THE DAYTON PROJECT, 1945 and Beyond

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While the Dayton Project focused intensely in its early months on filling polonium production quotas, by 1945 planners began looking towards future production on a more permanent basis. The co-opted Runnymeade Playhouse, located in a residential sector and only temporarily leased by the government, was not an ideal, lasting solution, nor did its space prove sufficient. In July 1945, the Charles Shook Construction Company began construction on five structures on land leased from the Board of Education for offices, a cafeteria, a physics laboratory, laundry facilities, and machine tooling space. A space for storage of classified materials was built nearby as well. Portable aluminum buildings were shipped in from Oak Ridge, and Monsanto leased further warehouse space from General Electric Supply Corporation.

During the war, the polonium produced at Dayton was shipped to Los Alamos, where it was used to build the initiators needed for the first nuclear weapons. With the war over and production methods having been established, the decision was made to consolidate polonium and initiator production to a central location, possibly near Dayton. A new 40'x100' building built around Runnymeade Playhouse in December 1945 housed "urchin" production throughout the search for a permanent facility.

For security reasons, planners decided early on to build the facility underground. Initially, planners explored building by Clinton Engineer Works in Oak Ridge, Tennessee and transferring the Dayton 'know-how' to Tennessee. Few Dayton employees were willing to move, and this along with other problems resulted in a search for a site near Dayton. In September 1946, construction began on 160 acres near Miamisburg, Ohio, just southwest of Dayton. The new plant was designed to withstand a 2000 lb., jet-assisted, armor-piercing bomb, as well as biological and chemical attacks.

This Miamisburg facility, later known as Mound Laboratories for a nearby Indian burial ground, became an important Atomic Energy Commission and Department of Energy (DoE) facility. In the 1950s, it produced additional non-nuclear components of nuclear weapons, including cable assemblies, explosive detonators, and electronic firing sets. It further became a center of integrated research, development, and production for various DoE programs including fossil fuels research and production of generators to provide power for space exploration. Mound Laboratories shut down in 2003, and the DoE and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) began work on cleanup of the decommissioned site.

Sources and notes for this page

The text for this page is original to the Department of Energy's Office of History and Heritage Resources. Portions were adapted or taken directly from Manhattan District History, Book VIII, Los Alamos Project (Y) - Vol. 3, Auxiliary Activities, Ch. 4, Dayton Project; Lillian Hoddeson, et al, Critical Assembly: A Technical History of Los Alamos during the Oppenheimer Years, 1943-1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 123-125, 254; Jim DeBrosse, "The Dayton Project" at the Atomic Heritage Foundation website. For information on Mound Laboratories, see US Department of Energy documentation on the site.