Ceramic Mug 15oz (Manhattan Project)

Thousands of African American men and women contributed to the Manhattan Project, which was the U.S. government’s top-secret program to build an atomic bomb during World War II. They played a crucial role in the workforce, especially at the Hanford and Oak Ridge sites1. More than 15,000 African Americans arrived in the Tri-Cities during the Manhattan Project1. Approximately 7,000 African Americans worked in Oak Ridge for the Manhattan Project1.

While many African Americans were construction workers, laborers, janitors, or domestic workers, a limited number of African American men and women worked as scientists and technicians at smaller Manhattan Project sites in New York and Chicago. According to the Atomic Heritage Foundation, at least 12 Black chemists and physicists participated in primary research at the Metallurgical lab.

Despite the hardships and discrimination, they faced, these workers, technicians, and scientists were integral to the project. Their contributions, from the plants of Hanford and Oak Ridge to the laboratories of Chicago and Columbia, helped bring World War II to an end. However, many of their stories remain untold.