Introduction

During World War II, thousands of scientists and engineers worked on the Manhattan Project. Leona Woods was 23 when she joined Enrico Fermi's team to build a nuclear reactor in Chicago. She absorbed so much radiation that her white blood cell count dropped to half its normal level. Over the next few weeks we're bringing you lost women of thehattan Project. We'll read hundreds of their names aloud and get to know a half dozen of them particularly well.