SANDIA HISTORY/ARCHIVES PROGRAM NEWSLETTER

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NEWS FROM THE CORPORATE ARCHIVES Photo Albums and Scrapbooks The Corporate Archives has many interesting photo albums and scrapbooks compiled by Sandians over the years. These materials give us a snapshot in time of specific events or topics. For example, a photo album of construction at Tonopah Test Range in 1956 provides a detailed and centralized record of how the first facilities were constructed there. It includes photographs of a contraves tower and metro and balloon buildings. Someone took great care in selecting, sequentially placing, and describing the photographs included in this small album. Another photo album, compiled by Sandia photographer Wayne Gravning in 1977, provides a photographic record of the spectacular 60 mile-per-hour crash tests in which shipping casks for spent nuclear fuel and their truck transports were rammed into concrete walls. Albums may also commemorate special events. The John J. "Mike" Michnovicz Collection has a small notebook with photographs of President John F. Kennedy's visit to Sandia on December 7, 1962. Photographs include preparations for the historic visit, the White House Press Corps, and Kennedy's limousine entering Technical Area I with Sandians observing along the route. Similarly, a photo album compiled by John Leslie, section supervisor of Community Relations, commemorated the Sphere of Science shortly after it was installed in 1959 as Sandia's exhibit center. The semi-permanent structure was placed north of Technical Area I to display piezoelectric devices, electromagnetic equipment, aerodynamics, optics, mathematics, physics, radiation, environmental testing, and manufacturing control. In 1980, the dome was converted to a Visitors Center, and in the 1990s was used for employee health programs. In 2002, the Department of Energy determined the dome to be eligible for the National Register of Historic Places because of its role in Sandia's early community outreach efforts. Sandia will fully document the building's historical attributes. Corporate Historian Rebecca Ullrich was able to use a copy of the album in the documentation that will be provided to the New Mexico State Historic Preservation Office. Other photo albums serve as examples of work or programs. Fred Leckman, Division Supervisor of the Personnel Administrative Service Division compiled a scrapbook of Sandia employment advertisements that appeared throughout the 1960s in many technical publications-including Scientific American and Physics Today. Readership surveys were conducted to determine the value of the advertisements in certain publications. Today, the scrapbook documents how Sandia recruited its employees in the 1960s. Similarly, in 1967, Sandia's Public Relations Department announced Donald Wilkes' new rolamite invention. Although rolamite was originally invented as an inertial switch for weapons safing it was thought that the invention would have many industrial applications. Sandia publicized the invention and within a week of its announcement in 1967, photographs of Don Wilkes and his invention had appeared in newspapers across the country. The Public Relations Department collected the articles from a variety of publications—Newsweek, The Chicago Sun Times, Los Angeles Herald, and Mechanical Engineering—and these serve as a record of this highly publicized invention. Sandia staff assigned to the Nevada Test Site in the 1970s compiled a large scrapbook. The scrapbook includes some news clippings and photographs of Sandians at work and play. The pages show employees at the work site and after hours-revealing their camaraderie and providing a record of their way of life.

1960s recruiting ads emphasized specific technical achievements and opportunities at Sandia. This ad was aimed at recent and about-to-be grads. Note that Sandia was recruiting under the Bell System umbrella.

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	Rebecca Ullrich, Corporate Historian, 844-1483
	Jean Ann Plummer, Web Page Maintenance, 284-3536
	Last modified: December 16, 2002