Re: Tracer Lab

[Paul Tyree <mrpmt@empire.net>]

To Vas Komanduri, et al.

Alas, my friend, every Radsafer is looking for TracerLab.

Tracerlab was a Radsafers' Camelot. Founded circa 1950, it was one of
very few non-governmental entities involved in things radiologic, and
was primarily a think tank/ contractor to the government's "atomic
establishment" during the thermonuclear weapon development/test era.
T-Lab's Richmond, CA laboratories developed and performed the airborne
atmospheric monitoring program to assess the Soviet Union's H-Bomb test
viability [see Rhodes, the Making of the Hydrogen Bomb]

With the advent of the Atomic Energy Act in 1954, Tracerlab was one of
very few businesses prepared to provide the new "Nuclear Industry" with
comprehensive radiological products and services. It became part of
another new technology player on Massachusetts' Rt. 128 - Laboratory for
Electronics [LFE]. A line of "nucleonics" was soon part of its product
arsenal.

The high-power organization attracted many veterans of the Manhatten and
peripheral "Projects", and soon had the dilemna of too many chiefs. An
exfluence of high-end talent soon earned it the title "T-Lab U", with
numerous ex-patriot start-ups, including New England Nuclear [>DuPont]
and Controls for Radiation [>Teledyne Isotopes]. This "brain-drain", and
other factors related to LFE's lagging in IC electronics and profits,
put the TracerLab division in the "for-sale" column, circa 1968.

That wyly Yugoslavian racing-cyclist, Milan Panic, was on an
acquisistion binge (also the Chemtrac Div. of Baird-Atomic, Nuclear
Science & Engineering) to make his International Chemical and Nuclear
(ICN, then in City of Industry, CA) into a congomerate entity to occupy
his newly acquired tract on the Irvine Ranch property in Orange County,
CA. About the only vestige of Tracerlab that one can identify today is
ICN Dosimetry, the lineage of which is traceable back to the TracerLab
film badge operation.

So, Vas Komanduri, WHY are YOU trying to locate TracerLab?

Thank you, Radsafers, for entertaining some (possibly blemished)
recollections of a November-Days colleague. Warmest regards,

Paul Tyree <mrpmt@empire.net>