in theoretical physics at the University of California at Berkeley, while also working part-time at the Berkeley Radiation laboratory, mainly on the cyclotron and a beta-ray spectrograph. After failing an oral preliminary examination on mechanics and heat, and a second prelim in modern physics in 1949, Taylor was disqualified from the graduate program. Taylor married Caro Arnim in 1948 and had five children in the following years: Clare Hastings, Katherine Robertson, Christopher Taylor, Robert Taylor, and Jeffrey Taylor. Arnim was majoring in Greek at Scripps College, a liberal arts university in Claremont, California, and Taylor would visit her whenever he could. Both Arnim and Taylor were very shy people, and unsure of what the future held. When they first met they both believed that Taylor would end up as a college professor in a sleepy town, and that Caro would be a librarian. After 44 years of marriage the couple divorced in 1992. Taylor died on October 28, 2004, of coronary artery disease. Early career Prior to Taylor's work at Los Alamos, he had firmly declared himself an opponent of nuclear weapons. While at the midshipmen school, he received news of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima by the United States. He immediately wrote a letter home discussing the perils of nuclear proliferation and his fears that it would lead to the end of mankind in the event of another war. He showed some optimism, however, as he felt with proper leadership the nuclear bomb could result in the end of wars altogether. Either way, he was still very curious about the field of nuclear physics after his time as an undergraduate. Taylor began his work in nuclear physics in 1949 when he was hired to a junior position at Los Alamos National Laboratory in the Theoretical Physics Division. He received this job after failing out of the PhD program at Berkeley; J. Carson Mark connected Taylor with a leader at Los Alamos and recommended him for a position. Taylor was unsure of the details of his new job at Los Alamos prior to his arrival. He had only been briefed that his first assignment related to investigations of Neutron Diffusion Theory, a theoretical analysis of neutron movement within a nuclear core. While at Los Alamos, Taylor's strictly anti-nuclear development beliefs changed. His theory on preventing nuclear war turned to developing bombs of unprecedented power in an attempt to make people,