Sunday, September 24, 2006

A Monkey Was The Real Brains Behind The Atom Bomb!

It is commonly believed that there were 10 principal scientists who were responsible for developing the Atom Bomb. What few people know is that there was an 11th . . .









Zippy The Chimp

Zippy was originally sent to Los Alamos as a security consultant, because his activities in Africa (dropping coconuts onto the heads of Marxist-Leninist guerrillas) had demonstrated his usefulness in battling "The Red Menace".

Many A-Bomb scientists had been exposed to Communism during their college years. Zippy's lack of higher education insulated him from these leftist influences.

After watching Zippy open coconuts (by banging them together) Leo Szilard was able to formulate his seminal Implosion Theory which was the heart of the "Fat Man" A-Bomb design.

After that, Zippy quickly became a integral part of the Manhattan Project team. Leo Szilard, Robert Oppenheimer and Nils Bohr relied heavily on Zippy to refine the designs of bomb components. Although Zippy's test methods were unorthodox, his work consistently resulted in improved performance. A recently declassified document reveals that Zippy's "Samsonite Test" was perhaps the most important contribution to A-Bomb develoment.

After the war, Zippy was troubled by the ethical implications of his work. He returned to Africa and opened up The Jungle Peace Center, whose mission statement was "To provide an open forum for predators and prey to discuss their differences in a neutral and supportive environment". Unfortnately, 6 months later, he was eaten by a lion while hosting a seminar on conflict resolution.

It is time for the world to know the profound influence this savvy simian had on the history of western civilization. His last words "Can't we all just get along?" would be echoed by later generations.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

A most interesting piece of journalism! Monkey Bob excels in his ability to discover little known gems of history. His prose style is unsurpassed! Reading a Monkey Bob story always leaves me hungry for more. I hope that Monkey Bob gets the recognition and praise that he so richly deserves!

- Monkey Bob

jon said...

Thanks for reading and enjoying the book! Glad it got you blogging!

Monkey Bob said...

Jon's comments (listed above) were from Jonathan Yang, who wrote a book called The Rough Guide to Blogging. As a newbie blogger, I found it to be an excellent resource for learning the basics of blogging. He broke up the information into "bite sized pieces" and used a combination of fonts and color that made it an easy read. I highly recommend this book. I bought it at Borders. The publisher is www.roughguides.com.