Edward Condon

Edward Uhler Condon (March 2, 1902 – March 26, 1974) was an American nuclear physicist, a pioneer in quantum mechanics, and a participant during World War II in the development of radar and, very briefly, of nuclear weapons as part of the Manhattan Project.

The Franck–Condon principle and the Slater–Condon rules are co-named after him.

Edward Uhler Condon was born on March 2, 1902, in Alamogordo, New Mexico, to William Edward Condon and Carolyn Uhler.

His father was supervising the construction of a narrow-gauge railroad, many of which were built in the area by logging companies.

After graduating from high school in Oakland, California in 1918, he worked as a journalist for three years at the Oakland Inquirer and other papers.

He then attended the University of California, Berkeley, initially joining the College of Chemistry; when he learned that his high school physics teacher had joined the faculty, he switched majors to take classes in theoretical physics.

Condon earned his bachelor's degree in three years and his doctorate in two.

His Ph.D. thesis combined work by Raymond Thayer Birge on measuring and analyzing band spectral intensities and a suggestion by James Franck.

Thanks to a National Research Council fellowship, Condon studied at Göttingen under Max Born and at Munich under Arnold Sommerfeld.

Under the latter, Condon rewrote his Ph.D. thesis using quantum mechanics, creating the Franck–Condon principle.

After seeing an ad in Physical Review, Condon worked in public relations at Bell Telephone Laboratories in fall 1927, in particular promoting their discovery of electron diffraction.

Condon taught briefly at Columbia University and was associate professor of physics at Princeton University from 1928 to 1937, except for a year at the University of Minnesota.

With Philip M. Morse, he wrote Quantum Mechanics, the first English-language text on the subject in 1929.

With G.H. Shortley, he wrote the Theory of Atomic Spectra, "a bible on the subject from the moment of its 1935 publication".

He was associate director of research at the Westinghouse Electric Company in Pittsburgh, beginning in 1937, where he established research programs in nuclear physics, solid-state physics, and mass spectroscopy.

He then headed the company's research on microwave radar development.

He also worked on the equipment used to isolate uranium for use in atomic bombs.

He served as a consultant to the National Defense Research Committee during World War II and helped organize MIT's Radiation Laboratory.

On May 11, 1940, Condon showcased his machine called the Nimatron at the 1940 New York World Fair.

Condon filed for the patent on April 26, 1940 and got it on September 24, 1940 for his innovating machine, Nimatron.

In 1943, Condon joined the Manhattan Project.

Within six weeks, he resigned as a result of conflicts about security with General Leslie R. Groves, the project's military leader.

General Groves had objected when Condon's superior J. Robert Oppenheimer held a discussion with the director of the project's Metallurgical Lab at the University of Chicago.

In his resignation letter, he explained:

"In trying to be clear about the reasons for the decision [to leave Los Alamos and return to Westinghouse] I suppose it boils down to this: With additional knowledge of detailed needs of the project I was unable to get a strong conviction that I am decidedly more useful to the war here than at Westinghouse. Since the change would entail considerable personal sacrifices I do not feel justified in making it. I do not see how such a view could have been reached without my coming here to see the problem at first hand. [...] The thing which upset me most is the extraordinary close security policy. I do not feel qualified to question the wisdom of this since I am totally unaware of the extent of enemy espionage and sabotage activities. I only want to say that in my case I found that the extreme concern with security was morbidly depressing—especially the discussion about censoring mail and telephone calls, the possible militarization and complete isolation of the personnel from the outside world.

I know that before long all such concerns would make me so depressed as to be of little if any value."

From August 1943 to February 1945, Condon worked as a part-time consultant at Berkeley on the separation of U-235 and U-238.

Condon was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1944.

He was the director of the National Bureau of Standards (now NIST) from 1945 to 1951.

In June 1945, Condon was among many prominent American scientists invited to attend a celebration of the 220th anniversary of the founding of the Russian Academy of Sciences to be held in Moscow.

He indicated his desire to attend.

When Groves learned of this, he contacted Condon's employers at Westinghouse, and explained that he believed this would be dangerous from the perspective of possibly revealing information about the atomic bomb work that was still on-going.

Condon attempted to contact the White House in protest.

Subsequently, Groves requested that the State Department revoke Condon's passport, which they did.

Following the war, Condon played a leading role in organizing scientists to lobby for civilian control of atomic energy rather than military control under strict security.

In 1946, Condon was president of the American Physical Society, and in 1953 was president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

During the McCarthy period, Condon was one of the first prominent scientists to become a target of the House Un-American Activities Committee, charged publicly in 1948 with being "one of the weakest links in our atomic security" on account of his extensive knowledge of classified information, his connections with the development of the atomic bomb, and his alleged sympathies for communism and the Soviet Union.

His case became a cause célèbre among those who opposed McCarthyism, especially scientists, and was one of the most prominent cases of its time, and he was defended by many prominent scientists, as well as President Harry Truman.

Condon became widely known in 1968 as principal author of the Condon Report, an official review funded by the United States Air Force that concluded that unidentified flying objects (UFOs) have prosaic explanations.

The lunar crater Condon is named for him.