National Nuclear Security Administration/Nevada Site Office Photo Library The first hydrogen bomb tested by the United States vaporized the islet of Elugelab in the Marshall Islands in the North Pacific on Nov. 1, 1952. The first hydrogen bomb tested by the United States vaporized the islet of Elugelab in the Marshall Islands in the North Pacific on Nov. 1, 1952.

On Nov. 1, 1952, the United States conducted its first nuclear test of a fusion device, or “hydrogen bomb,” at Eniwetok in the Marshall Islands. News of the event surfaced more than two weeks later, when The New York Times reported : “The Atomic Energy Commission announced tonight ‘satisfactory’ experiments in hydrogen weapon research … In a three-paragraph announcement, the Commission did not go so far as to state that a full-scale hydrogen bomb had been detonated, but it did say ‘experiments contributing’ to hydrogen bomb research had been completed.”



The origins of the hydrogen bomb date to the early 1940s, when the Italian-born physicist Enrico Fermi suggested to the Hungarian-born Edward Teller that a weapon based on nuclear fission was possible. Dr. Teller, a member of the Manhattan Project assigned to build the atomic bomb for the Allies, advocated for a hydrogen “super bomb” instead.

After the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the United States government did not pursue the development of the hydrogen bomb in the years after World War II. But after the Soviets successfully detonated an atomic bomb in 1949, President Harry S. Truman ordered the creation of a hydrogen bomb project.

With the help of the Polish mathematician Stanislaw Ulam, Dr. Teller developed a model for the hydrogen bomb known as the Teller-Ulam design. Scientists constructed a three-story structure, which was named “Mike,” on the island of Elugelab in the Eniwetok atoll. Mike was not a typical bomb, as it had no practical use in warfare; it was simply intended to test the principles of the Teller-Ulam design and help scientists make progress in building a smaller bomb.

The Mike bomb exploded with a yield of 10.4 megatons and generated a fireball more than three miles wide. It destroyed the island of Elugelab and parts of nearby islands. The Teller-Ulam design is the concept behind most of the world’s nuclear weapons today.

Connect to Today:

The Times Topics: Nuclear Weapons overview calls Barack Obama “the first president to make nuclear disarmament a centerpiece of American defense policy” and cites his success in signing the New Start nuclear arms treaty with Russia, as well as his difficulty in getting domestic and international support for a treaty banning all nuclear tests.

Why do you think it has been so challenging to ban nuclear testing and reduce nuclear arms? Do you think President Obama’s pledge to “set a goal of a world without nuclear weapons, and pursue it” is realistic? Why or why not?

Learn more about what happened in history on Nov. 1»

Learn more about Historic Headlines and our collaboration with findingDulcinea »