I debunked this on an earlier thread. MIT opened in 1861. Let's say Hart graduated in 1870 at the age of 20 (I'm being generous). That would mean Hart, if he toured Trinity in 1950, would have been 100 years old. I don't think so.
Shrug. Perhaps, Mr. Hart is just fiction; geeze thanks for killing an ancient atomic bomb theory!
OOO good catch!
"There was an article written on Hart's life by Margarethe Casson that appeared in the magazine Rocks and Minerals (no. 396, 1972), that mentions this occasion. In the article she writes: "At the time he was puzzled and quite unable to explain a large expanse of greenish glass which covered the sands as far as he could see. Later on, during his life he passed by the White Sands area after the first atomic explosion there, and he recognized the same type of silica fusion which he had seen fifty years earlier in the African desert.""
That would make him at least a spry 75.
It's possible that the omission of the type of engineer coupled with the assumption that all of MIT's engineering disciplines were offered the day MIT opened it's doors leads to incorrect conclusions.
Suppose he was among the first Chemical Engineering graduates?
From MIT's web site:
The first chemical engineering curriculum at MIT was offered in 1888 and helped to establish chemical engineering as a discipline.
A little math...
First chemical engineer graduate 1893. 1893+50 years=1943, pretty consistent with Casson's biography.
He could well have been among the first graduates in:
Chemical Engineering (Department established 1888)
Naval and Oceanic engineering (Department established 1893)
Aeronautical engineering (Department established 1896)
Geology and Mining engineering (first engineering class offered 1871)
The math on the other disciplines is left to the reader as an exercise...