---
title: "J. Robert Oppenheimer"
chunk: 15/17
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Robert_Oppenheimer"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:07:13.473219+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

=== Enrico Fermi Award ===
In 1959, then-Senator John F. Kennedy voted to deny Lewis Strauss, Oppenheimer's greatest detractor in his security hearings, confirmation as Secretary of Commerce, effectively ending Strauss's political career. In 1962, Kennedy―now President of the United States―invited Oppenheimer to a ceremony honoring 49 Nobel Prize winners. At the event, AEC chairman Glenn Seaborg asked Oppenheimer whether he wanted another security hearing. Oppenheimer declined.
In March 1963, the General Advisory committee of the AEC selected Oppenheimer to receive its Enrico Fermi Award, an award Congress had created in 1954. Kennedy was assassinated before he could present the award to Oppenheimer, but his successor, Lyndon Johnson, did so in a December 1963 ceremony at which he cited Oppenheimer's "contributions to theoretical physics as a teacher and originator of ideas,  [and] leadership of the Los Alamos Laboratory and the atomic energy program during critical years." He called the signing of the award one of Kennedy's greatest acts as president. Oppenheimer told Johnson, "I think it is just possible, Mr. President, that it has taken some charity and some courage for you to make this award today."
Kennedy's widow, Jackie, made a point of attending the ceremony so she could tell Oppenheimer how much her husband had wanted him to have the medal. Also present were Teller, who had recommended Oppenheimer receive the award in hopes that it would heal the rift between them, and Henry D. Smyth, who in 1954 had been the lone dissenter from the AEC's 4–1 decision to define Oppenheimer as a security risk.
However, congressional hostility to Oppenheimer lingered. Senator Bourke B. Hickenlooper formally protested Oppenheimer's selection just eight days after Kennedy was killed, and several Republican members of the House AEC Committee boycotted the ceremony.
The rehabilitation represented by the award was symbolic, as Oppenheimer still lacked a security clearance and could have no effect on official policy, but the award came with a $50,000 tax-free stipend.

== Death ==
In late 1965, Oppenheimer was diagnosed with throat cancer, likely caused by chain smoking cigarettes for much of his life. After inconclusive surgery, he underwent unsuccessful radiation treatment and chemotherapy late in 1966. On February 18, 1967, he died in his sleep at his home in Princeton, aged 62 years. A memorial service was held a week later at Alexander Hall on the campus of Princeton University. The service was attended by 600 of his scientific, political, and military associates, including Bethe, Groves, Kennan, Lilienthal, Rabi, Smyth, and Wigner. His brother Frank and the rest of his family were there, as was the historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., the novelist John O'Hara, and George Balanchine, the director of the New York City Ballet. Bethe, Kennan and Smyth gave brief eulogies. Oppenheimer's body was cremated and his ashes placed in an urn, which Kitty dropped into the sea within sight of the Saint John beach house.
In October 1972, Kitty died from an intestinal infection complicated by a pulmonary embolism. She was 62. Oppenheimer's ranch in New Mexico was then inherited by their son Peter, and the beach property was inherited by their daughter Katherine "Toni" Oppenheimer Silber. Toni's two marriages ended in divorce. She obtained a temporary position as a translator at the United Nations in 1969, but the position required an FBI security clearance, which never came through due to the old charges against her father. She moved to the family beach house on Saint John and committed suicide by hanging there in 1977. She left the property to "the people of Saint John." The house was built too close to the coast and was destroyed by a hurricane. As of 2007, the Virgin Islands Government maintained a Community Center nearby.

== Legacy ==