Book review: 'The Girls of Atomic City'

What could have been is not in this book which is about as dull and lifeless as the September 11 Memorial at the Pentagon.

For a layperson, a good chunk of The Girls of Atomic City: The Untold Story of the Women Who Helped Win World War II by Denise Kiernan is about as compelling as a manual on neutrons splitting, "liquid thermal diffusion" or "concentric vertical pipes" which actually fill up every other chapter with descriptions about the development of the atom bomb. Yawn. Once I figured out the pattern I skipped about a third of those confounded interruptions (they got more interesting) and moved on since a nuclear scientist I ain't.

Even with a character list in the front, the women who are the subjects are too many and varied to keep straight. Who did what and with whom? And what was her background?

An improvement would have been a biographical sketch of each woman separately, rather than assembling all the players together in one jumbled heap, chapter after chapter.

Another flaw are the tenses: present tense, past tense, and past progressive tense, as in far too many "was's." "Was" this, "was" that. (I "was tense." Just kidding.) I couldn't help but think that in the hands of a more skillful writer or editor, the story would have been vastly more absorbing. But you must catch my drift by now.

 The focus is a handful of female employees who worked at the Oak Ridge plant in the 1940s, workers who unknowingly assisted in the production of the atom bomb.

Were they happy with the end product when they learned what it was after it was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945?  Not really.  No one ran around slapping high-fives or drinking champagne.

Rather than the main characters, the true horror story threaded throughout the book is the history of the development of the town with no name which the governor of Tennessee didn't even know existed until a year after the place got started in 1942.   (It was called “Clinton Engineer Works” for short before it was christened Oak Ridge in 1949.)

Practically none of the thousands of new employees knew what anyone else was doing, or what they were working towards or building, and, as a matter of fact, they didn't even know what they were working on since everything was "hush, hush."  Asking questions would certainly raise suspicions.  After all, it was the "Secret City" where  everyone was sworn to secrecy, except for enlisted "snitches."

About all that was “publicly” known was they had accepted jobs in an undeveloped new town in Tennessee, which drew employees from various parts of the U.S., to work at who knows what in a mud mess of a place filled with quickly constructed "hutments" (defined by Wikipedia as  "one room shacks") which passed for living accommodations for those less fortunate.

The employees socialized whenever possible, despite efforts by the government to keep them quiet and harnessed.  That way, communication between employees was kept at a minimum.  As for blacks, married black couples were not permitted to live together nor could they swim in the pool. Or attend the schools. (They were sent to nearby Knoxville.)

Have there been any studies on comparative cancer rates among Oak Ridge employees who lived and worked on the bomb?  Just asking.

You think Hitler only practiced in Europe? Seems like the U.S. military got hold of his playbook early, to wit:

Any "creep" could report anyone anonymously for "sedition," and based on one person's account, the reported employee and his or her family could be thrown out of Oak Ridge within 24 hours. Pay your own way back to wherever you came from, please. (Okay, so they weren't murdered a la Hitler. Please read on.)

Why not test the effects of deadly plutonium on humans by injecting it into an unsuspecting black man without his consent, an automobile accident victim with broken bones?  Why bother to get consent?  And why not wait 20 days to set his broken bones to check on plutonium's effects upon broken bones?  Great idea!   And while you're at it, why not extract some of his teeth without his permission, like about 15 of them, and ship them to New Mexico to find out what plutonium does to teeth.? Oh, and then have the subject, labeled HP-12 (real name:  Ebb Cade) "conveniently" disappear and die at age 61?

Yes and why not administer electroshock to an employee who talks too much? And place him in solitary confinement, too, for good measure? That'll show the rest of 'em to keep their mouths shut!

A World War II billboard in Oak Ridge, Tennessee/James E. Westcott and Wikimedia Commons

There once was an couple in Oak Ridge who went parking (click here for a definition), and a stranger poked his head in the car window while said couple was parked on a lonely road and called out the woman's name. At work the next day, the man's boss approached the woman and ordered her not to see the man any more. Don't worry! I want to keep my teeth!

During the 1940s my ex-father-in-law, whom I never met, was an engineer at Oak Ridge who died mysteriously one night while at work. He was 37. His superiors said he died of a "heart attack" which the coroner confirmed. Do you think a coroner back then (and what about now?) would reject the military's pronounced cause of death?

Over the years I've urged my children to exhume their grandfather's body and find out if a "heart attack" was the cause of his death. Early heart attacks then and now are not part of his family's history. Except for his.

Correction on page 277:  It was not Kingston which was/is the site of Tennessee Eastman's main operations, but Kingsport, where I graduated high school.

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New moderns at the National Gallery of Art spark passions

Richard Artschwager, Piano/Piano, 1963-65/2011. National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of the Collectors Committee/Patricia Leslie

Please, National Gallery of Art, throw a party with these artists and invite me. 

 
Four of the five are still living, and one's a woman.

Even for die-hard anti-moderns (I know a few), these new pieces, made possible at the National Gallery by its Collectors Committee, are worth a look, especially when you know a little something about the creators, like Hans Haacke (b. 1936 in Cologne) a leading political artist, whose specialities involve kinetic art, who helped birth institutional critique, or Ed Ruscha (b. 1937, Omaha) whose Stains (1969) include gun powder, cherry pie, and daffodils among 75 ingredients spread on different paper sheets.

The Collectors Committee has also acquired for the Gallery Piano/Piano,  1963-65/2011, by Washington's own Richard Ernest Artschwager (1923-2013) whose furniture business background helped steer him to artistic success.

The newest Artschwager consists of two laminated wooden pianos which intermingle in passionate embrace, an example of "synthetic cubism," according to the National Gallery, and on view in the East Building inside the interior "sculpture garden" near the Small Auditorium. Atschwager completed the piece for an exhibition last year in Rome.

Other new works come from Rineke Dijkstra (b. 1959, Sittard, Netherlands), the first of her achievements for the National Gallery, and Allan McCollum (b. 1944, Los Angeles) whose Plaster Surrogates, 1982/1989  (not on display yet), has toured the world.

McCollum is a self-taught artist who created his early works in a California storefront and then a parking garage after he tried acting, restaurant management, truck driving, and building crates for a West Hollywood art company where he mingled with art dealers, collectors and artists.  They influenced his artistic development and his direction into "quantity production." McCollum resonates with the history and development of local communities and their relationship to their particular geographies, as well.

Meanwhile, Haacke’s Condensation Wall, 1963-66/2013, stands in prominent position at the foot of the East Building’s main floor staircase. This example of minimal sculpture  and kinetic art becomes "a micro-environment contingent with its surrounding." Water collects and drops inside the sculpture, depending upon the temperature of the building, with the entire natural process and nearby art works visible through Condensation's transparent walls.

Hans Haacke, Condensation Wall, 1963-1966/2013. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Gift of the Collectors Committee/Patricia Leslie.  Behind Condensation Wall is Richard Serra's Five Plates, Two Poles, 1971, and Robert Motherwell's Reconciliation Elegy, 1978, another gift from the Collectors Committee.

 

 

One of Haacke's most famous works and an early example of institutional critique, Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, A Real Time Social System, as of May 1, 1971, was his attack upon a slum landlord in New York which caused  the cancellation of his solo show at the Guggenheim and the firing of its curator. (Ten years later it went up at the Museum of Contemporary Art in New York.)

 
Powerful stuff, huh?

But back to D.C.'s Artschwager.  His mother studied at the Corcoran School of Art and helped develop her son's artistic interests, now associated with minimalism, pop and conceptual art.

He graduated from Cornell, married, and worked as a furniture salesman, then later a furniture designer.  Artschwager's future took a right turn after he received a commission from the Catholic Church in 1960 to "build portable altars for ships."  This production led to his use of wood and Formica to make small wall pieces and to larger objects.

Dijkstra is a photographer whose video, I See a Woman Crying (Weeping Woman), 2009, is based on Picasso's The Weeping Woman, 1937, which is not seen or labled in this piece.  Rather, Dijkstra's subject is Catholic school children who respond to Picasso's Woman on three screens. And it's on display in the West Building through Labor Day, September 2, 2013.   

Ed Ruscha, another artist associated with the Pop movement, says he was inspired by Jasper Johns, Arthur Dove, Marcel Duchamps, and John Everett Millais's Ophelia which, coincidentally, hangs in the Gallery's West Building through May 19, part of the enthralling Pre-Raphaelites exhibition.  (Don't miss it!)

The people wait for entry outside the West Building. The enlarged reproduction is John Everett Millais's Marianna, 1850-1851, one of the artists who inspired Ed Ruscha.  Many Millais paintings may be found in the West Building, part of the Pre-Raphaelites exhibition/Patricia Leslie 

Influenced by Hollywood films, Ruscha's art direction stems also from his training in commercial art, words and typography. His Words in Their Best Order, 2002, is a "site-specific" work of three panels, each 13 x 23 feet, found at the Gannett Building in Tysons Corner.

It's not easy to make out Ed Ruscha's Words in Their Best Order, 2002, at the Gannett Building at Tysons Corner, Virginia, but look closely (very closely) and the words may appear through the windows/Patricia Leslie

Ruscha has experimented with the use of gunpowder, vinyl, blood, red wine, fruit and vegetable juice, axle grease, chocolate syrup, tomato paste, bologna, cherry pie, coffee, caviar, daffodils, tulips, raw eggs and grass stains.

Would you not leap at an opportunity to meet these artists? I think I fell in love with Haacke, and I don't even know what he looks like, but what do looks matter when his art revolution can shut down an exhibition? He is the people's power Putin of the art world today. I wonder if he rides horses topless. 

Wikipedia quotes Ruscha: "Art has to be something that makes you scratch your head." After viewing these stimulations, you may not have any head hair left, but art is not a passive fancy, and aims to stimulate or please somebody, maybe, whether it's you or the artist. (Call me, maybe.)

What: Modern Art

When:  10 a.m. - 5 p.m., Monday - Saturday and 11 a.m. - 6 p.m., Sunday

Where: The East (Haacke, Ruscha) and West (Dijkstra), National Gallery of Art, between Third and Ninth streets, N.W., Washington, D.C.

How much:  Admission is always free at the National Gallery of Art

Metro stations:  Archives-Navy Memorial, Judiciary Square, the Smithsonian, or L'Enfant Plaza

For more information:  202-737-4215

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Free 'Porgy and Bess' concert Wednesday at St. John's, Lafayette Square

Alvy Powell, bass-baritone

Alvy Powell, the bass-baritone who has sung the role of "Porgy" more than 2500 times across the globe from San Francisco to La Scala to Carnegie Hall to Australia, will sing selections from George Gershwin's opera, Porgy and Bess, in a free noontime concert May 1 at St. John's Episcopal Church, Lafayette Square.

Accompanying Powell will be Michael Lodico, St. John's associate organist.

In 2007 Powell debuted with the Choral Arts Society of Washington singing "Porgy" which he has also performed with the Virginia Opera and with the Nashville Symphony which features him in its recording of Porgy and Bess.

Click here to see and hear Powell sing the duet, Bess, You Is My Woman Now with Charlae Olaker.

Other Powell achievements include Bartolo from Le Nozze di Figaro with The Virginia Opera, Sharpless from Madame Butterfly with the Connecticut Opera, Coline in La Boheme with the Tulsa Opera, and Opera Pacific, and as Timur in Turandot with Opera Carolina, Opera Grand Rapids, and the Cleveland Opera.

For the Vatican production commemorating the centennial of the death of Giuseppe Verdi, Powell was soloist in the Verdi Requiem with the Rome Opera. He is a Sergeant First Class in the U.S. Army and sings solo with its chorus.  Last week they performed at the dedication of the George Bush library in Texas.

His performance at St. John's is part of the church's First Wednesday Concert Series which begin at 12:10 p.m. and end at 12:45 p.m.  This year's series ends June 5 when Jeremy Filsell, artist-in-residence at the Washington National Cathedral, plays organ works by Bach, Dupre, and Rachmaninov.

St. John's Episcopal Church, Lafayette Square/Patricia Leslie
 

St. John's, known to many Washington residents as the yellow church at Lafayette Square, is often called the “Church of the Presidents.” Beginning with President James Madison, who served from 1809 to 1817, every president has either been a member of, or has attended services at St. John's. A plaque at the rear of the church designates the Lincoln pew where President Abraham Lincoln often sat when he stopped by St. John's during the Civil War. 

The concerts are excellent respites from Washington's usual weekday harried cycle.  Food trucks are located at nearby Farragut Square so listeners may "eat and run" back to the office.

Who:  Alvy Powell, bass-baritone, and Michael Lodico, organist

When: 12:10 p.m., May 1, 2013

Where: St. John’s, Lafayette Square, 1525 H Street, NW, at the corner of 16^th, Washington, D.C. 20005

How much:  No charge

Duration: About 35 minutes

Wheelchair accessible

Metro stations: McPherson Square or Farragut North or Farragut West

Food trucks:  Located two blocks away at Farragut Square

For more information: 202-270-6265

patricialesli@gmail.com

Civil War art leaves Washington Sunday

George N. Barnard, Ruins In Charleston, South Carolina, 1865, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri.  Gift of Hallmark Cards, Inc./Michael Lamy

If you know little about the Civil War conflict in the U.S. (1861-1865), a trip to the Smithsonian American Art Museum this weekend will supply a quick education. And if you know a lot about the Civil War, this is a big show commemorating the war’s 150th anniversary you do not want to miss.

It is the presentation of the war’s pain and toll upon art and artists, said Eleanor Jones Harvey, SAAM's senior curator, who directed the show and wrote the catalogue. "What do these artists tell us?" about the way citizens felt after the war, she asked.

Generally excluded among the 57 paintings and 18 photographs are classic battlefield scenes which often come to mind when the War Between the States is mentioned. This exhibition, instead, provides rich detail about the common people and the war's effects upon them, told in mostly chronological order in arresting land and peoplescapes.

Some well-known artists represented are Winslow Homer (13 works in the show), Frederic Church (7), Sanford Gifford (8), Eastman Johnson (6) and Alfred Bierstadt (2).
Lesser known is Martin Johnson Heade whose Approaching Thunder Storm, 1859,  not only foretells the war but the style of Edwin Hopper (1882-1967) whose artistic fame came 75 years later.  

Martin Johnson Heade, Approaching Thunder Storm, 1859, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, gift of Erving Wolf Foundation and Mr. and Mrs. Erving Wolf, in memory of Diane R. Wolf, 1975

When speaking about slavery, President Abraham Lincoln used the words "coming storm," a term adopted by many abolitionist preachers for their sermons, one of whom bought this work.

Viewers will also find Uncle Tom and Little Eva, 1853, by Robert S. Duncanson, known as the first African-American artist to enjoy international acclaim and whose Still Live with Fruit and Nuts, 1848, was added last year at the National Gallery of Art.

While at the SAAM exhibition, leave several minutes to study Eastman Johnson's Negro Life at the South, 1859, which depicts blacks with various skin tones, alluding to mixed races.  See the white cat entering slave quarters.

Consider the significance of Julian Scott's Surrender of a Confederate Soldier, 1873.  The war had ended when Mr. Scott, a member of the Union army, painted a sympathetic portrait of his opponent to perhaps signify the unification of the country. 

 

Photographs by George Barnard show the "Hell Hole," at New Hope Church, Georgia in 1866, destruction in Columbia and Charleston, South Carolina at war's end, and the scene of General James B. McPherson's death July 22, 1864 near Bald Hill outside Atlanta.

Six photographs made of the aftermath of the Battle of Sharpsburg/Antietam  by Alexander Gardner are included.  The bloodiest single-day battle in American history only 70 miles from Washington, Sharpsburg claimed the lives of 22,717 men on September 17, 1862.  The pictures show bodies of Confederates upon the ground. Two weeks later President Lincoln visited the battlefield.

Alexander Gardner, President Abraham Lincoln with General George B. McClellan and officers, Antietam, October 3, 1862/Library of Congress, Wikimedia Commons

 

The exhibition ends with giant land and icescapes which, at first glance, a viewer may think belong to another collection, another time, but they show the turmoil experienced by Frederic Church, among others, during and after the war, in works which capture "defiance, fear, despair, and hope."

Frederic Edwin Church, Cotopaxi, 1862, Detroit Institute of the Arts, Founders Society Purchase.  The Bridgeman Art Library

The collection moves to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York where it will open Memorial Day, May 27, 2013.

Elizabeth Broun, SAAM's director, called the Civil War exhibition "one of the most important shows we've offered in a long time," and the "brainchild" of Ms. Harvey.

To obtain the art for the show took "elaborate negotiations" and persuading lenders to loan their works for the research-based presentation, said Ms. Harvey.

What:  "The Civil War and American Art"

When:  11:30 a.m.  - 7 p.m., through Sunday, April 28, 2013

Where:  The Smithsonian American Art Museum, Eighth and F streets, N.W., Washington, D.C.

How much:  Free admission

Metro station:  Gallery Place-Chinatown or walk from Metro Center

For more information:  202-633-7970 or 202-633-1000

patricialesli@gmail.com

A salute to Nashville's recycling star

The picture of Sherry Force on the plaque in her honor to hang at Granbery School

It was a beautiful day in the neighborhood at Granbery School in Nashville on Earth Day where the memory of environmental heroine Sherry Force was honored with an outstanding tribute.

"Happy Earth Day" proclaims the banner hanging at the entrance to Granbery School/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Hundreds of Granbery students, graduates, parents, and friends, many wearing green, turned out for a celebration of Sherry’s life.

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The "Gecko Echoes," a Granbery teachers' chorus, sang We are the World and Sweet, Sweet Spirit in tribute to Sherry Force/Photo by Patricia Leslie 

Members of the "Gecko Echoes" who paid tribute to Sherry Force in song are Scott Adkins, Kate Affainie, Lana Bogie, Lanee Ferguson, Daniel Hayes, Theresa Hill, M.L. Morlock, Carol Scruggs, Angela Spiller, and Stacie Stark/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Chirping birds in the trees sang with the children's and teachers' choruses which made melody with the flutists and original poems students composed to commemorate the achievements of Ms. Force and the Granbery community over the more than 20 years she directed the school's recycling program. 

The Oliver Middle School Flute Choir, under the direction of Susan Waters, played at the memorial for Sherry Force at Granbery School/Photo by Patricia Leslie

In 1989 with a single newspaper bin, Sherry started up recycling at Granbery.

Her teachings over time about the values of protecting the Earth literally affected thousands of students who enlightened their families about new practices which soon became habits.

Long before anyone knew what "wet dry" was all about, Ms. Force implemented a food composting program at Granbery, a model copied by the Tennessee Department of Corrections which was able to reduce its solid waste budget by 75 percent.

Under her leadership, the school earned local, state, regional, and national awards for environmental awareness and action.  

Sherry Force/SEIU

Many recycle every Saturday at Granbery where Ms. Force never failed to show, come snow, ice, piercing sun, or holiday.  It didn't matter if Christmas Day fell on a Saturday:  She was there.

On cold winter days she served cups of hot chocolate to volunteers, and in the summer, popsicles.  Sherry's liberal leanings occasionally got her into trouble and almost cost her job, she said last June, but she grinned and bore it and proudly recycled on.

Last December she was felled by sudden illness, but her spirit and legacy did not die.  Her efforts will live for a long time as Granbery children educate their own children who will teach still more about the importance of preserving the environment and making it better.  Her spirit can always be found, floating around those bins.

Sherry Force died December 19, 2012 at Vanderbilt Hospice.

At the Granbery celebration these boys read poems they composed in tribute to Sherry Force/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Granbery students sang What a Wonderful World and This Land is Your Land/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Granbery kindergarten teacher M. L. Morlock sang In My Life/Photo by Patricia Leslie

These students read poems they had written to honor Ms. Force and said they learned "one person can make a difference," just like Ms. Force said/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Lori Donahue, Granbery principal, praised Sherry Force and announced the creation of a scholarship in Sherry's honor which will send a student to an environmental camp/Photo by Patricia Leslie

A representative from the mayor's office read a proclamation commending Sherry Force.

The students were perfectly poised and listened attentively throughout the 45-minute program/Photo by Patricia Leslie

A student held the plaque dedicated to the memory of Sherry Force/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Jessi Force, Sherry's daughter, greeted friends and families after the service/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Student ushers stand beside the dogwood tree planted at Granbery School in Sherry Force's honor/Photo by Patricia Leslie

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Crosses on the Mall

Crosses on the Mall April 12, 2013/Patricia Leslie

After a 24-hour vigil and the reading of victims' names, volunteers on Friday began removing from the National Mall, 3,300 crosses, Stars of David, and Islamic insignia, reminders of those killed by gun violence since the Newtown murders on December 14, 2012.

Crosses on the Mall April 12, 2013/Patricia Leslie

Groups which participated in the placement of the temporary grave markers on Thursday included the Sojourners,  Park View Kids Zone,  Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, and PICO National Network (People Improving Communities through Organizing).

Crosses on the Mall April 12, 2013/Patricia Leslie

Their members were part of hundreds who converged on Capitol Hill to urge Congress to act to curb more gun deaths, and they made a difference:  16 Republican senators voted with 52 Democrats to continue the gun control debate, no small feat in times of heady money and influential lobbyists for the gun industry.

Crosses on the Mall April 12, 2013/Patricia Leslie

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Anti-droners rally at the White House

It was another pretty day in the neighborhood yesterday, another typical day with a protest out front of the White House with about four times the customary number of police cars available to handle the cherry blossom crowd and the protesters/Patricia Leslie

About 200 marched in front of the White House April 13, protesting the use of drones worldwide by the U.S. government/Patricia Leslie

The rally was organized by the ANSWER Coalition and was one of several demonstrations against drones held in major American cities/Patricia Leslie

At the anti-drone protest in front of the White House April 13/Patricia Leslie

 

The sign says "If you see something...Hello? I'd like to report my government."  He/she holds a telephone with the rest of the phone taped to the sign/Patricia Leslie

At the anti-drone protest in front of the White House April 13/Patricia Leslie

 

At the anti-drone protest in front of the White House April 13/Patricia Leslie

At the anti-drone protest in front of the White House April 13/Patricia Leslie

A "veteran for truth" at the anti-drone protest at the White House April 13/Patricia Leslie

Representatives from the Ivory Coast participated/Patricia Leslie

At the anti-drone protest in front of the White House April 13/Patricia Leslie

 

Words and symbols on the brown cardboard sign say "Make love, not drones"/Patricia Leslie

Among the victims listed on "Obama's Kill List" are the "Constitution, Rule of Law, Due Process, Magna Carta and the 10 Commandments"/Patricia Leslie

 

 

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