1942-1953

  • Production of the atomic bomb is approved

  • Manhattan Engineer District is established

  • Groves selects Los Alamos, New Mexico, as site for separate scientific laboratory to design an atomic bomb

  • Congress passes the Synthetic Liquid Fuels Act authorizing the Bureau of Mines to build energy research laboratories

  • Harry S. Truman becomes president

  • Germany Surrenders

  • Uranium bomb, Little boy is dropped on Hiroshima, Japan

  • Plutonium bomb, fat man, dropped on Nagasaki, Japan

  • Japan surrenders

  • President Truman signs the Atomic Energy Act of 1946 transferring Manhattan Project

  • Soviet Union begins blockade of West Berlin

  • Soviet Union detonates first atomic device.

  • North Korea invades South Korea. The Korean War begins.

  • Dwight D. Eisenhower is inaugurated President

  • President Eisenhower delivers the “Atoms for Peace” speech at the United Nations