Chapter One: Where the
spaces are wide open . . .
A-long the trail you’ll find me lopin’
Where the spaces are wide open
In the land of the old A-E-C, (Yahoo)
Where the scenery’s attractive
And the air is radioactive
Oh the wild west is where I want to be-e-e-e …
From a song by Tom Lehrer
I love all
deserts, but I have a particular fondness for that bleak and barren piece of
wasteland that sprawls for hundreds of miles west and south of Idaho Falls,
Idaho. It is blistering hot in August, bitter cold in January, barely tolerable
the rest of the time.
It’s called the
Snake River Plain or the northern Great Basin Desert, depending upon which map
you peruse. Nothing there grows higher than your knees, and mostly it’s scrubby
sagebrush that claws at your legs when you walk through it. In spring, after
the snow melts and the rains fall, this desert has a green blush that masks the
outcroppings of black lava bedrock. When it rains the air is heavy with the
camphorous odor of sage. In September the sage and grasses turn pale and, after
those searing hot days of August, the desert smells like burnt grass and
everything is crackling dry. In winter, just before dawn, the snow is tinged
icy blue, like a scene out of Dr. Zhivago.
The cold, dry air stings your nostrils when you inhale.
Perhaps the real reason
I like this desert so much is because it’s a land of extremes, and I
worked in it doing extreme things.
It was important, cutting edge science. In recent times one reporter called us
“The Right Stuff” of nuclear science because we were pushing the outside of the
envelope of reactor safety. And on November 5, 1962 I punched through that
envelope by blowing up a reactor. Deliberately.
My God, but it had
been fun. And exciting.
Headed west in
1960, fresh out of Michigan Tech with a degree in physics and an eye toward
California, land of sunshine and aerospace industry, I took a wrong turn in the
middle of Wyoming, or thought I did at the time. I wanted to see Yellowstone,
make one of those typical in-and-out-of-the-park trips, mostly to confirm the
wild stories I'd read about the place. My road map had been lost for days,
buried somewhere in a backseat that was full of clothes and empty beer cans,
but I knew where I was going and I knew that somewhere, just before
Yellowstone, I would pass a mountain range called the Tetons. That name
conjured up dim memories, from an old calendar photograph, perhaps, or a travel
article, of towering peaks covered with a frosting of dazzling snow.
West of Riverton
and across hot, shimmering desert, the blue forms of distant mountains took
shape. Past Dubois they were confirmed, rough, rugged mountains jutting out of
a deep-green sea of forest —the Tetons, obviously. (Actually, as I was to learn
later, what I was seeing was part of the southern Absaroka Range.) The highway
continued on, climbing upward and apparently through the range. Funny. I didn't
recall the map showing any highway cutting across the Tetons. Near the top of
Togwotee Pass I stopped to breathe in that crisp air, take a picture of the
great cliffs towering above, and listen to a Californian brag to another
tourist about why he lived in the land of smog instead of here: "Ya can't
eat scenery." ("Damned good thing," I muttered to myself.)
I was totally
unprepared for what happened next. Having seen and crossed the
"Tetons," I continued my journey. In a few miles I rounded a bend on
the west side of Togwotee Pass and very nearly drove off the road. Before me
was the most stunning panorama I had ever seen. Laid out like a lush green
carpet below me was the valley of Jackson Hole. And at the far edge of that
carpet, poking upward like carnivorous teeth biting into a deep-blue Wyoming
sky, were the most incredible mountains. No. They couldn't be real. They must
be the leftover backdrop from a ridiculous Hollywood extravaganza. Even in my
wildest dreams I could not have conceived of a range of peaks so awful, so
bristling, so wild and rugged and magnificent. But there they were. As I drove
closer the first impressions were amplified. They were awful, looming jaggedly
over Jackson Hole. Frightening. Wild. And fascinating.
 |
| The Tetons from Togwotee Pass |
The aerospace
industry could do without my talents. I chose instead to settle somewhere near
these magnificent Tetons—my Tetons.
(I secretly laid claim to them that day on Togwotee Pass.) And thus began what
was to become—and remain—a love affair with a great mountain range and wild
country everywhere.
Fortunately,
before leaving the East Coast for my cross-country jaunt, I had submitted a
resume in response to an ad in a technical magazine. A prime contractor for the
United States Atomic Energy Commission was seeking physicists for
reactor-safety studies at the National Reactor Testing Station in Idaho.
Idaho! I had never
been west of Wisconsin, so I hadn't the foggiest notion of what Idaho was like.
I suppose in my mind there was some vague vision of a Sun Valley ski resort
rising like Mt. Fuji, abruptly and snow-capped, out of a vast sea of potatoes.
It didn't matter; if it was close to the Tetons and Yellowstone, Idaho it would
be. Especially if I could be in the nuclear field as well.
I had deep roots
in nuclear science. When I was ten years old, I could write complex chemical
equations and I knew the symbols and atomic weights for most of the known
elements. By then I had graduated from the simple chemistry sets and had a
fully stocked chemical laboratory in our basement. News of the atomic bomb drew
me into physics like a magnet. By the time I was twelve I could explain in
great detail the concept of critical masses and the fission process. My career
path was becoming clear.
I received my
first AEC/FBI security clearance at age eighteen, right out of high school.
This gave me access to information classified up to Top Secret. In order to
earn money for college I had taken a job in Attleboro, Massachusetts as a lab
technician in a metallurgical laboratory doing research on fuel elements for
nuclear submarines. I guess I impressed them enough for they hired me back each
summer during college. It was there that I handled Uranium-235 (the highly enriched
fissionable isotope of an atomic bomb) for the first time and I got to play
with exotic elements from a big chunk of the periodic table. Then, at nineteen,
I was accepted with a scholarship to Michigan College of Mining and Technology.
It was the poor man's MIT, located in the wonderful boondocks of Michigan’s
Upper Peninsula. I majored in physics with a minor in beer consumption.
So, when I hauled
into Idaho Falls, only a two-hour drive from the Tetons, I was pretty excited.
I put on my only suit and tie and went to see a man about a job. I was ecstatic
when they offered me a position there.
