How History Unfolds on Paper: Important Americana from the Eric C. Caren Collection, Part X

Washington, D.C.: United States Atomic Energy Commission, April 2, 1948-April 7, 1952. Comprising approximately 37 mimeographed press releases and reports issued by the Atomic Energy Commission. In blue cloth ring binder; some reports stapled at top corner; scattered wear; "Mr. Fiedler" in pencil in top corner of a report at rear.

The Atomic Energy Commission was created in 1946 following the end of World War II to manage the development, use, and control of atomic, or nuclear, energy for military and civilian purposes. Signed into law by President Harry Truman, it transferred control of nuclear energy from military to civilian hands. Following increasing criticism regarding its regulations, it was abolished in 1974, and its operations were subsumed with the creation of the Department of Energy by President Jimmy Carter in 1976.

The present collection contains reports from the critical years immediately following the agency's creation, including those by Lewis L. Strauss, W.W. Waymack, David E. Lilienthal, Robert F. Bacher, Lawrence R. Hafstad, among others. Topics covered include those on the nature of atomic energy, on uranium supplies, the Colorado plateau program, the creation of nuclear reactors, plutonium production, foreign distribution of radioisotopes, reports from Congressional committees, minutes of press conferences, a statement on the arrest of German-born British scientist Klaus Fuchs for passing top-secret information about the atomic bomb to the Soviet Union, the application of atomic energy, the discovery of element 98 Californium, the revisal of security clearance procedures, the creation of production plants, weapons tests in Nevada, the creation of nuclear submarines, etc. One report mentions J. Robert Oppenheimer by name.

Lot includes an issue of Prevent World War III (New York: Society for the Prevention of World War III, Inc., Summer 1965, No. 66).