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Martyl Langsdorf, longtime resident of Schaumburg's historic Schweikher House and the professional artist who first depicted the nuclear Doomsday Clock, died Tuesday at the age of 96.
Her late husband, Alexander Langsdorf Jr., was a physicist who worked on the Manhattan Project that developed the first atomic bomb, but he later came to regret its use, their daughters said. He worked to ensure it would never be used again and died in May 1996.
Martyl Langsdorf created the image of the Doomsday Clock -- an indicator of how far humanity is from its destruction from nuclear weapons and other technologies -- for the cover of the June 1947 issue of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. In its first depiction, the Doomsday Clock was at 11:53 p.m.
Kennette Benedict, executive director and publisher of the Bulletin, said it was Martyl Langsdorf who came up with the idea of the clock as well as deciding on its look.
When asked to design the first cover as...