Description
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewThe American Lab is highly recommended reading not just for science collections; but for anyone who would better understand the intersection of and connections between political, scientific, educational, and military communities.
—
Donovan's Literary ServicesUp to now, the growing lexicon of scholarship on the U.S. national laboratories has lacked work on the history of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, aside from one dissertation and a classified document. This book by a former laboratory director, which covers the defense laboratory's history from its beginnings to 2008, provides the first comprehensive, easily accessible account . . . Given the enormous national investment in this complex, the work and devices it produces, and its impact on research and development, Tarter's book offers crucial, previously missing information.
—Catherine Westfall, Michigan State University,
IsisToday we know Silicon Valley as a veritable field of dreams for startups, but in
The American Lab, the former director of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, C. Bruce Tarter, recounts how a culture that valued debate, questioning, and passion made Livermore not only the first successful startup in the San Francisco Bay Area but a uniquely American lab.
—Sarah Wells,
MIT Technology ReviewTable of ContentsPreface
Acknowledgments
Part I. Making the Cold War Cold, 1952-1971
Chapter 1. Origins
Chapter 2. Getting Started
Chapter 3. The Foundation of Deterrence
Chapter 4. Arms Control, Atoms for Peace, and the Test Ban
Chapter 5. Organization and Evolution of the Laboratory
Chapter 6. Development of the Stockpile
Chapter 7. Nuclear Excursions
Chapter 8. Transition
Part II. Lasers, Lasers, Nothing but Lasers, 1971-1988
Chapter 9. Changing of the Guard
Chapter 10. The Nuclear Weapons Program
Chapter 11. Lasers
Chapter 12. The Energy Crisis and New Programs
Chapter 13. Evolution of the Broader Lab
Chapter 14. Star Wars
Chapter 15. End of the Era Part III. Renaissance, Repression, and Reorganization, 1988-2008
Chapter 16. End of the Cold War
Chapter 17. Post-Cold War Changes
Chapter 18. Early Days with the New Administration
Chapter 19. Stockpile Stewardship and the Presidential Decision
Chapter 20. Growth of the Lab
Chapter 21. The Troubles and Their Weathering
Chapter 22. Summing Up
Chapter 23. Transitional Years
Epilogue
Acronyms and Abbreviations
Bibliography
Index
