Clarence Larson

Clarence Larson
Born	(1909-09-20)September 20, 1909 Cloquet, Minnesota, U.S.
Died	February 15, 1999(1999-02-15) (aged 89) Bethesda, Maryland
Nationality	American
Fields	Chemistry, nuclear physics
Known for	Director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory 1950-1955 Executive of Union Carbide 1955-1969 Commissioner of United States Atomic Energy Commission 1969-1974

Clarence Edward Larson (September 20, 1909 – February 15, 1999) was an American chemist, nuclear physicist and industrial leader. He was involved in the Manhattan Project, and was later director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory and commissioner of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission.

Larson was born in Cloquet, Minnesota, in 1909. As a teenager he was involved in church groups and the local YMCA, and occasionally acted as a substitute minister at nearby parishes. In his primary education, Larson was selected for a class that combined both seventh and eighth grades which meant he entered high school a year younger than his peers. In high school he created his own telegraph network between his neighbors' houses by collecting discarded parts from the Bell telephone company. He had not intended to attend university as very few high school graduates in his home town did so.

Larson studied chemistry and chemical engineering at the University of Minnesota, graduating in 1932, and obtained a Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley, studying blood clotting. Larson designed a glass electrode in order to measure the acidity of flowing solutions, while at UC, Berkeley.

His later work focused on isotopes produced by a cyclotron, invented by his future colleague, Ernest Lawrence. His study of the behavior of ions in electric fields gave him a good understanding of electrochemistry, which he would later come to use in the Manhattan Project. From 1939 to 1942 Larson chaired the Chemistry Department at the College of the Pacific, where he continued his cyclotron research, which led to his recruitment into the Manhattan Project.

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