In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

SAIS Review 23.1 (2003) 332-334



[Access article in PDF]
Tuxedo Park, by Jennet Conant. (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2002). 352 pp. $26.

Science and government have had a historically uneasy relationship in the United States. The government has designed effective science policies most often on matters related to national defense, when immediate threats provoked rapid innovation. The two most famous such cases occurred during World War II: the development of radar and atomic weapons to repulse the Nazi onslaught in Europe. But can government alone, even when compelled by extreme circumstances, ever drive innovation successfully? Jennet Conant's account of Tuxedo Park's brief and successful history answers no. The collection of top scientists at Tuxedo Park charged with developing ground and air-based radar defenses and given the resources to do so, came together as the result of many individual efforts. Government management alone would not have been enough.

Tuxedo Park, by Jennet Conant, centers on the decisive involvement of Alfred Lee Loomis, a Wall Street millionaire and scientific genius whose curiosity and cash may amount to the greatest contributions to the "Big Science" that helped win the war. Tuxedo Park was Loomis's Xanadu. He had won big on Wall Street and rewarded himself by retiring to his estate for a life pursuing advances in scientific research, a subject about which he knew much. Though not wholly selfless, nor (from Conant's depiction) necessarily personable, Loomis set his sights on rewarding the scientific community and when war came, he put science to work for the nation. Tuxedo Park was open to all cutting-edge scientists—guests ranged from J. Robert Oppenheimer to Albert Einstein—and Loomis's resources, will, and talent crafted it into a factory for scientific innovation.

Much of the action in the book, however, takes place outside the gates of Tuxedo Park. The cast of principals includes Vannevar Bush, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's wartime science advisor, who is still renowned as the father of the National Science Foundation, and Harvard President James B. Conant (Jennet Conant's grandfather). Jennet Conant describes [End Page 332] the science behind the development of radar and the intra-governmental maneuvering required to put the new technology to use. But the names of the scientists and public servants involved in this effort are familiar only to students of scientific history. And there lies one of the author's lessons: these scientific war heroes made an invaluable contribution to their country without becoming household names. Loomis, specifically, embodied a unique combination of personal wealth, and administrative and scientific talent; without him it may not have been possible to develop radar defenses in time for use in the war. Does the low profile of these scientific war heroes indicate that government ignores the potential for science policy to serve the public interest unless there is a major crisis?

Conant is not the first to single out Loomis and Bush for credit for navigating bureaucratic pitfalls, particularly when confronting a military establishment that remains, by nature, resistant to change. Loomis's private stash of capital, and the even deeper pockets in his Wall Street Rolodex, insured that the complicated, slow-moving government allocation process did not hinder progress at Tuxedo Park. Current stores of private capital, much of it foundation funding, continue to offer a route around government impasses. This is one of the book's messages that resonates most loudly today. Thus, two rarities made the "Big Science" solution to the radar question (and subsequently the atomic weapons question) possible. The first was the unanimous recognition of an overwhelming security threat. The second was the fact that a small group of individuals possessed the means to confront that threat, including financial resources, scientific knowledge, political connections, and the insight to exploit them.

Subsequent struggles to perpetuate effective collaboration between government and the scientific community in peacetime reinforce the need for both individual leadership and a pressing challenge to focus the national research agenda. Without these two elements, conflicting priorities make a cohesive national research program unsustainable. Is there hope for such a confluence in our time? No one wishes on...

pdf

Share