Beschreibung:

FEYNMAN, RICHARD P.Autograph letter signed ("RP Feynman"), to Lucille Feynman, August 7, 1945.
3 pages in pencil on 3 sheets (8 x 10 1/2 in.). Creases where folded. Small piece of corner missing to top left of second sheet (all text intact), small hole to last sheet where folded. [WITH]: personal cover ("Dr. Richard P. Feynman/Box 1663/Santa Fe, New Mexico") hand-addressed to Mrs. M.A. Feynman, postmarked Aug. 7, 1945, Santa Fe, N. Mex. Feynman's personalized address to top flap bisected at middle where envelope was opened, but otherwise intact.Condition reportTo request a condition report for this lot, please email science@sothebys.com.Catalogue noteHISTORIC LETTER WRITTEN THE DAY AFTER THE HIROSHIMA BOMBING, AUGUST 7, 1945, RECOUNTING THE EXCITEMENT AT LOS ALAMOS AFTER DROPPING THE "GADGET"
Written to his mother the day after the Hiroshima bombing, Richard Feynman discusses the atmosphere at Los Alamos upon hearing about the bomb drop ("Nobody could work all afternoon + everyone celebrated all night"). The United States would drop another atomic bomb on Nagasaki on August 9th, after which Japan would surrender on September 2nd, 1945.
Feynman strikes a somewhat dismissive tone about the killing of civilians at Hiroshima ("there are a small number of guys who feel bad about all the killing — but I say they should have gotten over that when they started working 3 years ago"), but seems quite concerned about what would be done with nuclear weapons after the war ("We most seem to think that it should be public knowledge — handled in some international way so that all nations can know about it +...know what the others are doing.").
Feynman also discusses the possibility — of course later realized — of a nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union ("If, for example, we try to keep secrets from the Russians then they will work hard to make them [nuclear bombs] + we will have to keep up + neither will know what the other has till another war starts.").
Later, Feynman would become disturbed by the role he played in the Manhattan Project: "He felt certain that the world had seen only the beginning of nuclear war. The memory of Trinity, sheer ebullient joy at the time, haunted him now...Feynman could not meet his mother at a midtown restaurant without thinking about the radius of destruction." (James Gleick, Genius, p. 263).
Richard Feynman's autograph letter reads, in full:
"Hello:
Saturday and Sunday I took off to go on a mountain climbing trip with the boss + two other guys. We went up Mount Wheeler which is about 25 miles north of Taos (the 2nd highest in New Mexico). It was a very beautiful climb. We got within 8 miles of it by car to an abandoned mining town (called Twining) on Saturday afternoon + went for a walk in the woods. We slept out Sat night + Sunday started the real climb. During most of the climb you could see great panoramas, always changing, of the nearby mountains + the ones at great distances. What a lot of beauty!
Monday, yesterday, my work was interrupted by a news announcement, + it hasn't been resumed yet. We have a system for paging people with loudspeakers in all the halls which said [in a dull voice similar to the one used to announce "Will extension 64 please hang up the receiver"] "There has been a successful combat drop of our gadget over Hiroshima." So everybody flew (me too) out of their rooms + ran rapidly around looking for radios. In all the excitement I still had a certain amount of cool sense I guess because I saw a very pretty girl in the excitement who I had never seen before — so I asked her for a date to celebrate last night. It ended up by our going first to supper at somebody's house + then we went to a champagne party. Nobody could work all afternoon + everyone celebrated all night.
I JUST GOT YOUR TELEGRAM. Pretty good. Maybe the Santa Fe Electric Laundry will return things more promptly when they realize what we can threaten them with. Maybe the sheriff of Bernalillo county won't swagger quite so much + try to tell us off.
To be accurate there are a small number of guys who feel bad about all the killing — but I say they should have gotten over that when they started working 3 years ago. Actually a very serious problem about which we are all concerned, and about which the majority have the same opinion, is how should the thing be handled after the war. We most seem to think that it should be public knowledge — handled in some international way so that all nations can know about it +, as well as possible, know what the others are doing. If, for example, we try to keep secrets from the Russians then they will work hard to make them + we will have to keep up + neither will know what the other has till another war starts.
You might have doubts as to the accuracy of the press dispatches. They are however remarkably accurate (we wrote much of them) in numbers of tons equivalent of TNT etc. There is only some exaggeration in personalities — they have to pick out one or two guys + praise them sky high. E.O. Lawrence + General Groves have a little too much ballyhoo but the others are O.K.
Putzie missed all the excitement. She never knew what I was doing.
I got a raise at Cornell — from $3000 to $4000/yr, but since I don't work yet they don't pay.
So longRP Feynman"
RELATED LOTS:See Lot 26 for Feynman's eyewitness account of the Trinity atomic bomb test on July 16, 1945
REFERENCES:Gleick, James. Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman. New York: Vintage, 1992, p. 263.