page_title: Clinton Engineer Works
section_title: Township
hierarchical_section_title: Clinton Engineer Works / Township
caption_attribution_description: Housing at Oak Ridge For more information or additional images, please contact 202-586-5251.
context_page_description: The Clinton Engineer Works was the production installation of the Manhattan Project that during World War II produced the enriched uranium used in the 1945 bombing of Hiroshima, as well as the first examples of reactor-produced plutonium. It consisted of production facilities arranged at three major sites, various utilities including a power plant, and the town of Oak Ridge. It was in East Tennessee, about 18 miles west of Knoxville, and was named after the town of Clinton, eight miles to the north. The production facilities were mainly in Roane County, and the northern part of the site was in Anderson County. The Manhattan District Engineer, Kenneth Nichols, moved the Manhattan District headquarters from Manhattan to Oak Ridge in August 1943. During the war, Clinton's advanced research was managed for the government by the University of Chicago.
  Construction workers were housed in a community known as Happy Valley. Built by the Army Corps of Engineers in 1943, this temporary community housed 15,000 people. The township of Oak Ridge was established to house the production staff. The operating force peaked at 50,000 workers just after the end of the war.
context_section_description: Planning for a "Government village" to house the workers at the Clinton Engineer Works began in June 1942. Because the site was remote, it was believed more convenient and secure for the workers to live on the site. The gentle slopes of Black Oak Ridge, from which the new town of Oak Ridge got its name, were selected as a suitable location. Brigadier General Lucius D. Clay, the deputy chief of staff of the Army Services of Supply, reminded Marshall of a wartime limit of $7,500 per capita for individual quarters. Groves argued for "economy" with small and simple houses; but Marshall, who had argued for an exemption from the limit, saw no prospect that the kind of workers they needed would be willing to live with their family in substandard accommodation (and du Pont at HEW agreed). The houses at CEW and HEW were basic but of a higher standard (as specified by Marshall and Nichols) than the houses at Los Alamos (as specified by Groves; and the quality of housing there suffered).
  The first plan, submitted by Stone & Webster on 26 October 1942, was for a residential community of 13,000 people. As Stone & Webster began work on the production facilities, it became clear that building the township as well would be beyond its capacity. The Army therefore engaged the architectural and engineering firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill to design and build the township. The John B. Pierce Foundation were brought in as a consultant. In turn, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill brought in numerous subcontractors. This first phase of construction became known as the East Town. It included some 3,000 family dwellings, an administrative center, three shopping centers, three grade schools for 500 children each and a high school for 500, recreation buildings, men's and women's dormitories, cafeterias, a medical services building and a 50-bed hospital. The emphasis was on speed of construction and getting around wartime shortages of materials. Where possible, fiberboard and gypsum board were used instead of wood, and foundations were made from concrete blocks rather than poured concrete. The work was completed in early 1944.
  In addition to the East Town, a self-contained community known as the East Village, with 50 family units, its own church, dormitories and a cafeteria, was built near the Elza gate. This was intended as a segregated community for Black people, but by the time it was completed, it was required by white people. Black people were instead housed in "hutments" (one-room shacks) in segregated areas, some in "family hutments" created by joining two regular hutments together.
  The Army presence at Oak Ridge increased in August 1943 when Nichols replaced Marshall as head of the Manhattan Engineer District. One of his first tasks was to move the district headquarters to Oak Ridge, although the name of the district did not change. In September 1943 the administration of community facilities was outsourced to Turner Construction Company through a subsidiary, the Roane-Anderson Company. The company was paid a fee of $25,000 per month on a cost-plus contract, about 1 percent of the $2.8 million monthly cost of running the town facilities. Roane-Anderson did not take over everything at once, and a phased takeover started with Laundry No. 1 on 17 October 1943; transportation and garbage collection soon followed. It assumed responsibility for water and sewage in November, and electricity in January 1944. The number of Roane-Anderson workers peaked at around 10,500 in February 1945, including concessionaires and subcontractors. Thereafter, numbers declined to 2,905 direct employees and 3,663 concessionaires and subcontractors when the Manhattan Project ended on 31 December 1946.
  By mid-1943, it had become clear that the initial estimates of the size of the town had been too low, and a second phase of construction was required. Plans now called for a town of 42,000 people. Work began in the fall of 1943, and continued into the late summer of 1944. Hospitals were expanded, as were the police and fire services, and the telephone system. Only 4,793 of a plan
caption: A hutment at Oak Ridge. Each of these 16-by-16-foot (4.9 by 4.9 m) temporary structures provided accommodation for five workers.
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