One of the major industries in the town was tourism based on its wartime history. I got a chance to talk to a few of the old timers, and I talked to a lot of other people who had talked to the old timers.

The general agreement was that everybody knew they were working on top secret war work, but no one knew just what it was. There were several cover stories being circulated (one involved disease-carrying mosquitoes) but no one really believed them. Still, when the truth finally came out, it pretty much took everybody by surprise.

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During the war, my mother worked for the postal censorship office, reading other peoples' mail. Most of the things she looked for and redacted were reports of troop movements and postings of servicemen. A harmless message from a GI saying he was assigned to a certain base or given a certain type of training could alert a spy the military was interested in a particular place or campaign. My mom and dad worked out elaborate codes so he could keep her informed on where he was being stationed (he wound up in Burma, servicing aircraft flying over the Hump) and not have the censors pick up on it.

But she was also briefed on things to look for in the letters, and she remembered one of the many items she was told to look for was any mention of the word "Uranium". She looked it up and saw it was a chemical element, but she had no idea what it was used for.

One of the girls she worked with was removed from the office and transferred to another group after receiving a citation for outstanding meritable service to the war effort, and she often wondered if it was for catching a reference to "Uranium", but she never found out. It was never brought up.