Trinity Test and Manhattan Project (1945)

• July 16, 1945: Trinity test conducted by US scientists at Los Alamos, New Mexico
• Led by J. Robert Oppenheimer, team included many refugee physicists from Nazi Germany
• 24-year-old Richard Feynman from Queens, NY played minor but important role
• Feynman's eyewitness account: tremendous flash, purple splotch, white light changing to yellow/orange, clouds forming/disappearing, orange ball rising and billowing, black edges, smoke with internal fire flashes
• Sound came after ~1.5 minutes - "tremendous noise bang and then rumbles like thunder"
• Sound convinced everyone "it really worked"

Atomic Bombs and WWII End

• Few weeks after Trinity: US dropped atomic bomb on Hiroshima
• President Truman: bomb had "more power than 20,000 tons of TNT"
• Hiroshima destroyed, tens of thousands killed
• 3 days later: second bomb dropped on Nagasaki
• 6 days after Nagasaki: Japan surrendered, ending WWII
• Feynman's post-war depression: "it's useless to make anything"
• Believed nuclear weapons would lead to human extinction
• Would visualize destruction when seeing people building things
• Father died, wife Arlene died - "not a happy time at all"

Post-War Recovery and Brazil

• 5 years after war: taught physics at Cornell University
• Depressed, restless, hard time engaging in work
• Winters in upstate New York were long and cold
• Friend invited him to Brazil for summer
• Learned Portuguese quickly, 6-week trip
• Returned for sabbatical year to teach at Brazilian Center for Research in Physics, Rio
• Salary partially paid by US State Department
• Beaches in Rio different from Far Rockaway Queens - "more samba music, more sun, more fun"
• Wrote to physicist friend Enrico Fermi: "I get lots of ideas at the beach"

Move to Caltech (1950)

• Left Cornell for California Institute of Technology position
• Caltech in Pasadena, northeast of downtown Los Angeles
• "Fresh start" - open sky, sunny weather
• Stayed at Caltech until death 38 years later (1988)
• Became local celebrity for wit, bongo playing, distinctive van
• Drove Dodge Tradesman van - extended version, horrible gas mileage, loud, long, uncomfortable
• Van painted with Feynman diagrams (mistaken for hieroglyphics)

Feynman Diagrams and Nobel Prize

• Visual representations of quantum electrodynamics interactions
• Simplified complex particle physics calculations
• Made quantum electrodynamics easier for trained physicists
• Competitive relationship with Julian Schwinger (also born 1918, Jewish, New York)
• 1965: Shared Nobel Prize in Physics with Schwinger and Shin'ichirō Tomonaga
• Initially considered refusing prize, asked reporter if rejection was possible
• Attended Stockholm ceremony, enjoyed himself despite complaints
• Nobel acceptance speech praised the "joy and affection" from friends and colleagues
• Final line: "you Swedish people with your honors and your trumpets and your king, forgive me, for I understand at last"

Teaching at Caltech

• Officially taught undergraduate class only 2 years
• Created famous "Feynman Lectures on Physics" - three big red books
• Informal class called "Physics X" - not in catalog, no grades
• Rules: ask about understanding something, not coursework or papers
• "Ask me anything" - everything is interesting
• Example: student asked about "waves on Mars" - Feynman worked out gravity effects, atmospheric differences, wave heights
• Mesmerizing lecturer but arguments difficult to reconstruct afterward
• Blackboard choreography carefully planned, ended exactly on time

Personal Life and Relationships

• First wife Arlene died from tuberculosis in her 20s
• Wrote love letter to her 2 years after death: "I don't even have a girlfriend except you sweetheart"
• Second marriage to Mary Louise Bell (Cornell) - "horrible match," lasted 4 years
• Divorce included claims of violence and cruelty
• Reputation as "womanizer of the worst sort"
• Slept with undergraduates and wives of graduate students at Cornell
• "Old-fashioned sexist" but helped women understand physics better

Third Marriage and Family

• 1960: Married Gwenneth Howarth from West Yorkshire, England
• Met on beach in Switzerland when she was working as au pair
• Platonic relationship initially, he waited 6 months before proposing
• Married at Huntington Hotel, Pasadena - ran out of gas on honeymoon
• Two children: Carl (born 1962) and Michelle (adopted 1968)
• Became devoted father, enjoyed stable family life
• Taught children through exploration: "don't take advantage of your position"
• Never said "because I said so" - philosophy of "let's go find out"

Later Career and Interests

• Served on curriculum commission, passionate about math education quality
• Defended daughter Michelle against rigid teaching methods
• Became interested in computation, worked with Thinking Machines Corporation
• Helped develop algorithms for transcendental functions on connection machine
• Felt physics was "tapped out" for his contributions
• Friendship with artist Jerry Zorthian - taught each other art and physics
• Learned to draw, became skilled artist

Final Years and Death

• 1978: Diagnosed with abdominal cancer
• Multiple treatments and surgeries over next decade
• Refused to consider nuclear radiation exposure at Los Alamos as cause
• LA Times prepared obituary mentioning "skirt chasing" reputation
• Feynman read his own obituary, sad about womanizing reputation being highlighted
• Died February 1988 with family present
• Last words: "I'd hate to die twice. It's so boring"
• Blackboard after death: "What I cannot create I do not understand"
• Gwenneth died in 1989, both buried at Mountain View Cemetery, Pasadena