History of an exhibit

Memorable date

We are opening a new section of our weekly newspaper with a story from the JINR Museum. On 17 October, Evgeny Shabalin turned 88 years old. In his opinion, the date is not round, but significant: if you turn the numbers 90 degrees, you get two infinity signs that instills hope for a long and wonderful future.

In the Museum of History of Science and Technology of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, next to the mechanical random-number generator that was used at the time by the citizens of Obninsk that designed the IBR-1 reactor, the work journal of the FLNP chief researcher E.P.Shabalin is. It contains preliminary calculations that at the suggestion of FLNP Deputy Director F.L.Shapiro, he had made even before D.I.Blokhintsev proposed at the Scientific Council to design a new pulsed reactor that would exceed the first one in power by a thousand times.

When the time came to write history, Evgeny Shabalin took the journal down from the mezzanine, blew the dust off it and immersed himself in the past. Leafing through the pages, he noted with annoyance that the young man he had been half a century ago had not bothered to care about the historians of the future and had not put dates. One date, toward the end of the journal, was found. It was under an entry written in red ink: "Evgeny Pavlovich! You can calm down a little, another battle has been won". The date was 9/VII 65 and the signature of Deputy Director for Economic Affairs P.S.Sergeev. Therefore, the journal was started in the first half of 1965 and perhaps even earlier. The historian's task was accomplished.

And what was this battle that Petr Stepanovich was writing about to the young scientist? And where was this battle fought? It was fought at a meeting of the housing commission. That year, Evgeny Shabalin moved into a new apartment.

А. R.

From the editors. We invite everyone who has such memorable things or documents to take part in this undertaking. These "exhibits" will help to supplement the history of our Institute with funny events, unite yesterday with the present, make bright memories available to society that may remain in archive folders and eventually turn into useless waste paper. Editorial address dnsp@jinr.ru.