Floy Agnes Lee facts for kids
Floy Agnes "Aggie" (Naranjo Stroud) Lee was a scientist who studied living things (a biologist). She worked on a secret project called the Manhattan Project in Los Alamos. Her job was to test blood samples.
Early Life and Education
Floy Agnes Lee was born on July 23, 1922, at the Albuquerque Indian School. She was one of five children. Her mother was a teacher from Indiana, and her father was from the Santa Clara Pueblo.
Floy grew up at the Albuquerque Indian School. She went to St. Mary’s Catholic School and then graduated from Albuquerque High School. In 1945, she earned a degree in biology from the University of New Mexico (UNM). While in college, she worked for a professor, studying how different liquids affected plant growth. This job made her very interested in doing scientific research.
During her college years, Floy also learned to fly airplanes! She worked at a grocery store to pay for her flying lessons. She was almost ready to join the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) program, which was a group of women who flew planes for the military during World War II. However, the program ended in 1944, just before she could join.
In 1945, her biology professor, Edward Castetter, asked her to do research for him. She was gathering information about what the Native American people of New Mexico ate before European settlers arrived. While she was working on this, Professor Castetter received an important call from Los Alamos. They were looking for a biology student to work in a special blood testing lab.
Working on the Manhattan Project
Floy Agnes Lee accepted the job at the blood testing lab in Los Alamos in 1945. Her main task was to collect and examine blood samples from the scientists working on the Manhattan Project. This included important scientists like Louis Hempelmann, Louis Slotin, and Alvin Graves. She took blood samples from Slotin and Graves after they were exposed to high levels of radiation from a special experiment.
Floy learned how to take blood, count blood cells, and identify blood types right on the job. She quickly became very good at these tasks. She even traveled to different parts of the Manhattan Project to collect blood samples from other people. While working in the lab, she was assigned to keep an eye on specific scientists, including the famous physicist Enrico Fermi.
Floy and Fermi became good friends. She didn't know who he was at first because everyone at Los Alamos was known by a number, not their real name, to keep the project secret. She said they would talk about what they liked to do, and they discovered they both loved playing tennis. They played tennis often, even before the atomic bombs were used. Floy said Fermi was a short man with a "funny little hat."
After the atomic bombs were dropped, Floy was surprised to learn that her tennis partner was a Nobel Prize winner! She couldn't believe it because she often beat him in tennis. She said, "Oh, I can’t believe that!" After that, she tried not to beat him, and they remained very good friends.
After the War
After World War II ended, Enrico Fermi encouraged Floy to continue her studies. She moved to Chicago and started working on her doctorate degree in biology at the University of Chicago. She also worked at Argonne National Laboratory. Floy continued her studies, worked at the lab, and raised her young daughter after her husband passed away from cancer. After 14 years of hard work, she earned her PhD.
Later in her career, Floy worked at the Jet Propulsion Lab in California. She then returned to work at Los Alamos National Laboratory before she retired. Throughout her long career, she researched how radiation affects the tiny parts of our cells called chromosomes.
Floy Agnes Lee passed away in 2018 at the age of 95.
