Glenn
Seaborg, the son of Herman Seaborg
and Selma Erickson, was born in Ishpeming,
Michigan on 19th April, 1912. His family were poor and he had to
work his way through college as a stevedore, fruit-packer and laboratory
assistant.
After graduating from the University of California in 1934, Seaborg
completed his Ph.D. at Berkeley. During the Second
World War Seaborg worked at the University of Chicago's Metallurgical
Laboratory, where he helped to develop plutonium in uranium reactors.
In 1946 Seaborg was appointed as professor of chemistry at the University
of California and five years later was awarded the Nobel prize for
his discovery of plutonium. He continued his research into transuranic
elements and helped identify berkelium (1949), californium (1950),
einsteinium (1952), fermium (1953), mendelevium (1955) and nobelium
(1957).
In 1961 President John Kennedy appointed
Seaborg as chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission. He also held
the post under Lyndon B. Johnson
and Richard Nixon. Seaborg returned to
the University of California in 1971.
(1)
Glenn Seaborg, wrote about his Swedish background in his autobiography,
Life of Glen Seaborg (1982).
Both of my parents were Swedish. My mother, Selma Olivia Erickson,
was born in Grängesberg, in the southern Dalarna region of
Sweden and came to the United States (Ishpeming) in 1904, when she
was seventeen years old. My father, Herman Theodore Seaborg, was
also born in Ishpeming. His parents came to Ishpeming in their youth
and met and were married there.
Ishpeming had typical sections that were nearly all Swedish and
it was in one of these that we lived. Since my father was fluent
in Swedish and this was my mother's native tongue, the Swedish language
was spoken in my home as it was throughout this community. I learned
to speak and understand Swedish before I did English, but I am afraid
that in the intervening years my facility with the language has
declined.
Swedish customs of all kinds prevailed in our home. I remember particularly
well the Swedish food that we enjoyed at our dinner on Julaften,
or Christmas Eve. The fare usually included smörgåsbord,
which featured sil, or pickled herring. One of the mainstays was
lutfisk, which was always served with boiled potatoes and a white
sauce. Another feature always was saffron buns and bread, usually
served hot and made with glacéd fruits. This was part of a
large spread of buns and cakes including gingersnaps made in the
form of goblins, piglets, stars and other patterns. Another component
which was almost always present was the Swedish lingonberries, which
I still like so much. The meal was usually topped off with risgryn,
or rice pudding, which was topped with cinnamon and cream and sugar.
(2) Glenn Seaborg, Life of Glen Seaborg
(1982).
I attended the Ishpeming public schools until I was ten years
old and starting the fifth grade. Then my family, which included
my younger sister Jeanette, moved to Home Gardens, now a part of
South Gate, California (near Los Angeles). This move was made largely
at the urging of my mother, who wanted to extend the horizon for
her children beyond the limit of opportunities available in Ishpeming.
However, unlike in Ishpeming, where he would have had guaranteed
employment for life, my father never found a permanent employment
in his trade in California, and our family found itself in continuing
poor circumstances. Since the new subdivision of Home Gardens had
no schools, my sister and I during the first year traveled by bus
to attend the Wilmington Avenue Grammar School in the Watts district
of Los Angeles. I completed my grammar school education through
the eighth grade in the newly constructed Victoria Avenue Grammar
School in House Gardens, skipping a couple of semesters on the way
to my eighth grade diploma.
My father was a machinist. He had worked for an iron-mining company,
as had his father and grandfather, but it didn't take me long to
realize that I had no aptitude for my father's craft. I think I
was a good student in grammar school, but I had no special scholastic
interests. When I entered David Atarr Jordan High School in the
Watts district, I had to choose between a commercial and a college
preparatory curriculum. My mother urged the commercial course; to
her this was the road to a respectable white-collar job. But I started
down a different road and chose the college preparatory program,
with literature as my major subject.
In my junior year I was required to take a laboratory science. Because
my high school was small, chemistry and physics were offered in
alternate years and chemistry was the offering in my junior year.
It was fortunate for me that my first science course was taught
by Dwight Logan Reid, and outstanding teacher who exerted a strong
formative influence on me. Mr. Reid not only taught chemistry, he
preached it. He related some fascinating experiences he had as a
chemistry student in college, and , when he lectured, his eyes would
light up. His irrepressible enthusiasm, obvious love for the subject
and ability to inspire interest captured my imagination almost immediately.
(3)
Glenn Seaborg, Life of Glen Seaborg (1982).
I entered almost by accident the mainstream of my career as
a nuclear scientist. One day in 1936 I was suddenly confronted by
Jack Livingood, a physicist who was favored by ready access to the
twenty-seven-inch cyclotron. He literally handed me a "hot"
target, just bombarded by the machine, and asked me to process it
chemically to identify the radioisotopes that had been produced.
Naturally I jumped at the chance. The facility he offered in Le
Conte Hall was hardly luxurious. The resources consisted of tap
water, a sink, a fume hood and a small workbench. With some essential
materials bootlegged from the Department of Chemistry, I performed
the chemical separation to Jack's satisfaction. In the course of
my collaboration with Livingood, covering a period of five years,
we discovered a number of radioisotopes which proved useful for
biological explorations and medical applications. Among the isotopes
that we discovered were iodine-131 and iron-59 and among the useful
isotopes that we characterized was cobalt-60. In addition, during
this period, Emilio Segre and I discovered technetium-99m, which
eventually became the most used isotope for diagnosis in medical
applications.
(4)
Glenn Seaborg, Life of Glen Seaborg (1982).
I am particularly proud of the role that I was privileged to
play under President Kennedy in connection with the attainment of
the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, which prohibits signatory countries
from testing nuclear weapons in the atmosphere, in outer space or
underwater. I was a member of Secretary of State Rusk's delegation
to Moscow in August 1963, for the signing of this treaty. Just last
year (December, 1981) my book Kennedy, Khrushchev and the Test Ban
was published. This was based on the journal that I kept while I
was Chairman of the AEC. It is my hope that this book will help
toward the attainment of a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty that will
ban all nuclear weapons tests. And I was privileged to collaborate
with President Johnson in reducing the level of production of fissionable
material for our nuclear weapons production program as part of a
concentrated move toward arms limitation in this important field.
Under the leadership of President Johnson and President Nixon, the
Atomic Energy Commission played a significant role in the attainment
of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). We took a stronger and more
aggressive stand in the need for peaceful uses are subject to appropriate
inspections and controls to insure that they are not diverted to
weapons purposes.
(5)
Glenn Seaborg, Kennedy, Krushchev and the Test Ban (1981)
The telephone call that changed my life came on the afternoon
of January 9, 1961. The call was from President elect John F Kennedy.
He asked me to accept the job of chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission
within a few days I was plunged into a new kind of chemistry, that
of national and international events.
Now five American presidents and one Soviet Party Chairman later,
there is again an opportunity in the sense that the negotiating
positions of the two sides on a comprehensive test ban treaty seem
quite close together. What stands in the way as a huge obstacle
is a mountain of mistrust and political ill will. The fund of confidence
has been sorely depleted. If this should change- and the world has
seen many starting political reversals in recent years- and agreement
banning all nuclear tests can follow.
Such an agreement today might well not have the saving power- in
ensuring stability in the arms race, in moderating its costs, and
in preventing proliferation of nuclear weapons - which a similar
agreement would have had in the 1960s. As Averell Harriman pointed
out, we are negotiating at a higher and more dangerous level. If
we allow the present opportunity to slip away, however, the next
one, if there is a next one, will be at a level still higher and
still more dangerous. The hour is late. Let us hope not too late.
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