B Reactor History Room: Little Joe

The Little Joe exhibit panel in the History Room.

See exhibit panel for specific image credits.

Main Text
Text at the bottom reads: “Little Joe - With the help of information provided by spies in Los Alamos, physicist Igor Kurchatov developed the first Soviet atomic bomb. The successful test of RDS-1, or Little Joe, occurred in a field in modern day Kazakhstan on August 29, 1949. The Little Joe test announced to a shocked world that the U.S. was no longer the world’s only nuclear superpower. This sparked a nuclear arms race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union known today as the Cold War.”

Exhibit Panel Description
The poster shows the front page of the Arizona Daily Star newspaper from September 24, 1949. A large, black headline in all capital letters reads, “USSR Possesses Atom Bomb.”

Visit This Exhibit Panel
In-person visitation of the B Reactor is only authorized on guided tours offered by the Department of Energy.