Behind The Fence

Secret History - What was being built and the secrecy required

Clinton Engineering Works (C.E.W.) was separated into several different communities.  It wasn’t until after the war when the buses started going through the gates that people realized C.E.W. was more than just their particular housing area, shopping center, and war-time facility. 

The division and segregation of each community was vital to the secrecy the military was enforcing in the city.  The less the residents knew, the better.  They had no way of knowing that there were four facilities being built.  They had no way of knowing there was more than one town site, more than one movie theater, more than one school. 

Happy Valley was the town located next to the K-25 Gaseous Diffusion Plant.  This was more of a camp site than an actual town.  The campsite was made up hutments, trailers, dormitories, and barracks.  A few farm houses remained on the land and were used by higher level officials. ( Download Lost City Story)

While Happy Valley was situated near the K-25 site, Town Site was filled with workers who were busy building the Y-12 and X-10 plants.  They had no way of knowing there was another Manhattan Project facility being built in the next valley.

Each plant had a secret code name, designed specifically to mean absolutely nothing.  This was intentionally done so outsiders who might get inside the gates wouldn’t know what was going on at each plant.  The only plant name that had a tell-tell sign was the K-25 plant.  The 25 was taken from the Uranium 235 that was being produced in the plant, and the K stood for Kellex, the subsidiary of M.W. Kellogg Corporation that was engineering and constructing the building.  By the time General Groves arrived in Oak Ridge and found out about this, he thought that changing the name would attract too much attention, so he left it as it was.

General Leslie Groves had requested compartmentalization in all matters related to the Manhattan Project because he wanted to limit any knowledge of the project held by any individual so that person would not betray it to an enemy.

Continue: Behind The Fence – Stealing Secrets

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