25 July 2023
WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — Oppenheimer, the anticipated Christopher Nolan biopic of the “Father of Nuclear Weapons,” came in #2 at the box office, taking in $80.5 million.
Barbie was the big winner, bringing in $155 million.
Nolan’s biopic tells the story of the life of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the physicist responsible for helping develop the first atomic weapon. Though his work is responsible for its creation, it took a team of scientists to make the first atomic weapons test a reality. One of those scientists is a Kansan, who played a crucial role during his time working on the Manhattan Project.
Dr. Lewis Worth Seagondollar was born in Hoisington in 1920, according to nuclearmuseum.org. He attended Emporia State Teaching College, which later became Emporia Unversity. There he obtained an AB in Physics. He went on to receive his master’s from the University of Wisconsin.
Seagondollar joined the Manhattan Project in 1944. His team was tasked with determining the critical mass of plutonium which is the amount of plutonium required for an atomic bomb. He also witnessed the first atomic bomb test at Alamogordo.
After the Manhattan Project, Seagondollar returned to Kansas, teaching Physics at the University of Kansas in Lawrence. While there, he also helped build the first Van de Graaff accelerator, a type of particle accelerator that is used in low-energy nuclear physics research.
He would go on to head the Physics Department of North Carolina State University until his retirement. His obituary in Physics Today says he remained active after retirement making numerous speaking engagements.
Seagondollar died September 20, 2013, at his home in Raliegh, North Carolina.