 | Summaries and Customer Reviews are supplied by Amazon.com This must have been an extremely difficult book to write. Its subject, Alfred Loomis, never gave interviews during his lifetime and destroyed all his papers before his death. "Few men of Loomis' prominence and achievement have gone to greater lengths to foil history," writes author Jennet Conant. Had he not done these things, his name would be better known--and this probably wouldn't be the first biography about him. So who was Alfred Loomis? "He was too complex to categorize--financier, philanthropist, society figure, physicist, inventor, amateur, dilettante--a contradiction in terms," writes Conant. Loomis established a private laboratory in New York and hired scientists whose work in the 1930s wound up making possible both the radar and the atomic bomb. These developments were essential to Allied victory in the Second World War. Conant is perhaps the only person who could have pierced Loomis's obsessive secrecy and written this book; she grew up with Loomis's children and other members of his family. Her grandfather, Harvard president James Bryant Conant, was one of Loomis's scientists. Tuxedo Park is an important book about the development of military technology in the United States; admirers of The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes and similar titles won't want to miss it. --John Miller Average Customer Rating:  
Steven Winkler's review of Jennet Conant's Tuxedo Park
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Stories you should know from WWII era
| Customer Rating: | | This book truly occupied my mind from an era that I lived through. I have recommended this book to a number of friends. Well done and a story that is truly amazing. |
What an amazing book
| Customer Rating: | Being a very big history buff, I was shocked to find out about the little-known contribution of a single patriotic individual that totally changed the progress of the war. This book is a must read for all! Extremely well written to entice the reader and present the facts; personal as well as historical.
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Achievement with a Capital "A"?
| Customer Rating: | | Having been a Radarman in the Vietnam War, I found the gensis of radar and the man responsible for it and many other things in life. Albert Loomis was a giant in the first half of the 20th Century and under the radar. He may have been bigger in the first half of the century than Bill Gates was in the second half. But, you won't know why until you read the book and understand the magnitude of his impact on America and the World then and now. |
One of the most important men in US history
| Customer Rating: | | Chances are you have never heard of Alfred Loomis before this book but you will not forget him once you have read it. This man is truly one of the most influential people in US history. A modern day renaissance man who made millions in the stock market before 1929 and was a genius scientist who developed modern radar technology. He established a lab at Tuxedo Park where he hosted scientists who would work on a variety of projects. While he was not directly connected to the Manhattan project many of the things worked on at his lab were eventually essential for the project. He worked closely with Vannavear Bush to bring over radar technology that would be invaluable for both sub hunting and eventually air defense in World War 2. This scientist even left his mark in World War 1 helping to develop new ways to fire artillery. If you want an interesting story this is the book for you. |
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