"Gene and Jim – Steve Blaising" 1974 Side 1., 1974

Item — track: 10

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

He began working at the company just before the United States entered World War 2. He took motion pictures of his lab.
They talk about Phil's love of baseball and listening to it on the radio.
He recounts seeing color TV for the first time at the company in 1941 which was pretty much unheard of at that time.
They talk about Phil's procrastination when it comes to signing books. He says that Phil left the book on his desk in his room for six weeks before it was finally returned. Phil never read the book because it wasn't entirely complimentary.
He tells a story of when they discovered their fusion experiment was working and the joy that they all felt when they thought they had proved it was working. A graduate student then pointed out that it was not working as they had hoped and in the end the project was unsuccessful.
They talk about Phil's impatience with the publishing process and his wife tells a story of Phil talking to Albert Einstein, who insisted that Phil push forward his math on fusion for publication. Phil instead tried to make his fusion energy system work, and then have someone else go through the process of getting the math to be published and publicly accepted. Unfortunately, he was unable to complete this project before he died.

Dates

1974

Language of Materials

From the Collection: Collection material in English.

Conditions Governing Access

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