Born in 1908, Edward Teller earned a degree in chemical engineering from the University of Karlsruhe, and a doctorate in physics from the University of Leipzig in 1930. He left Germany in 1934 with the help of the Jewish Rescue Committee, and moved to the United States as a professor of physics in 1935. He became famous for his work on the Manhattan Project, and is known as the "Father of the Hydrogen Bomb."
Dr. Teller was a strong advocate for Project Chariot (and Operation Plowshare as a whole). He toured Alaska in 1958 and promoted his ideas for nuclear geoengineering, at one point joking that "If [a] mountain is not in the right place, just drop us a card." He talked to Alaskan lawmakers and business leaders about Project Chariot, but was mostly unsuccessful in convincing them that it made economic sense.