Print, Photographic

Photograph. Black and white photo showing a head and shoulders portrait of Dr. Enrico Fermi. He is wearing a light-colored striped shirt, tweed tie, and a tweed herringbone jacket and vest. A mathematical equation is faintly visible on a blackboard in the background. A typewritten note on the verso shows "For use on or after Wednesday, August 8, 1956. ENRICO FERMI (1901-1954) -- the pioneering Italian-American physicist after whom Michigan's first atomic power plant has been named, was the first scientist to demonstrate how the power of the atom could be controlled and put to use of man. Born and educated in Europe, he first came to America in 1930 to spend a summer in Ann Arbor as a lecturer at the University of Michigan. In 1939, the year after he won the Nobel Prize, he brought his family to the United States. It was in 1942 that he directed the building and operation of an "atomic pile" at the University of Chicago which initiated a self-sustaining chain reaction and achieved the controlled release of atomic energy. At Los Alamos, nine year before his death at the age of 53, Dr. Fermi voiced his conviction that the nation which developed the "breeder" reactor would lead in the peaceful use of atomic energy. The reactor unit of the Enrico Fermi Atomic Power Plant is of the fast neutron breeder type. From Public Information Department, The Detroit Edison Company." The groundbreaking day for the new plant was August 8, 1956. The estimated date of the photo is based upon the age of the subject who was deceased at the time when the groundbreaking took place.