Too Cheap too Meter

["D. Kosloff" <dkosloff@ncweb.com>]

I have in front of me a microfilm copy of page 5 of the New York Times dated
September 17, 1954.  It has the following article This is the article
exactly as it appeared:

ABUNDANT  POWER
 FROM ATOM SEEN

It Will Be Too Cheap for Our
Children to Meter, Strauss
 Tells Science Writers

Rear Admiral Lewis L. Strauss chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission,
predicted here last night that industry would have electrical power from
atomic furnaces in five to fifteen years.
   "Our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to
meter," he declared.
   Admiral Strauss was the principal speaker at a dinner at the Statler
Hotel celebrating the twentieth anniversary of the founding of the National
Association of Science Writers.
   He reported that in Brussels yesterday Dr. Lawrence Hafstad, head of the
reactor development division of the Atomic Energy Commission, was prepared
to be asked at the Congress of  Industrial Chemistry the following question:
"How soon will you have industrial atomic electric power in the United
States?"  Admiral Strauss said Dr. Hafstad was prepared to answer:  "From 5
to 15 years, depending upon the vigor of the development effort."
   Admiral Strauss said this time scale could be shortened if research were
pushed.  Of the nation's $8,000,000,000 atomic program he said:
   "Transmutation of the elements, unlimited power, ability to investigate
the workings of living cells by tracer atoms, the secret of photosynthesis
about to be uncovered, these and a host of other results, all in fifteen
short years.
   "It is not too much to expect that our children will know of great
periodic famines in the world only as matters of history, will travel
effortlessly over the seas and under them and through the air with a minimum
of  danger and at great speeds, and will experience a life span far longer
than ours, as disease yields and man comes to understand what causes him to
age."
   Admiral Strauss called upon science writers to help people understand
that the Atomic Energy Commission conducts peaceable as well as military
research, and that it is not true that the Atomic Energy Commission holds a
lot of secrets which it stubbornly refuses to publish.  He said a stack of
publishings three feet high was the unclassified output of
commission-approved scientists this year.
   Three hundred scientists and writers attended the dinner.  Dr. Harry L.
Fisher paid tribute to the twelve writers who founded the National
Association of Science Writers in 1934.  Waldemar Kaempffert and William L.
Laurence of The New York Times were among them.  Alton Blakeslee of The
Associated Press, president of the association, presided.

----------------------------------------------------------------
According to Admiral Strauss in his book "Men and Decisions", which I also
have in front of me:  " From the age of sixteen until twenty, I was a
traveling salesman - in the vernacular, a 'drummer' - selling shoes at
wholesale to merchants in the Carolinas, Georgia, and West Virginia"  "That
I never did get to college is unfortunately evident enough, though the
reason will appear as this account continues."  Admiral Strauss then worked
as an investment banker with Kuhn, Loeb & Co. until he went on active duty
in the Navy at the beginning of WW II.

I will send a photocopy of the NY Times article to anyone who sends me a
copy of the coverage of this event from another paper or magazine.  Also any
written record of what Aubrey Wagner said would be appreciated.  I have
several document that indicate that AEC and "nuclear industry" personnel did
not share Admiral Strauss' optimism, I would like to have some records that
support the contention that the "nuclear industry adopted it as gospel".

 Don Kosloff dkosloff@ncweb.com
2910 Main St, PERRY OH 44081-9593 03

----- Original Message -----
From: <GlennACarlson@aol.com>
To: Multiple recipients of list <radsafe@romulus.ehs.uiuc.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, April 26, 2000 10:19 PM
Subject: Re: costs


> Whether an industry insider said it first or not, the nuclear industry
> adopted it as gospel.
>
> Glenn A. Carlson, P.E.
> glennacarlson@aol.com


************************************************************************
The RADSAFE Frequently Asked Questions list, archives and subscription
information can be accessed at http://www.ehs.uiuc.edu/~rad/radsafe.html