July 16, 1945 was a quiet, soggy morning in the New Mexico desert.

Only about 200 people in the world knew that life as they knew it was about to change.

For three years, scientists in secret cities around the United States had been in a race

against time to complete the world's first atomic weapon.

And in July of 1945, the very first plutonium bomb was ready.

Constructing the gadget, as it was called, had taken $2 billion and the collective work

of 400,000 people who was ready to be tested and it needed to work.

I'm Sharon McMahon, and here's where it gets interesting.

Jay Robert Oppenheimer, who became known to history as the father of the atomic bomb,

had developed a plan for the weapons test.

He called the operation Trinity, a coat named inspired by a John Dunn poem called,

Badder My Heart Three Person God.

The poem employs the Christian Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Ghost.

But later biographers of Oppenheimer have noted that he also studied Hinduism,

which has a Trinity of Brahma, the creator, Vishnu, the preserver, and Shiva, the destroyer.

Oppenheimer chose the site for the Trinity test, Alamogordo bombing range,

some 240 miles away from the Los Alamos, New Mexico Manhattan project base.

And even though several years of preparation and work had gone into the test,

there was still a giant question mark hanging over it.

A few of the scientific team gently reassured each other that they would

not ignite the atmosphere and completely wipe out humanity, but fear was there, just below the surface.

Perhaps to add some levity, scientist Igariko Fermi took side bets as to whether or not

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