American Experience

For each of the following statements, write T if it is true; if it is false, rewrite it so that it is true.

1. Oppenheimer was born in 1904; his father was a Jewish immigrant from Russia.
2. Oppenheimer’s parents recognized and encouraged his intellectual gifts from an early age.
3. After studying theoretical physics in Germany, Oppenheimer returned to the United States and became a high school teacher.
4. In the 1930s Oppenheimer had a relationship with Jean Tatlock, a member of the Communist Party.
5. Oppenheimer joined the Communist Party while he was involved with Tatlock.
6. In 1940 Oppenheimer married Kitty Harrison, a current Communist Party member.
7. In 1942 General Leslie Groves selected Oppenheimer to head the secret “Manhattan Project” laboratory to design and built an atomic bomb.
8. Oppenheimer, who had lived in Arizona and loved the area, suggested that the Manhattan Project site be built there.
9. Haakon Chevalier, a friend of Oppenheimer’s, approached him while he was working at Los Alamos to obtain atomic secrets to pass on to France.
10. Throughout Oppenheimer’s years with the Manhattan Project, Army intelligence continued to see him as a possible security risk.
11. When Jean Tatlock asked Oppenheimer to visit her from Los Alamos in 1943, he refused.
12. At Los Alamos, tension developed between Oppenheimer and Edward Teller because Teller wanted to focus on building a hydrogen bomb, not an atomic bomb.
13. The world’s first nuclear explosion took place over the Japanese city of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945.
14. After the invention of the atomic bomb, Oppenheimer favored international control over nuclear energy and the elimination of nuclear weapons.
15. Oppenheimer opposed the development of a hydrogen bomb because he saw it as a weapon of genocide, not war.
16. Lewis Strauss, who became chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission in 1953, was a strong supporter of Oppenheimer.
17. When President Eisenhower suspended Oppenheimer’s security clearance, Oppenheimer insisted on a hearing to prove his innocence.
18. The hearing gave Oppenheimer a fair opportunity to defend himself.
19. During the hearing, Oppenheimer denied that he had lied to an army investigator during the war regarding possible Soviet interest in atomic secrets.
20. The board determined that Oppenheimer was not a loyal American and revoked his security clearance.