Notes • July 16, 2025by johnataylor on TwosNot a Fun Fact—However, an important one: On July 16, 1945, an test codenamed "Trinity" was conducted by the U.S. Army. Trinity, the first detonation of a nuclear weapon, was conducted as part of the Manhattan Project under the leadership of J. Robert Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer picked the codename inspired by the work of poet John Donne. As Oppenheimer notes: “Why I chose the name is not clear, but I know what thoughts were in my mind. There is a poem of John Donne, written just before his death, which I know and love. From it a quotation: ‘As West and East / In all flatt Maps – and I am one – are one, / So death doth touch the Resurrection.’" The test was conducted using the same design as the Fat Man bomb in order to determine it's viability. Later, on August 9, 1945, the Fat Man bomb was detonated over Nagasaki, Japan. Prominent observers of the test included Kenneth Brainbridge, responsible for the planning and coordination of the test, as well as Vannevar Bush, James Chadwick, James B. Conant, Thomas Farrell, Enrico Fermi, Hans Bethe, Richard Feynman, Isidor Isaac Rabi, Leslie Groves, Frank Oppenheimer, Geoffrey Taylor, Richard Tolman, Edward Teller, and John von Neumann. Only one female, Mary Argo, was officially invited to watch the test, but nuclear physicist Joan Hinton snuck into the area to observe the test for herself. Later, Hinton, was shocked when the U.S. government, three weeks later, dropped nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Soon after, she left the United States to live and work in China, supporting socialism and the Cultural Revolution of Chairman Mao Zedong. After witnessing the explosion, Oppenheimer famously reflected on a quote from the Bhagavad Gita, 'Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." Unfortunately, the Nuclear Age was born, granting humanity the power of unleashing a weapon capable of unprecedented destruction.