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>Date: Fri, 02 Jan 2009 13:35:36 -0600
>To: editorial@chicagoreader.com
>From: James Struck <accelinflation@yahoo.com> (by way of Editmail
><editmail@chicagoreader.com>)
>Subject: University of Chicago was not first nuclear fission reaction
>
>University of Chicago describes itself as the place where the first
>nuclear fission reaction occurred in around December 1942. The
>memorial to that reaction is on the campus near the present day
>Joseph L. Regenstein Library-a library for the Humanities and Social
>Sciences. Harper Library also has materials about the social
>sciences and humanities on the south side of the quadrangle.
>
>
>Enrico Fermi, Leo Szilard, Lise Meitner, Otto Hahn, Glen
>Seaborg and others are said to have collaborated on the first
>nuclear fission reaction in the squash or racquetball courts near
>the former location of Stagg Field. This assocation between the
>University of Chicago and the first nuclear fission reaction is
>described in places like the Museum of Science and Industry near
>57th street in the Hyde Park Community. A model of the squash court
>or racquetball court depicts the reaction.
>
>
>Unfortunately, this tale of University of Chicago as the site of the
>first nuclear fission reaction amounts to a myth. There is a reality
>involved- a nuclear reaction probably occurred there. The false part
>is that University of Rome Italy could just as easily be described
>as the site of that first reaction.
>
>See Richard Rhodes “Atomic Physicist:Enrico Fermi” Time 153 no. 12,
>March 29, 1999. “The Pope and his team almost found nuclear fission
>in 1934 in the course of experiments in which, looking for
>radioactive transformations, they systematically bombarded one
>element after another with the newly discovered neutron. They missed
>by the thickness of the sheet of foil in which they wrapped their
>uranium sample; the foil blocked the fission fragments that their
>instruments would otherwise have recorded. It was a blessing in
>disguise. If fission had come to light in the mid-1930’s, while the
>democracies still slept, Nazi Germany would have won a long lead
>toward building an atom bomb.”
>
>Richard Rhodes discussion states that there were fission fragments
>from uranium which were not detected. According to Rhodes argument,
>uranium was bombarded in 1934 and not only 1942.
>
>To test the veracity of Rhodes argument, one should be able to
>detect some small quantity of radiation where that reaction occurred
>at the University of Rome. Even if the parrafin foil blocked the
>fission fragments,there should be a small amounts of radioactivity
>where he studied.
>
>James T. STruck BA, BS,AA, CNA, MLIS
>A French American Museum of Chicago
>P.O. Box 269052
>Chicago, IL 60626
>cell (312) 316-2055