In March 2009, papers and notebooks from experiments conducted by Princeton chemists for the Manhattan Project were uncovered. Some thought the notebooks would be great additions to Princeton’s Mudd Library collections. However, many of the documents and notebooks were contaminated with radioactive material. The documents were reviewed by Scott Kemp, Ph.D. student in the School of Public and International Affairs, who determined that the papers were historically interesting, but the notebooks contained mostly just measurements from specific experiments and thus were not particularly useful. Most of the notebooks were discarded. The other documents were added to the Mudd collection.

View the entire article from Princeton Alumni Weekly: https://paw.princeton.edu/article/manhattan-project-notebooks-hold-secret-radioactivity