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Sept 21, 2026 |
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RIDDLE OF THE DAY |
I have two stomachs, and my job is to make sure one empties while the other fills. What am I? |
The answer is revealed below |
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Smart starts here. |
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You don't have to read everything — just the right thing. 1440's daily newsletter distills the day's biggest stories from 100+ sources into one quick, 5-minute read. It's the fastest way to stay sharp, sound informed, and actually understand what's happening in the world. Join 4.5 million readers who start their day the smart way. |
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"THE FATHER OF THE ATOMIC BOMB" WAS DESTROYED BY THE SAME GOVERNMENT HE SERVED |
J. Robert Oppenheimer gave the United States the weapon that ended World War II. As director of the Los Alamos Laboratory during the Manhattan Project, he led the team that built the atomic bomb, a weapon so powerful it forced Japan's surrender and reshaped the entire course of human history. |
But his own government never fully trusted him for it. |
Oppenheimer's political past made him a target from the start. He was never a Communist Party member himself, but his wife, his brother, close friends, and former lovers all had ties to the party. |
The FBI spent years secretly wiretapping his office, his house, and his phone, tracking his movements around the clock and planting undercover agents inside his own staff. |
Oppenheimer endured all of it, believing his usefulness to the country outweighed the invasion of his privacy. |
Then, after the war ended, he made a decision that turned powerful men against him for good. |
He refused to support the development of an even more devastating weapon, the hydrogen bomb, publicly criticizing the government's push toward an endless arms race and, eventually, the end of the world. |
In 1953, his enemies made their move. Politician Lewis Strauss orchestrated a security hearing designed to question Oppenheimer's trustworthiness and loyalty to the country he'd already given everything to. |
Over four brutal weeks in 1954, prosecutors tore apart every detail of his personal and political life in front of the public. They never proved he was a security risk. |
But after Nagasaki turned into ashes, what happened to "the father of the atomic bomb" was almost as devastating as the blast itself. |
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RIDDLE HINT: TURNING ME UPSIDE DOWN GIVES ME A FRESH START. |
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STEVEN SPIELBERG HAD ONLY ONE THING TO SAY ABOUT THAT PLAYBOY SHOOT |
Drew Barrymore had known Steven Spielberg since she was seven years old, when he cast her as Gertie in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and turned her into a household name overnight. |
She loved him enough to beg her mother to make him her godfather, and he took the role seriously for years. |
By 1995, Barrymore was 20 and long past her child-star image. That year, she posed for Playboy, a deliberate statement that the little girl from E.T. was gone for good. |
Around the same time, her birthday arrived, and so did a package from Spielberg. |
Inside was a quilt, with a simple instruction attached: "Cover yourself up." Tucked alongside it were copies of her own Playboy photos, which Spielberg had quietly sent to his art department to digitally clothe before mailing them back to her. |
Barrymore expected congratulations, or at least silence, but instead got a “lecture” wrapped in fabric. |
But years later, what Barrymore said about that gift, and about Spielberg himself, revealed she'd taken the message very differently than he intended. |
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RIDDLE OF THE DAY |
I have two stomachs, and my job is to make sure one empties while the other fills. What am I? |
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