Download this as a PDF

Local History/Background for Teachers’ Prep: 

During World War Two (1941-1945), the United States was in a rush to create the Atomic Bomb before the Germans did. In order to complete this mission, the Manhattan Project (1942-1945) was put into place. One part of creating an Atomic Bomb was ensuring whetehr a self-sustained nuclear chain reaction was possible or not. The Chicago-Pile 1 was assembled under the abandoned Stagg Field by scientists and day laborers, under the supervision of the Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi (1901-1954). The experiment was a resounding success, proving that an artifical nuclear reaction could happen. This success was a small part of ensuring the success of the Manhattan Project. Eventually, the Atomic Bombs created by scientists in the Manhattan Project were dropped on two cities in Japan, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing hundreds of thousands of people from impact and the diseases that followed for years after the bombings. The people extinguished in these bombings by the U.S. government were civilians. 

In 1967, Henry Moore (1898-1986) completed a Nuclear Energy Sculpture on the site of the world’s first self-sustained nuclear chain reaction. The sculpture looks like a mushroom, or a human head, the confusion being in part intentional to portray both the excitement and the fear of such a scientific achievement. Moore, famously, was against the use of nuclear science to conduct warfare, even founding the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in 1958. Yet, he took on this project in 1963, perhaps to show both the wonder and the anxiety that such a commemoration can imply. 

This site has been contentious, with anti-nuclear and anti-war activists protesting and vandalizing the statue on the Hiroshima bombing anniversary and the Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster anniversary. It also serves as a reminder of academia’s role in warfare and the dismal effects of scientific discovery and progress. 

The Stagg Field does not exist at this location anymore, instead The Joe and Rika Mansueto Library (2011) and the Regenstein Library (1970) stand on this site. The Manuseto Library has a state-of-the-art robot book retrieval system and the Regenstein is the largest library on UChicago’s campus. Both libraries are connected through a corridor and are used extensively by students for research, studying, and group projects. They are also open to the public for tours and research.