# Were janitors and other menial workers at the A-bomb tests really illiterate? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 15, 2011, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529 "2011-06-15T04:44:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/it_s_not_rocket_surgery/32/312_2.png) [@It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/It_s_Not_Rocket_Surgery)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/1 "2011-06-15T04:44:54Z")
We were asked a question at tonight’s pub quiz that struck me as a possible urban legend. However, I was unable to find anything online to disprove (or confirm) the question and answer. The question was: During the time that the atomic bomb was first being tested in New Mexico, applicants for menial jobs such as janitor (at the Alamogordo facility) were disqualified if they possessed what skill? The answer was: literacy. Can anyone find anything on this? ---
**Author:** ![It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/it_s_not_rocket_surgery/32/312_2.png) [@It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/It_s_Not_Rocket_Surgery)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/2 "2011-06-15T04:55:48Z")
Update: I have found several blurbs on “true facts” sites. They all read exactly the same: _“During the time that the atomic bomb was being hatched by the United States at Alamogordo, New Mexico, applicants for routine jobs like janitors, were disqualified if they could read. Illiteracy was a job requirement. The reason: the authorities did not want their trash or other papers read.”_ One site cited\* Issac Asimov’s Book Of Facts\* (1981) as the source. It seems the book a) was not written by Asimov and b) contains lots of falsehoods. I can find no other cites to confirm this. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/3 "2011-06-15T05:13:43Z")
I found an excerpt from another book online which says the same. A book called _New Mexico_, by Calvin Alexander Roberts, [says the same thing on pg 177](http://books.google.com/books?id=SttlyvdXitEC&pg=PA177&lpg=PA177&dq=illiterate+alamogordo+atomic&source=bl&ots=e3UyUqkJM5&sig=KlsbV1AQ37DZav3MGHhTalMe2l8&hl=en&ei=rj74Te2NI8GDtgfa9vDhCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7&sqi=2&ved=0CEsQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q&f=false). Go figure, I never heard this. If only they thought to hire illiterate scientists, the Russians never would have got the secrets of the bomb. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Crazyhorse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crazyhorse/32/31_2.png) [@Crazyhorse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crazyhorse)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/4 "2011-06-15T05:16:16Z")
This doesn’t confirm it as being true but another cite can be found in this [quote] ([http://www.someworthwhilequotes.com/ATOMBOMBATTRACTION.html](http://www.someworthwhilequotes.com/ATOMBOMBATTRACTION.html)), apparently from [Alistair Cooke’s _America_.](http://books.google.com/books?id=wnM5PwAACAAJ&dq=Alistair+Cooke%27s+America&hl=en&ei=gD_4Te_2H87dgQeahbWFDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAA) > [@](#): > > Their leader was a forty-year-old American, Dr. Robert Oppenheimer, known as Oppy. They were allowed no personal contact here with their families, who could write only to a post-office box number. They lived in tar-paper shacks. The cleaning women and the other routine job workers were chosen for their illiteracy, in case they came on an engineering tool or a formula on a scrap of paper. ---
**Author:** ![GreasyJack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/df705f/32.png) [@GreasyJack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreasyJack)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/5 "2011-06-15T05:34:15Z")
Here’s a government history of the practical aspects of the Manhattan Project: [Manhattan Project History (1942) | PDF | Los Alamos National Laboratory | New Mexico](http://www.scribd.com/doc/45990258/1942-46-Los-Alamos-Project-History) Not that I read the whole thing, but searching for terms like “literate” and “illiterate” and such yield zero results. Considering such agonizing detail it goes into as to the conditions of low-level civilian workers at the site, I have a feeling that “oh, and by the way, none of them could read” would be an unlikely omission. Considering that the literacy rate in the US in the early 40’s was in the 2% range, I’d think they’d have trouble staffing the place with exclusively illiterate employees (although maybe exclusively Spanish-speaking would have been more possible). As an aside, when the pub quiz guy/gal comes up with some spurious whopper like this is one of the most annoying things in the world. There’s a couple of pub quizzes in town we no longer frequent because of nonsense like this. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/6 "2011-06-15T06:20:07Z")
Were there even any such ‘menial’ workers at the site? I seem to remember reading a book by Richard Feynman about his time there, and he mentioned that they had to do things like emptying their office wastebaskets themself, because there weren’t any janitors. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/7 "2011-06-15T06:39:00Z")
> [@GreasyJack](#): > > Considering that the literacy rate in the US in the early 40’s was in the 2% range, I suspect you mean illiteracy rate…😃 ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/8 "2011-06-15T11:58:53Z")
What we need to know here is - are Were Janitors people who only turn into janitors at the full moon? ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/9 "2011-06-15T12:16:34Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > What we need to know here is - are Were Janitors people who only turn into janitors at the full moon? Even worse at my workplace, we have to deal with bloody-mouthed Santas come the full moon when we work with SQL and its [del]were-Clauses[/del] where clauses. ---
**Author:** ![GythaOgg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/49beb7/32.png) [@GythaOgg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GythaOgg)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/10 "2011-06-15T12:31:23Z")
At Los Alamos, they employed members of a local Indian tribe to do things like serve as housemaids and janitors in the living quarters - doing things like tending furnaces. Maid service for Los Alamos housewives was based on a priority system. No doubt many of the people hired for the work were illiterate, but I’ve never seen it mentioned anywhere that this was an actual requirement. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/11 "2011-06-15T14:59:13Z")
I’ve never heard of it before either. But now I have, from multiple sources. I’m not certain where to go from here. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/12 "2011-06-15T15:21:59Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > I’ve never heard of it before either. But now I have, from multiple sources. I’m not certain where to go from here. Go to Straight Dope. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![johnpost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f17d59/32.png) [@johnpost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnpost)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/13 "2011-06-15T15:23:20Z")
it’s time to look through some wartime HELP WANTED ads for something like: Janitorial and housekeeping. Must be illiterate and have TOP SECRET clearance. of course other people would have to read the ad for them. ---
**Author:** ![It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/it_s_not_rocket_surgery/32/312_2.png) [@It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/It_s_Not_Rocket_Surgery)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/14 "2011-06-15T20:01:40Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > What we need to know here is - are Were Janitors people who only turn into janitors at the full moon? "Wow, Lupe, you’re really attacking that floor with the mop! Lupe?" ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/15 "2011-06-15T20:40:31Z")
Here’s a link to the [National Center For Educational Statistics](http://nces.ed.gov/naal/lit_history.asp#illiteracy) As you can see minorities were still over 10% illiterate in the 40s However schooling wasn’t as strict. I recall George Burns saying he could barely read. He said, he had his secretary read him his radio scripts and he’d memorize them. He said, he was always embarrassed about how poorly he read. He said, he read probably at at 3rd grade level. So I would bet it wouldn’t be all that hard to find people who may not have been illiterate but read very poorly ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/16 "2011-06-15T21:08:38Z")
This might be a good one for **Cecil Adams**. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/17 "2011-06-15T21:11:36Z")
I would have thought the menial labor at a top secret military program would have been done by enlisted servicemen. If this was the case, finding illiterates would have been a simple matter of locating those who were disqualified for other duties because of their illiteracy. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/18 "2011-06-15T21:18:46Z")
It’s entirely possible that all the janitors and housemaids were illiterate because that’s the kind of jobs that illiterate people got. If you were somewhat literate, you could get a better job as a file clerk. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/19 "2011-06-15T21:20:33Z")
How many janitors could read and understand Advanced Physics or Calculus? Even if they could read, any notes would be complete gibberish to the average guy. I had basic physics and calculus in college. I’m sure any notes from those scientists would make my head spin. That stuff is way over the heads of most people. ---
**Author:** ![GythaOgg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/49beb7/32.png) [@GythaOgg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GythaOgg)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529/20 "2011-06-15T22:21:25Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > I would have thought the menial labor at a top secret military program would have been done by enlisted servicemen. If this was the case, finding illiterates would have been a simple matter of locating those who were disqualified for other duties because of their illiteracy. There were all kinds of non-military people at Los Alamos doing all kinds of work, particularly some of the menial things. There was the local Indian tribe serving at the very least as maids and janitors for the living quarters; there were also civilian construction crews contracted by the military to build barracks, housing, laboratories, etc. I believe there’s some discussion in the book “109 East Palace” by Jennet Conant about the extensive amount of hiring Los Alamos did from the local labor pool. Heck, the person in complete charge of welcoming staff to The Hill and finding them housing, Dorothy McKibbin, wasn’t military in the least. This was also, at the time, a very rural and isolated area (which is why General Groves chose it for the lab). There were also servicemen working there, too. But there was no absence of civilian staff. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-janitors-and-other-menial-workers-at-the-a-bomb-tests-really-illiterate/585529.md?page=2)