities in Washington State to fuel the US nuclear arsenal, with riveting details about the nearly aborted mission to bomb Nagasaki…Steve Olson leaves much to ponder, and he calls on our collective ingenuity to address the threat that nuclear weapons pose today."

Cynthia C. Kelly

"A compulsively readable blend of science and storytelling…The Apocalypse Factory is a carefully researched tale of inventive genius, state-authorized mass murder, and the supertoxic legacy of a federal bomb-making mess that will never be cleaned up."

Blaine Harden

"A gripping story of a time when the fate of the world lay on the line as the United States and Germany raced to translate scientific discoveries into decisive weapons of war. Anyone who has questioned whether investment in science matters must read this book. Anyone who hasn’t will want to."

Marcia McNutt

"Olson is a crisp writer who brings clarity to complex subject matter...[he offers] hope based on his faith in human brilliance, tenacity and ingenuity to meet our challenges — the kind of traits and talents that made the Manhattan Project possible in the first place."

New York Times - Denise Kiernan

07/01/2020

The thesis of Olson's (Eruption: The Untold Story of Mount St. Helens) latest work of nonfiction is that Washington State, in particular the Hanford Nuclear Facility, played a lesser-known, but equally vital role in the creation of the atomic bomb. Glenn Seaborg, who discovered plutonium, is spotlighted along with several other scientists in the late 1930s as they raced against time to discover atomic weaponry before the Germans. These discoveries led to the production of plutonium in Washington in the early to mid-1940s. Olson does a solid job of framing the strategy of the Manhattan Project within global affairs. While readers may know the story of Los Alamos, New Mexico, and the eventual bombing of Japan, few will know how those bombs were truly made. Ultimately, Olson brings a philosophical eye to the scientific details described, asking how humans live in a world they now have the power to destroy. VERDICT While avid readers of World War II will turn to Richard Rhodes's The Making of the Atomic Bomb as the definitive book on the Manhattan Project, those looking for a digestible and humanistic version of events will find Olson's book fascinating and thought provoking. The rare crossover nonfiction for history and science readers to enjoy and ponder.—Keith Klang, Port Washington P.L., NY

Library Journal

★ 2020-03-29
How Americans made the plutonium that went into the first atomic bomb.

Beginning a captivating, unnerving history, Seattle-based journalist Olson emphasizes that while uranium gets the headlines, plutonium makes up almost all of the thousands of bombs in arsenals around the world. In 1943, everyone in an immense southern Washington area received orders to move out within a month. Tens of thousands of workers poured in to build entire cities and infrastructure and then three nuclear reactors to produce plutonium and three huge factories to extract it. Olson delivers gripping accounts of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation’s construction, the iconic summer 1945 test in New Mexico, and the bombs’ destruction of Japanese cities. Hanford’s output peaked in the 1960s before obsolescence and overproduction took its toll. By the 1970s, most reactors had shut down. With the project’s declassification, the first historical accounts extolled its immense effort, technical accomplishments, and ultimate triumph, but time has produced more unsettling information—especially regarding the health effects, given that “Hanford had released far more radioactivity into the air, water, and soil than outsiders had known.” Until Hanford, no one had handled radioactive material on an industrial scale, and readers will be dismayed as Olson describes the results. In addition to the problems associated with radioactive gas, cooling water and factory chemicals flowed into the nearby Columbia River. Radioactive solid waste lay in open dumps until experts decided that this was a bad idea; then it was collected in huge steel containers with a predicted lifetime of 20 years, after which someone would surely find a better way to deal with it. Most are still there, corroded and leaking. Billions of dollars have been spent in a cleanup, but a huge area remains poisoned. If it’s any comfort, Kate Brown’s superb Plutopia (2013) reveals that the Soviet Union’s version of Hanford was worse.

A riveting history of a lesser-known Manhattan Project triumph that, like so many wartime triumphs, has lost its luster. (32 illustrations)

Kirkus Reviews