Scope and Content Note
The papers of Lawrence E. Glendenin (1918-2008) span the years 1935-2009, with the bulk concentrated in the period 1945-1975. The papers consist of correspondence, writings, subject files, and printed matter. The collection contains material on the Bikini Scientific Resurvey, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and Glendenin and Jacob A. Marinsky's discovery of Promethium, the 61st element on the periodic table. The collection also contains material on the Oak Ridge petition written by Oak Ridge scientists in 1945 following review and debate of a petition by Leo Szilard calling for President Harry S. Truman to describe and demonstrate the atomic bomb's power and then offer Japan the opportunity to surrender. The collection includes the Smyth report, an administrative history of the Manhattan Project by physicist Henry DeWolf Smyth. The report was published on August 12, 1945, under its official name, A General Account of the Development of Methods of Using Atomic Energy for Military Purposes.