This year marks 75 years since the United States dropped atomic bombs on Japanese cities Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II. The Manhattan Project, which resulted in development of the first nuclear weapons, is the subject of the recent blockbuster motion picture Oppenheimer.
Ira B. Whitney, a member of the Manhattan Project team, moved to Eureka Spring after the war and opened Whitney’s Gems, offering watch repair, gems, jewelry and other items.
Charlisa Cato recalls the shop was located on Spring Street in the same location that today houses a pawn/jewelry shop.
“Ira had been living here for some time when I met him in the fall of 1971,” Cato said. “He was a tall and lanky man with a wry sense of humor. He retired from the world of nuclear physics and moved to Eureka and opened a lapidary. He said he enjoyed the detailed work of cutting gems, watch repair and setting stones. Ira and his wife lived upstairs from the shop.”
Cato recalled Whitney suffered greatly from radiation poisoning, and it caused his death.
“He spoke a good bit about the lack of knowledge and precautions taken around radioactive substances when nuclear weapons were first being developed,” Cato said. “He was often frustrated at the lack of precautions and insisted his team be protected. He wrote the first book on safety standards regarding the handling of these materials. My partner Woody Kane remembers Ira was the leader of his team.”
Ira and Woody developed a close friendship and spent hours talking “shop”–physics. Cato said the subject matter was way over her head, but she listened in anyway.
“Woody and I lived in the Handmakers, a retail shop just down the street,” she said. “We did not have a shower so Woody traded that luxury for helping Ira solder and work on detailed projects that took a steady hand as Ira’s hands were too shaky for some things. Once a month Ira was visited by someone with the government for a chat. So much of what he knew was classified, and he could never speak of it.”
One of Cato’s favorite memories of Whitney is him fixing spaghetti with a secret ingredient that guests had to guess. (It was cinnamon).
Lucilla Garrett recalls Whitney being very knowledgeable about semi-precious stones and particularly sought out by tourists interested in crystals, amethyst and other gems.
“He was extraordinarily kind and helpful,” Garrett said. “He was willing to inform you about gems or other things. I never asked him about his time in Tennessee at Oak Ridge, but I do know he was part of the Manhattan Project. He came here with his wife, Frances. They lived upstairs in the space where Debbie Clark has run the Pink Flamingo. I did not ask him about the Manhattan Project because I was under the impression that he didn’t talk about that a lot. He was very funny. I know he was a very intelligent man, but also humble and soft spoken. He did not have a big ego. He didn’t wear it on his sleeve. He wasn’t going to try to impress you with his knowledge, which made him a very approachable person. He was a quite likeable man without being demonstrative. His skill was very popular with tourists and locals alike.”
Garrett said Whitney was quite a staple presence on the street. He was around most of the time.
“You could always say ‘hello’ when you walked by,” Garrett said. “He is really an important part of Eureka history. And, once again in a sense he is in the news because of Oppenheimer.”
According to the Atomic Heritage Foundation, Whitney was a veteran of the Manhattan Project who worked for Clinton Laboratories with the X-10 graphite reactor at Oak Ridge, Tenn. At the time he moved to Eureka Springs, resident Marge Lyons was writing a column about Eureka Springs and the Ozarks for the Chicago Tribune. Lyons is credited with a number of people, including the Whitneys, moving from Chicago to Eureka Springs.