Human radiation studies: Remembering the early years: Oral history of health physicist Karl Z. Morgan, Ph.D., conducted January 7, 1995

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June 1995 Setb'ng: January 7,1995, Indian Springs, Rorida Interviewers; Michael Yuff^e and Marisa Caputo, DOE Oiiice of Human Radiation Experiments ORAL fflSTORY OF HEALTH PHYSICIST Karl Z. Morgan -was selected fo r this oral history project because o f his researchfor the Manhattan Project at the Metallurgjccd Laboratory in Chi cago, and his work at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The oral history covers Dr. Morgan’s work as a pioneer in the field o f health physics, his health pf^sics research at the Oak Ridge National Lcdroratory, and his work since he retiredfrom ORNL. ics and Mathematics) in 1929 and 1930, respectively, from the University ofNordi Carolina, and received his Ph.D. (Cosmic Radiation) in 1934 from Duke University ^Durham, North Carolina). He is married and has four grown children. Dr. Morgan began his career as a physics professor at Lenoir-Rhyne College (1934-1943), where he focused his work on cosmic ray research. In 1943, Dr. Morgan moved to Chic^o to become a senior scientist in health physics for the Manhattan Engineer District. The following year. Dr. Morgan went to the newly formed Oak Ridge National Laboratory (formerly Clinton Laboratories) in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where he served as Director of Health Physics from 1944 to 1972. Since joiniiig ORNL, Dr. Morgan has also held the following positions: 1945 to ’71—^Member, Intemational Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) 1955 to ’78—Member, National Council on Radiation Protection (NCRP) 1955 to ’78—^Editor-in-Chief, Health Physics Journal 1960 to ’72—Adjunct Professor of Health Physics, Vanderbilt University 1972 to ’83—Professor of Health Physics, Georgia Institute of Technology 1983 to ’86—Visiting Professor of Health Physics, Appalachian State University Dr. Morgan has published many times on health physics, addressing such topics as the m axim inn permissible occupational dose of specific isotopes. In addition. Dr. Morgan has researched and published numerous articles dealing with nuclear worker safety issues.

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Setting: January 7,1995, Indian Springs, Florida June 1995 interviewers: Michaei Yuffee and Marisa Caputo, DOE Office of Human Radiation Experiments College and G raduate School in North Carolina; Unintentionally Joining the Manhattan Project in Chicago in 1943 CAPUTO: Today is Januaiy 7,1995. My name is Marisa Caputo and Fm here widi Michael Yuffee. We are from the Department of Energy’s Office of Human Radiation Experiments. We’re here today in Indian Springs, Florida, to interview E)r. Karl Morgan about his knowledge o f Cold War human radiation experimentation. Dr. Morgan, I was hoping that we could start with where you were bom and the year you were bora, and then maybe get into your educational background. MORGAN: I am Karl Ziegler Morgan. I North Carolina, not far firom Charlotte— I spent a good portion o f my early life in Raleigh, the later portion in Salisbmy, North Carolina. I spent die first two years o f college at a small college, Lenoir-Rhyne, in Hickory [North Carolina]. I then went to the Univer sity o f North Carolina, where I received my B.S. and M.S. in Physics I worked about a year with Westinghouse in Philadelphia in 1930. Then I received a fellowship at Duke University, where I received my doctor ate in 1934. M y major research project there was the study o f cosmic radiation.* Following my receipt of the Ph.D. degree—^this during the Depression— became chairman of the Physics Department at LenoirRhyne College in Hickory. While teaching, I did cosmic ray research for about eight years. Re search in caverns way underground and high mountains, Mt. Mitchell, Mt. Evans in Colorado, etc. YUFFEE: Well, after your tenure with Lenoir-Rhyne, you went to the University o f Chicago and joined the MED?^ MORGAN: While doing research at Lenoir-Rhyne, with Drs. [Walter] Nielsen and others there, one o f the research projects was in Dr. [Arthur] Compton’s’ laboratory on top of Mt. Evans [in Colorado]. During the summer I was there, I met Dr. [Jason] Stems, chairman o f the Physics Department at radiation o f high penetrating power originating in outer space and consisting partly of high-energy Manhattan Engineering District, the Government agenty that oversaw development of the atomic bomb under the ultrasecret Manhattan Project Dr. Arthur Compton o f the University o f Chicago headed a National Academy of Sciences committee that in May 1941 recommended to Dr, Vannevar Bush, head of the National Defense Research Conunittee, that nuclear resean^ be pursued as part of the national defense effort for several purposes, including development o f an atomic bomb. In the summer o f 1941, Bush instructed Compton to assess technical questions related to critical mass and destructive capability and verify a British conclusion that develop ment o f a uranium bomb that could be dropped from existing aircraft was feasible within two years. On November 6,1941, Compton reported a conclusion less sanguine than that of the British but still con firming the feasibility o f an atomic weapon deliverable by aircraft. Early in 1942, as part o f the emerging effort to develop an atomic bomb. Bush appointed Compton to be one o f three program chiefs with re sponsibility to run chain reactions and develop weapons theory. As a result, imder Arthur Compton, the Metallurgical Laboratory at the University of Chicago became a critical research facility for the Manhat

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June 1995 Setting: January 7,1995, Indian Springs, Florida interviewers: Michael Yuffee and Marisa Caputo, DOE OfRce of Human Radiation Experiments military people. Francis Davis and Paul Reindhart in my group were the ones who developed this aircraft technique of finding sources [of radio activity] when you fly over them. Incidentally, Oak Ridge is accused of spreading radioisotopes in the area and flying over them. Well, what we spread was solid sources, of course, that were carefully taken out of lead containers that weighed maybe a half a ton to two tons. The lid was taken off [the container] wiA a backhoe device,®* like a bulldozer, and the source was lifted out very carefully and set on the ground in a place that was marked with red stripes or white stripes. Then over here (holds out his arm), three himdred yards [away], was another white stripe [where we] did the same Francis Davis and Paul Reindhart flew over these areas with the instru ments they had developed, and in so doing, they developed this tech nique, which became so useful to the DOE. In the earlier days, I used to have friends in the Department of Energy. I doubt if I have a single one there today, except maybe the director [(Secretary O’Leary)] would not consider me as an enemy, maybe even a fnend. I have not gone along with the cover-up [of tire AEC’s and sometimes, to crack the closet [of secrecy] where you can sort of peep in and see the “skeletons” hanging there [the wrongdoings of the AEG and DOE]. At times I did two or three things that I should not have done. I did not intentionally lose my job at Oak Ridge [by going pubic with what we were doing]. I should have done it, maybe. One time I did not intentionally lose my job, but I think it probably was right because it would have divulged the trigger mechanisms of our weapon, had I done so. On many occasions, even at Oak Ridge, I was on one side of the battlefteld and the engineers on the other with their monitors [or Anyway, in the very early period at Hanford, you’ll recall, they had a terrible problem. [Manhattan Engineer District Commander General Leslie R.] Groves was pushing Hanford, “Get that stuff up to Los Alamos as quick as you can”®—the cooling time® maybe now is a hun dred days—^TLet’s get it down to fifty, maybe even forty,” since they were t^ in g all sorts of risks. As we all know, there are a number of radioisotopes of iodine [that have] half’lives much shorter than the days and hoiu^ and minutes and seconds. Then [if they reduced the an excavating machine with a bucket attached to a hinged boom that digs being drawn toward the machine; invented in the first half o f the 1940s ® Eugene Paul Wigner (1902-95), U.S. physicisi where it would be assembled into nuclear bombs time allowed for the short-lived fission products to decay a w ^ so that the fuel rods could be chemically processed and plutonium separated out

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Setting: January 7,1995, Indian Springs, Fiorida June 1995 Interviewers: Michael Yuffee and Marisa Caputo, DOE Office of Human Radiation Experiments I ended up at Georgia Tech. Maybe that was a bad choice. I had offers at my former school, [University olO North Carolina; I wish, in retro spect, diat r d gone there. I think it became a decision of Nuclear Power [versus] The Health o f People—^and Carolina would have been a much better choice dian Georgia Tech, who wants to please Coca Cola and the I ’ve given a black eye here—^you’d better tell your director [(Energy Secretary O’Leary)] to watch out, because I can name four women that have been killed since t h ^ took strong positions against nuclear power, beginning with Karen Silkwood, and I testified in her case. It’s very dangerous for—especially a woman, for some reason. You’d better be carefiil. I don’t know why they pick on women.** MORGAN: I doubt she (Secretary O’Leary) could live through this (inaudible) Administration because some o f the old (inaudible) are back in the es YUFFEE: I don’t have any more specific questions. CAPUTO: Neither do I. Have we missed something? Is there a question we should have asked MORGAN: I don’t know quite vdiat you have in mind. As I say, I don’t want to give you everything that will go in the book [I am writing jointly with my MORGAN: It’s about the early history o f health physics. But, as I said, I have to depend on my memory, mostly, and my library, which is incomplete, because Martin Marietta won’t allow me free access in the Laboratory, [a privilege they extend] to scores o f other former employees. They are afraid of me because they think I’m against nuclear energy, I guess. energy]. I just think that Admiral Rickovei*^ was just too successful, and we land-based his PWR“ too soon. We should have done at least thirty more years’ research before we built reactors on land, and certainly within 50 miles o f big cities like New York and Philadelphia. I testified Morgan adds: “I have the highest admiration for your Secretary O’Leary for die brave stand of openness and honesty she has taken, but I have a sense of uneasiness. I testified in the Karen Silkwood case and know of these heroic women who have suffered the same fete as Karen. I fear she has a bear by the tail.” clear submarine and is sometimes called the “Father o f the Nuclear Navy” pressurized water reactor—one of the two kinds of light-water reactors used in virtually all domestic commercial nuclear reactors. Actually, U.S. Navy submarines rely chiefly on the other kind: boiling