From: Verlie Whitlock (whitlock@NRTCO.NET)
Date: Wed May 26 1999 - 11:51:03 PDT
I enjoyed Walter Felscher's account of the events surrounding the
development and use of the atomic bomb, but I noted the absence of any
mention of the woman scientist involved; I'm wondering if she has been
written right out of the story in the country where she worked. Since I
couldn't remember her name, I consulted my son, who has studied this whole
subject quite extensively. I forwarded Walter's article to him and his
reply came back:
"He overlooks Lise Meitner, who worked with Hahn and Strassman for several
years, but by the time the crucial uranium experiments took place in winter
1938, she was already a refugee in Sweden (she was Jewish). However, it was
Meitner and her nephew Otto Frisch who came up with the fission explanation
(and coined the word "fission"), since Hahn and Strassman couldn't figure
out what their results meant.
Jeremy."
It seems that, even in the account of historical events, we women have
to look out for each other - even when the events took place 60 years ago!
Verlie Whitlock
Technology is the patsy of human error