I write from Santa Fe, New Mexico, where, joined by the amazing Judge Paul Grimm,  I have the enviable annual task of talking with employment law specialists about e-discovery at a venerable ALI CLE event called Current Developments in Employment Law.  Housed at the charming La Fonda Hotel, I am just steps away from 109 East Palace Street, the portal through which all civilian scientists and their families passed on their way to nearby Los Alamos to work on the Manhattan Project (so named to deflect suspicion from the real locations in Los Alamos, NM and Oak Ridge, TN).  Today, Los Alamos is world famous for the role it played in the creation of the atomic bomb; but back in 1943, Los Alamos was the most closely guarded secret in the world.  Officially, it didn’t exist.  You couldn’t even send mail there.  Instead, all communications came addressed to “Box 1663, Santa Fe, New Mexico.”

When in Los Alamos, I never fail to visit a little gem called the Norris E. Bradbury Science Museum.  The Bradbury has incomparable exhibits exploring the lives of the many ordinary and extraordinary people who changed the world at an old ranch school in the high desert.  It’s also a great place to get up close and personal with a nuclear warhead.  Admission is free, but you still need to pass through military checkpoints to come into town.

It will come as no surprise that I am passionate about computers.  Heck, I could look at computers all day (and often do)  But, you may be surprised to learn that computers played a big part in the development of the first Los Alamos A-bombs (code named Fat Man and Little Boy).  Los Alamos had the finest computers that money could buy.  Why am I so enamored of computers from that long-ago era?  Check out this clip from the new television series, Manhattan, to find out.

They sure don’t make ’em like they used to.