it could only receive mail through a fake address

at a university, a place residents were discouraged

from using their real names, and where no one was

above suspicion of being a spy.

We're talking Los Alamos, New Mexico.

This wasn't just another American town.

It was a military facility housing the world's most highly

top secret and dangerous scientific research project,

and the people living there were building an atomic bomb.

Today, we're going to take a look

at what life was like at Los Alamos

while building the atomic bomb.

But before we don the blast suits,

be sure to subscribe to the Weird History Channel

and leave us a comment letting us

know what top secret government project you

would like to hear more about.

Now, shall we stare into the light of trinity?

[MUSIC PLAYING]

When the US government decided to proceed

with the creation of an atomic bomb,

they knew maintaining secrecy would be essential.

With somewhere in the neighborhood of 150,000 people

working on the project, physical isolation would be necessary.

Eventually, they decided to place the research facility

at a remote location in Los Alamos, New Mexico.

Mail in and out of the town was heavily monitored.

Scientists weren't even allowed to have magazine subscriptions

because the military was worried it would look suspicious.

The facility was surrounded by armed guards and barbed wire

fences.

Entering required passing through multiple security

checkpoints, and every single person involved needed security

clearance.

Despite all this, the government was still worried.

They understood that yappy employees were, in many ways,

as big of a threat as enemy agents.

After all, loose lips sink ships.

Leaders would constantly remind the scientists

that the things they saw, heard, and did within the ground

had to stay within the ground.

To really underscore this point, a billboard

was installed in a highly visible location

to remind everyone about staying quiet.

"It read, keep mum about this job."

Very subtle.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

When you're trying to keep a secret as big as the Manhattan

Project, there's no such thing as being too security

conscious.

Secrecy was vigorously enforced.

Scientists were forbidden from telling anyone, even

their spouses, about their work, and merely leaving

the area would require authorization.

One measure taken to prevent scientists and employees

from spreading the identities of other workers on the project

was to have everyone live under an assumed name.

In this way, a scientist couldn't even accidentally tell

anyone else who was involved since they didn't know who they

were talking to to begin with.

Despite the fact that they were building in a bomb there,

Los Alamos was an ideal place to have children.

Indeed, while the bomb was being developed,

the city experienced its own baby boom.

However, when it came to the Manhattan Project,

everything was top secret, even the babies,

so birth certificates from those born at Los Alamos

during this period was PO box 1663 New

Mexico as their place of birth rather than the town's name.

This, not coincidentally, was also

the address used for absolutely everything shipped

to the facility, whether it was a postcard

or a ton of machinery.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

The librarian at Los Alamos during the Manhattan Project

was Charlotte Serber.

She had been asked to join the project

by her close friend, lead scientist J Robert Oppenheimer.

Part of her job included protecting

the sensitive materials stored in the library.

However, getting the scientists to observe the strict secrecy

rules was no easy feat.

On one of her nightly security sweeps through the library,

Serber discovered some technical specs that

had been left lying around.

She confronted the scientist responsible,

who sarcastically retorted that there was no need

to worry about this particular report falling into enemy hands

because the report was all wrong.

Regardless of her efforts and her connections,

Serber herself eventually came under suspicion

for being a communist sympathizer.

In 1943, she was investigated and the Army recommended firing

her.

Luckily for her, Oppenheimer dropped the power bomb,

insisting that she could be trusted.

As a result, no action was taken.

Boom.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

As a fully functional city, Los Alamos

had a school system for the children of those

working on the project.

The local school was staffed mostly

by the wives of the scientists and functioned

like any other school.

But the school wasn't exactly like other schools.

One major difference was that the children

were required to follow the Manhattan Project's

strict security rules as much as their parents were.

Kids as young as six years old would

be issued an official security ID so they could enter and exit

the town.

One resident recalled that the strict security protocols

benefited parents.

A parent who wanted to stop their kids from leaving

the area only needed to take their security ID away,

because without one, you couldn't leave Los

Alamos under any circumstances.

Oh, much like The Beach Boys song,

and they'll have fun, fun, fun until their daddy took

their top secret government ID away.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

To the people of nearby Santa Fe,

the new military installation at Los Alamos was hardly a secret,

and residents inevitably began to wonder

what was going on at the highly guarded facility.

In an effort to keep the locals in the dark,

several of the scientists and civilians on the project

would occasionally make efforts to spread misinformation.

For example, remember librarian Charlotte Serber?

Well, Charlotte and her husband, physician Robert Serber,

once visited a bar in Santa Fe where they spent their time

spreading the rumor that the facility was

building an electric rocket.

You'd probably think some local Santa Fe residents would

be fascinated to get top secret details of what

was going on at a heavily guarded military research

facility, but not so much.

Charlotte recalls asking one man what

he thought was going on at the base

only to be told that he didn't care.

He just wanted to dance with her.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

With so many people working on the project,

there were bound to be some close calls, and there were.

During one incident, the operation

was nearly exposed by the Santa Fe Public Library.

As is usual, the library kept a log

of visitors who checked out books.

One day, they sent a mass mailing to the names

in the log, many of whom happened

to be scientists at Los Alamos.

This sent the military security folks into a crisis mode.

They were baffled as to how the library was

able to obtain so many of the project scientists' real names.

Turns out the scientists, who weren't

used to living under such strict security measures,

had been using the real names to check out the books.

This was, of course, a major violation of security protocol,

and the scientists were quickly reprimanded.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

The rules of the project held that residents of Los Alamos

were never allowed to state their location

in correspondence except to say that they were somewhere

in New Mexico.

They were also forbidden from discussing

how many people were working on the project

or who any of those people were.

Accordingly, all mail in and out of the facility

was screened by the Office of Censorship.

Many of the scientists involved weren't

used to this level of secrecy and would occasionally

try to find ways around it.

Physicist Richard Feynman, known as the town prankster,

would constantly look for ways to circumvent the censors.

One of the ways he did this was exchanging coded letters

with his wife, Arlene Greenbaum.

To further confuse things, they would white out selected words

and passages in the letters.

The censors, as you might imagine, were not amused.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Beneath the cutting-edge science and life or death discussions

of morality, Los Alamos wasn't that

different from any other American town.

Dance parties were a regular event,

and the facility even had a local band, The Keynotes.

Square dancing was especially popular,

and was often led by the base commander himself.

The town had its own theater where plays were performed,

and even a radio station, KRSN.

One resident recalls being amused

that the town, which was so obsessed with secrecy,

never seemed concerned that its radio

station was easily receivable by those outside the perimeter.

Convinced that their efforts were

going to save American lives, the scientists at Los Alamos

worked long hours.

The stakes were high, and the pressure was equally intense.

To help deal with that stress, the scientists

enjoyed getting drunk and partying into the night.

One engineer recalls how these parties

would serve punch that would inevitably

be spiked with alcohol.

Where did they get that alcohol?

According to physicist Albert Bartlett,

it was ethyl alcohol taken from the laboratories,

and it made for some pretty strong punch.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Building a secure facility in a geographically isolated

location is bound to create a few complications.

For example, Los Alamos, which was built on top of a plateau,

was only accessible by dirt roads.

This meant that when the rainy season arrived,

the roads became muddy and difficult to traverse.

The remote location also meant that residents

didn't have many options when it came to shopping

for the things they needed.

One former resident recalled, you

couldn't buy so much as a spool of thread on the base itself.

Therefore, anyone going to town for their once a month day off,

was usually burdened with a long list

of purchases for the others.

While the purpose of the project may

have been destructive and frightening,

the area surrounding Los Alamos was quite beautiful.

Many of the scientists, who came from disparate areas

of the country, were taken by the scenery.

Scientist Rebecca Diven fondly recalled

memories of co-workers banging on her door before breakfast

to take her for a morning on the ski slopes,

a hike in the mountains, or a ride on horseback.

Dolores Heaton, who grew up at the facility,

recalls it being surrounded by huge mountains

in all directions, and described it

as the most beautiful setting she ever saw in her life.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

For most of the project's duration,

Los Alamos seamlessly blended the normal elements

of American life with a massive top secret scientific

undertaking, but as completion of the project drew nearer,

things began to change.

The staff believed their work would end World War II,

and they took that goal very seriously.

Workdays became longer as everyone threw themselves

into getting the bomb finished.

Working to create the most destructive weapon

in the history of the known universe

raised some ethical questions for those involved.

Many of the scientists were dead set against the military's plan