Sunday, August 2, 2009

...first we take Manhattan...


...and I don't mean the cocktail. Hello. It has been raining for hours in Chester County, PA and that made for some oddball dreams that continued all night long. There are 5 of us who are now in from the rain and somewhat dried off, a few none too happy about it. There were flashes of lightening that illuminated the sky but they pale in comparison to Nuclear Bombs, from what I have been able to learn. On this day in 1939, Albert Einstein and Leo Szilard wrote a letter to Franklin D. Roosevelt. In this letter they urged the then President of the United States to begin the Manhattan Project to develop a nuclear weapon. The project's roots lay in scientists' fears since the 1930s that Nazi Germany was also investigating nuclear weapons of their own. Born out of a small research program in 1939, the Manhattan Project eventually employed more than 130,000 people and cost nearly 2 billion dollars way back then. Shrouded in secrecy, it resulted in the creation of multiple production and research sites. An acquaintance of mine is one of the few people still living who worked on the Manhattan Project. Very heady times and they don't seem to have changed much over the years. I am installing a window treatment at noon today and more window treatments tomorrow morning at 8. Rise and shine! But not too brightly. This nuclear weaponry is in the forefront of my mind today and no one needs that kind of stuff flashing about. "First We Take Manhattan?" Jennie and Lenny in classic form. Have a great day.
"A world without nuclear weapons would be less stable and more dangerous for all of us." Margaret Thatcher