202 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1955 



CONCLUSION 



To establish a nuclear power industry in this country will be a great 

 achievement. If power becomes cheaper and more plentiful, our ma- 

 terial standard of living will be raised. In other countries the effect 

 may be even greater. By the accident of history the first use of this 

 great new discovery has been in the development of weapons of war, 

 weapons of appalling magnitude. The nations of the world have to- 

 day the means to destroy each other. They also have, in this same 

 nuclear energy, a new resource which could be used to lift the heavy 

 burdens of limiger and poverty that keep masses of men in bondage 

 to ignorance and fear. Toward this peaceful development of nuclear 

 power we have, all of us, a high obligation to work with all the in- 

 genuity and purpose we possess. 



Reprints of the various articles in this Report may be obtained, as long as 

 the supply lasts, on request addressed to the Editorial and Publications 

 Division, Smithsonian Institution, Washington 25, D. C. 



