There were no precise construction blue prints and workers on the top secret project did not know what they were building, but B Reactor was completed and went critical in September 1944. The ...

B Reactor also produced plutonium for the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, Aug. 9, 1945, just weeks after the Trinity Test. Japan surrendered Aug. 15, 1945, ending World War II.

Hanford’s B Reactor will open for the first time as part of the new Manhattan Project National Historical Park on Nov. 12 with something new — crowds of fourth-graders.

Some Tri-Cities residents want the Hanford nuclear reservation's B Reactor--the world's first nuclear reactor--to be preserved as a museum in Hanford, Washington. Seattle Times/MCT Seventy years ...

Making B Reactor part of the National Park Service received the backing of Ken Salazar, the secretary of the Interior, on Wednesday. He recommended to Congress that a national historical park be ...

The Hanford B Reactor was built in 11 months amid fears the Nazis would produce an atomic bomb first. Plutonium from Hanford fueled the bomb dropped on Nagasaki.

Readers respond to our March 22 story "10 Washington road-trip spots recommended by the people who know them best" with more ideas and maybe a little grumpiness.

July 22, 2008 2:58 PM ORDER REPRINT → Visitors check out the face of B Reactor core in Richland, Wash. Paul T. Erickson / Tri-City Herald / MCT ...

He called the B Reactor and two facilities at Oak Ridge the X-10 Graphite Reactor and the Y-12 Beta-3 Racetracks “undoubtedly the crown jewels of the Manhattan Project historic assets.” ...