Glenn T. Seaborg, 1912-1999

Linus Pauling and Glenn Seaborg with three young science students, American Chemical Society Meeting, St. Louis, April 1984.

“I hardly noticed that the work was exacting and demanding, because I couldn’t believe that I was being paid to do what I would have chosen as a hobby. It was exciting just to walk into the lab, full of anticipation that that day I might be the first human being ever to see some unimaginable new creation.“

–Glenn Seaborg

Advising nine presidents on nuclear policy as the Chairman of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, Glenn T. Seaborg, whose centenary we celebrate today, contributed to the discovery and isolation of ten elements, was the author of 500 scientific articles, father of six kids and, most notably, the recipient of the 1951 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Gaining international fame over the course of his career, Seaborg is best known for discovering the element plutonium in 1941, as well as nine other new transuranic elements.

Seaborg describes the search for Plutonium, “element 94.”

Alongside Edwin McMillan, Seaborg received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for discoveries in the structure and function of the transuranium elements. In addition, Seaborg and his colleagues can be credited for the identification of more than 100 isotopes of elements throughout the periodic table. At the time that he was publishing it, Seaborg’s work required a major realignment of the periodic table of the elements, which was naturally controversial among his contemporaries, but Seaborg was willing to take a risk and it paid off. On hearing the news that he had received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Seaborg was quoted as saying,

One November morning as I drove to work, the radio cackled with news of my reward for taking this chance – the 1951 Nobel Prize in chemistry shared with colleague Ed McMillan. At 39, I was one of the youngest winners ever of the world’s most prestigious award.

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“Education is the best investment we can make in the future, and like any investment, it costs money. We can’t continue to pretend that it doesn’t. We must invest money for buildings, money for supplies, money to improve the curriculum, and money to pay teachers a salary that will attract our brightest people to the profession.“

-Glenn Seaborg

Glenn Theodore Seaborg was born in Michigan on April 19, 1912. Ten years later, his family moved to California in search of opportunity. Seaborg graduated as class valedictorian from David Starr Jordan High School and continued his studies at UCLA. Attending graduate school at the University of California-Berkeley, Seaborg blossomed as a scientist, noting

By day I ran experiments on acids and bases as the personal assistant of cigar-chewing Gilbert N. Lewis, the world’s pre-eminent physical chemist. And by night I spent my free time exploring the mysteries of the atom.

Receiving his Ph.D. in chemistry in 1937, Seaborg continued on as laboratory assistant to G. N. Lewis, who was himself an important mentor to Linus Pauling. In 1939 he was hired as an instructor of chemistry at Berkeley, later becoming Professor of Chemistry.

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“Most of my scientific work has been basic research. There were no immediate uses for my discoveries – but today the radioisotopes are the workhorses of nuclear medicine, an isotope of plutonium is a major energy source in the space program, and the element americium is critical to the smoke detectors in every house in the country. The cost of neglecting basic research will be a continued decline in America’s technological innovation and competitiveness.“

-Glenn Seaborg

In 1958, seven years after his receipt of the Nobel Chemistry Prize,  Seaborg was named Chancellor of the University of California-Berkeley.  Over the course of his short chancellorship, the university saw an increase in enrollment as well as in student activism – a harbinger of things to come in Berkeley.

Three years later, in 1961, he was appointed by President John F. Kennedy to the Atomic Energy Commission. During this time, Seaborg pushed for commercial nuclear energy and peaceful applications of nuclear science. He believed his most significant achievement while at the AEC to be the growth of the civilian nuclear power program.

Notes from a Pauling speech, "The Bomb Test Controversy and World Peace." November 1, 1962.

While Pauling’s feelings on these issues were mixed, and his relationship with the AEC often combative, it is clear that on other matters of nuclear policy, he and Seaborg shared common ground.  In a 1986 typescript, Pauling recalled

At a recent national meeting of the American Chemical Society, held in St. Louis, Glen Seaborg and I participated in a press conference, with many reporters and television crews present.  Seaborg, who had been Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, accompanied the United States negotiators when the partial bomb test treaty was made [in 1963].  The Soviet Union was eager to make a comprehensive bomb test treaty, but the administration in Washington, Seaborg said, had instructed the U.S. team not to agree to a comprehensive test ban, which would hamper seriously the program of continually developing new nuclear weapons.

Indeed, throughout his career, Seaborg corresponded with Linus Pauling on a number of issues, including the investigation of uranium hexafluoride and mutual congratulations shared on the occasion of one another’s Nobel Prizes. In May 1969, when Pauling was made an Honorary Member of the American Institute of Chemists, Seaborg wrote, “Your accomplishments had already qualified you for such an honor and your work during the intervening years of our friendship has added much to this early distinction.”

On April 13, 1981, Seaborg visited Oregon State University as part of a lecture series on “Technology and Change.”  While in Corvallis, he led a seminar titled “The Transuranium Elements,” as well as public talk titled, “Our Energy Problem.” One of the transuranium elements that Seaborg discussed in his seminar, element 106, was named “seaborgium” in August 1997, making it the first element to be named for a living person.

Just before his death on February 25, 1999, the ultimate result of a stroke, Seaborg’s lifetime of achievement was honored by the American Chemical Society, who named him one of the “Top 75 Distinguished Contributors to the Chemical Enterprise.”  Seaborg was among the top four vote-getters for this decoration, joining Robert B. Woodward, Wallace Carothers and, in first place, Linus Pauling, at the top of the list.

Scientific Discussion Groups and the May-Johnson Bill

Leslie R. Groves and J. Robert Oppenheimer, 1940s.

“We are all very busy here working against the May-Johnson bill. The men are pretty well organized and all of us are asked to give a lot of talks over the radio and to various organizations in the city. I have already given two this week and have to give two more, but these efforts seem to be bearing some fruit because it appears now as though Congress will not railroad this bill at least as had been originally planned by the War Department.“

-Thorfin Hogness, letter to Linus Pauling, October 24, 1945

Shortly after the end of World War II in 1945, the future of America’s atomic policy was in the midst of formulation. Though the fate of atomic weapons programs warranted substantial attention, the future of atomic energy and research proved to be a far more contentious issue. In order to address needs that were becoming increasingly apparent, General Leslie R. Groves, overseer of the Manhattan Project scientists, helped the War Department draft a bill.

Under this bill, which attempted to satisfy both scientists and the military, development of atomic energy was to be put under the jurisdiction of a nine member panel, made up of scientists and military men, which would report directly to a permanent and full-time administrator. The proposal, called May-Johnson after its co-sponsors, appeared to include adequate mechanisms for civilian involvement, and several influential scientists lent it their support. Accordingly the bill passed through the House Military Affairs Committee very quickly and without much debate.

However, the lack of more comprehensive discussion for such important legislation caused a wave of alarm among many in the scientific community, certain of whom felt the idea to be deeply flawed. It was argued that little would keep the military from taking control of the nine member panel if it wished to do so, and it appeared that General Groves was being groomed for the position of panel administrator. Dr. Harold Urey, a Nobel Prize recipient, had a particular lack of fondness for the legislation, referring to it in a New York Times article as  “the first totalitarian bill ever written by Congress. You can call it a Communist bill or a Nazi bill, whichever you think is worse.”

Harold Urey, 1930s

Scientific discussion groups that had formed at Caltech began considering the subject more earnestly. The Association of Pasadena Scientists was formed around this time, “to meet the increasingly apparent responsibility of scientists in promoting the welfare of mankind and the achievement of a stable world peace.” The leaders of the group, and a substantial portion of its membership, were opposed to the May-Johnson legislation. As time went on, similar groups began sprouting up in the area, including the Northern California Association of Scientists in Berkeley.

Around the time that May-Johnson was being debated, a number of incidences occurred which cast doubt upon the military’s capability to responsibly direct post-war, non-military, scientific activities. Of particular concern to the fledgling discussion groups and to scientists on either side of the Pacific, was the destruction of several Japanese cyclotrons by American occupation forces. The devices had been built for strictly peaceful research purposes, and the decision to dismantle the devices fueled flames that were already growing against the May-Johnson bill.

As consensus coalesced between the different scientific discussion groups, they merged together and formed the Federation of American Scientists. Members of the new organization, and many other scientists, traveled to Washington where they lobbied public officials to fight against the bill. Another bill, which received input from the Federation of American Scientists during its formation, added a fresh element to the growing maelstrom. The new legislation, named the McMahon Bill after its sponsor, outlined a proposal for an Atomic Energy Commission that would be led by a panel of full-time, presidentially appointed, civilian scientists. Fierce debate over the two bills created many deep divisions within the scientific community.

May-Johnson was supported primarily by scientists and civilians who thought that sharing responsibility for atomic decisions with the military, private industry and government officials was reasonable as well as necessary. They seemed to agree that the bill could benefit from revision, but that, as currently written, it included adequate safeguards and representation for the public and the scientific community.

Supporters of the McMahon Bill were much more skeptical of significant military influence over the future of atomic science. Bell Telephone Laboratories head and National Academy of Sciences President, Frank Jewett, supported McMahon, as did some of the atom bomb’s developers. Linus Pauling also lent the bill his support.

As time went on, and both bills maneuvered through congressional committees, support for McMahon began to grow as lobbying pressure and concerns from the electorate gradually swayed the opinions of important political leaders. In the end, the McMahon bill was revised to include language that gave the military some input in the proposed Atomic Energy Commission, and the bill was passed by Congress. Members of the FAS, the APS and all of the McMahon bill’s supporters rejoiced after their victory.

With the bill’s passing it seemed that political leaders who had supported the bill were also beginning to support further cooperation with the Soviet Union. To many involved with the process, world peace appeared eminent. However, new pressures and perspectives were beginning to take hold of public discourse, and a number of opposing interests began to emerge. The environment that had allowed for open debate and defeat of the May-Johnson bill would soon be subject to dramatic change.

For more on the scientific community’s response to May-Johnson, see the website Linus Pauling and the International Peace Movement: A Documentary History.