The National Academy of Sciences The First Hundred Years, 1863-1963 (1978) / Chapter Skim
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15. The Years between the Wars
15. The Years between the Wars
Pages 475-516
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From page 475... ...
Jewett, that of Alfred Newton Richards was in the nature of an interregnum, lowkeyed and lasting just three years. Yet, during that brief period the Academy and its President were involved in some of the most urgent and intensive inquiries in its history.
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From page 476... ...
Bronk's "Alfred Newton Richards ( ~ 876- ~ 966) ," Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 19:413~22 (Spring ~976)
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From page 477... ...
Mansfield Clark.4 When his duties as Chairman of CMR ended early in ~946, Newton Richards returned on a full-time basis to the University of Pennsylvania, where he resumed his duties as Vice-President in Charge of Medical Affairs. A year later, at age seventy-one, he was elected President of the National Academy.
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From page 478... ...
The Loyalty Issue The controversy over atomic legislation caused some Congressmen to resent the scientists who had worked on the atomic bomb and who had been active in seeking transfer of control of atomic energy from the army to the civilian AEC. Rumors of foreign and domestic Communist activities in connection with the development of the bomb began to appear in the press.
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From page 479... ...
Robert Oppenheimer, see Annual Reportfor 1948-49, pp. 2, lO; NAS Archives: ORG: NAS: Com on Civil Liberties: Ad Hoc: ~948-~949
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From page 480... ...
With the organization of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in March ~949, Canada, the United States, and ten nations of Northern Europe agreed to joint action in the event of attack by Russia.
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From page 481... ...
When no modification for nonclassified projects could be effected, the Academy, whose Research Council administered the AEC fellowship program under contract, requested that the AEC take over the program. Pressed to continue, the Academy negotiated a new and more limited agreement with the AEC, which made no offer of predoctoral fellowships for two- ~ 95 ~ and provided Research Council administration of postdoctoral fellowships during that year only for fellows whose intended research involved access to classified data.
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From page 482... ...
The Foundation got off to a slow start when the House failed to appropriate the full half million dollars authorized for its organizational activities and diverted half that sum instead to current emergency spending.~4 It was November Anglo, seven months later, before President Truman appointed the twenty-four-member National Science Board, which was to establish its general policies and guide its operation. On the Board were Academy members Detlev W
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From page 483... ...
Despite the troubles and uncertainties that afflicted the country and the Academy during the brief period between World War II and the Korean conflict, Richards's short presidency was marked by many positive accomplishments. These included the establishment of the Pacific Science Board and the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission; a fresh and greatly broadened approach to the field of oceanography; and, finally, active support of the State Department's concentrated effort to include science more significantly in the conduct of foreign relations.
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From page 485... ...
Geological Survey. Prior to its dissolution in Ado, the Merriam committee organized the first Pan-Pacific Scientific Conference (thereafter called Pacific Science Congress)
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From page 486... ...
iii-vii. 22 NAS, Annual Reportfor 1926-27, p.
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From page 487... ...
Harrison received several suggestions that the Research Council serve as a meeting ground for the large number of scientists interested in "this vast area which previously had been closed to American sc~entists."25 The conference that Harrison called in June ~946 was attended by more than ninety researchers interested in the Pacific, representing the anthropological, plant, zoological, and earth sciences; oceanography and meteorology; and public health and medicine. Also present were seventy-f~ve officials from government agencies concerned with problems of the Pacific.26 The conference agreed that the Pacific was, scientifically speaking, terra incognita, and that the United States had "done less to carry out explorations tin the Pacific Ocean ~ than has any nation in the northern hemisphere." The lack of interest in the Pacific and Pacific problems up to that time had been "indeed striking," and, without support, many fields out there remained "literally untouched."27 A Navy spokesman, acknowledging that "little twas ~ known about tropical oceanography," discussed the fundamental information that his department urgently required in the anthropological sciences; earth, plant, and zoological sciences; hydrography; meteorology; public health; and medicine.
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From page 488... ...
With grants from the Viking Fund (renamed in ~ 95 ~ the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research) and from the Office of Naval Research, a party of forty-two CIMA scientists representing more than twenty universities and research institutions boarded Navy transports in the early summer of ~94~.
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From page 489... ...
Visiting conservationists carried out intensive ecological surveys of the islands; of the plant life, forests, marine invertebrate and fish resources; of animal and insect life; and of land resources and land utilization. Representing a comprehensive survey of the natural history and resources of Micronesia, the reports of the anthropolog~sts and conservationists proved particularly useful in the studies made by the medical and public health groups in the islands.36 Associated with the community of more than To American scientists in the Pacific science programs were two international groups, the South Pacific Commission and the Pacific Science Association, ~, The Pacific Science Board, with ONR support, launched the first number of the Atoll Research Bulletin in the fall of ~95~.
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From page 490... ...
Brues, Paul S Henshaw et al., "General Report, NAS-NRC Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission," January ~947, pp.
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From page 491... ...
Frederick W Ullrich of the Navy Medical Corps as an interim commission, which left for Japan to assess the scope and means for a program of studies.4~ They were in Japan when President Truman on November 26 approved a Navy request to the Academy to establish and operate, with funds subsequently supplied by the Atomic Energy Commission, "a long-range continuing study of the biological and medical effects of the atomic bomb on man." The Academy, usually called upon only for advice to the government, in this instance accepted operational responsibility for the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission.42 The ABCC was designated a field agency of the Research Council, its activities supervised by a Committee on Atomic Casualties in the Division of Medical Sciences, headed by Thomas M
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From page 492... ...
Carl F Tessmer of the Army Medical Corps, had begun its first genetic and hematological studies in Hiroshima and in Kure, its control city, and had drawn up plans for the construction of permanent laboratories in those cities, as well as in Nagasaki and its control city, Sasebo.44 A survey of projected studies made a year later suggested a duration of the work of the ABCC on the order of one hundred years.45 As a civilian agency in an occupied country, the ABCC initially operated under the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers.
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From page 493... ...
Although all of these came under its observation and were of medical concern, the Commission of necessity limited its principal efforts to a homogeneous population of one hundred thousand representing survivors in the immediate impact area; survivors believed to have been well beyond the effects of radiation; and a control group, none of whom had been in either Hiroshima or Nagasaki in ~945.48 The Commission originally planned to determine the incidence of new diseases uniquely associated with radiation, altered incidence of 48 These figures and much of the account of ABCC research that follows are from R Keith Cannan, Chairman, NRC Division of Medical Sciences, "The Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission: The First Fourteen Years," NAS-NRC, News Report 12 :1-7 (January-February ~96~)
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From page 494... ...
A rare disease in ordinary populations, leukemia occurred in survivors closer than one thousand meters at more than fifteen times the normal rate observed in survivors beyond two thousand meters of the hypocenter, the incidence based on the ~ 66 cases found among the exposed group in the first eleven years of the study. The expected increase in the incidence of other forms of cancer proved to be very much smaller than that for leukemia, and appeared only after a much longer time following irradiation.
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From page 495... ...
It was found, as well, that during the ~950-~960 period the mortality ratios for exposed persons who had been within twelve hundred meters of the hypocenters were elevated by about ~5 percent.50 Prominent throughout the early years of work in the two cities, but wholly beyond assessment, were the psychological traumas suffered by the survivors, visible in the lingering effects of the stresses induced by the disaster itself and "the fears engendered by the constant reiteration in the press of the hazard of ultimate sickness and death from 'A-Bomb Disease'." Yet the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission reported in the fifteenth year of the program that most of the survivors were still alive and in apparent good health and that 50 Cannan, NA0NRC, News Report 12:5 (January-February ~962) ; James V
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From page 496... ...
A searching report made in November ~955 by a group headed by Dr. Thomas Francis, Jr., Chairman of the Department of Epidemiology at Michigan, led to the reconstitution of the NRC Committee on Atomic Casualties as the NAS-NRC Advisory Committee for the ABCC, reorientation of the long-range objectives of the program, and in ~957 the appointment as ABCC Director of George B
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From page 497... ...
, George B Darling (Director, Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission)
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From page 498... ...
The creation in ~888 of the Marine Biological Laboratory, also at Woods Hole, under Charles 0. Whitman, Agassiz's student at Penikese, would later influence the choice of that site for the present-day Woods Hole Oceanographic Institutiorl.60 Besides the diversified environment of Woods Hole~wing much to its glacial origins which favored marine biological research, its geographic setting, remote from large population centers and with pp.
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From page 499... ...
407-425. 62 Charles Gravier, "Recent Oceanographic Researches," Smithsonian Institution, Annual Reportfor 1914, pp.
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From page 500... ...
. Another project presented to the Division of Biology and Agriculture in 1919 concerned the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, Massachusetts, then in need of financial support.
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From page 501... ...
Two far-reaching studies resulted, one on the scientific and economic importance of oceanography, by Bigelow, and the other on its international aspects, by Thomas Wayland Vaughan, geologist and oceanographer, who since ~g20 had been a member of the Research Council's Committee on Pacific Investigations and was then Director-elect of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.65 The formal report of Lillie's committee, two years later, declared that the United States, without research vessels or shore facilities, was far behind the nations of northwestern Europe in research in physical oceanography and marine biology. It recommended the development of a central oceanographic institution on the East Coast to promote research and education in the science of the sea and provide a center for coordinating the isolated aspects of the science currently pursued by private institutions and by such federal agencies as the Hydrographic Office, Coast and Geodetic Survey, Coast Guard, and Bureau of Fisheries.66 64 Correspondence in NAS Archives: B&A: Com on Marine Biological Laboratory: ~9~924.
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From page 502... ...
The slow progress in oceanographic research over the next three decades was owing largely to the sheer immensity of the task, but also to the lack of new technologies required for the scientific exploration of the depths.67 The wartime development of sonar, LOON, the radio buoy, and other electronic devices represented significant advances much of the work carried out at the New London, Woods Hole, and San Diego laboratories under Jewett's Division C of NDRC. The Navy research continued after the war, assisted by the Committee on Undersea Warfare in the Research Council, set up in October ~946 under John T
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From page 503... ...
70 Memorandum, Columbus Iselin, Director, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, for Richards and Bronk, September I, ~ 948 (NAS Archives: ORG: NAS: Com on Oceanography) ; NAS, Annual Report for 1948~9, pp.
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From page 504... ...
Secretary of State and the Secretary General of the International Council of Scientific Unions (~csu) .72 When the Convention on the Continental Shelf was adopted by the United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea in ~958, the assembly requested its national members to ask their governments, when ratifying the Convention, to signify that in doing so they granted general permission to any scientific research vessel to conduct investigations of the bottom and subsoil of the continental shelf, provided the program had been specifically approved by ~csu and the results of the investigations would be published openly.7S The growing importance of the ocean depths in research and military operations led the Academy's Committee on Undersea Warfare to propose a joint symposium with the Office of Naval Research on the potential of new developments for exploring and measuring the properties of these "vast uncharted and relatively inaccessible regions." At the conference, held early in ~956, it was agreed that the time had come for a national program of deep-sea research; and, to that end, intensive development of air, surface, and submarine vehicles should be promoted.74 Subsequent to the conference, in the late summer of ~956, the Office of Naval Research, the Fish and Wildlife Service of the Department of the Interior, and the Atomic Energy Commission re72 MS Annual Report for 1954-55 [p.
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From page 505... ...
39 et seq. The original members of the committee were Maurice Ewing, Director of Columbia's Lamont Geological Observatory; Columbus Iselin, senior physical oceanographer, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution; Fritz Koczy, geochemist at the Institute of Marine Science, University of Miami; Sumner Pike, former commissioner, AEC; Roger Revelle, Director, Scripps Institution of Oceanography; Gordon A
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From page 506... ...
The operation of the committee led to an innovation in Academygovernment relations. The report had an unquestioned impact, owing to the successful efforts of the committee chairman to gain the interest of congressmen and of the Science Adviser to the President, George Kistiakowsky, who saw in its comprehensive plan an opportunity to coordinate the research programs of a number of federal agencies with oceanographic interests.
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From page 507... ...
Cannon, Harvard physiologist and wartime Chairman of the Research Council Division of Foreign Relations, and Princeton geologist Richard M Field, urged an end to the long period of scientific isolation and disruption of the work of the international scientific unions.
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From page 508... ...
Conant, and Alexander Wetmore.84 UNESCO itself held the first session of its General Conference in Paris, November ~9 to December lo, 1946. UNESCO, which had no powers like those of the United Nations' Security Council, had been created, as its preamble stated, "for the purpose of advancing, through the educational and scientific and cultural relations of the peoples of the world, the objectives of international peace and of the common welfare of mankind for which the United Nations Organization was established."85 It was to be a world center for the exchange of ideas and mingling of cultures and for the promotion of scientific research that could be most advantageously undertaken on an international basis, as in meteorology, oceanography, education, epidemic disease, and other international health problems.86 82 For the decision to include the "s" in UNESCO, see Nature 156:553-561 (November lo, ~945)
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From page 509... ...
Until World War II, we had never consciously defined our objectives or organized our resources tional Council of Scientific Unions (~csu) and to recognize that association of scientific organizations as its coordinating and representative body ["Statement of December ~9, ~949..." by the NRC Committee on International Scientific Unions," reproduced in International Science Policy Survey Group, Science ~ Foreign Relations (Washington: Department of State Publication 3860, May Ago)
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From page 510... ...
The policy emerged two years later in President Truman's inaugural speech in January 1949. To support the United Nations' programs for world economic recovery and strengthen friendly nations against the dangers of aggression, he called for a four-po~nt program of assistance by this country, Point IV of which declared that through the United Nations We must embark on a bold new program for making the benefits of our scientific advances and industrial progress available for the improvement and growth of underdeveloped areas.90 The Point IV program became the responsibility of the State Department; and, after consultation and deliberation, Bok, as head of the Research Council Committee on UNESCO, on June ~ 2, ~ 949, requested the Research Council Chairman, Detlev Bronk, to suggest the appointment of a full-time special adviser in science to the State Department and the assignment to our embassies abroad of foreign officers with training in some branch of sciences On October 4, ~949, the State Department appointed Academy member Lloyd V
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From page 511... ...
national security program and the earlier Marshall Plan for economic recovery abroad. The Military Assistance Program was awaiting congressional action when the State Department requested Berkner to review its role in international science.
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From page 512... ...
A few days later, President Richards sent Webb a brief report of the observations of the Adams committee on the desired distribution of the Berkner report and on the implementation of its recommendations.95 The premise of the Berkner report reflected the international tensions of the times: The international science policy of the United States must be directed to the furtherance of understanding and cooperation among the nations of the world, to the promotion of scientific progress and the benefits to be derived therefrom, and to the maintenance of that measure of security of the free peoples of the world required for the continuance of their intellectual, material, and political freedom.96 Further supporting that shield of science, the report recommended establishment of a science office in the State Department under a highly qualified scientist who would maintain liaison between the Department and scientific activities in this country and render scientific and technological advice where appropriate in the formulation of foreign policy. The report urged establishment, with full diplomatic status, of overseas science attaches in the major diplomatic missions abroad, including those in occupied Germany and Japan.
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From page 513... ...
A full-time Executive Secretary for the division, Wallace W Atwood, Jr., former Professor of Physiography at Clark University and then with the Research and Development Board, was brought in to maintain continuing relations with the State Department, with the national academies and research councils abroad, the international scientific unions, and scientific representatives of other countries here in the United States.
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From page 514... ...
It was the unique capability, stated four decades earlier in the order creating the National Research Council: To survey the larger possibilities of science, to formulate comprehensive projects of research, and to develop effective means of utilizing the scientific and technical resources of the country for dealing with these projects.~°3 99 Science ~ Foreign Relations, pp. ~ OC~ ~ O I; NAS, Annual Report for 1950-51, pp.
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From page 515... ...
At a meeting of the Council of the Academy with the Committee on Nominations two weeks after giving notice of his resignation, President Richards called attention to a two-page list recently prepared in his office on the duties of the President. To it Richards had added one more, to have future consequences, that "he should assume the privilege of initiating discussions with those in public office on matters of science which affect the public welfare." The list had been compiled in response to a proposal on December e8, ~949, from Council member Joel H
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From page 516... ...
He had become Chairman of the National Defense Research Committee when it was reorganized in the Office of Scientific Research and Development under Vannevar Bush in ~94~. With Bush and Karl Compton, Conant had been a key figure in coordinating the development of the atomic bomb and establishing the Manhattan Project.
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