Clinton Engineer Works, the Manhattan Project's manufacturing company, needed land for its facilities; so in 1942, the federal government seized 56,000 acres in Tennessee's Roane and Anderson Counties in order to build the city of Oak Ridge. The Ohio River Division (ORD) of the Army Corps of Engineers appraised properties owned by those who would soon be displaced. Photos were taken of every structure on their properties and filed with documentation of valuation. Most owners were never paid what the land and their homes were worth to their families. The Segment Maps below were published by the Oak Ridge Department of Health in July, 1944 and provide a final visual of the land acquisition, divided into fifteen parts, Segments A-O. Residents of Wheat, Tennessee owned property in Segments A, H, I, J, K, N, and O.
Click on the Segments below to find individual owners, view photographs, and learn more.