Alexander
Ogilvie
Alexander worked
as a gear cutter for the Fox Valley Iron Works during the war. He
helped make high-speed pumps for the government's top secret Manhattan
Project. Scientists in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, used these pumps to
separate Uranium 235 isotopes from ordinary uranium. Uranium 235
helped produce atomic explosions.
|
Back

Alexander Ogilvie worked at the Fox Valley Iron Works, circa
1940
Courtesy of Douglas Ogilvie
|
Alexander
Ogilvie and a half million other Americans worked on the development
of atomic bombs. Most employees did not know the nature of their
work until the War Department issued them this certificate. The
US dropped two atomic bombs during the war on the Japanese cities
of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Japanese Empire surrendered on August
15, 1945, a week after the second blast. Over 200,000 people died
in the explosions and thousands more died later from radiation poisoning.
Back
|

The War Department awarded Alexander Ogilvie a certificate of participation
in the making of atomic bombs, August 6, 1945 |