Page 10 of The Women of Oak Ridge
She tightened her grip on me. “Of course you can stay. I’m glad you’re here.” She paused. “And I am proud of you, Laurel. Proud of your hard work and determination. I know you mean well, but I’m not going to be able to help with your project. I’m very sorry, but I just can’t.”
“It’s okay, Aunt Mae.”
We made our way back to the house. After lunch, we baked a batch of chocolate chip cookies, then Aunt Mae went to her room to lie down. As three o’clock neared, I gathered a notebook and two pencils, ready to jot down Georgeanne’s remembrances of bygone days.
She was waiting on her porch when I arrived.
“I can’t recall the last time anyone was interested in hearing my stories about working in Oak Ridge during the war.” She led the way into the house. “My kids and grands aren’t interested. They’ll humor me every now and again and let me tell a tale or two, but we might as well be back in the days of the war, keeping secrets, for all I get to talk about it.”
I settled on a floral sofa with my notebook and pencils while she got comfortable in a plaid armchair. Although her home and Aunt Mae’s were identical in their layout, the similarities ended there. Unlike my aunt’s sparse décor, Georgeanne’s house brimmed with furniture, knickknacks, framed photographs, and books. Lots and lots of books.
When I remarked on the similar floor plans, Georgeanne filled in the details.
“Housing was always a problem in Oak Ridge during the war. The Army built different sizes of homes, dormitories, apartments, and barracks as fast as they could, but it was never fast enough. They even brought in thousands of tiny trailers and simple wooden shelters they called hutments.” She glanced around the room. “These little two-bedroom houses were classified as Type A Cemestos, named after the building material used to construct them. There were others that were larger—types B, C, D, and so on. Only married couples with children were allowed to live in them back then. Stanley and I bought this one in 1962. Mae moved into hers the following summer.”
I noticed a wedding photograph on the mantel. Georgeanne’s gaze followed mine.
“We spent many happy years in Oak Ridge and raised our daughters here. Stanley passed away five years ago. I miss him every day.”
“Did you meet him here in Oak Ridge?”
She nodded. “He worked at X-10, the graphite reactor. I hadn’t been here but a couple days when my shoes got stuck in the never-ending mud on the way to my first dance. I tell you, it felt like I was in quicksand. I was nearly in tears when this handsome fellow slogged out to me, scooped me up in his arms, and carried me to one of the wooden walkways. Then he went back and retrieved my shoes. I knew I’d found my knight in shining, albeit muddy, armor.”
She picked up a plate with blueberry-filled pastries from where it sat next to a pitcher of iced tea on the low table between us. I was stuffed with tuna salad and cookies but didn’t turn down the delicious-looking treat.
“I appreciate your willingness to tell me about your experiences.Last week I had the opportunity to interview a gentleman who was one of the mathematicians in Los Alamos. He lives in New York City now. His stories were fascinating, although I’m sure he didn’t tell me even half of what really went on. I hope to travel to New Mexico and Washington next summer to visit those locations and meet with people who still reside in the area.”
Georgeanne looked thoughtful. “I imagine those who held important jobs—the scientists and people who knew the truth about the Manhattan Project from the beginning—would be a bit reticent about divulging certain information. Both Los Alamos and Oak Ridge have laboratories that are still in operation, working on all kinds of top secret jobs for the government. Secrecy was drummed into us back in those days, and I suspect that is still true today.”
She asked questions about my studies, about psychology in general, and what I hoped to achieve after I received my doctorate. Then we dove into the reason I was there.
“I’m writing my dissertation on the people who worked for the Manhattan Project during the war. How the secrecy and pressure affected them, short term and long term. I’m especially interested in learning more about women like you and Aunt Mae. I want to understand why you were willing to come to a place you’d never heard of and do a job you knew nothing about.” I picked up my notebook. “I’d like to ask a series of questions about your time at Oak Ridge. Would that be all right?”
“Of course, dear. Like I said, I don’t get to talk about those days much, and unlike your aunt, I believe there’s value in telling our stories. After all, no one on the planet experienced what we did. Our role to help win the war was as unique as the bomb itself.”
I jotted down her words. “That’s exactly how I feel. My generation and the generations to come need to hear those stories. We can’t change the historical facts or the outcomes, but we can learnfrom them.” My aunt’s worried face came to mind. “I know there are people like Aunt Mae who would rather not go back and relive those days, and I respect that. But I’m also grateful for people like you who are willing to share with the world about the important work you did back then.”
Georgeanne chuckled. “My, you make me sound like a heroine in a novel. The reality, however, was far less dramatic. I was a country girl looking for some excitement. My papa owned a farm in Clinton, not far from here. When the government started snatching up thousands of acres of land near the Black Oak Ridge, he feared they’d take ours too. They didn’t, of course, but back then we didn’t know what was going on over here. Communities like Wheat and Elza, Scarboro and Robertsville—places where we’d had friends and family—all but disappeared in just a matter of weeks.”
“That must’ve been frightening. I can only imagine what it must have been like for people who were forced off their land. You said you knew some of them?”
“Oh, sure, we knew a number of folks who had to move. Some families had lived on their land for generations.” She shook her head. “They’d receive a letter in the mail or tacked to the door, telling them they had so many days to vacate the premises. Some of the school children even heard about it from their teachers or principal and ran home to tell their folks. The whole thing was upsetting, but people didn’t have any choice. If the government said they had to go, they had to go. The officials eventually acquired sixty thousand acres. I don’t know how many families had to move, but it was a lot. Most of them didn’t get a fair price, either. We were awfully glad the suited men didn’t come to Clinton.”
“When did you first realize a large government facility was being built here?”
“Rumors and speculations flew from the moment folks heardabout the land acquisitions. Lots of companies in those days were making things for the war effort. Tanks, guns, munitions, that sort of thing. We figured some big manufacturing plant was comin’ in, considering all the acres of land they’d bought. Once we got over our initial touchiness about how the properties were taken, excitement about what was being built settled in. Jobs in those days were scarce. The depression still had its grip on most of us, so the prospect of a big employer comin’ to the area was good news.” She shrugged. “Funny thing is, no one could figure what was being manufactured here. Trainloads of something came in at all hours of the day and night, but nothing ever went out. No tanks. No Jeeps. No nothing.”
“How old were you when you began working at Oak Ridge?”
“I was nineteen, as naive as the day I was born, almost. I was hired to work for a company called Clinton Engineer Works. Papa couldn’t believe it when I told him how much money they were willing to pay me. If my memory is correct, I made seventy-five dollars every two weeks, which was a fortune for a country girl like me.”
“What was your job?”
“I was what they called a cubicle operator. I didn’t have a clue what that meant back then. I’m still not certain I fully understand what I did all day, but I’ll try to describe it to you.” She sat forward. “You see, I worked at the plant known as Y-12. All the buildings at CEW were given code names—a letter, followed by a number—and thousands of us girls were assigned to Y-12. The plant ran twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, so we worked in shifts. Even though the job was tedious and boring most of the time, I took pride in my position. I tried never to miss a day or call in sick, because every job was important to the overall project. What I did, all day long, was sit on a high stool and monitor knobs and dials on a big machine we called a cubicle.”
I tried to visualize what she meant. “Can you describe it? What did the cubicle look like?”
“It was a tall, wide, metal boxlike machine, and it had all kinds of needle gauges and meters across the front of it. There were handles and knobs to turn, too. We were given some training, and they told us, ‘If this dial went over too far on that gauge, you get busy and get it back where it’s supposed to be.’ The same thing would happen on this gauge or that gauge, and we would have to twist and turn instruments lickety-split until it was right again. I got the hang of it after a while and knew which knobs to turn to get everything back to normal.”
“What happened if you couldn’t get them—the dials—back to where they should be?”
“We had a supervisor, and he’d come over to help.”
I tapped the pencil on the notebook. “But you didn’t know what you were doing at the time? You didn’t have any idea what the dials and meters were for?”
She shook her head. “Not a clue. We learned about the atomic bomb the day they dropped it on Hiroshima. Someone later told me Y-12 was where the uranium was enriched using giant magnets, and that the cubicles we worked on had something to do with the process.” She gave a slow nod. “That’s when it all began to make sense.”
